How I Met God in the Middle of Meth and Metal

What does heavy metal have to do with Jesus? A lot, actually. Brian “Head” Welch, along with his band Korn, changed the game when it comes to rock & metal music. Along the way, “Head” had to battle loneliness, depression, addiction, being a single dad and so much more. Watch his story and you’ll see how God can redeem any story and He can redeem your story too.

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    – Hey, I'm Brian Tome, senior pastor at Crossroads.
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    Welcome, glad you're with us today.
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    Today, we're going to have Brian Head Welch
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    from the band Korn talk about meth, metal and Jesus.
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    You might go, "Korn? Heavy metal? Meth?
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    What is that all about?"
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    This is part of what I love about Brian.
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    He's been a friend of mine for years.
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    And part of what I love about today.
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    We want to strip away the religiosity.
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    We want to stop just saying the nice things
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    that people in church are supposed to say.
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    We want to talk about things that are real,
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    things are in our lives in a way
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    that normal people do on their back deck.
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    That's what we're going to do today
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    to try to get you and I to a new place.
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    Brian's a great friend.
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    He's got some good stuff for us.
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    Let's get started.
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    – You're on.
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    – Special guest to the stage, please.
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    Special guest to the stage.
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    – Is this thing on?
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    – I had friends who invited me
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    to have dinner with you a few years ago,
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    and it was great.
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    We've downed a lot of calories together,
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    a lot of calories.
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    And they said, "Well, he has this documentary out."
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    And I'm kind of a documentary buff.
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    – Me, too.
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    – But I wasn't all that excited about it,
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    because I knew ahead of time it was going to talk
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    about your coming to Christ.
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    And Christian documentaries,
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    "Christian documentaries" tend to not inspire me.
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    What I saw was not a Christian documentary.
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    It was a documentary where Christ
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    was through the whole thing and I was blown away.
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    I mean, I'm talking very, very deeply moved.
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    And it just made me look forward
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    to having that first dinner with you.
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    And I'm just excited for people here Crossroads
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    to get to know you,
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    hopefully get engaged with your movie.
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    Just give us a little snippet of your life.
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    Not that we want to let the cat out of the bag
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    about your documentary, but just tell us,
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    who is Brian Head Welch?
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    You've got a big head, Keith.
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    – That's exactly --
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    – What is that head thing about. What are you Head Welch for?
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    – That's why, because my head grew before my body
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    when I was 14 and everybody else was taller than me,
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    but my head was bigger than theirs,
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    puberty, that puberty thing.
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    So they started calling me Head because
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    I was disproportionate and everything.
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    And so it was a -- it was a troubling nickname
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    when I was a kid, but when I was in the band,
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    we wanted nicknames in our early 20s.
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    We're still kids.
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    "Didn't they used to call you Head?"
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    I was like, "Yeah, let's go with that."
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    You know, I wasn't very creative,
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    so I just went backwards.
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    But, you know, I just -- I just --
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    My life, I wanted to be, we talked about earlier,
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    AC/DC, I got the album Back in Black
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    and I put it on and I heard,
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    "Back in black, I hit the sack."
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    And I was like, I heard the guitar
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    and I just want to do that.
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    This is what I want to do.
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    10 years old, I knew what I wanted to do.
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    And so I went for it and I achieved it.
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    And we'll get into the story,
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    but I suffered self-hatred and depression
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    since I was a kid, and I think the music
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    was like what I hung on to to make me
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    feel better about myself because I got good at it.
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    And so it just made me feel like I was better
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    than the person I looked and I saw in the mirror.
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    Know that I -- and so I hung on to that.
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    And then when I got in front of, you know,
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    sold millions of records, got in front of
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    all these thousands of people, I was insecure.
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    And so I always wanted to be masking a love,
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    you know, kind of like overshadowed
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    the self-hatred and the addictions and everything
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    and started making me process.
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    Not that I got clean
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    and got my life figured out right away,
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    but it started, the seed was planted in like,
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    "Oh, you can't be like this forever.
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    Now you have someone that needs to look up to you
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    and you need to be there for."
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    So it started, you know, took a few years,
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    but that seed was planted.
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    – I wonder what the rejection you've said
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    that you felt, the self-hatred, the bullying,
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    right around that time when Jennea, your wife left you,
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    did that feel you like another way
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    that women didn't like you, or is that another
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    sense of form of rejection that hit you deeply?
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    What did that do for your spiritual journey?
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    – That -- hat parts?
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    – When your marriage dissolved?
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    – Oh, wow.
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    So my first girlfriend, the first real girlfriend,
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    two years know we were together, we had
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    a great, great relationship early on,
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    then that self-hatred and alcoholism
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    kind of kicked in around that time, too.
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    It made me, once I knew that she was--
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    I believed that she loved me,
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    then I got comfortable.
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    And the anger that I had towards myself,
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    I put it onto her and I started treating her bad.
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    Anyway, long story short, I got my heart broken.
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    Man, I'm a feeler. I feel deep.
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    And even though I messed up and I couldn't,
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    like, keep the relationships going,
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    I couldn't treat people, especially girls,
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    like I wanted to, I felt it big time and got suicidal.
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    And so I stayed single for a while,
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    then and I met my wife, who would be my wife.
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    And we were off and on for a while.
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    But yeah, when she got pregnant
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    and we wanted to make this family work, you know,
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    and be this married couple that could just
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    have at least semi happy.
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    But when she left me, the divorce,
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    that was another just blow.
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    It seemed like I was always the one
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    just to stay in the relationship,
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    even if it was misery. I don't know why.
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    But it was only two real relationships,
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    but both of them left me.
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    And so when my ex-wife left me, she, you know,
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    she was broken, she was a hurting soul.
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    She ran away at 14 because of just family issues.
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    So, yeah, that was devastating,
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    but mainly because she left her daughter. You know?
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    She did want to take her daughter with her,
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    but she was with some gang bangers, you know?
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    And I have high powered lawyers.
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    I can't -- I wanted her in her mom's life,
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    but I couldn't let her, "Oh, take your daughter."
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    I cannot let these felons around my daughter.
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    There's going to be some kind of abuse
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    whether it's physical, sexual, or something.
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    So I had to protect her. You know?
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    And so I just did what --
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    I manned up and did what I could do.
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    And I tried to keep her in her life,
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    you know, supervised,
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    but she went off the deep end, unfortunately.
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    – I think that's what I love about your story,
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    your documentary, it's very real, it's very raw.
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    You're very respectful to your ex-wife
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    in the documentary, but the language that
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    you allow your bandmates to use in talking about Christians,
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    which is very negative in the beginning
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    part of the documentary, the level of brokenness
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    and despair you allow people to see in your life
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    is quite frankly, exhilarating for me, exhilarating.
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    It seems like the longer I'm a follower of Christ,
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    the more I'm supposed to have everything together.
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    And there is a level of you do spiritually mature
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    and you do figure out life
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    and you get closer with God
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    and you don't step in the same potholes
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    as you did when you were 16 or 26.
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    But you just ripped the mask off of that.
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    You're just like, "Here's my life,
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    here's what God's done for me."
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    And you're talking about your wife
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    and your daughter just reminds you of that.
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    So I just say, kudos, man.
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    I just hope that that spirit, that ethic, if you will,
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    infiltrates our entire church
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    and our entire country because it's needed desperately.
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    – I hope that you guys talk about
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    these hard issues at your church,
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    whether it's smaller groups.
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    And I know you do, you have counseling.
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    You have -- we have to deal with it.
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    And that's what I wanted to do in this documentary,
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    because you know how many
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    broken Korn fans are out there?
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    I mean, so many people came to Korn
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    because our singer sing about pain.
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    We sang about child abuse.
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    We sing about, you know, just parental issues,
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    bullying, all this stuff,
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    when we first started especially.
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    And these kids, man, back in the day,
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    they would run to us and just tell us like
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    we make them want to keep living.
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    We just did 700 meet and greets on Zoom during COVID.
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    And every single -- we did it for over a month,
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    like 20 people a night for three nights a week.
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    Every single night there was adults saying,
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    "Like, I wouldn't have this family,
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    these kids run around behind me
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    if it wasn't for you guys.
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    I had a gun to my head and just thank you.
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    I just wanted to tell you thank you for
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    I have my family because your music helped me."
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    And so it's just --
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    – "Your music helped me"?
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    Korn isn't known is uplifting and inspiring,
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    encouraging Christian music. Or is it?
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    – If you read the Psalms where David's
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    getting chased by, you know, and what is he saying?
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    He's saying, my eyes are, you would know,
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    you're a pastor, but his eyes are swollen from tears
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    and all the stuff. I'm in despair, everything.
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    – Laments, it's the laments.
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    – Right. He's lamenting.
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    Korn has done that in music.
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    And yeah, there's some FU's and, you know,
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    and, you know, you treated me this way.
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    But it's a step into healing for these people.
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    Maybe it's not a complete healing and forgiveness
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    and into God's, you know, all that.
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    But God has used it massively
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    as a step to keep people living.
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    – What was the tipping point for you spiritually
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    when you when you came to Christ, whatever,
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    I don't even know what nomenclature you prefer?
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    When you came to Christ, you got converted,
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    you got saved, you felt the love of God.
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    Was there a unique tipping point moment
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    or did you just gradually
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    grow into relationship with Christ?
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    – It was a handful of things.
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    It was, okay, I was desperate
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    for freedom from addiction because
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    I ended up going overseas.
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    I was such an addict that I took
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    eight balls of meth with me.
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    I ran out of drugs in Europe and I had my dealer
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    send me three more eight balls of meth
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    inside of these candles that he made.
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    And I've watched them be FedExed.
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    And it was when FedEx tracking
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    early 2000's was starting to take off.
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    And I watched them get sent to me.
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    I thought I was -- I was paranoid that
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    I was going to get caught
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    and they're going to find them in the scanners,
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    you know, because I'm watching a show on Netflix
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    about border security and I'm like,
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    "Wow, that's how they do it.
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    They could have easily found my drugs."
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    So that's when I got to the bottom
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    and I needed to get -- I needed to get free.
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    And so once I went to rehabs
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    and AA and NA, all that stuff,
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    I got some some hope and wisdom from those places,
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    but I couldn't stop.
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    So what I needed from Christ was -- or church people.
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    I don't even think Christ, like I couldn't.
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    If God is real, you can't know until you die.
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    So but I go around these church people
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    because I want them to help me get sober.
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    And then they introduced me to Christ,
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    that He's living and He'll come and live
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    inside of you and He'll reveal that to you.
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    And if you stay seeking Him, three things:
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    going to church, fellowshipping with other Christians
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    and learning from them and reading your Bible.
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    That's what the pastor told me to do,
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    if I kept doing that,
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    Christ would be revealed to me.
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    And Jesus said, "If you love me."
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    – Go to church, interact with other believers,
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    read your Bible? And you did those three things?
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    – I did those three things.
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    I was like, OK, if you crazy Ned Flanders Christians
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    are lying to me, I'm going to find out in a month.
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    But if not, I've actually found out
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    the meaning of life through it, because
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    Christ revealed Himself to me.
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    Jesus said, "If you love me,
  • 00:12:42
    that He would manifest himself to you."
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    In John 14 He said He would manifest himself.
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    He manifest Himself to me. And once --
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    So, OK, that's --I needed freedom from addiction
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    from Him, but what I didn't know was
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    that the whole reason for living is knowing Him.
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    And so once my addiction was done, I was like,
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    "Oh my gosh, I didn't know this dream
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    could come into my life,
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    that I didn't even have a desire to.
  • 00:13:09
    I didn't know I could know Jesus like this."
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    All the love that crushed my heart,
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    the relationships that didn't work,
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    Jesus would never do that to me.
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    He would never leave me.
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    He would never crush my heart like that,
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    even if I treated Him bad,
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    like I did the girls in the past,
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    my ex-wife when she left me and that other girl.
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    If I did worse to Jesus, He would never leave.
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    He would never abandon my heart like that.
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    I was like, so addicted to staying with Him
  • 00:13:37
    and working through this process with Him.
  • 00:13:40
    It's like -- and people were like,
  • 00:13:41
    "Man, this is just a phase.
  • 00:13:42
    You're coming off of meth. You know?
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    You're trading one addiction for another.
  • 00:13:47
    You know, it's not going to stay."
  • 00:13:48
    And I'm like, "You don't understand,
  • 00:13:50
    I found the meaning of life."
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    So I started getting Jesus tattooed and scriptures.
  • 00:13:54
    I was like, I'll show them, you know?
  • 00:13:56
    Matthew 11:28, that's the scripture that
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    this guy sent it to me I went off meth,
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    right before I went to church he was like,
  • 00:14:02
    "I felt like Jesus gave me this scripture for you.
  • 00:14:05
    I've never done this before, but I'm giving it to you.
  • 00:14:07
    Don't think I'm weird, please.
  • 00:14:09
    It says Matthew 11:28, 'Come to me, '
  • 00:14:12
    Jesus says, "All who are weary and burdened
  • 00:14:14
    and I will give you rest.'"
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    And I just was like that's the scripture
  • 00:14:19
    that got me and started opening up the life, you know?
  • 00:14:25
    – That's amazing.
  • 00:14:27
    What I love, there's so many things I love
  • 00:14:31
    about you and love about your story.
  • 00:14:33
    One of the things is just how
  • 00:14:37
    you still are finding a way
  • 00:14:41
    to represent Jesus inside of your occupation.
  • 00:14:46
    You know, if you can figure out a way
  • 00:14:48
    to represent Jews inside of a metal band
  • 00:14:51
    and actually change the band, in many ways.
  • 00:14:53
    You guys pray for people at your concerts even, right?
  • 00:14:57
    – I do. – You do?
  • 00:14:58
    – Yeah. – And that's why some people
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    were getting on those Zoom calls
  • 00:15:01
    and talking about those things with you.
  • 00:15:04
    I think all of us could figure out
  • 00:15:06
    how to represent Christ and whatever job we are,
  • 00:15:08
    and the world would probably be a lot more different
  • 00:15:10
    and our lives would be different.
  • 00:15:12
    And I want to ask you to make a little shift right now.
  • 00:15:14
    Are you up for a challenge, Brian Head Welch?
  • 00:15:16
    – Always up for a challenge. – Are you up for a challenge?
  • 00:15:19
    – Yes. – All right.
  • 00:15:20
    First of all, you said you're very emotional.
  • 00:15:22
    Is that -- I never asked you about your tattoos
  • 00:15:24
    with the teardrops and stuff on the side of your eyes.
  • 00:15:26
    Is that coming out of --
  • 00:15:28
    – I got those laser tattoo removal.
  • 00:15:30
    Look, they're almost gone
  • 00:15:32
    because people thought I killed two people.
  • 00:15:35
    You know, teardrops mean murder.
  • 00:15:36
    I'm just joking. They were -- They were too --
  • 00:15:38
    I didn't like them on the side or whatever.
  • 00:15:40
    – Well, I like them.
  • 00:15:41
    – Thank you. Well, I'm not putting them back.
  • 00:15:43
    – It fits your ethic. That's good.
  • 00:15:44
    – Thanks. – But let's play preaching time.
  • 00:15:48
    I'm going to give you like
  • 00:15:50
    three one-minute sermon opportunities.
  • 00:15:53
    Can you do it? Are you up for that opportunity?
  • 00:15:55
    – Of course.
  • 00:15:56
    – OK, so let's say you're preaching right now.
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    You got one minute to talk to everybody
  • 00:16:02
    who's dealing with addiction.
  • 00:16:05
    Preach to them right now. What do you say?
  • 00:16:07
    – In that camera? – Sure.
  • 00:16:09
    – Or to you? – That camera.
  • 00:16:12
    – So there is a healthy addiction you can have
  • 00:16:14
    and that's a love that comes from another realm.
  • 00:16:18
    Once you touch that, and I mean,
  • 00:16:20
    I would just say my story,
  • 00:16:21
    once you touch that love, you kind of
  • 00:16:24
    put down these little --
  • 00:16:25
    like those other addictions seem like little toys.
  • 00:16:27
    It's like your child, you have these toys
  • 00:16:29
    and your parents come in and bring you
  • 00:16:31
    this big truck and you're like,
  • 00:16:33
    you just throw those toys away
  • 00:16:35
    and you go to the truck.
  • 00:16:36
    It's like that when you meet Christ,
  • 00:16:37
    these little addictions, you throw them away
  • 00:16:39
    and you just follow this big great, forgiving,
  • 00:16:45
    loving God that doesn't judge you,
  • 00:16:49
    that just as mercy, nothing but mercy for you,
  • 00:16:52
    kindness, and the power to give you
  • 00:16:56
    to overcome all of your addictions.
  • 00:16:58
    And it happened to me.
  • 00:17:00
    I mean, if Jesus can set a crazy rock star
  • 00:17:05
    with all the drugs that I wanted.
  • 00:17:08
    I had all the money that I wanted
  • 00:17:10
    to buy all the drugs that I wanted.
  • 00:17:11
    If you could set me free from drugs,
  • 00:17:14
    then obviously, your addictions are nothing to Him.
  • 00:17:17
    It's simple.
  • 00:17:19
    – Ok, now give a minute sermon to those of us
  • 00:17:25
    who some of us may be millionaires
  • 00:17:27
    or be on top of the world in terms of world success,
  • 00:17:30
    but the self-loathing and the sense of rejection,
  • 00:17:34
    the need to measure up is
  • 00:17:35
    a never-ending CD in the back of their mind.
  • 00:17:38
    What do you preach to us?
  • 00:17:39
    – Oh, man. You put me on the spot now.
  • 00:17:41
    – Yeah.
  • 00:17:42
    – I mean, Paul said in the New Testament
  • 00:17:46
    that he has learned the secret of being
  • 00:17:49
    content in life with having --
  • 00:17:52
    with being in want and being in need and having plenty.
  • 00:17:56
    So I look at that as him saying like
  • 00:17:59
    he's been rich and he's been poor
  • 00:18:01
    and he's found the secret of being content
  • 00:18:04
    in both situations.
  • 00:18:05
    And that secret is in the next verse
  • 00:18:08
    where he says, "I can do all things
  • 00:18:09
    through Christ who strengthens me."
  • 00:18:11
    And in my life, I was definitely
  • 00:18:13
    living on couches before Korn.
  • 00:18:15
    I was eating Top Ramen.
  • 00:18:17
    I was definitely homeless.
  • 00:18:19
    And I lived both of those realms.
  • 00:18:24
    I lived poor, then I got rich without Christ.
  • 00:18:27
    I was a poor alcoholic, Top Ramen eaten poor guy.
  • 00:18:33
    And I was a rich rock star without Christ.
  • 00:18:36
    And I was a failure at both.
  • 00:18:37
    Once I met Christ, I was a multimillionaire
  • 00:18:41
    and I didn't have that contentment.
  • 00:18:45
    When I had all the money, when I was walking with Christ,
  • 00:18:48
    I ended up with all these emotional problems
  • 00:18:50
    and I lost all my money.
  • 00:18:52
    Then I went back to the poor realm,
  • 00:18:54
    not really poor or homeless,
  • 00:18:55
    but I lost all my millions and ended up in bankruptcy.
  • 00:19:00
    The Lord showed me that He took care of me
  • 00:19:02
    in my need, just like Paul said,
  • 00:19:05
    and He brought me contentment
  • 00:19:06
    when I was in lack during the bankruptcy.
  • 00:19:09
    Then He started piling back onto me the riches
  • 00:19:12
    and giving me blessings,
  • 00:19:14
    financial blessings, and everything.
  • 00:19:16
    And now I'm learning all of this other stuff
  • 00:19:19
    with investments and everything and walk
  • 00:19:21
    and being content with the riches.
  • 00:19:22
    So it's like He teaches you
  • 00:19:25
    how to be in charge of your finances
  • 00:19:29
    and He teaches you that He'll take care
  • 00:19:31
    of you when you don't have finances.
  • 00:19:33
    It's just He's everything, man.
  • 00:19:35
    And and I would just say, anybody rich out there --
  • 00:19:38
    This is longer than a minute.
  • 00:19:39
    Anybody that's rich and successful out there
  • 00:19:41
    and you're trying to measure up, man,
  • 00:19:43
    just surrender, just surrender,
  • 00:19:46
    and you give your heart to Christ
  • 00:19:47
    and let Him hold you, because that stuff is --
  • 00:19:50
    it can be here today and gone tomorrow.
  • 00:19:54
    – Ok, one minute preaching
  • 00:19:56
    to people who are single parents.
  • 00:19:59
    – Ok, so I'm the classic example
  • 00:20:02
    of a parent who loved their kids,
  • 00:20:06
    but massively made mistakes before Jesus
  • 00:20:09
    and after Jesus.
  • 00:20:11
    I would just say to you single parents that
  • 00:20:14
    you can do it and God is with you.
  • 00:20:17
    God says He's a father to the fatherless,
  • 00:20:20
    so that also means He can be like
  • 00:20:23
    a mother to the motherless.
  • 00:20:25
    And my daughter grew up without her mother
  • 00:20:27
    and God was right there helping us along the way.
  • 00:20:31
    He was right there healing my mistakes
  • 00:20:35
    and leading us to the right people.
  • 00:20:38
    And even when my daughter got rebellious
  • 00:20:41
    because of wounds from her childhood,
  • 00:20:44
    He helped me be strong enough to use tough love
  • 00:20:47
    to get her into a therapeutic boarding school
  • 00:20:50
    to make her life just flourish and heal.
  • 00:20:54
    And so every step of the way, I would say to you,
  • 00:20:58
    single parent, I know the pain.
  • 00:20:59
    I know how hard it is, but do everything
  • 00:21:02
    you can do to train your children up with God
  • 00:21:08
    so that they don't depart from it.
  • 00:21:10
    And even if it's tough love before they're 18,
  • 00:21:13
    don't let them go. Don't let them go.
  • 00:21:17
    Do everything you can to show them love,
  • 00:21:20
    but also to be there.
  • 00:21:22
    Because children, they need discipline
  • 00:21:24
    and they need to know that you're going
  • 00:21:26
    to step out there and stop them
  • 00:21:29
    if they're going the wrong way.
  • 00:21:32
    Because something, even if they're like
  • 00:21:35
    they're yelling that they hate you,
  • 00:21:38
    deep down in their souls they want to see that
  • 00:21:41
    because a parent that lets kids do whatever they want,
  • 00:21:43
    it shows them that --
  • 00:21:45
    – They're not worth fighting for.
  • 00:21:47
    – Yeah, they're not worth fighting for.
  • 00:21:48
    Maybe they do love them,
  • 00:21:49
    but they're not worth fighting for.
  • 00:21:51
    So there's something in the soul of children
  • 00:21:54
    that need that and want that.
  • 00:21:56
    That's what it says in the Bible, that,
  • 00:21:58
    you know, it's healthy to discipline out of love,
  • 00:22:00
    it's very important.
  • 00:22:01
    So don't give up again.
  • 00:22:04
    Again, a messy rock star, single parent,
  • 00:22:06
    messed so many things up with my child.
  • 00:22:09
    And she is doing amazing,
  • 00:22:10
    working for a nonprofit, 22 years old,
  • 00:22:13
    and I'm so proud of her.
  • 00:22:14
    So keep your head up.
  • 00:22:16
    – Is there anything you want to talk about
  • 00:22:18
    that I didn't prompt you with
  • 00:22:20
    or that we haven't talked about yet?
  • 00:22:25
    – Off the top of my head?
  • 00:22:27
    – And you can say no too. That's fine.
  • 00:22:34
    Yeah, I would.
  • 00:22:36
    I would just want to say
  • 00:22:37
    there's a lot of people in big churches and small,
  • 00:22:40
    you know, especially big churches
  • 00:22:42
    where they come and, you know, they hear about God
  • 00:22:46
    and they hear about what God can do.
  • 00:22:49
    And sometimes in small churches or big churches,
  • 00:22:53
    you can get lost in the fact that,
  • 00:22:56
    and I know your heart is the same way.
  • 00:22:58
    That God has given us these churches
  • 00:23:01
    and this message in the Bible is about
  • 00:23:04
    one on one relationship that we don't have,
  • 00:23:07
    we don't go to God through the pastor.
  • 00:23:09
    We don't come to see a sermon.
  • 00:23:11
    We don't -- we're not living our relationship
  • 00:23:16
    through a spiritual leader.
  • 00:23:19
    The churches are meant to be a spiritual
  • 00:23:22
    filling station for us to go home
  • 00:23:24
    and spend every day with our relationship with God.
  • 00:23:27
    He wants us to have a personal relationship with God
  • 00:23:29
    and to build us up in that relationship.
  • 00:23:32
    And I love what you guys do here.
  • 00:23:35
    And because it's just all about
  • 00:23:39
    building that relationship with, of course,
  • 00:23:41
    with the church body, that's so important.
  • 00:23:43
    I wouldn't got I wouldn't have got clean
  • 00:23:45
    if I didn't have that church body and friends.
  • 00:23:47
    But seriously, Jesus, He squashed all that stuff
  • 00:23:52
    where we've got to go through man.
  • 00:23:53
    You go directly to Jesus, spent time with at home,
  • 00:23:56
    talk to Him on your way to work.
  • 00:23:59
    And I talked to Him in the bathroom.
  • 00:24:00
    I talked to Him on my way to work,
  • 00:24:02
    going shopping, in my car all the time,
  • 00:24:04
    when I wake up, when I go to bed.
  • 00:24:05
    He's always there and He wants that relationship.
  • 00:24:08
    So He died for a relationship. Don't abandon it.
  • 00:24:10
    And I'm talking to myself, too,
  • 00:24:12
    because I get lazy, too, sometimes spiritually.
  • 00:24:14
    So that's my number one message
  • 00:24:16
    is intimacy with God a relationship.
  • 00:24:19
    That's what He died for.
  • 00:24:22
    – Brian, thanks for pouring into us today.
  • 00:24:24
    Man, it's just been great being your friend,
  • 00:24:28
    and I look forward to seeing what God's going
  • 00:24:30
    to do with your life
  • 00:24:31
    and in our friendship of the future.
  • 00:24:33
    Thanks, brother.
  • 00:24:34
    – Yes, I love you, man. – I love you, too.
  • 00:24:41
    – If you'd like another dive on Brian,
  • 00:24:43
    I had him on my podcast called The Aggressive Life.
  • 00:24:46
    You can go to Crossroads.net/podcasts
  • 00:24:49
    and you can find that Aggressive Life
  • 00:24:50
    podcast with Brian Walsh.
  • 00:24:52
    All these things that we do, we do to help you
  • 00:24:55
    and help me get to a new place spiritually
  • 00:24:58
    and sense God's presence in our life.
  • 00:25:01
    And that happens in part because people
  • 00:25:04
    are faithful to God with the blessings
  • 00:25:06
    that He's given us, we're givers in return.
  • 00:25:09
    You can give right now if you want
  • 00:25:10
    to support our church and help us
  • 00:25:12
    get God's word into your heart, my heart
  • 00:25:15
    at Crossroads.net/give.
  • 00:25:17
    Some of us kind of just throw some money here and there,
  • 00:25:19
    others of us are very disciplined about it
  • 00:25:21
    and we actually tithe,
  • 00:25:22
    give 10% of our money to the work of God.
  • 00:25:25
    If you want to try that out, it's actually
  • 00:25:26
    a test that God encouraged us to take.
  • 00:25:29
    It's called a Tithe Test and you can do that with us.
  • 00:25:31
    If you try this for 90 days
  • 00:25:33
    and you don't see God meet you where you are,
  • 00:25:36
    we will refund you all of that money.
  • 00:25:37
    Go to Crossroads.net/tithetest.
  • 00:25:42
    Well, now we're going to come with God through music.
  • 00:25:44
    It's another way for us to come to Him
  • 00:25:46
    with our hearts and our minds
  • 00:25:47
    and have a connection with Him.
  • 00:25:49
    So let's worship him together right now.
  • 00:25:54
    – Hi, everybody, my name is Josh,
  • 00:25:56
    and I get the joy, the pleasure
  • 00:25:59
    of being able to lead you in worship.
  • 00:26:01
    And one of the things that as a Christ follower
  • 00:26:04
    that I know to be true is that the story,
  • 00:26:07
    God's story is one of redemption.
  • 00:26:09
    So Genesis to Revelation, front to back of the Bible,
  • 00:26:13
    it's God makes something awesome,
  • 00:26:15
    something totally terrible happens,
  • 00:26:17
    and then God redeems it.
  • 00:26:19
    And that is the arc of my faith.
  • 00:26:22
    High, very highs, very high highs, very low lows.
  • 00:26:26
    And then the Lord comes in and He brings it up.
  • 00:26:28
    And there's a reality that sometimes
  • 00:26:32
    in those low places, it is hard to see
  • 00:26:35
    the redemption happening.
  • 00:26:37
    It's hard to see the work of God in the low places.
  • 00:26:39
    And there's a promise in scripture in Joel 2:25:
  • 00:26:49
    Now, where I live in Cincinnati,
  • 00:26:51
    we just got over this swarm of cicadas
  • 00:26:56
    and it's not quite locusts destroying everything.
  • 00:26:59
    But with those cicadas, I mean, it was
  • 00:27:02
    sometimes cacophonous volume,
  • 00:27:04
    like you would walk out your door
  • 00:27:06
    and it would be so loud you could not hear anything.
  • 00:27:09
    And that's the reality of some of those low places,
  • 00:27:11
    like the brokenness and the loneliness that we feel,
  • 00:27:15
    the desperation, it just gets cacophonous.
  • 00:27:18
    And Jesus says, "I'm going to step in
  • 00:27:20
    and I'm going to shut that noise off
  • 00:27:22
    and I'm going to bring you redemption."
  • 00:27:24
    So this song that we're going to sing
  • 00:27:25
    is just -- it's a declaration of that.
  • 00:27:27
    It's saying, yeah, from front to back,
  • 00:27:30
    God, you are about the business of redemption.
  • 00:27:32
    So I just invite you to sing this with us.
  • 00:29:46
    – That's a pretty crazy thing to say,
  • 00:29:49
    hallelujah for the Cross, hallelujah for the grave,
  • 00:29:52
    but that's the reality for us.
  • 00:29:54
    In order for redemption to happen in our lives,
  • 00:29:57
    Jesus goes, "Great. I'm going to give my life for you,
  • 00:29:59
    which is an incredible thing.
  • 00:30:01
    So this next part of this song says,
  • 00:30:03
    God, you keep hope alive.
  • 00:30:06
    And I'll say for myself, lately, things have not been --
  • 00:30:13
    Hope has not been alive lately. I'll just say that.
  • 00:30:16
    And the reality is I have to go back,
  • 00:30:20
    so I have to go back to this idea of redemption.
  • 00:30:22
    God is constantly redeeming.
  • 00:30:24
    So if I know that to be true,
  • 00:30:25
    the hopelessness I feel right now is not void.
  • 00:30:29
    There is a continuum.
  • 00:30:31
    And in that continuum of redemption happening,
  • 00:30:34
    I'm going to find some more hope.
  • 00:30:36
    And so we can say, honestly, yes, God,
  • 00:30:37
    you keep hope alive, even though right now
  • 00:30:40
    I don't see it, I'm going to choose to trust
  • 00:30:43
    and believe that hope is rising.
  • 00:30:46
    Hope is swelling up as a part of
  • 00:30:48
    your arc of redemption, so sing this.
  • 00:30:51
    If you're in a place where you like, "Yeah, that's me."
  • 00:30:53
    Join with me. Join with me.
  • 00:30:56
    Go, "Yeah, I don't feel it, but I'm going to trust it.
  • 00:30:58
    I'm going to believe that it's there.
  • 00:31:00
    Because you see, God, you keep hope alive in my marriage.
  • 00:31:03
    You keep hope alive with my daughter.
  • 00:31:05
    You keep hope alive in my job,
  • 00:31:07
    in my sickness, in my finances.
  • 00:31:10
    God, you keep hope alive in my sexuality.
  • 00:31:12
    You keep hope alive in my talents, my gifts,
  • 00:31:18
    my job, my vocation, all of those things,
  • 00:31:20
    You keep hope alive, God."
  • 00:31:22
    So sing that as a declaration of something
  • 00:31:25
    I want to aspire to.
  • 00:33:36
    – Man, it's great being with you today.
  • 00:33:39
    I hope you got a lot out of Brian Head Welsh, my buddy.
  • 00:33:41
    Man, he is a deep well for sure.
  • 00:33:44
    Hey, you can have stuff like this every single week.
  • 00:33:46
    We want to help you. We want to partner with you.
  • 00:33:48
    Whatever your stuff might be.
  • 00:33:50
    If you're dealing with addiction,
  • 00:33:51
    if you're dealing with loneliness, hopelessness,
  • 00:33:54
    you can go to Crossroads.net/getstarted.
  • 00:33:57
    We want to be in your life.
  • 00:33:59
    We'd love for you to be incorporated
  • 00:34:00
    inside of our community.
  • 00:34:02
    Next week, we've got another guy named David Mahan
  • 00:34:05
    who's coming in and he's got
  • 00:34:06
    some really deep stuff for us.
  • 00:34:08
    He's going to talk about
  • 00:34:10
    what would Jesus do about public policy?
  • 00:34:13
    We'll see you next week. Don't miss it.

Jul 9, 2021 • 34 mins 35 sec

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