August 7, 2024 • 41 mins
On this special edition of the podcast, Ray takes listeners on a journey to what is was like growing up as a young man in a family where alcohol abuse and domestic violence nearly took his life. Despite the trauma and tragedies, Ray shares how he has come to discover the power of forgiveness and reconciliation.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, everyone. I'm Ray Sanders, and you're
listening to the Ray SandersLeadership Podcast. You know, we
have a special podcast schedulefor you today. I recently had
the opportunity to be down nearmy alma mater, the University of
Oklahoma, at a church down therecalled New Life Bible Church,
and they asked me to speak andtell about my story. And so
(00:21):
that's what I want to introduceyou to today.
You know, if you know much aboutme, you know that my childhood
and my upbringing was a littlesketchy, a little crazy at
times, and there's a lot ofthings that went wrong along the
way. But one of the things I'velearned in life, it's how to
forgive and forget and move on.So on this special edition of
this podcast, I wanna take youwith me down the road aways to a
(00:45):
live service where I shared mystory on forgiveness and
reconciliation. Let's join thatservice in progress as we speak.
Hello, everyone.
I'm Ray Sanders, and you'relistening to the Ray Sanders
Leadership Podcast.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
I want
Speaker 1 (01:05):
you to go back with me. Ancient history. Back to
1960. 1960. There was a younggirl moved to a small town, not
too far from here, out in UnionCity.
Moved to a small town. Her dadwas gonna be the new baker
banker in town. And she wascute. And as it often goes, you
(01:30):
know, the new girl gets all theattention. And she showed up at
school and everybody began totake interest in her.
But one guy in particular tookinterest in her and that was her
next door neighbor. And theywere they were hanging out And,
he wasn't in school. She was inschool, but he wasn't in school.
And it turns out that he waslike 8 years older than her.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Would, you know, go cruising around. And they
Speaker 1 (01:53):
began to kind of become sweethearts. But
unfortunately, he was kind ofmanipulative and it ultimately,
he took advantage of her. Andwhen I say he took advantage of
her, I mean, he really tookadvantage of her. Some would
(02:14):
even call it I hate to use thisword, but some would even call
it statutory rape. And shebecame pregnant at 15 years old.
15 years old. Now think aboutthat. You're 15 years old, 1960.
What happens? You show up to theschool.
(02:34):
What do they do? Oh, we can'thave those kind in here. And she
was asked to leave school. Shewas asked to leave school and
then her mother takes her to thedoctor and there her mother and
the doctor talk. And even inthose days, it wasn't
necessarily legal, but in thosedays, she had options.
You know what I mean? She hadoptions. And to her credit, she
(02:57):
said, you know what? I don'twant those options. Yeah.
I've made a mistake, and whatI'm gonna do is I'm gonna have
my child. She got kicked out ofschool. She had to live at home.
And this guy that, got herpregnant decided to do the right
thing, and
Speaker 2 (03:16):
they got married.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
And they had a child. And they had a child. And And
they had a child. And that childis standing before you today.
And that child is me.
And because of the decision shemade, I had 6 kids. I now have
10 grandchildren. And on my wayout here, my my youngest
(03:37):
grandson I have 10 well, I have9, a 10th on the way. My
youngest grandson named HankFaceTimed me because every
morning, he FaceTimed me. And hewas FaceTiming me on my way in
here.
And I'm not gonna miss thatcall. Service will start late
because I'm taking Hank's call.And so I facetimed Hank. And I
look at the decision she madeand I go, wow, that's amazing.
(03:59):
That's that's incredible thatshe would have that much
courage.
And if she hadn't made thatchoice, then I wouldn't be here.
My brother wouldn't be here. Allthese other grandkids wouldn't
be here. But let's pick up thestory a little bit. So they they
lived in the country.
He was a country boy. And on thedock, he did okay. But he really
(04:21):
was never too, proud of what hehad done. And he took to drink
and other things, alcohol anddrugs. And he began to, really
turn on his wife, my mother.
And that was my dad. So much sothat he would he would beat her.
He would drag her around by thehead of her hair. It became a
classic domestic abusesituation. In fact, he would
(04:46):
stay at the bars at night andthen come home.
And a lot of times, I rememberas a kid, when I was a little
bit younger, my dad would comehome. Some of you are old enough
to know this. We didn't haveremote controls. You know. It's
fun to watch these kids play outhere.
They have games and they'redoing it with their hands. I was
my dad's remote control. And infact, we had a television with
(05:07):
something called rabbit ears.You all remember that? And if
you wanted to watch 4, 5, and 9,you could turn the dial.
If you wanted to catch the UHFchannels, there was a dial in
the back and everything was kindof fuzzy. Guess who got to get
up and go adjust the channel? Idid. I would play with the
rabbit ears. But I never wouldforget it.
My dad would come in. He wouldbe in his overalls and he'd be
in his work boots. He wasworking on the dock. He kinda
(05:29):
had that grease, kinda smelly,sweaty, aroma about him. And he
would have a big tall boy, Coorsor Falstaff.
Some of you may know what thatis. Sitting beside him. And he
kicked back in his lazy chair.And the first thing I was to do
is I was to pull his boots offand I'd unlaced those those kind
of tan colored boots with ayellow string. You guys know
(05:51):
what I'm talking about?
And and I would pull those off,and he may want me to change the
channel. And then it'd be timefor dinner. And it's funny what
you remember as a kid and thosesmells. And we'd get up and go
into dinner, and my dad, youknow, he would, at that point,
be kinda be inebriated, and he'dhe'd sit down at the table. And
my mom was I mean, I'm talkingcomfort food.
I mean, we're talking, you know,we're talking about farming
(06:12):
community where it's all castiron skillet and fried chicken
and, corn and mashed potatoes.I'm making a mistake. You never
talk about food from the stageon a Sunday morning. Anyway, I
mean, I'm talking good stuff andthere might even truly be a pie
in the window cooling. This islike this isn't like
thanksgiving.
This is like every day. And ifmy dad didn't like what my mom
(06:35):
had done, what he would do is hewould take the back of his hand
and he would just literallyclear the table. Clear the
table. Dump it all in the 4 4and tell her to clean it up, you
know. And and this was wouldn'tfit it wouldn't fit to eat.
Didn't have the just right salt.Didn't have the just right
pepper. And she would cry orworse than that, the fight would
(06:56):
be on. And I mean, things wouldget slowing around the house.
Furniture broken.
My mom was, you know, youngerthan him, but she would get in
there and she would scrap withhim. And I mean, she would get
the snot beat out of her. Andthat that was the environment we
grew up with as a little kid.And I know some of you are
sitting out there today, yousay, man, I can relate to that.
I can relate to that pain.
I can relate to that suffering.I remember there would be times
(07:18):
that my dad would just bewaylaying and my mom we lived in
a little 900 square foot house.We had 2 bedrooms and a kitchen.
And I tell my kids, I didn'thave a shower till I was 15. And
you're like, you didn't shower?
I took baths. We didn't have ashower. That's the kind of house
we lived in. Some of you livedin those kind of houses. No.
(07:39):
We didn't share bath water. Weknow we all get a fresh, you
know, fresh we'd pull the plug.And, so but but what I can tell
you is that it was it was chaos.It was terrible. Domestic abuse
and violence is awful.
It's terrifying for a young kid.And I remember one time in a
small little hallway, my dad waswaylaying into my mom, and my
(07:59):
brother was balled up in acorner, balled up in a corner in
a white hanger like you havewhenever you go to the dry
cleaners. He had that hanger inhis hands. And on both sides, he
was just back and forth, backand forth, back and forth. Just
balled up.
And he was just so anxious. Itwas those things stick in your
mind. And there would be timesin the middle of the night and
sometimes it'd be raining and wewould we would run across the
(08:22):
street. We'd run across thestreet and we'd run to mister
Brown's house, mister and missusBrown. And we go knock on that
door, and it'd be raining.
And I I might be in my littlebriefs, my little underwear, and
my brother would be coming withme. And behind me, my mom would
come and probably have blood onher face, and she'd run-in that
family. It could be 9 o'clock atnight. Across the street, they
(08:46):
always let us in. Mister andmiss Brown.
And when you go in, missus Brownwould say, it's okay. It's gonna
be alright kids. It's okay. Comeinside. My mom's, they would
make a place for her on thecouch and they'd lay a pallet on
the floor for me and my brother.
And I always loved going tomister and missus Brown's
because her house smelled sogreat. Remember what I was
(09:08):
talking about earlier? About howhouses and experiences and
things like that make you feel?How do people make you feel? And
mister and mister Brown wereChristians.
And that's not how we lived inmy house, but we would go into
their house and we always feltcomfort. We always felt loved.
And she made candles. And sowhen you walk into her house,
(09:29):
it's like, oh. It was justinstant.
Just beautiful. And if it waslate at night, sometimes what I
would hear is I'd hear this. Andsome of you are thinking, was it
the dog from Sandlot? No. It wasmister Brown.
(09:53):
It's mister Brown coming downthe hall. But in this case, he
didn't have his, he didn't havehis cane. He wasn't going.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
And
Speaker 1 (10:02):
at first, you know, when you're a kid you're like,
what is that? But mister Brownhad a prosthetic leg and he was
missing a leg. He could havestayed in bed and let mama
handle it. But mister Brown onthe floor would come on the
floor with his elbows. And he'dget to the end of that hall and
(10:28):
he had a haircut like me andhe'd peek his head out like this
and says, hey kids.
Hey, mister Brown. Where's yourlegs? And he said, hey, we just
want you all to know you'reyou're safe. It's gonna be okay.
And the next morning, missusBrown would treat us like
royalty and we'd get bacon andeggs and all this stuff.
(10:52):
And my dad would be off to workand we would go back to our
house. And that's the kind oflife I lived. I remember at 10
years old, I was 10 year old. Mydad was got to where he'd be a
bar fighter. And I could tellyou, I could be to every shanty,
every beer joint in Canadiancounty in the in the west side
of Oklahoma City.
And my dad it it didn't matterhow big you are. He would hit
get his liquid courage. You knowwhat I mean? His liquid courage.
(11:15):
And he'd have him one too manyand he'd try to find the biggest
guy in the bar and he'd try tofigure out if he could whip him.
Now you may think, okay. But thetrouble is my dad was 5.8 and
about a £120. He looked like abany rooster. But he didn't care
how big they were, he wanted tosee how hard they'd fall. And he
(11:35):
would get in these fights.
And there'd be times I rememberone time I was in Union City, he
would he had been in a barfight, 152 Highway down what is
now Garth Brooks Boulevard at 10years old in an old Galaxy 500
vehicle. At 10 years old I'mdriving him home. I'm driving
him home, and he's passed out inthe back seat. And my mom was
(11:57):
like, you know, this this can'tcontinue. We can't we can't keep
living like this.
And so she made the decision,that she was gonna divorce him.
And she did that after one timewhen he was way laying into her
and I stepped in between himwhen I was around 12 years old.
And I was a little bit biggerthan him at that time. And she
(12:18):
realized at that point that ifshe didn't do something, he was
gonna start doing the same thingto us that he was had been doing
to her. And so she divorced himand that really made my dad go
crazy.
And one time I was staying withhim. I went to visit with him,
and he took me down to, have youever been to one of these little
restaurants you walk in? It's adiner. If you ever been to
Chickasha, there's j and w oryou go to El Reno. There's these
(12:39):
these these these have a bar andstools, and the and the and the
cooks behind there, and there'sthese little bar stools.
And you sit there. It's alwaysthe best burgers. If you ever
find a place, pull over. It'sworth it. So we're hanging out
in there.
And, my dad and I are eating. Wefinish and we go to the end of
(12:59):
the counter. We're checking outand it's a small town and
there's this little cabinet. Andin this cabinet of all kinds of
weird things. It's out in thecountry.
It's like, bow bowie bowie knifebowie knives, matches and
trinkets and stuff. And one ofthe things that was in there was
a revolver, a pistol, an ammo,and a little country diner. And
(13:23):
so we're checking out. My dadsays, you know, we're standing
there. My dad says, hey, what doyou think you've what do you
think your mom would think ifyou weren't here?
And I'm like, like, not hangingout with you? No. I mean, like
not here. I didn't think muchabout it. Sorry, mister Brown.
(13:46):
I didn't think much about it.And he buys the revolver and the
ammo. And he takes me out intothe country. And he takes me out
to where he grew up, and he tookme out to this big creek, real
deep ravine. He told me to walkdown in the ravine.
And this is the point in themovie where you say, what is he?
Some kind of idiot? Why would hedo that? And you think, no.
(14:10):
Don't do that.
Don't go there. Don't do that.But when you're 13, 14 years
old, this is your dad. You don'tknow really you know, you're
thinking, he's not gonna hurtme. But he walked me down into
this big ravine.
He told me to stop, turn around.I looked at him and he's
pointing the gun right at me.And he points it up like this.
(14:31):
He pulls back and he starts tocock it. And you think, run.
Unless you've ever been thereand it's your dad, all I can
tell you is I'm like, this isn'thappening. What's going on? I'm
like, dad. Dad, please. Dad,please.
Dad. And he and he comes out ofit. And I think I I don't know
(14:52):
for sure, but I think my dad wasprobably bipolar or even
schizophrenic and he had alcoholto that. And for whatever
reason, he broke down and criedAnd he and he and and he had
shot once and left into theright, and then he stopped. And
I'm like, holy cow.
I'm gonna have to stop byWalmart and get new underwear. I
mean, this was crazy. So I gohome and I tell my mom about it.
(15:14):
And guess what? I wouldn't wannago see him anymore.
And it's interesting along theway, some things start to
happen. I don't go see himanymore. And I played I played
basketball in high school. Iknow you're looking at me
thinking, I bet you were a star.And I know you're looking at me
thinking, yeah, I bet you were astar.
I was a b teamer, baby. I was ab teamer. I made I was like top
(15:39):
of the b team, bottom of the ateam. And if you've ever been on
the b team, you know what I'mtalking about. You get to put on
the warm ups.
You get to sit on the bench, butyou're on the end of the bench.
And when a game's going good andyou're up by 30,653 points, The
coach looks down the bench. Whohadn't played? Who has on their
warm up? And that was coachWilson.
(16:03):
Coach Wilson. And God bringspeople into your life whenever
you're, you know, 14, 15 yearsold and your dad's crazy. It's
amazing how the Lord can bringpeople into your life to
influence you. And at thisparticular point, I wasn't
thinking I was getting positiveinfluence, because I'm looking
down he's looking down thebench. And if you're a b teamer
(16:25):
and it's the Q4 and there's 30seconds in the game, you're the
only one with your warm upjersey on.
You know what you're doing.Back. Please, Lord God, no.
Please, no. And you know,
Speaker 2 (16:34):
always sees my shoes. I need to pull your shoes back.
Who hasn't played?
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Who hasn't played? So Who hasn't played? Who hasn't
played? Sanders. Oh, no.
30 seconds to go. 30 seconds togo. Like, I'm gonna win the
game. We're up by, like I toldyou, 30,000. And so I'm a big
kid.
(16:55):
I'm a little bit chubby. And atthat point, they don't care
who's on the field on the court.Right? And so the guy tosses the
ball into me. Tosses the ballinto me and I'm like, do do
Speaker 2 (17:07):
do do do
Speaker 1 (17:08):
do. I'm I'm I'm like, oh. It's kinda like right now.
Oh, look at all these lights.This is what it's like to be in
a game.
And just like you all are doing,people were laughing at me, but
it but it got worse. I'm not aguard. I'm a forward. I'm the
guy at the bottom that's tryingto push big guys out. And I'm
(17:29):
like, I get to half court.
I look up at the lights, and I'mlike, right off the tip of my
toe. Game over. Crowd roars. Howdid I feel? I'm the kid whose
(17:49):
dad beats his wife.
I'm the kid who's been shot at.My self esteem was about this
tall. What do I do? The buzzerwent off. I'm running off the
court.
It gets worse. I run the thebuzzer goes off. I run-in back
in the day, I run down back downinto the basement. Down my way
down to the basement, I hit myhead on the sewer pipe.
(18:10):
Everybody comes around.
They're gathered. I mean, youused to did you do that on
purpose? That's hilarious. Yeah.That's funny.
Wow. That was so funny. Yeah.I'm just wanting to I wanna put
myself in a band box. Put me onthe cheerleader's bus.
I don't care. About a weeklater, I was always helping
(18:31):
coach Wilson out. It was a darkevening. Everybody's going home.
I was, kinda, helping him walkup.
And there's those moments.Remember the smell of my dad,
the boots, the burger shop.There's things you remember.
Places matter when you come inthat make you feel a certain
way, just like today. And I canstill hear the chains going
around the door locks.
(18:53):
And coach Wilson's here and I'mright here. And he puts those
chains around those pushing barson those doors. And he raises up
and it's just me and coachWilson. Put his arm around me
and he says, you know, Sanders,you and I both know you'll never
(19:13):
start on the 18. Pull it outcoach.
Pull it out. But he said, let metell you something. You keep up
your work ethic. You keeptreating people the way you
treat me, and kid, you're gonnabe something someday. Now for a
(19:38):
15 year old chubby kid whokicked the ball to the upright
on a basketball game, I'm stilltalking about it today.
I'm still talking about misterBrown. I'm still talking about
coach Wilson. Not too long afterthat, my mom and I and my
brother, we were working outsidein the backyard and we hear this
car racing down the street. AndI look up and it's my dad in a
(20:05):
car. And he sees us in thebackyard and he jumps up on the
curb and he starts to chase usliterally in his car around the
backyard.
My brother goes one way, I goanother way, my mom and I go in
the house. And then we hear thisbig and I'm thinking, oh my
word. He's driven the car in theback of the house and killed my
brother. Now growing up, one ofthe things that I would do is I
(20:26):
would go to sleep every nightwith a 12 gate shotgun under my
bed. After my dad had divorcedus or divorced my mom, or my mom
divorced my dad.
And I would sleep with a 12gauge shotgun loaded with turkey
shot in it. And when I heardthat that crash, I ran
immediately to my I ranimmediately to my bedroom and I
pulled a gun out. And I heardone door come down. I heard
another door come down. And asthe and I heard one door come
down.
(20:46):
I heard another door come down.And as this last door came down
and he came through that door, Ithought to myself, this is the
day my dad dies or we're notgonna deal with this anymore.
And I pumped that 12 gaugeshotgun and put it on my
shoulder. And when he walkedinto that door, he was looking
down the end of a 12 gaugeshotgun. Now by that time, my
(21:08):
mom had called the police.
The SWAT team arrives. They'reknocking down doors. They come
in and I got a 12 gauge shotgunin my dad's face. Who do you
think they think is the problem?Put the gun down.
Put the gun down. And I did andthat was the last time I saw my
dad for 35 years. He became aconvicted felon
Speaker 2 (21:33):
and I
Speaker 1 (21:33):
didn't see him for 35 years. So one night here in
Northwest Oklahoma City, I'mlaying in bed. We had moved back
from Washington DC, andStephanie and I are asleep. And,
I looked down at the end of mybed. I'm I wake up.
I don't know if I'm dreaming orwhat it is, but I looked down
and I see what is some type sortof an angelic figure. I don't
know if it was a cherubim. Idon't know if it was an angel or
(21:54):
what it was. But this this angelbegins to rise from the end of
my bed. Now I'm not a mystic.
I'm not I wasn't I I didn't havetoo much pizza. I mean, I hadn't
been drinking. I don't know ifI'm I'm telling you. I'm I don't
know if it was real. I don'tknow if it was a dream.
I don't know if Stephanie was,you know, doing puppet shows. I
don't know what it was. But butat the end of the day, there was
(22:14):
this large, massive angelicfigure at the end of my bed. And
it really got my attention.Wouldn't it get yours?
It got my attention. And thisangelic figure began to rise
from the end of my bed. And asit began to rise, I noticed it
was holding someone in itswings, in the face that it this
person's face was there. Andwhen I looked it was my father.
(22:34):
I hadn't seen him in 35 years.
And it and it was him as Ithought he might look like. I
woke up Stephanie. I said, didyou see that? She says, what are
you talking about? I said, thatangel, hold on.
Go back to sleep. Didn't thinkmuch about it. Drove to work.
The next morning, I'm sitting inmy office. I get an email.
Ping. There's an email. A cousinthat I hadn't heard from in 35
(22:57):
years. Dear Ray, we want toinform you that your father is
dying. Not dead, is dying.
Your father's dying wish is towhat? See me. Really? I hope
(23:23):
you've got fire insurance,because I think that's where
you're heading. And I might bethe first one to light the
match.
So I call Stephanie and I say,can you believe this? My dad's
dying and what is he he didn'tsee me in 35 years. The last
time I saw him I was holding ashotgun on me. Tried to kill me
twice and he wants to see mebefore he dies. He can rot in.
(23:48):
And Stephanie says, well, whatabout that angel thing last
night? That was last night. Thisis this morning. Do you think
God might be up to something?Now all the guys in the room are
going, yeah.
I know, man. I've got a juniorHoly Spirit in my life, too.
Stephanie was my junior HolySpirit. She said, I think you
(24:09):
may need to consider what'sgoing on. Long story short, I
took one of my best friends withme.
I go and I find where my dad'sat. He's on oxygen. He's got the
cannulas. He looks like deathwarmed over. If you have you
ever seen those chick tracks?
You know, these sign find themin truck stops and things
sometimes, and they always havethe grim reaper reaper in it and
he looks like death warmed overlike a walking skeleton. That
(24:31):
was my dad. I thought he oh, heposed for those tracks. That's
And he looked terrible. Helooked terrible.
And I took my friend with me. Isaid, because I don't know if
this is a big joke. I don't knowif my dad is about to go out and
this is his last hoorah, hewants to get me back. Or I don't
(24:55):
know if I will be able tocontain myself because I might
actually take my fist and put itthrough his face. Because of
what all he did to our family.
I haven't seen him in 35 years.But guys, I kid you not, I knock
on the door. Come in. Come in.Remember those sounds?
How you feel about certainthings? I still hear the creaky
(25:17):
door. And then it was a,thriller. Thriller. No.
I'm joking. It wasn't. But itwas that kind of and he's in
this chair and he swings aroundand and I mean, I just went pale
and I because I thought he wasgonna he was swinging around to
shoot me. He swung around inthat chair and then he got up
(25:42):
and he fell on his knees. And hegrabbed me around the legs and
put his head into my thigh.
And just weeped and weeped andweep. And he said, I'm sorry.
I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry. Ican't believe you came.
(26:05):
I can't believe you came. And sowhat do you think I did? I'm
standing there and I take myknee and I just put it in his
chin. No, I didn't. I fell downon my knees beside the prodigal
father.
The prodigal father. And wewept, and I boohooed, and it was
(26:29):
one of those slobbery girlcries. I mean, it was snot on
the face, and I felt I mean, itwas amazing. I couldn't believe
it. I couldn't believe it.
And I sat down beside him, and Ididn't have one good memory of
my dad. I'm not kidding. We'vetalked about this many times. I
didn't have one good memory. I'mtalking I was 50 years old at
(26:52):
the time.
I didn't have one good memory.But I did have a pocket watch
that my dad gave me. And thepocket watch was something I
remember and I thought, if I seehim and it goes well, I'm gonna
ask him if he remembers whatthis this pocket watch was
about. And I opened up my hand,I show him the pocket watch. He
looks at it and goes, oh yeah.
I remember that pocket watch.And I looked down and the pocket
(27:15):
watch was stopped at 2 o'clock.2 o'clock. And it's like the
Holy Spirit said to me, tell himthis, dad, look at the time on
the clock. Look at the time onthe pocket watch.
It's 2 o'clock. I said, dad, Ithink God is telling me we're
getting a second chance. I don'tknow if you're gonna live 3
(27:38):
hours. I don't know if you'regonna live 3 days. I don't know
if you're gonna live 3 weeks, 3months or 3 years, but can we
just decide today, we're gonnaforget about the past.
We're gonna start over. We'regonna begin again. We're not
gonna look back. Whatever timewe have left, let's go do what
we can do in the time you haveleft. I called a meeting.
(27:59):
I called in all my kids. They'relike, is this the guy? And he
couldn't believe it. He hadnever seen his grandchildren. He
he got so worked up and soexcited at our family dinner.
He couldn't eat and we had totake him to the hospital because
his COPD and his cannulasweren't wasn't giving him the
next oxygen. He couldn't believethe mercy and grace that he
(28:20):
felt, and the forgiveness thathe felt, and how much he was
loved by grandchildren thatdidn't even know him, and a son
he hadn't seen in 35 years.That's the power of forgiveness.
That's the kind of forgivenessour God gives each and every one
of us. So my dad doesn't diewithin 3 days.
(28:44):
He doesn't die within 3 weeks. Ayear and a half later, I'm
taking him to the hospital for aopen heart surgery. He lives
through it. The doctor's like,he ain't coming back out of
here. He ain't coming out.
We've worked on skeletonsbefore. They just they don't
ever make it. And he's he'scoming out. We're a Baptist
hospital. And some of you I'mI'm really aging myself today,
Tom.
(29:05):
The old Cara Burnett character,you know, Tim Conway. You know,
how he goes he would walk likethis, just barely walk. You
know, I'm talking about that wasmy dad. And he was honoring. We
were walking out of thehospital.
We're walking out of thehospital and he's walking. And
he gets right to the the thedoors. You know where he goes,
(29:26):
as he takes it. He walks up alittle bit more, and he stands
right in the middle. And one ofthe doors do, He's like, I'm
like, you sick sucker, man.
Let's go move it along littlecowboy. I'll never forget it.
Remember those moments? Thosemoments you feel special? Those
memories that are built in yourmind?
(29:47):
He's all hunkered over. He can'thardly talk. He's got his
cannulas. He's got his bonyfingers and a hairdo like mine.
And he steps a little bit.
Those doors are going off. Andhe looks up, and he says, you
know, they think I ought to bedead by now. They think God
(30:17):
ought to be dead by now. Andthen he says, but you and I both
know that god's given me moretime with you. Wow.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
He lived 3 years, 3 years on his death bed, hospice,
cannulas, oxygen. If we had lita cigarette in his room, it
would have blown up. I mean,that's the power of forgiveness.
It rev it revived him. You see,I was sitting with my dad one
(30:58):
day and I said, dad, what does aguy do that's been disconnected
from his family for 35 years, aconvicted felon, what do you do
all day?
You live in this stinkyapartment in deep snuff. What do
you do? He says, well, I do 2things. You know, I read my King
James Bible. He came to faith.
(31:20):
He had been left in a ditch in abar fight. They broke his neck
and he said, it was then when Irealized, man, I gotta get my
act together. And he became abeliever. Reading his old King
James Bible, and then he saidsomething, then he said
something that blew my mind. Andthis remember the angel?
Remember the the crazy stuffthat happens? He said, I read
(31:44):
the dictionary. In my mind, I'mthinking, okay. So this is where
it goes. You read the King JamesBible and you read the
dictionary.
I said, can I see thatdictionary? He said, sure. He
reached the door and he grabbedit and handed it to me. And you
know how thick a dictionary is.Right?
(32:05):
You know how thick a dictionaryis. I flipped the dictionary
open. I looked down on the pageand there was a word record,
circled on the page. There's aword circled on the page and a
note beside it.
Speaker 2 (32:20):
Do you
Speaker 1 (32:20):
care to guess what word out of all the words in the
dictionary, I open up the bookand I look down on the page. Do
you care to guess what word wascircled? The word reconcile.
Speaker 2 (32:35):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
Now I don't know where you're at today, but I
know this much. There's beenpeople in your life that have
hurt you. Maybe you have a aDonnie in your life. Maybe you
are Donnie. Maybe there's a dadin here that's doing the same
things that Donnie was doing.
Hey, man. Come talk to me.There's a way. You can get you
(32:57):
don't have to keep living thatway. Maybe there's another
little boy or little girl thatare putting up with what you're
doing.
And maybe you're a mom and youneed to find the courage to do
what you think is the rightthing. But I can just tell you
that we all hurt people. Andwhat had happened for me for
many years was Donnie, my dadwas Maya Charles Manson and he
(33:17):
had held me captive for so manyyears. For so many years, he had
held me captive and I lived in aprison made of his making. And
eventually, I came to the pointto where I forgave him.
Did he deserve it? Heck no. Heckno. He did not deserve it, but
(33:40):
when I forgave him I was setfree. I was set free.
I wasn't held back by thosechains anymore. I was set free
from my past. I didn't have tobe held hostage by my past. It
didn't matter where I started.It's where I was going and where
I was heading, because the pastdidn't matter anymore.
And you may be thinking, that'sgreat. You you you forgave him.
(34:02):
And, yeah, I had the chance toreconcile. And some of you say,
well, I won't ever have thechance to reconcile. My dad's in
prison, or my mom died, or theperson that's doing this I could
never get with, or not mentallyhealthy enough.
And you know what? I thinkthat's okay. But I think
ultimately, what the Lord wantsto do, is the Lord wants us to
be reconciled. He wants to makeall things new. He wants to
forgive us.
(34:23):
And see, I don't care whereyou've been. I don't care what
you've done. I don't know whatyour life's like. I don't care
if you're cheating on your wife.I don't care if you're cheating
on your boss.
I don't care what you're doing.We're all broken. We're all
Donnie's in our own way. We'reall messed up. We're all broken.
We need forgiveness. We need tobe reconciled and brought free
(34:45):
because we can stay in the past,we can be hung up in the past,
or we can you don't have to bepresent with the person to
forgive them. You can forgivethem. They don't even have to
know it, but don't let them holdyou hostage. Don't let your past
hold your hostage.
You see, I had a journey. I hada coach Wilson. I had a mister
(35:08):
Brown. And all of us have theopportunity to be those kind of
people in the lives of otherpeople. And this, you may be
wonder what is this?
Well, this is a turtle. And I'mnot gonna tell you anything
(35:29):
else. But that turtle rightthere, that's me. And you're
thinking, he has this similarhaircut just like you. But see,
we're all turtles on a post.
And we don't get to where we areunless somebody else put us
(35:52):
there. If you ever see a turtleon a post, what do you know? And
they're out there, I promiseyou. You'll go Google it. If you
see a turtle on a post, you whatyou what do you know?
He didn't get himself there. Hecan crawl all day and he's never
gonna get up there, but somebodyhelped get him there. And in my
life, it was a mister Brown. Itwas a coach Wilson. And are you
ready for this?
(36:13):
It was a guy named Donnie. Hehelped me become who I am today,
but guess what? Ultimately, whoI am, the person that put me on
this post, is Jesus himself.Because we don't get to where we
are without Jesus and otherpeople come around us. And so
then the question becomes this,and I'm gonna close here in just
(36:33):
a minute.
I'm gonna give you thescripture. Here's the thing.
When you look around thisneighborhood and you did book
bags, you're thinking, oh,there's some book bags and
pencils and scissors andnotebooks. Let's hope that Jesus
works through all that. Can Ijust tell you?
You better believe he will.Because in this community around
Norman, there's little Rays andthere's little Tommies who need
(36:56):
coach Browns and mister Wilsonto step into their life and fill
the gap and be that forsomebody. And at the same time,
there's people in this communitywho need to know what
forgiveness looks like. Theyneed to know what,
reconciliation can look like.The name of this church is New
(37:18):
Life Bible Church.
You see, we all need a restart.We need to reset. We need to be
the influence and we need to bereconciled. And so the verse I
want to close in this morning isthis. It ties this story all
together.
Ask yourself, where do you seeyourself in this passage? What
role can you play? You've heardthis passage before. 2nd
(37:41):
Corinthians 5 17. And here itgoes, Anyone.
Anyone. Anyone. Anyone whobelongs to Christ has become a
new person, a new creation. Ithappened in my dad's life. It
(38:02):
happened in my life.
It happened in mister Brown'slife. It actually happened in
coach Wilson's life. Then whatdoes it say? The old life is
gone. When Donnie grabbed mearound the knees, it was over.
The old life was gone. A newlife has begun. Forget the past.
(38:27):
Move on. Jesus has made itclean.
It's a fresh start. It's a newbeginning. And all of this is a
gift. Very important. You don'tearn it.
You can't earn it. You can't begood enough. You you can grow up
in a Christian home. It doesn'tmatter. You can come to church 6
times a week.
It doesn't matter. It's a giftthat you have to accept and that
(38:49):
gift is what? For God so lovedthe world that he gave his only
begotten son, that whosoeverbelieves in him will not perish,
but have everlasting life. Andit's not just in the by and by,
it's now. Right?
And that's available to you. Itsays, who brought us back to
himself through Christ and Godhas given us this task of
(39:11):
reconciling people to him. Whyare you guys here? You guys are
here to reconcile people back tothe Lord into good relationship
with him. For God was in Christreconciling the world to
himself, no longer countingpeople's sins against him.
Praise God. And he gave us thiswonderful message. That's what
(39:32):
you guys are all about, ofreconciliation. It's in the
dictionary. Donnie circled it.
So we are Christ's ambassadors.God is making his appeal through
us. You and me, mister Brown,coach Wilson, we need to help
(39:55):
put people on their post. Wespeak for Christ when we bleed.
Come back to God.
That's where it all started.That's where it all began in
Genesis. But we messed it up. Wechose our way. And you're
sitting in the room today andsays, man, I don't know what
happened but I started makingsome choices.
And I started drifting. Istarted getting away from the
(40:18):
Lord. And I think today, Irecognize, you know what? I
wanna get back. I wanna beforgiven.
I wanna reconcile, not only withGod, but with my wife, my
friends. There's some peoplethat I need to call, and I need
to say, I blew it. I'm sorry.And guess what? There's some
people you need to call, andsay, hey.
I'm gonna and say, hey. I'm theturtle on a post. I wanna call
you and thank you for helping mebe who I am today. Mister Brown,
(40:40):
coach Wilson, I rememberstepping up on mister Brown's
porch years later. He said, RaySanders.
I said, yes sir, mister Brown.He said, I never thought you
kids would amount to anything.So today, my message is simple.
Forget about the past. Let looseof those change.
(41:02):
Let the Lord forgive you fromanything that you've done. Start
afresh. It's an opportunity youhave every day. Forgive those
who have hurt you and ask forforgiveness. Be reconciled.
It's your calling. It's yourmission. It's your passion. It's
the name of your church, newlife. Let's pray.
Hello, everyone. I'm Ray Sanders, and you're
listening to the Ray SandersLeadership Podcast. You know, we
have a special podcast schedulefor you today. I recently had
the opportunity to be down nearmy alma mater, the University of
Oklahoma, at a church down therecalled New Life Bible Church,
and they asked me to speak andtell about my story. And so
(00:21):
that's what I want to introduceyou to today.
You know, if you know much aboutme, you know that my childhood
and my upbringing was a littlesketchy, a little crazy at
times, and there's a lot ofthings that went wrong along the
way. But one of the things I'velearned in life, it's how to
forgive and forget and move on.So on this special edition of
this podcast, I wanna take youwith me down the road aways to a
(00:45):
live service where I shared mystory on forgiveness and
reconciliation. Let's join thatservice in progress as we speak.
Hello, everyone.
I'm Ray Sanders, and you'relistening to the Ray Sanders
Leadership Podcast.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
I want
Speaker 1 (01:05):
you to go back with me. Ancient history. Back to
1960. 1960. There was a younggirl moved to a small town, not
too far from here, out in UnionCity.
Moved to a small town. Her dadwas gonna be the new baker
banker in town. And she wascute. And as it often goes, you
(01:30):
know, the new girl gets all theattention. And she showed up at
school and everybody began totake interest in her.
But one guy in particular tookinterest in her and that was her
next door neighbor. And theywere they were hanging out And,
he wasn't in school. She was inschool, but he wasn't in school.
And it turns out that he waslike 8 years older than her.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Would, you know, go cruising around. And they
Speaker 1 (01:53):
began to kind of become sweethearts. But
unfortunately, he was kind ofmanipulative and it ultimately,
he took advantage of her. Andwhen I say he took advantage of
her, I mean, he really tookadvantage of her. Some would
(02:14):
even call it I hate to use thisword, but some would even call
it statutory rape. And shebecame pregnant at 15 years old.
15 years old. Now think aboutthat. You're 15 years old, 1960.
What happens? You show up to theschool.
(02:34):
What do they do? Oh, we can'thave those kind in here. And she
was asked to leave school. Shewas asked to leave school and
then her mother takes her to thedoctor and there her mother and
the doctor talk. And even inthose days, it wasn't
necessarily legal, but in thosedays, she had options.
You know what I mean? She hadoptions. And to her credit, she
(02:57):
said, you know what? I don'twant those options. Yeah.
I've made a mistake, and whatI'm gonna do is I'm gonna have
my child. She got kicked out ofschool. She had to live at home.
And this guy that, got herpregnant decided to do the right
thing, and
Speaker 2 (03:16):
they got married.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
And they had a child. And they had a child. And And
they had a child. And that childis standing before you today.
And that child is me.
And because of the decision shemade, I had 6 kids. I now have
10 grandchildren. And on my wayout here, my my youngest
(03:37):
grandson I have 10 well, I have9, a 10th on the way. My
youngest grandson named HankFaceTimed me because every
morning, he FaceTimed me. And hewas FaceTiming me on my way in
here.
And I'm not gonna miss thatcall. Service will start late
because I'm taking Hank's call.And so I facetimed Hank. And I
look at the decision she madeand I go, wow, that's amazing.
(03:59):
That's that's incredible thatshe would have that much
courage.
And if she hadn't made thatchoice, then I wouldn't be here.
My brother wouldn't be here. Allthese other grandkids wouldn't
be here. But let's pick up thestory a little bit. So they they
lived in the country.
He was a country boy. And on thedock, he did okay. But he really
(04:21):
was never too, proud of what hehad done. And he took to drink
and other things, alcohol anddrugs. And he began to, really
turn on his wife, my mother.
And that was my dad. So much sothat he would he would beat her.
He would drag her around by thehead of her hair. It became a
classic domestic abusesituation. In fact, he would
(04:46):
stay at the bars at night andthen come home.
And a lot of times, I rememberas a kid, when I was a little
bit younger, my dad would comehome. Some of you are old enough
to know this. We didn't haveremote controls. You know. It's
fun to watch these kids play outhere.
They have games and they'redoing it with their hands. I was
my dad's remote control. And infact, we had a television with
(05:07):
something called rabbit ears.You all remember that? And if
you wanted to watch 4, 5, and 9,you could turn the dial.
If you wanted to catch the UHFchannels, there was a dial in
the back and everything was kindof fuzzy. Guess who got to get
up and go adjust the channel? Idid. I would play with the
rabbit ears. But I never wouldforget it.
My dad would come in. He wouldbe in his overalls and he'd be
in his work boots. He wasworking on the dock. He kinda
(05:29):
had that grease, kinda smelly,sweaty, aroma about him. And he
would have a big tall boy, Coorsor Falstaff.
Some of you may know what thatis. Sitting beside him. And he
kicked back in his lazy chair.And the first thing I was to do
is I was to pull his boots offand I'd unlaced those those kind
of tan colored boots with ayellow string. You guys know
(05:51):
what I'm talking about?
And and I would pull those off,and he may want me to change the
channel. And then it'd be timefor dinner. And it's funny what
you remember as a kid and thosesmells. And we'd get up and go
into dinner, and my dad, youknow, he would, at that point,
be kinda be inebriated, and he'dhe'd sit down at the table. And
my mom was I mean, I'm talkingcomfort food.
I mean, we're talking, you know,we're talking about farming
(06:12):
community where it's all castiron skillet and fried chicken
and, corn and mashed potatoes.I'm making a mistake. You never
talk about food from the stageon a Sunday morning. Anyway, I
mean, I'm talking good stuff andthere might even truly be a pie
in the window cooling. This islike this isn't like
thanksgiving.
This is like every day. And ifmy dad didn't like what my mom
(06:35):
had done, what he would do is hewould take the back of his hand
and he would just literallyclear the table. Clear the
table. Dump it all in the 4 4and tell her to clean it up, you
know. And and this was wouldn'tfit it wouldn't fit to eat.
Didn't have the just right salt.Didn't have the just right
pepper. And she would cry orworse than that, the fight would
(06:56):
be on. And I mean, things wouldget slowing around the house.
Furniture broken.
My mom was, you know, youngerthan him, but she would get in
there and she would scrap withhim. And I mean, she would get
the snot beat out of her. Andthat that was the environment we
grew up with as a little kid.And I know some of you are
sitting out there today, yousay, man, I can relate to that.
I can relate to that pain.
I can relate to that suffering.I remember there would be times
(07:18):
that my dad would just bewaylaying and my mom we lived in
a little 900 square foot house.We had 2 bedrooms and a kitchen.
And I tell my kids, I didn'thave a shower till I was 15. And
you're like, you didn't shower?
I took baths. We didn't have ashower. That's the kind of house
we lived in. Some of you livedin those kind of houses. No.
(07:39):
We didn't share bath water. Weknow we all get a fresh, you
know, fresh we'd pull the plug.And, so but but what I can tell
you is that it was it was chaos.It was terrible. Domestic abuse
and violence is awful.
It's terrifying for a young kid.And I remember one time in a
small little hallway, my dad waswaylaying into my mom, and my
(07:59):
brother was balled up in acorner, balled up in a corner in
a white hanger like you havewhenever you go to the dry
cleaners. He had that hanger inhis hands. And on both sides, he
was just back and forth, backand forth, back and forth. Just
balled up.
And he was just so anxious. Itwas those things stick in your
mind. And there would be timesin the middle of the night and
sometimes it'd be raining and wewould we would run across the
(08:22):
street. We'd run across thestreet and we'd run to mister
Brown's house, mister and missusBrown. And we go knock on that
door, and it'd be raining.
And I I might be in my littlebriefs, my little underwear, and
my brother would be coming withme. And behind me, my mom would
come and probably have blood onher face, and she'd run-in that
family. It could be 9 o'clock atnight. Across the street, they
(08:46):
always let us in. Mister andmiss Brown.
And when you go in, missus Brownwould say, it's okay. It's gonna
be alright kids. It's okay. Comeinside. My mom's, they would
make a place for her on thecouch and they'd lay a pallet on
the floor for me and my brother.
And I always loved going tomister and missus Brown's
because her house smelled sogreat. Remember what I was
(09:08):
talking about earlier? About howhouses and experiences and
things like that make you feel?How do people make you feel? And
mister and mister Brown wereChristians.
And that's not how we lived inmy house, but we would go into
their house and we always feltcomfort. We always felt loved.
And she made candles. And sowhen you walk into her house,
(09:29):
it's like, oh. It was justinstant.
Just beautiful. And if it waslate at night, sometimes what I
would hear is I'd hear this. Andsome of you are thinking, was it
the dog from Sandlot? No. It wasmister Brown.
(09:53):
It's mister Brown coming downthe hall. But in this case, he
didn't have his, he didn't havehis cane. He wasn't going.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
And
Speaker 1 (10:02):
at first, you know, when you're a kid you're like,
what is that? But mister Brownhad a prosthetic leg and he was
missing a leg. He could havestayed in bed and let mama
handle it. But mister Brown onthe floor would come on the
floor with his elbows. And he'dget to the end of that hall and
(10:28):
he had a haircut like me andhe'd peek his head out like this
and says, hey kids.
Hey, mister Brown. Where's yourlegs? And he said, hey, we just
want you all to know you'reyou're safe. It's gonna be okay.
And the next morning, missusBrown would treat us like
royalty and we'd get bacon andeggs and all this stuff.
(10:52):
And my dad would be off to workand we would go back to our
house. And that's the kind oflife I lived. I remember at 10
years old, I was 10 year old. Mydad was got to where he'd be a
bar fighter. And I could tellyou, I could be to every shanty,
every beer joint in Canadiancounty in the in the west side
of Oklahoma City.
And my dad it it didn't matterhow big you are. He would hit
get his liquid courage. You knowwhat I mean? His liquid courage.
(11:15):
And he'd have him one too manyand he'd try to find the biggest
guy in the bar and he'd try tofigure out if he could whip him.
Now you may think, okay. But thetrouble is my dad was 5.8 and
about a £120. He looked like abany rooster. But he didn't care
how big they were, he wanted tosee how hard they'd fall. And he
(11:35):
would get in these fights.
And there'd be times I rememberone time I was in Union City, he
would he had been in a barfight, 152 Highway down what is
now Garth Brooks Boulevard at 10years old in an old Galaxy 500
vehicle. At 10 years old I'mdriving him home. I'm driving
him home, and he's passed out inthe back seat. And my mom was
(11:57):
like, you know, this this can'tcontinue. We can't we can't keep
living like this.
And so she made the decision,that she was gonna divorce him.
And she did that after one timewhen he was way laying into her
and I stepped in between himwhen I was around 12 years old.
And I was a little bit biggerthan him at that time. And she
(12:18):
realized at that point that ifshe didn't do something, he was
gonna start doing the same thingto us that he was had been doing
to her. And so she divorced himand that really made my dad go
crazy.
And one time I was staying withhim. I went to visit with him,
and he took me down to, have youever been to one of these little
restaurants you walk in? It's adiner. If you ever been to
Chickasha, there's j and w oryou go to El Reno. There's these
(12:39):
these these these have a bar andstools, and the and the and the
cooks behind there, and there'sthese little bar stools.
And you sit there. It's alwaysthe best burgers. If you ever
find a place, pull over. It'sworth it. So we're hanging out
in there.
And, my dad and I are eating. Wefinish and we go to the end of
(12:59):
the counter. We're checking outand it's a small town and
there's this little cabinet. Andin this cabinet of all kinds of
weird things. It's out in thecountry.
It's like, bow bowie bowie knifebowie knives, matches and
trinkets and stuff. And one ofthe things that was in there was
a revolver, a pistol, an ammo,and a little country diner. And
(13:23):
so we're checking out. My dadsays, you know, we're standing
there. My dad says, hey, what doyou think you've what do you
think your mom would think ifyou weren't here?
And I'm like, like, not hangingout with you? No. I mean, like
not here. I didn't think muchabout it. Sorry, mister Brown.
(13:46):
I didn't think much about it.And he buys the revolver and the
ammo. And he takes me out intothe country. And he takes me out
to where he grew up, and he tookme out to this big creek, real
deep ravine. He told me to walkdown in the ravine.
And this is the point in themovie where you say, what is he?
Some kind of idiot? Why would hedo that? And you think, no.
(14:10):
Don't do that.
Don't go there. Don't do that.But when you're 13, 14 years
old, this is your dad. You don'tknow really you know, you're
thinking, he's not gonna hurtme. But he walked me down into
this big ravine.
He told me to stop, turn around.I looked at him and he's
pointing the gun right at me.And he points it up like this.
(14:31):
He pulls back and he starts tocock it. And you think, run.
Unless you've ever been thereand it's your dad, all I can
tell you is I'm like, this isn'thappening. What's going on? I'm
like, dad. Dad, please. Dad,please.
Dad. And he and he comes out ofit. And I think I I don't know
(14:52):
for sure, but I think my dad wasprobably bipolar or even
schizophrenic and he had alcoholto that. And for whatever
reason, he broke down and criedAnd he and he and and he had
shot once and left into theright, and then he stopped. And
I'm like, holy cow.
I'm gonna have to stop byWalmart and get new underwear. I
mean, this was crazy. So I gohome and I tell my mom about it.
(15:14):
And guess what? I wouldn't wannago see him anymore.
And it's interesting along theway, some things start to
happen. I don't go see himanymore. And I played I played
basketball in high school. Iknow you're looking at me
thinking, I bet you were a star.And I know you're looking at me
thinking, yeah, I bet you were astar.
I was a b teamer, baby. I was ab teamer. I made I was like top
(15:39):
of the b team, bottom of the ateam. And if you've ever been on
the b team, you know what I'mtalking about. You get to put on
the warm ups.
You get to sit on the bench, butyou're on the end of the bench.
And when a game's going good andyou're up by 30,653 points, The
coach looks down the bench. Whohadn't played? Who has on their
warm up? And that was coachWilson.
(16:03):
Coach Wilson. And God bringspeople into your life whenever
you're, you know, 14, 15 yearsold and your dad's crazy. It's
amazing how the Lord can bringpeople into your life to
influence you. And at thisparticular point, I wasn't
thinking I was getting positiveinfluence, because I'm looking
down he's looking down thebench. And if you're a b teamer
(16:25):
and it's the Q4 and there's 30seconds in the game, you're the
only one with your warm upjersey on.
You know what you're doing.Back. Please, Lord God, no.
Please, no. And you know,
Speaker 2 (16:34):
always sees my shoes. I need to pull your shoes back.
Who hasn't played?
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Who hasn't played? So Who hasn't played? Who hasn't
played? Sanders. Oh, no.
30 seconds to go. 30 seconds togo. Like, I'm gonna win the
game. We're up by, like I toldyou, 30,000. And so I'm a big
kid.
(16:55):
I'm a little bit chubby. And atthat point, they don't care
who's on the field on the court.Right? And so the guy tosses the
ball into me. Tosses the ballinto me and I'm like, do do
Speaker 2 (17:07):
do do do
Speaker 1 (17:08):
do. I'm I'm I'm like, oh. It's kinda like right now.
Oh, look at all these lights.This is what it's like to be in
a game.
And just like you all are doing,people were laughing at me, but
it but it got worse. I'm not aguard. I'm a forward. I'm the
guy at the bottom that's tryingto push big guys out. And I'm
(17:29):
like, I get to half court.
I look up at the lights, and I'mlike, right off the tip of my
toe. Game over. Crowd roars. Howdid I feel? I'm the kid whose
(17:49):
dad beats his wife.
I'm the kid who's been shot at.My self esteem was about this
tall. What do I do? The buzzerwent off. I'm running off the
court.
It gets worse. I run the thebuzzer goes off. I run-in back
in the day, I run down back downinto the basement. Down my way
down to the basement, I hit myhead on the sewer pipe.
(18:10):
Everybody comes around.
They're gathered. I mean, youused to did you do that on
purpose? That's hilarious. Yeah.That's funny.
Wow. That was so funny. Yeah.I'm just wanting to I wanna put
myself in a band box. Put me onthe cheerleader's bus.
I don't care. About a weeklater, I was always helping
(18:31):
coach Wilson out. It was a darkevening. Everybody's going home.
I was, kinda, helping him walkup.
And there's those moments.Remember the smell of my dad,
the boots, the burger shop.There's things you remember.
Places matter when you come inthat make you feel a certain
way, just like today. And I canstill hear the chains going
around the door locks.
(18:53):
And coach Wilson's here and I'mright here. And he puts those
chains around those pushing barson those doors. And he raises up
and it's just me and coachWilson. Put his arm around me
and he says, you know, Sanders,you and I both know you'll never
(19:13):
start on the 18. Pull it outcoach.
Pull it out. But he said, let metell you something. You keep up
your work ethic. You keeptreating people the way you
treat me, and kid, you're gonnabe something someday. Now for a
(19:38):
15 year old chubby kid whokicked the ball to the upright
on a basketball game, I'm stilltalking about it today.
I'm still talking about misterBrown. I'm still talking about
coach Wilson. Not too long afterthat, my mom and I and my
brother, we were working outsidein the backyard and we hear this
car racing down the street. AndI look up and it's my dad in a
(20:05):
car. And he sees us in thebackyard and he jumps up on the
curb and he starts to chase usliterally in his car around the
backyard.
My brother goes one way, I goanother way, my mom and I go in
the house. And then we hear thisbig and I'm thinking, oh my
word. He's driven the car in theback of the house and killed my
brother. Now growing up, one ofthe things that I would do is I
(20:26):
would go to sleep every nightwith a 12 gate shotgun under my
bed. After my dad had divorcedus or divorced my mom, or my mom
divorced my dad.
And I would sleep with a 12gauge shotgun loaded with turkey
shot in it. And when I heardthat that crash, I ran
immediately to my I ranimmediately to my bedroom and I
pulled a gun out. And I heardone door come down. I heard
another door come down. And asthe and I heard one door come
down.
(20:46):
I heard another door come down.And as this last door came down
and he came through that door, Ithought to myself, this is the
day my dad dies or we're notgonna deal with this anymore.
And I pumped that 12 gaugeshotgun and put it on my
shoulder. And when he walkedinto that door, he was looking
down the end of a 12 gaugeshotgun. Now by that time, my
(21:08):
mom had called the police.
The SWAT team arrives. They'reknocking down doors. They come
in and I got a 12 gauge shotgunin my dad's face. Who do you
think they think is the problem?Put the gun down.
Put the gun down. And I did andthat was the last time I saw my
dad for 35 years. He became aconvicted felon
Speaker 2 (21:33):
and I
Speaker 1 (21:33):
didn't see him for 35 years. So one night here in
Northwest Oklahoma City, I'mlaying in bed. We had moved back
from Washington DC, andStephanie and I are asleep. And,
I looked down at the end of mybed. I'm I wake up.
I don't know if I'm dreaming orwhat it is, but I looked down
and I see what is some type sortof an angelic figure. I don't
know if it was a cherubim. Idon't know if it was an angel or
(21:54):
what it was. But this this angelbegins to rise from the end of
my bed. Now I'm not a mystic.
I'm not I wasn't I I didn't havetoo much pizza. I mean, I hadn't
been drinking. I don't know ifI'm I'm telling you. I'm I don't
know if it was real. I don'tknow if it was a dream.
I don't know if Stephanie was,you know, doing puppet shows. I
don't know what it was. But butat the end of the day, there was
(22:14):
this large, massive angelicfigure at the end of my bed. And
it really got my attention.Wouldn't it get yours?
It got my attention. And thisangelic figure began to rise
from the end of my bed. And asit began to rise, I noticed it
was holding someone in itswings, in the face that it this
person's face was there. Andwhen I looked it was my father.
(22:34):
I hadn't seen him in 35 years.
And it and it was him as Ithought he might look like. I
woke up Stephanie. I said, didyou see that? She says, what are
you talking about? I said, thatangel, hold on.
Go back to sleep. Didn't thinkmuch about it. Drove to work.
The next morning, I'm sitting inmy office. I get an email.
Ping. There's an email. A cousinthat I hadn't heard from in 35
(22:57):
years. Dear Ray, we want toinform you that your father is
dying. Not dead, is dying.
Your father's dying wish is towhat? See me. Really? I hope
(23:23):
you've got fire insurance,because I think that's where
you're heading. And I might bethe first one to light the
match.
So I call Stephanie and I say,can you believe this? My dad's
dying and what is he he didn'tsee me in 35 years. The last
time I saw him I was holding ashotgun on me. Tried to kill me
twice and he wants to see mebefore he dies. He can rot in.
(23:48):
And Stephanie says, well, whatabout that angel thing last
night? That was last night. Thisis this morning. Do you think
God might be up to something?Now all the guys in the room are
going, yeah.
I know, man. I've got a juniorHoly Spirit in my life, too.
Stephanie was my junior HolySpirit. She said, I think you
(24:09):
may need to consider what'sgoing on. Long story short, I
took one of my best friends withme.
I go and I find where my dad'sat. He's on oxygen. He's got the
cannulas. He looks like deathwarmed over. If you have you
ever seen those chick tracks?
You know, these sign find themin truck stops and things
sometimes, and they always havethe grim reaper reaper in it and
he looks like death warmed overlike a walking skeleton. That
(24:31):
was my dad. I thought he oh, heposed for those tracks. That's
And he looked terrible. Helooked terrible.
And I took my friend with me. Isaid, because I don't know if
this is a big joke. I don't knowif my dad is about to go out and
this is his last hoorah, hewants to get me back. Or I don't
(24:55):
know if I will be able tocontain myself because I might
actually take my fist and put itthrough his face. Because of
what all he did to our family.
I haven't seen him in 35 years.But guys, I kid you not, I knock
on the door. Come in. Come in.Remember those sounds?
How you feel about certainthings? I still hear the creaky
(25:17):
door. And then it was a,thriller. Thriller. No.
I'm joking. It wasn't. But itwas that kind of and he's in
this chair and he swings aroundand and I mean, I just went pale
and I because I thought he wasgonna he was swinging around to
shoot me. He swung around inthat chair and then he got up
(25:42):
and he fell on his knees. And hegrabbed me around the legs and
put his head into my thigh.
And just weeped and weeped andweep. And he said, I'm sorry.
I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry. Ican't believe you came.
(26:05):
I can't believe you came. And sowhat do you think I did? I'm
standing there and I take myknee and I just put it in his
chin. No, I didn't. I fell downon my knees beside the prodigal
father.
The prodigal father. And wewept, and I boohooed, and it was
(26:29):
one of those slobbery girlcries. I mean, it was snot on
the face, and I felt I mean, itwas amazing. I couldn't believe
it. I couldn't believe it.
And I sat down beside him, and Ididn't have one good memory of
my dad. I'm not kidding. We'vetalked about this many times. I
didn't have one good memory. I'mtalking I was 50 years old at
(26:52):
the time.
I didn't have one good memory.But I did have a pocket watch
that my dad gave me. And thepocket watch was something I
remember and I thought, if I seehim and it goes well, I'm gonna
ask him if he remembers whatthis this pocket watch was
about. And I opened up my hand,I show him the pocket watch. He
looks at it and goes, oh yeah.
I remember that pocket watch.And I looked down and the pocket
(27:15):
watch was stopped at 2 o'clock.2 o'clock. And it's like the
Holy Spirit said to me, tell himthis, dad, look at the time on
the clock. Look at the time onthe pocket watch.
It's 2 o'clock. I said, dad, Ithink God is telling me we're
getting a second chance. I don'tknow if you're gonna live 3
(27:38):
hours. I don't know if you'regonna live 3 days. I don't know
if you're gonna live 3 weeks, 3months or 3 years, but can we
just decide today, we're gonnaforget about the past.
We're gonna start over. We'regonna begin again. We're not
gonna look back. Whatever timewe have left, let's go do what
we can do in the time you haveleft. I called a meeting.
(27:59):
I called in all my kids. They'relike, is this the guy? And he
couldn't believe it. He hadnever seen his grandchildren. He
he got so worked up and soexcited at our family dinner.
He couldn't eat and we had totake him to the hospital because
his COPD and his cannulasweren't wasn't giving him the
next oxygen. He couldn't believethe mercy and grace that he
(28:20):
felt, and the forgiveness thathe felt, and how much he was
loved by grandchildren thatdidn't even know him, and a son
he hadn't seen in 35 years.That's the power of forgiveness.
That's the kind of forgivenessour God gives each and every one
of us. So my dad doesn't diewithin 3 days.
(28:44):
He doesn't die within 3 weeks. Ayear and a half later, I'm
taking him to the hospital for aopen heart surgery. He lives
through it. The doctor's like,he ain't coming back out of
here. He ain't coming out.
We've worked on skeletonsbefore. They just they don't
ever make it. And he's he'scoming out. We're a Baptist
hospital. And some of you I'mI'm really aging myself today,
Tom.
(29:05):
The old Cara Burnett character,you know, Tim Conway. You know,
how he goes he would walk likethis, just barely walk. You
know, I'm talking about that wasmy dad. And he was honoring. We
were walking out of thehospital.
We're walking out of thehospital and he's walking. And
he gets right to the the thedoors. You know where he goes,
(29:26):
as he takes it. He walks up alittle bit more, and he stands
right in the middle. And one ofthe doors do, He's like, I'm
like, you sick sucker, man.
Let's go move it along littlecowboy. I'll never forget it.
Remember those moments? Thosemoments you feel special? Those
memories that are built in yourmind?
(29:47):
He's all hunkered over. He can'thardly talk. He's got his
cannulas. He's got his bonyfingers and a hairdo like mine.
And he steps a little bit.
Those doors are going off. Andhe looks up, and he says, you
know, they think I ought to bedead by now. They think God
(30:17):
ought to be dead by now. Andthen he says, but you and I both
know that god's given me moretime with you. Wow.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
He lived 3 years, 3 years on his death bed, hospice,
cannulas, oxygen. If we had lita cigarette in his room, it
would have blown up. I mean,that's the power of forgiveness.
It rev it revived him. You see,I was sitting with my dad one
(30:58):
day and I said, dad, what does aguy do that's been disconnected
from his family for 35 years, aconvicted felon, what do you do
all day?
You live in this stinkyapartment in deep snuff. What do
you do? He says, well, I do 2things. You know, I read my King
James Bible. He came to faith.
(31:20):
He had been left in a ditch in abar fight. They broke his neck
and he said, it was then when Irealized, man, I gotta get my
act together. And he became abeliever. Reading his old King
James Bible, and then he saidsomething, then he said
something that blew my mind. Andthis remember the angel?
Remember the the crazy stuffthat happens? He said, I read
(31:44):
the dictionary. In my mind, I'mthinking, okay. So this is where
it goes. You read the King JamesBible and you read the
dictionary.
I said, can I see thatdictionary? He said, sure. He
reached the door and he grabbedit and handed it to me. And you
know how thick a dictionary is.Right?
(32:05):
You know how thick a dictionaryis. I flipped the dictionary
open. I looked down on the pageand there was a word record,
circled on the page. There's aword circled on the page and a
note beside it.
Speaker 2 (32:20):
Do you
Speaker 1 (32:20):
care to guess what word out of all the words in the
dictionary, I open up the bookand I look down on the page. Do
you care to guess what word wascircled? The word reconcile.
Speaker 2 (32:35):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
Now I don't know where you're at today, but I
know this much. There's beenpeople in your life that have
hurt you. Maybe you have a aDonnie in your life. Maybe you
are Donnie. Maybe there's a dadin here that's doing the same
things that Donnie was doing.
Hey, man. Come talk to me.There's a way. You can get you
(32:57):
don't have to keep living thatway. Maybe there's another
little boy or little girl thatare putting up with what you're
doing.
And maybe you're a mom and youneed to find the courage to do
what you think is the rightthing. But I can just tell you
that we all hurt people. Andwhat had happened for me for
many years was Donnie, my dadwas Maya Charles Manson and he
(33:17):
had held me captive for so manyyears. For so many years, he had
held me captive and I lived in aprison made of his making. And
eventually, I came to the pointto where I forgave him.
Did he deserve it? Heck no. Heckno. He did not deserve it, but
(33:40):
when I forgave him I was setfree. I was set free.
I wasn't held back by thosechains anymore. I was set free
from my past. I didn't have tobe held hostage by my past. It
didn't matter where I started.It's where I was going and where
I was heading, because the pastdidn't matter anymore.
And you may be thinking, that'sgreat. You you you forgave him.
(34:02):
And, yeah, I had the chance toreconcile. And some of you say,
well, I won't ever have thechance to reconcile. My dad's in
prison, or my mom died, or theperson that's doing this I could
never get with, or not mentallyhealthy enough.
And you know what? I thinkthat's okay. But I think
ultimately, what the Lord wantsto do, is the Lord wants us to
be reconciled. He wants to makeall things new. He wants to
forgive us.
(34:23):
And see, I don't care whereyou've been. I don't care what
you've done. I don't know whatyour life's like. I don't care
if you're cheating on your wife.I don't care if you're cheating
on your boss.
I don't care what you're doing.We're all broken. We're all
Donnie's in our own way. We'reall messed up. We're all broken.
We need forgiveness. We need tobe reconciled and brought free
(34:45):
because we can stay in the past,we can be hung up in the past,
or we can you don't have to bepresent with the person to
forgive them. You can forgivethem. They don't even have to
know it, but don't let them holdyou hostage. Don't let your past
hold your hostage.
You see, I had a journey. I hada coach Wilson. I had a mister
(35:08):
Brown. And all of us have theopportunity to be those kind of
people in the lives of otherpeople. And this, you may be
wonder what is this?
Well, this is a turtle. And I'mnot gonna tell you anything
(35:29):
else. But that turtle rightthere, that's me. And you're
thinking, he has this similarhaircut just like you. But see,
we're all turtles on a post.
And we don't get to where we areunless somebody else put us
(35:52):
there. If you ever see a turtleon a post, what do you know? And
they're out there, I promiseyou. You'll go Google it. If you
see a turtle on a post, you whatyou what do you know?
He didn't get himself there. Hecan crawl all day and he's never
gonna get up there, but somebodyhelped get him there. And in my
life, it was a mister Brown. Itwas a coach Wilson. And are you
ready for this?
(36:13):
It was a guy named Donnie. Hehelped me become who I am today,
but guess what? Ultimately, whoI am, the person that put me on
this post, is Jesus himself.Because we don't get to where we
are without Jesus and otherpeople come around us. And so
then the question becomes this,and I'm gonna close here in just
(36:33):
a minute.
I'm gonna give you thescripture. Here's the thing.
When you look around thisneighborhood and you did book
bags, you're thinking, oh,there's some book bags and
pencils and scissors andnotebooks. Let's hope that Jesus
works through all that. Can Ijust tell you?
You better believe he will.Because in this community around
Norman, there's little Rays andthere's little Tommies who need
(36:56):
coach Browns and mister Wilsonto step into their life and fill
the gap and be that forsomebody. And at the same time,
there's people in this communitywho need to know what
forgiveness looks like. Theyneed to know what,
reconciliation can look like.The name of this church is New
(37:18):
Life Bible Church.
You see, we all need a restart.We need to reset. We need to be
the influence and we need to bereconciled. And so the verse I
want to close in this morning isthis. It ties this story all
together.
Ask yourself, where do you seeyourself in this passage? What
role can you play? You've heardthis passage before. 2nd
(37:41):
Corinthians 5 17. And here itgoes, Anyone.
Anyone. Anyone. Anyone whobelongs to Christ has become a
new person, a new creation. Ithappened in my dad's life. It
(38:02):
happened in my life.
It happened in mister Brown'slife. It actually happened in
coach Wilson's life. Then whatdoes it say? The old life is
gone. When Donnie grabbed mearound the knees, it was over.
The old life was gone. A newlife has begun. Forget the past.
(38:27):
Move on. Jesus has made itclean.
It's a fresh start. It's a newbeginning. And all of this is a
gift. Very important. You don'tearn it.
You can't earn it. You can't begood enough. You you can grow up
in a Christian home. It doesn'tmatter. You can come to church 6
times a week.
It doesn't matter. It's a giftthat you have to accept and that
(38:49):
gift is what? For God so lovedthe world that he gave his only
begotten son, that whosoeverbelieves in him will not perish,
but have everlasting life. Andit's not just in the by and by,
it's now. Right?
And that's available to you. Itsays, who brought us back to
himself through Christ and Godhas given us this task of
(39:11):
reconciling people to him. Whyare you guys here? You guys are
here to reconcile people back tothe Lord into good relationship
with him. For God was in Christreconciling the world to
himself, no longer countingpeople's sins against him.
Praise God. And he gave us thiswonderful message. That's what
(39:32):
you guys are all about, ofreconciliation. It's in the
dictionary. Donnie circled it.
So we are Christ's ambassadors.God is making his appeal through
us. You and me, mister Brown,coach Wilson, we need to help
(39:55):
put people on their post. Wespeak for Christ when we bleed.
Come back to God.
That's where it all started.That's where it all began in
Genesis. But we messed it up. Wechose our way. And you're
sitting in the room today andsays, man, I don't know what
happened but I started makingsome choices.
And I started drifting. Istarted getting away from the
(40:18):
Lord. And I think today, Irecognize, you know what? I
wanna get back. I wanna beforgiven.
I wanna reconcile, not only withGod, but with my wife, my
friends. There's some peoplethat I need to call, and I need
to say, I blew it. I'm sorry.And guess what? There's some
people you need to call, andsay, hey.
I'm gonna and say, hey. I'm theturtle on a post. I wanna call
you and thank you for helping mebe who I am today. Mister Brown,
(40:40):
coach Wilson, I rememberstepping up on mister Brown's
porch years later. He said, RaySanders.
I said, yes sir, mister Brown.He said, I never thought you
kids would amount to anything.So today, my message is simple.
Forget about the past. Let looseof those change.
(41:02):
Let the Lord forgive you fromanything that you've done. Start
afresh. It's an opportunity youhave every day. Forgive those
who have hurt you and ask forforgiveness. Be reconciled.
It's your calling. It's yourmission. It's your passion. It's
the name of your church, newlife. Let's pray.
Popular Podcasts
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.