From Respected Christian Lawyer to the Chain Gang

The following program is recorded content created by the Truth Network. From a prominent Christian attorney to the chain gang, a story of amazing redemption. Joining us on the line of fire. This is an interview I have been wanting to do for some time and so thrilled to have Brian and Donna Rauhm on the air with me. This is Michael Brown, your voice for moral sanity and spiritual clarity.

And the story you're going to hear is a story of warning and a story of redemption. And I'm going to dive right in with my guests, Brian and Donna. Welcome to the line of fire. Thanks for joining me. Hi, thanks for having us.

Hey there. All right. Can you hear me okay? I can. Can you hear me?

Breaking up just a little bit. So are you going to pass the phone to Donna at certain points? How are we going to do this? Okay. Yeah, I will pass it to her. I guess I'll just leave it off of speaker at this point and then just. Yeah, best to do that, right?

We get the best quality. Okay, Brian. All right. You were a student of mine at Christ for the Nations Institute of Biblical Studies on Long Island in the mid 1980s. And then went on from there, ended up going to law school. What happened to you after that, after you went to law school? What happened with your career?

After I went to law school, I ended up working for J. Succulo and we moved from Virginia Beach to New York to open up the New York City office. And I did that for a number of years. And then I went into private practice. And after that, I moved to Arizona and worked for a Christian legal organization for a number of years. And that's where things got a little murky.

All right. So so this was when I saw you, I hadn't seen you for years. I was out visiting a colleague who worked with that same Christian legal organization. And there you came in and jacket and tie.

It's like, whoa, man, you you have made it. I mean, this is a high, high level, highly respected organization. And what was your actual position within the organization at that time? I was at that point, I was vice president of marriage and family. So I was responsible for over a million dollar budget at about 20 people reporting to me. It was a lot of responsibility for sure. Right.

And prestigious organization, high level job, a lot of responsibility. So you and Donna are married. Did you have any kids at that point? Yeah, we were married in 92.

I went to work in Arizona in 2006. So at that point, we had five kids, one on the way and actually two other unofficially adopted children that we had taken into our house a number of years prior to that. So, yeah, we had a house full of kids at that point, for sure. So you were, I mean, living a dream in that respect, a follower of Jesus with a blessed marriage, with a bunch of kids in a very effective, important ministry, legal organization. Incredible.

And just passing things over to Donna. Donna, how would you characterize at the height at the best of things? How would you characterize life? Was it like living a dream? Was it just wonderful? And obviously life has its challenges, but did things really seem to be going well?

Yes, they were. It was just like living a dream. It was really idyllic. We had, I had the privilege of homeschooling our kids. We were part of a group of families who homeschooled. We were active in our church. I was very active in a kid's ministry in our church and everything was wonderful. It was blessed, just like he said. And would you say you were happily married? Absolutely. We were very happily married.

All right. So, so friends, this is, this is an amazing story. This is what many would hope for. I can't tell you how proud of Brian I was when I met him and saw, you know, a memory of a student in ministry school. I had no clue what his future would hold, no clue he'd go to law school, no clue he'd be that successful, to be entrusted with that much. And remember, this was marriage and family.

This is what he's, he's fighting for marriages and families in America, for righteousness, for goodness, and for Christian values, and for the threats to our legal rights. I mean, an important position there. Highly trusted. And something happened. So Brian, you and Donna just introduced a little habit.

It seems pretty harmless, pretty neutral. What happened? Yeah, at some point in our marriage, we began to drink on occasion. But as time progressed, I, you know, it was never enough.

I always seem to go too much. You know, it wasn't all the time. It was once in a while, here and there. But as the years went on, I opened the door more and more to alcohol abuse. And, you know, to the point where it was, it began to ruin my life.

I was, go ahead. Brian, did you struggle a lot with alcohol before that, or did it really start pretty innocently? Well, when I, I started drinking and using drugs at like 12 years old. Okay.

On Long Island. And, you know, I went through a progression. And then when I was 18, I started a job out of Delhi and I met a guy named Mark who shared the gospel with me. And after about a year of him sharing the gospel and then me saying, talk to the hand, I ultimately just committed my life to Jesus Christ and had a radical transformation. And I just rejected everything that was in my past. I stopped drinking. I stopped doing drugs and I was completely clean for years, for years.

I was, you know, and that's when I went to Bible college. That's when I met you, you know, and my life was on a right path, you know, until it started to go down the wrong path, you know, where I opened the door to those things from my past, which then, you know, took over even in a, with more of a vengeance than before. All right.

So, so over to, over to Donna here. When you first started socially drinking, you and Brian, did you think anything of it? Did it, did it seem totally innocent or did you have some concerns? It seemed totally innocent at first, but certainly after it started gaining momentum in the wrong direction, I started developing concerns, but we never really took any action to correct it because it didn't seem like it needed a course correction at that point.

All right. And that's, that's the way things creep in. So friends, this is a cautionary tale.

It's now you hear Brian and Donna on together now. So, you know, the end of the story must be a good ending, but it's going to get pretty bleak. It's going to get pretty dark. And Brian, I remember when you reached out to me some months back and said you, you wanted to talk to me, had quite a story to tell. So as you start getting into the darkest, worst parts of the story, I still noticed there was something positive in your voice. I thought, okay, there must be a good ending here because it's getting pretty dark. So what happens in your life?

You're living the dream, happily married, great wife, five kids serving in a high level Christian organization and trusted as a lawyer. And now you're starting to drink more and more. So paint the picture of what happened.

Yeah. I mean, I was traveling around the country going to different things, different meetings, and I would go out the night before. First of all, I started drinking while I was in the airport on my way to some meeting.

And then the night before I had a meeting, I would go out drinking and, you know, I would go to the meeting the next morning, you know, hung over, just bleary eyed. But I managed, you know, I seemed to get through it and I prospered, but I was living a double life and it was miserable. And at that point, infidelity crept in and I began to, you know, cheat on Donna on occasion and then it became, you know, it just became a very dark, dark double life that I was living.

And then I would come home and then everything, you know, I would just act like everything's fine. And it was just a horrendous existence at that point. What was going on in the inside of you? How did it feel to be living your life? What kind of torment were you living with? I just felt, I felt horrible. I felt like I was just like a terrible person, but I had like, I just couldn't seem to get, I didn't seem to have the wherewithal to get out of it.

You know, I would go back every time I would travel, I would just do the same thing. And it was just, it was incredibly hurtful inside to me. And then, you know, what I knew that I was keeping from my family and my wife was just horrendous. Yeah.

All right. So, so Donna, at what point did you realize that Brian was leading this double life? So believe it or not, it was not actually until he confessed it to me. Wow.

I had no idea what was going on. And we actually had a really wonderful married life. We spent a lot of time alone together. We were very faithful to have date nights. We, we had always really nurtured our marriage. And, and so all of that continued. And of course, I was busy with, with the kids and with ministry and stuff like that.

But, but we had always made our marriage a priority and we did continue to do that. So it was really a shock to me the day that, that Brian came in. He, ironically, we were hosting a Bible study that day. You might remember it.

It was called The Truth Project. I had no idea what kind of truth I was in for that day, but we were waiting for our guests to arrive. And he pulled me into the bedroom and, and simply blurted out, I've been unfaithful to you and I'm leaving.

And that was, that was the first I became aware that he had been living a double life. And, all right, it's, I want you to unpack this, but we're going to have a break coming up. But it wasn't then a confession of repentance and brokenness and agony. It was a confession of guilt and I'm going on with, with sin. So before we come back to you, Donna, to, to ask about the impact of, of that, and then what unfolds next, friends, you're hardly going to believe. One last question from you, Brian.

At that point, we've got about a minute now. At that point, you were not repentant. You were more locked in, like, this is who I am and this is what I'm going to do. Yeah, at that point, I had basically rejected God and was resisting Him completely. And I was living a life of just, you know what, I'm, I'm done with this. I'm just going to go off and do whatever I want to do. All right, friends, we've got a break. A little quicker than I said was coming. That's where things stood. And now what happens next is an unbelievable story.

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Here again, it's Dr. Michael Brown. Hey friends, a quick reminder, if you're not getting our Frontline newsletter every month, brand new publication, it'll bless you from the Hebrew word of the month to the amazing testimonies included to a great lead article to stir you. If you're not getting this, you want to get it. Plus, every week we'll let you know the latest articles and videos we've put out on key cutting edge issues to help you stand strong on the front lines. Go to thelineoffire.org. Thelineoffire.org. Take you a few seconds.

Sign up today. So back to Brian and Donna. Donna, in your mind, you're living a dream, happily married, great husband, devoted dad, five kids, church ministry, successful legal ministry career for your husband. And out of the blue, he tells you, I've been unfaithful and I'm leaving. So, you know, friends, when people say, how do you not notice these things? Number one, you're not looking for it.

You're not suspecting your spouse in this way. And people can compartmentalize to the point of living a double life, but only for so long. So Brian, rather than yielding to the internal torment and turning back to God, he sets his heart on rejecting God and being defiant.

So, Donna, that that moment and you've got people about to come over for a Bible study. I can't imagine your whole world crumbles. What what happened to you when he shared that? Well, I was devastated, of course. But what happened next in the hours and days that followed was really surprising to me. So Brian left.

He actually had the car running in the driveway when he made his announcement to me. Wow. Just left the kids, just walked out.

Yeah. And at that point we had six school aged kids at home and our two older kids. So we had eight kids at home. And I just fell to my knees and just, you know, buried my face in the couch and thought the Lord. But what happened next was very surprising to me because instead of the Lord speaking to me about Brian and talking to me about the condition of my own heart.

Wow. And it was like I wanted to say, well, Lord, didn't you just hear what he said? Didn't you didn't you catch that? But looking back, of course, I didn't realize this at the time, but it was just God's faithfulness to me that he wanted to deal with issues in my heart and my own sin and things that were separating me from him.

You know, things that are not as outwardly obvious, perhaps as alcoholism and drug abuse, stuff like judgment, which is equally sinful. But that was my moment alone with the Lord. And he led me to an opportunity. A couple of weeks after that, Brian and I had an opportunity to get together and the Lord led me to just repent to Brian and ask him to forgive me. Oh, hang on.

By the way, I want to make sure you're not on speaker phones so we can hear you as clearly as possible. Your husband has become an alcoholic and has cheated on you, committed adultery not once, but multiple times. He tells you that and he leaves. He's not he's not repentant. He's not broken. He leaves the family, abandons the kids, and God convicts you to ask him for forgiveness?

Explain that. Well, it sounds upside down, but I guess Jesus is upside down sometimes by our standards. And, you know, just to be clear, I was also freaking out at the same time. I was absolutely devastated. I had never experienced such profound rejection and fear and horror, really. But at the same time, I knew God's voice and I was seeking him in the word and that was where he led me. So I was just holding on with white knuckles, really.

I was just trying to do what he was showing me to do. Amazing. Amazing.

All right. So, Brian, she calls to us, sure, forgiveness. I'm sure you didn't see that coming. Did that soften your heart? Did that bring you to a point of repentance?

No, not at that point. I was still pretty, you know, hard-hearted. And, you know, at some point we reconciled on some level and went on for a couple more years. And then after that, I ended up going out and basically doing the same thing again, which then, you know, led to our ultimate divorce in 2014.

And at that point, go ahead. What happened to your job? Well, before that, when the organization I was working for found out that I had been on faithful, they asked for my resignation immediately.

So I was out of a job. That was, you know, early on when I had first, you know, come out to Donna and told her what happened. And then at that point, I was basically not working.

Then I started having my own practice where I was traveling to New York from Arizona and running a practice in New York. And that's when things went down the wrong road again and ultimately led in 2014 to our divorce. So at that point, after we were divorced, I went into complete and utter, a complete and utter tailspin into darkness. I ended up moving in with a woman and at, you know, at one point we were drinking like a 1.75 liter bottle of vodka every day.

I would drink, you know, wake up in the next morning and it would be like about an inch left, I would finish it off, get another one. And it was just, I was completely immobilized. I couldn't work, wouldn't work, whatever the case may be, I was completely and totally bound up by alcohol. And I didn't see my kids.

I didn't talk to Donna. I, you know, that's when I ended up going to jail twice for not paying child support. One time I spent, you know, about two months in jail and it was just a horrific existence.

I didn't have any hope for the future. I was living in complete darkness and I had rejected God and had just, I was a miserable pile of, you know what. And you actually ended up on a chain gang? Well, I was in what was called tent city in Arizona, which was a horrific existence where you lived outside in the heat and then you had to go to, you worked seven days a week. They chained you up. You walked about a mile to another facility where you worked all day and then you went back and you did this for seven days a week. No day off, no nothing.

They didn't pay you anything. It was just, it was a horrible, horrible experience. Right, so this was under a famous sheriff then in Arizona and ultimately that got banned.

But I just want you to get this picture. Living the dream, happily married, great wife, great family, five kids their own, other kids they've taken in, ultimately eight kids there. And then prestigious position in a prestigious Christian legal organization focusing on marriage and family from that to the chain gang. From that to being chained to other prisoners working humiliating work in the Arizona heat seven days a week and it started with a little social drinking. It started with something that seemed so innocent. Are you hearing me, friends? Are you getting the sense of this warning?

The plot thickens, but it's not the end of the story. As you can tell with Brian and Donna, I'm essentially you together. Hey, friends, Michael Brown here. My delight to serve as your voice for moral sanity and spiritual clarity. We are living in such urgent times today, friends, that all of us are in the line of fire. There's a target on your back.

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Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Friends, there's a message that I've preached now and taught for over 40 years. It came out of my study of Proverbs, and I was reading it in Hebrew and teaching an adult Sunday school class on Proverbs.

Late 70s, early 80s. And it was during that time I noticed the Hebrew word acharit, which can mean the end, and the acharit ha-yomim, at the end of days. But it's speaking not just end, but final consequence, after effects, end result.

And it occurs disproportionately in Proverbs. It's telling you to look at the acharit, you know, the seductive woman, your married man, the seductive woman. She may look so good. You may want that. She's so gorgeous.

But her acharit was the final land associated with her, is death and destruction. And Satan wants you to look at the moment. The flesh wants you to look at the moment. You need this. You want it. You have to have it. Be it the gratification of food, be it the gratification of sexual lust, be it the gratification of a gambling need. I have to have that now. And God wants you to look at the end result. In other words, if you could see the end result of your sin now, you'd never go in that direction. It's the same in Proverbs 23 with liquor.

You know, the wine, the glasses, and the cup. Oh, you want that. Make you feel better.

You rest better. And you don't see that it's acharit bites like a snake. So Brian has been bitten. He is now as low as it gets, working a chain gang. And Donna, a question for you. Obviously, when he wasn't paying child support, you did something legally that ended up with him being arrested and receiving this sentence. Why did you feel that that was the right thing to do at that point? And why did you feel that divorce was even a right thing at one point?

That's a great question. It was really twofold. Part of it was fear. I was afraid that Brian's reckless behavior financially was going to pose a threat to me and the kids.

And so part of it was just an attempt to mitigate that risk. And it was fear, just pure fear. But part of it also was my own just desire to be free from the marriage. And I was suffering so badly with rejection. And, you know, at that point I had walked with the Lord for long enough to know better than this. But I wanted to be loved. I wanted to experience the love of a man who would be faithful to me. And so I wanted to be free of the marriage. And so those were really the two reasons why I filed for divorce.

And obviously in retrospect, I don't I really don't think that that was the best solution, but it was the solution I chose at the time. And when you heard what had happened to Brian and ultimately on the chain gang, I believe two different occasions, how did you feel? Honestly, I was I felt gratified that he was paying a penalty because at that point I was so incredibly angry towards him. God did an unbelievably deep work in my heart and just helped me to to work through all of that anger and really just give it to him.

But I was happy that he was paying a penalty for what he had done. And what did the effect of his absence have on the kids? It was devastating, absolutely devastating to them.

They felt abandoned. And, you know, God is faithful. He he has restored and he's still in the process of healing them. But that father wound of abandonment, it's a big one. So they're still walking through that with the Lord.

But he's so good and he's so faithful. So at some point, though, your heart changes and you begin praying for Brian in renewed ways. So, Brian, you've hit bottom now, but rather than breaking, repenting, you're still in a rut. What begins to happen?

Where does light start to shine in the darkness? Well, I really got to the end of my rope. The woman I was living with, her house was getting foreclosed on. She was already going to stay with another guy.

It was just a really toxic relationship. And I had virtually nowhere to go. And Donna secured a place for me at the Phoenix Dream Center. And she said, look, I've got a place for you.

You can go. And I was at that point. I, you know, I was just I had nothing. I had no other option. And it was like, you know what, God, I'm going to go down this road because I know that I have no place, no other place to go. And there's no other hope for me. So what year is this, Brian?

This is in December of 2016. And during this time or leading up to this time, did you kind of feel that God would never forgive you, that you had gone too far? Yeah, I felt like completely disconnected and away from God. And I had didn't even really consider the fact that he that I could come back. You know, I was just I felt like I had made up my mind and that, you know, I had made my bed and I had to sleep in it.

And that was it. But at some point there was a glimmer of hope. When I went into the Dream Center at that point, I really didn't feel, you know, the wooing of the Holy Spirit. I just knew that I needed to I needed to take a step forward. And I went in in early December of 2016 when I went in on a Friday night. I had been drinking the night before. And, you know, every day when I would wake up, I would feel the effects of alcohol. I would have the shakes and I would feel, you know, horrible. And when I woke up that Saturday morning after I had gone into the Dream Center, I had no ill effects from the alcohol.

No withdrawal symptoms, nothing. It was just a miraculous, absolute deliverance. And at that point I was like, you know what, God, I am just going to submit myself to this program. Whatever they tell me to do, I'm going to do.

Whatever I have to do, I'm going to do. And I didn't at that point, I did not even feel the presence of God or the, you know, the sensation of the Holy Spirit or anything. I just knew in my heart that I had to walk it out. I had to walk down that road and leave my past behind and move forward. And little by little God began to restore in my heart different things. And what happened was in around February of 2017, Donna and I began to talk.

And she sent a letter to me and we started writing letters back and forth. And I'll let her explain what happened to her. She was at a conference and I'll let her talk about that. All right. So Donna, let's just back up a little. What happened in your heart that got you from being happy that he's on the chain gang to now getting a place for him in the Phoenix Dream Center? Start there and then we'll get to the specific anecdote that Brian wanted you to discuss.

OK. It's a great story. And it started one day while I was folding laundry. I was folding laundry and I was praying and and the Lord just spoke to my heart and he said, you know, you pray for people that you don't even know if somebody asks you to pray for them. You're like, yeah, of course, I'll pray for you. And yet you don't pray for this man who is the father of your children.

Like, what's up with that? And I was so convicted by that that I very reluctantly started to pray for Brian. And that was the first step. The next step was a dream that I had. And in the dream, I was in driving through the woods and I saw a little boy and this little boy had been bitten by a snake. And I knew that the little boy represented Brian.

I took the little boy into my car and I brought him to a place of safety. And when I woke up, I knew the dream was from the Lord. And so that was another big part of how God softened my heart. And then one other really big event for me was just a moment that I had alone with the Lord. I was reading The Problem of Pain by C.S.

Lewis. And in that book, there's a part where he's describing God's divine humility. He's talking about God, if God were proud, he would never have us on the terms that we come the way we come to him.

Like Brian was saying, he went to the dream center because he knew he had nowhere else to go. And and God knows that we come to him because basically we run out of options. And and Lewis says that if God were proud, he would never have us on those terms.

But he's not proud. He stoops to conquer. And in that moment, I recognize what Jesus did for me. I recognize that I came to him in very much the same way that Brian was going to the dream center. And for the first time in my life, I truly understood the cross. And it broke my heart. Incredible.

Incredible. The grace of God, the mercy of God and God's jealousy for relationships, marriages to be restored. Maybe your marriage is completely broken. Maybe you've gone through a divorce. If your spouse is still living, there's hope. There's hope for reconciliation.

So the specific instance that Brian was talking about, tell us about that. So I was I was at a conference and I had been praying and it's an annual event that we have at our church. And we we all pray for God to lead us and guide us. And then we all go up to this mountain top and we pray on this top of this mountain together.

And so in the moments where the pastor was leading us to really seek the Lord and hear from him, I felt like the Lord told me that he was going to reconcile our marriage. And I was like, no way. Not with me.

Find somebody else. Like I just still wasn't ready for that at that point. But again, I know I know my father's voice and I know I knew it was the word. So I grabbed two of my besties and I confided in them because I knew I needed accountability to this word. And the three of us prayed together and and that was the beginning of my step of faith. I told the Lord I don't I don't really want this. I don't want this reconciliation, but I can see your goodness. I know that this is you. And so if you change my heart, I'll step into this. Honesty before the Lord, since he knows things anyway. Yeah. Well, you can figure out what happened, but the story gets better.

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We use them ourselves through our offices here. Alright, let's get to the end of the story with Brian and Donna, really the beginning of the new story. So Brian, God puts this in Donna's heart. She doesn't want to reconcile but God's telling her he wants to and she's willing to let God work on her heart.

You now find out this is an option. God's been restoring you. So take it from there. So it was a process, a slow process of restoration at the Dream Center. The first six months I couldn't leave the campus.

I didn't have a phone. So we had very limited contact. Donna and I would see each other on Sunday at church and then she would come to visit on Sunday afternoon. By the second six months I was able to leave campus so we started to spend more time together. We went to counseling.

God started to just put together the pieces of our lives and restoring our affections for each other. Initially she had written me a letter and she said that she loved me. I was like oh, but she didn't really mean it that way evidently. But I took that as a door that was wide open. I was like I love you too.

I always did love you. But we got past that and God started to just really move in our lives. My first job that I had after my first six months at the Dream Center was working at the concession stand at the baseball stadium at the basketball arena. Upon the concession stand, that's where I worked for about a year, maybe two years. That was my step back into the working world through those doors of humility. In fact, at one point I was behind the counter and one of the people that I worked for at the Christian Legal Organization came up and I was like hi, how are you doing? It was just so humbling to find myself in that situation. And you got the outfit on, right?

Yeah, I got the hat on. But I didn't care because God had brought me, at that point I had left everything at the altar. Nothing bothered me.

It didn't bother me that I didn't have barely any clothes. I didn't have hardly any money because I knew that I was on the path back to where God wanted me to be. It was just an amazing experience of restoration, a slow process, which all led up to July 18th of 2020 when we were remarried.

That was the same day, July 18th was the same day we were initially married in 1992. So it was just an amazing feat of restoration that God had done and it was just the beginning. It was really just the beginning of what God was doing in my life and in our lives, restoring my relationship with our kids, helping me to build relationships that I never had with my kids. To this day, He's still working that out and restoring relationships that I had lost in my darkness with friends, people I had gone to Bible college with, people that I had worked with, my family, just everything, God putting the pieces together. I had lost my law license in 2017.

This summer I had the opportunity to reapply to get my law license restored. It's just an amazing, an amazing, an amazing experience of God's goodness and mercy and just His just pouring out, His blessing on us as a family, restoring our finances to us. Just everything that you can think of, every little thing, God, nothing gets wasted in God's economy. Every little thing God is using from my past, from our past, and He's putting it back together in a way that's glorifying to Him. It's just an amazing thing, and I know that if God did it in our lives, He can do it in anyone's lives, because God has no respect for a person.

He desires that all should know Him, come to repentance, and just experience the goodness of God, because God is so absolutely awesome, and I just can't say enough about what He's done in our lives. And Brian, you and Donna have been doing ministry within your church, sharing your testimony. You only came on the air here because your leadership said, hey, you're ready to share this on a national level. So, we've got about five minutes. I want to give a couple minutes to each of you. Donna, first, would you speak to individuals whose marriage is broken, maybe the divorce has already taken place, maybe separation right now. Could you just take a couple minutes and speak from your heart in terms of hope for restoration and don't give up fighting?

Absolutely. I think when God first told me that He wanted to restore our marriage, it was too unbelievable for me to process, but He did it, and He truly does do more than we could hope for or imagine. In fact, one day I was repenting to Him and saying, Lord, I'm so sorry that You're so good. I know You're so good. How could I have not imagined that You could have done such a miracle? And He just said, honey, it's okay.

That's my job to do more than you can imagine. So, I would just say, don't give up because God can do stuff that you never even dreamed possible. And He can change your heart to love a man that you once hated. I just, I cannot even tell you how deeply I love and admire my husband now. This is a new man. God can change your marriage, and your husband can become a new man, your wife can become a new woman.

God makes all things new. And would you say that your relationship, your marriage is even deeper and stronger now than it was back then? Absolutely. Absolutely. The Lord has brought us to a depth of intimacy in our relationship, spiritually and emotionally, even physically, that we never had before.

We just didn't know what we were missing. And had we not given Him the opportunity to have His will and to have His way in our lives, we would have never experienced the goodness that we're experiencing now and the opportunity to share His faithfulness with other people. Amazing. What a redeemer.

What a redeemer. And Brian, take a minute or two just to give a word of warning about the dangers of opening the door and playing with sin. Oh yeah, I mean, if you open the door to alcohol and drugs and you let that in, it can completely and absolutely dominate and take over your life. And that's what happened with me. And I would just say, stay away from it. There's nothing good about it.

There's nothing that is beneficial to it. And to be delivered from it is just an amazing, amazing thing. But for many people, it's not that easy. And it's just something that you don't want to have to deal with. So if you can avoid it, avoid it. And it's something that is avoidable. And I would say that take my story as one that, don't go down that road kind of a thing.

Don't go down that road. And last minute, how would you say your relationship with the Lord now is different than it was before your fall? Oh, I mean, my relationship with God now is just a completely different thing than it was before. I've got such an appreciation for what he's done. I've got such a thankfulness. I've got such an awe of who God is and what he has been to me in my life. The redemption, the restoration, the just the feeling. I sense God now more than I ever have. And you know, when I first got saved, I got radically saved and I was just full of spirit.

But now having gone through all of this in my life, it's just there's a depth that it goes way beyond what I had initially experienced. And I'm just so absolutely grateful and thankful for what God has done in my life. Amazing. Amazing.

Well, here's the deal, Brian. God willing, next time I'm out in Phoenix, got to meet you and Donna face to face and rejoice together in the amazing goodness of God and know that that your story is going to speak to a whole lot of people. It's going to save some from death and destruction. It's going to bring restoration and hope and people have given up all hope.

And as you continue to love the Lord, love one another, restoration keeps coming with kids and so many other ways. So thanks for your openness. Thanks for your humility. Thanks for your vulnerability. And I am so thrilled to be with you on this side of the story.

And I can't wait to share it with more people. Thanks again. And great blessing and love to you. Amen. Thanks a lot.

All right. Thank you are our absolute joy. Well, friends, you now know why I've been looking forward to doing this interview. And do I need to tell you to share it with others? If you're listening by podcast, share it with others. You watched it on YouTube or Facebook.

Share it with others. The warning, the hope from the heights to the depths. But thank God. Thank God. Thank God.

It didn't end there. He's more faithful than we could ever, ever imagine. And wherever you are, if you find yourself in the worst depths you could ever imagine, if from there you cry out, he will hear. He will help. He will deliver. Another program powered by the Truth Network.