by the time i reached indianapolis, everything i owned amounted to two pairs of pants, a few shirts, and some books. the room i moved into measured nine feet by ten. it brought me closer to my children, which was the reason for coming, but offered little space beyond that. for just over a year, home had meant sleeping outside, on someone’s floor, or on a mattress laid directly on it, first in los angeles, then phoenix, and now indiana.

getting through life had always meant pushing harder. growing up, survival and overachievement became familiar companions, and those instincts followed me into adulthood. ambition came naturally. so did stubbornness. whatever stood in front of me usually became another objective to pursue, another problem to solve. that approach carried me a long way before its limitations became painfully clear in the lives of the people closest to me.

i was a polygamist on a national cable network, part of a family of color whose unconventional life was unfolding on prime-time television. behind what viewers saw were three “wives,” five children, the pressure to present ourselves well, and the relentless pace of los angeles and its celebrity culture. keeping up with all of it consumed me.

eventually, that life began to come apart. relationships deteriorated, finances suffered, and the roles around which i had constructed my identity began slipping away. no longer feeling like a husband or a father left me confronting a question that achievement had never required me to answer: who was i without a purpose to fulfill?

those roles had become the measure of my worth. without them, i thought i was nothing.

los angeles offered a temporary refuge with an older couple who let me stay in their home in exchange for refinishing their floors. from there, phoenix brought me to my baby sister, who gave me room to cry and grieve. most other people were kept at a distance. each move changed the surroundings, but the memories came with me.

over the following months, moments of unkindness, impatience, anger, ignorance, verbal abuse, and physical violence returned with a weight they had not carried when i was busy justifying myself. seeing my behavior more clearly meant beginning to understand what it had cost other people. the pain i had caused, carried, and created became impossible to evade.

how had i been so blind? how had behavior that now grieved me once seemed acceptable? and how much intellectual gymnastics had gone into defending it?

the first thing i said to god was, “i’m so sorry.”

the words arrived before any explanation. repentance was immediate and overwhelming, followed by the much slower work of facing what that apology meant.

until then, god had largely occupied an intellectual space in my life. scientific theories, philosophical arguments, and statistical probability gave me ways to contemplate him while keeping the conversation within territory i understood. god was an energy, something expansive to examine and interpret.

christianity carried a different weight altogether. my understanding of it had been shaped by painful accounts and images: my father’s experience of being sprayed with fire hoses in his navy whites after returning from service aboard the uss enterprise during the vietnam war; photographs of lynchings, with white men posing beside a black person’s brutalized body; and the familiar blue-eyed, white depictions of jesus that seemed disconnected from his origins.

those associations ran deep. christianity’s profession of love was difficult to reconcile with the cruelty and racism i associated with people who claimed it. the distance between those two things had made the faith feel inaccessible to me.

yet more than a year spent largely alone, unhoused, sometimes without food, and feeling unloved left little room to escape myself. solitude gave me time to confront my choices and, eventually, to turn toward god with a vulnerability that had never been part of my intellectual understanding of him.

even then, repentance was complicated. reaching out to the people i had hurt raised questions that had no easy answers. would contact be welcome? could an apology reopen a wound? then the familiar impulse to defend myself would surface: what about what they had done?

that question required its own reckoning. whatever else had happened, my choices remained mine to acknowledge.

forgiving myself took time too. along the way, memories of close calls began acquiring a different meaning. moments when life could have taken a much darker turn now looked like instances of god’s protection and guidance. looking back, his care seemed to reach into years when i had scarcely known how to recognize it.

by then, rebuilding a relationship with ashley felt unlikely. being present for my children, however, was still something worth moving toward. becoming a “facetime dad,” maintaining my place in their lives through a screen, was not the future i wanted. indianapolis offered the possibility of showing up in person, so that was where i went.

ashley was staying with relatives who were preparing to move. their plans created an opportunity to offer her somewhere to stay and, perhaps, begin finding our way back to each other. with little more than a mattress and a fitted sheet, i sheepishly asked whether she would move into my cousin’s house with me.

after some hesitation, she agreed to try.

her agreement was to share a place to live. resuming our relationship was another matter entirely. still, the chance to be present for my family felt enormous. if god was opening that door, my promise was to be and do better.

at the time, ashley was attending church. given everything christianity represented to me, going with her held little appeal. but wanting my wife back was enough to get me through the doors.

that was the honest beginning: regret, hope, and the desire for another chance with the woman i loved.

once inside, the welcome unsettled my expectations. conversations did not revolve around my past. people made room for me without making me feel judged, and through their acceptance, god began to feel personal in a way that contemplation alone had never allowed.

soon, bible study, church groups, and volunteering became part of our lives. the church was thirty-five minutes away, yet we made that drive three or four times a week. anything that could anchor us felt worth reaching for. as we learned to navigate life together again, church became our lighthouse.

it was there that dave rodriguez, the founder of grace church, took time to listen to me.

wearing one of my two pairs of pants and a worn-out shirt, i approached him with an idea for a podcast featuring his books and work. to me, dave embodied qualities i deeply admired: strength, wisdom, patience, gentleness, and kindness. his willingness to entertain the proposal felt almost disproportionate to how little i thought of myself.

at our next meeting, the outfit was the same. this time, i brought an idea illustrated with lego bricks: reversebus.

dave’s openness was difficult for me to trust at first. more than once, i asked whether he was sure he wanted to work with me, sure he wanted me on his podcast. there he was, the founder of a major church, and there i was, someone whose behavior had played out on national television.

“you’re sure you want to work with me?” i would ask. “i’m a heathen who was showing his ass on national television.”

each time, he met the question with warmth and reassurance. what people said about me did not change his willingness to work together, and he encouraged me to stop allowing their judgments to determine my worth.

here was someone i admired who kept making room for me.

his trust eventually became an opportunity to build his podcast and website, helping his work reach more people. those abilities were still mine to offer, even while so much of my life was being rebuilt. our collaboration gave me a place to contribute and a relationship in which kindness could be received and reciprocated.

at home, rebuilding required a different kind of work. sharing a place to live gradually became an opportunity to restore our relationship, and ashley’s willingness to take those steps deserved care. every choice carried the possibility of honoring that trust or undermining it.

as we went deeper into the bible, the accounts of job, john, paul, and solomon opened questions about suffering, wisdom, repentance, obedience, and surrender. through those very different lives, i began examining my own determination to prioritize personal will over god’s. scripture gave me language for things that had once been obscured by ambition and self-justification.

that examination reached into the way i understood family. survival and overachievement had shaped my instincts, but a home needed patience, gentleness, and care. loving ashley and raising our children required learning responses that did not come automatically.

over time, my family became the most tangible expression of god’s grace in my life. that grace was walking around in front of me, embodied in the people i had been given another chance to love.

in 2024, our entire family was baptized.

standing there with ashley and our children felt surreal. after everything that had happened, we were sharing this moment. accepting jesus christ as my lord and savior brought an awe that was difficult to put into words. the thought kept returning: this is really happening.

alongside it came another, more sobering realization: now the real war for my soul has begun.

professing faith would carry a responsibility into ordinary life. decisions about my family, reactions to difficulty, and the struggle to place god’s will above my own would become the daily ground on which that commitment was lived. those struggles continue.

the biblical story that most clearly expresses the faith i want to practice takes place in capernaum, where four friends carried a paralyzed man to jesus.

their friend needed healing, and they believed they knew where to bring him. when the crowd blocked their access, they found another route. up onto the roof they went, carrying him with them, then opening it so they could lower him into jesus’ presence.

what captures me is the effort contained in that sequence. carrying another person. climbing with him. opening a roof. lowering him safely. their faith required ingenuity, persistence, grit, and a love willing to undertake what their friend could not do for himself.

once he was before jesus, the healing belonged to him.

the friends had devoted their strength to bringing him there. in that act, i see the humility of helping without needing to become the center of another person’s healing. jesus forgave the man’s sins and healed him, revealing his authority over both, while those who witnessed it responded with awe and glorified god.

i see myself as one of those friends.

that is the kind of service my faith calls me toward: becoming a catalyst who helps someone reach care, healing, and possibility. sometimes it requires carrying a burden alongside them. sometimes it takes resourcefulness to overcome whatever is blocking the way. throughout it, their needs must remain at the center.

remembering my own journey helps me understand that responsibility. an older couple offered shelter. my sister made room for grief. ashley allowed us to begin rebuilding. a church welcomed me. dave trusted me. each offered something that mattered while i was still struggling to find my footing.

their kindness also changed how i see people living through difficult seasons. something in their uncertainty, pain, or determination to make it through another day feels familiar. our circumstances vary, but beneath them are needs and struggles that connect us. so many of us are hurting, misguided, or lost, trying our best even when that best falls short.

part of what we need is to remember how to love. my own life has required that relearning. selfless action, attention to another person’s needs, and responsibility for the effects of our behavior give love substance beyond anything we say about it.

caring for someone while still needing care ourselves can be profoundly restorative. there is something about offering love that nurtures our own capacity to receive and practice it. we can extend kindness while our lives are still unfinished.

mine certainly is. questions of worthiness still trouble me. discerning god’s will from my own desires remains difficult, especially when those desires are easy to dress in spiritual language. making the best choices for my life and my family continues to require humility, prayer, and a willingness to examine myself.

yet my understanding of worth has changed. a title, an achievement, or another person’s opinion can no longer contain it. even my own perception is incomplete. my purpose is divine, and trusting god means accepting that he sees beyond what i can presently understand.

i am more than my sin.

the responsibility for the pain i caused remains. so does my apology. accepting jesus christ as my lord and savior gave me somewhere to bring my shame and opened a path toward redemption; learning to live from that grace is ongoing work.

when my thoughts return to those floors, those few clothes, and the man who believed he was nothing without a purpose, they also return to everything he could not yet imagine. the welcome at church. dave’s trust. the possibility of rebuilding a family. the awe of being baptized together.

every morning brings another opportunity to give the love god has given me. some days, that means caring for my family with greater patience. other days, it means helping someone reach a resource, a place of safety, or a possibility they could not reach alone. these are the ordinary places where my faith takes shape.

perhaps that is why my thoughts keep returning to that roof in capernaum. there will be seasons when we have the strength to carry someone and seasons when we need to allow ourselves to be carried. having known both, i am learning to receive love with humility and offer it with care.

whatever brought you to this page, i hope you leave knowing that your past does not exhaust the possibilities of your life. there is still room to acknowledge the harm, accept grace, and begin the work of living differently. that is the work i return to every day.

god has not given up on us. may we keep reaching toward him and toward one another, with enough faith to believe healing is possible and enough love to help someone get there.