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You know, but I always
try to do things my way.

I tried to do it without God's help.

I thought I could do it on my own,

but it seems like every time
I took one step forward,

I would trip and end up
taking two steps back.

But I was still determined that I was

gon' to do this thing my way.

You see, because I wanted
my part of this thing

that they call the American dream.

You know what I'm talking about?

I'm talking about the
cars, the clothes,

the house, or the bling and
everything that went with it.

And I was gonna do it.

And I was gonna scratch my way up,

even if I had to do it
with my own bare hands.

But every time I tried,

it seemed like these same two hands

would end up back in handcuffs.

And I would be back in
the Cook County jail in

Chicago on my knees
and crying out to God,

asking him to deliver me yet again.

(upbeat music)

I always knew I was gon' be a
preacher when I was a little child,

I think, nine, 10 years old.

I had my own church in my
mother's kitchen and my brother,

my little brother and my dog, Rex,

they were my two church members.

My brother wasn't all
that happy about it.

He wanted to go outside and play,

but I was bigger than
him. So I threatened him.

He had to sit there and listen to me

preach all the time every week.

But then what happened was,

I know that when I was
about 16 years old,

I went home from school.

And I remember that even
when I was younger,

I told my mother that I was
gon' be a preacher and she

told me that I couldn't
just decide that I

was gonna be a preacher.

She told me that God had to call me.

And so for the next few days,

I sat around the phone
waiting for God to call.

But when I was 16 years old,

I remember I was on my way
home from school and on

the bus and I kind of was

sitting there kind of
dozing or whatever.

But I remember I just saw

myself preaching and
preaching and preaching,

and it felt different that time.

And I was thinking that that was

God really calling me at that time.

And I talked with my
father who was a preacher.

I talked to my pastor
and I talked with

my aunt who was also a preacher.

And then that was when I decided,

and we all decided

that I should have go ahead on
and preach my trial sermon.

I left the church because I
was kind of disillusioned.

I was… I had a different opinion or

a set opinion of how I thought
a preacher was supposed to be

and how church members was
supposed to be and how church

itself was supposed to be
and I wasn't seeing that.

In my opinion, the preachers

weren't as Holy as I
thought they should

be and a lot of the
church members were not

acting as Holy as I
thought they should be.

I guess I was looking for

the perfect preacher or

the perfect church number
or the perfect church.

I went from one denomination to

another thinking that one might
be better than the other,

but I found out later on that
there is no such thing as

a perfect preacher or a perfect
church or perfect anything else.

There was only one perfect
person in the world that was

Jesus and so the illusion
that I had in my head,

that there just isn't any.

And so, but I discovered
that afterwards,

after I had already left the church
was that we were all flawed.

I was 20 years old,

it was shortly after
I left the church,

I started drinking
and started smoking

marijuana with some of my friends.

I was dropping a few
pills from time to time,

reds, trees and that kind of thing.

And then one time a friend of
mine came by with some drugs,

it was the street name of Duji.

I didn't know what at the time,
but Duji was really heroin.

Several friends came by and it was on

a Friday evening and they
had the Duji or heroin,

but they also had some
other drug paraphernalia.

They had needles and
makeshift syringes was,

and they were getting
everything together.

And I asked what was going on,

and he said, well, we're
going to shoot at this time.

I told him, well, just put
mine a little bit over

there for me and I'll snort mine.

But then, my friend said,

“No, you don't understand,

we shooting ours and you're
going to shoot yours too.”

And I didn't
realize it at the time,

but BB and Ronnie had
come up behind me.

And then they grabbed me
and was holding me down.

When my friend Tadpole was
coming toward me with the,

with the needle and
the makeshift syringe.

And he said, I remember
him saying, “sorry Bub,

but I know that this is
the only way I could get

you to try it.” And by the way,

that was my nickname
at the time, Bub.

And so when Tadpole started
sticking a needle in my arm,

I was struggling and resistant
and they said, “Hey man,

you need to quit struggling,

that needle’s going to
break in your arm.”

And so I quit struggling, I just stopped.

And I was thinking to
myself that, okay, when,

when this is over with,

I'm going to get my,

my gun and I'm gonna
shoot all three of them.

But then when the heroin started
going through my system,

it was a feeling of euphoria,

a feeling that I'd never felt before.

And that was the
beginning of drug use.

On hard drugs anyway.

It was a feeling I'd
never had before.

Heroin has you kind of mellowed out.

You are just laid back and relaxed

and it seems like nothing in
the world is going on matters.

If you’re listening to music,

like I was always listening to jazz,

the music sounded better.

The saxophone that was being
played, it sounded better.

The piano, whatever. All
the music was just great.

You hear it differently when you were

high and you just mellowed out.

It was unlike any other drugs
that I had ever, ever had.

Cocaine was like I said,
it's the opposite.

Once you, when you finish
shooting some cocaine,

you want to go back and
get some more, right then.

A lot sometimes when,

when I even the first
time that I shot

some cocaine for all the
needle was still in my arm,

I used my other hand

to reached in my pocket to see
how much money I had left,

so I can go back and get some more.

But that's the effect and the
difference that cocaine has,

it's an instant, high,

it's a high that you
really like feeling,

but you want to go back and
get some more right away.

And then again and again,
and that's why people,

some people will be on
binges where they do

cocaine three or four days in a row,

just getting high all day and

all night for several
days and several nights.

I shot both. I started
off snorting heroin,

and then I went to shooting heroin.

And then when I started on cocaine,

I started, well, I
started shooting cocaine.

That was when I was
really into my drugs.

I remember back earlier when
I was back in the service,

when I was back in the service,

I was snorting cocaine then.

But then when I started into

my heavy addiction and
I was shooting cocaine,

matter of fact, some people even
do what they call speed balling.

They mixed the whole cocaine
and heroin together,

and they shoot it
together because it gives

them the combined effect.

And that was one thing that I
really loved to do was speed ball,

shooting the heroin
and cocaine together.

(jazz music plays)

After thinking back on things,

there was an emptiness there that
I didn't realize at the time,

but there was an emptiness, I guess,

an emptiness or a void
that I was trying to fill.

But mostly what I think was,

I was always chasing something.

I don't know what it was.

A lot of addicts love chasing

something and they
don't know what it is.

And the best way to describe
it is when I was in prison.

I had a recurring dream and
that dream and in that dream,

I would be just about
to shoot some drugs,

heroin, or cocaine or both.

And I have the tie
or belt or whatever,

tied around my arm and I
was just about to stick

the needle into my arm and I would

wake up and this happened again,

and again, and again,

night after night, you know,

two or three, sometimes two
or three nights a week.

I would have that same dream,

and one time, it went even further,

I got the needle into my arm,

as I was about to push
the plunger, I wake up.

I woke up and I was wondering,
“Okay, what is up with this?”

I said, “Lord, at least let me
fill it at one time,

you know?” But anyway,

but that's a way of describing
what you are chasing.

You don't know what you're chasing,

but you're chasing
something and the thing is,

you never catch it,
you never achieve it.

And so you get more drugs,

still chasing whatever that was.

And what I think, you know,

looking back on stuff
when I was thinking is

that I didn't realize

it at the time and a lot of
addicts don't realize it,

but they were really
chasing his death.

Not saying that they want to
die, they’re trying to die.

But if they keep chasing what
is staying away from them,

what is one step ahead
of them, is death.

But it's still chasing it.

And the problem is, the bad thing is,

now too many of our people
are catching up with him.

They're no longer just chasing them.

They caught him, and
now they're dead.

(soft piano music)

About two weeks ago,

I left the ministry,
slacking a little bit in

my persistence towards God,

when I was afraid, you
know what I'm saying?

I started taking my eyes off Him,

and started putting it all about me.

It was all about me, you know?

So anyway, I felt bad.

You know, when I left,

I went out and used.

I only been out a week.
You know what I mean?

I came back. You know what I mean?

Came back to my senses and what

I wanted to give God the glory
for when I was out there.

I mean, it's just like people say,

once you leave the drug alone

and then you go back
to it, it gets worse.

3:45 in the morning pitch dark,

money in my pocket,

over 300 and something dollars
in my pocket. I'm out walking.

I'm like, I'm like,

every now and then a car
will pass and I'm like,

thinking to myself,
“Oh God, help me God.

Oh Lord God, please don't let nobody

pull up and blow my head off or

please don’t have somebody pull
up and try to rob me.” You know,

that’s just how much God loves me.

You know what I'm
saying? Today because,

there's been situations like
that where you heard about

it on the news or
whatever you want to say.

Things like that happen to people.

All my life, I always
felt God's hand on me.

So since I been back,

I been taking my eyes off myself.

You know what I'm saying?

Just coming to the Lord faithfully.

You just take one day at a time.

I knew I was in too
deep when I started

doing things that I really
said, I would never do,

I started stealing from the church,

particularly, my father
and my aunt's church.

I stole my father's tithe envelope

that he had dropped off at my aunts,

they put in an offering the next day.

I was what they call fiending and,

you know, I needed
some drugs right then,

so I took the money out of

my father's tithe envelope

and I went and bought
the drugs with it.

I was running… I found the checkbook,

the church's checkbook and I was
writing checks to myself from the

church’s checkbook and I was
signing fictitious names to them,

and so I was doing that,

and so that's when I
meant when I said I was

stealing from the church.

And another thing that really hurt,

I know my family, my aunt was that,

okay... My aunt who really loved me,

there's pictures of her holding
me when I was a baby and

I remember her taking
me to, she was a nurse.

And by the way, she
didn’t have any children,

she considered me her child,

and she loved me with
her whole heart and

I stole so much stuff on her
that they were prosperous,

but by the time I finished,

she couldn't even have her
electric was turned off,

her gas was turned
off and the telephone

was turned off because I
stole all of her stuff.

She had taken me in
after her husband had

passed to help her around the house,

and I was stealing her blind.

A lot of stuff that she had
accumulated I was selling.

She had a couple of fur
coats, I sold both of them.

I sold the coats and I remember she

was a pastor and one
of our members had

passed and she couldn't even go to

the funeral because she
didn't have a coat to wear,

I stole all of them.

Man, what have I become?

Auntie is gone now,

but that still bothers me.

I still, when I pray now,

ask God to forgive me for
what I did to Auntie.

My father took a Greyhound bus from

Chicago all the way to
Leavenworth to visit me.

When I was at the Cook County jail,

he visited me all the time.

And I didn't know the
effect that I was having on

him until some years later
cause I thought that,

okay, I'm not hurting anybody,

but myself and I was
wrong about that.

I remember hearing when I was sent to

the penitentiary and
I heard some time

later was the fact
that how it affected

my father when he had to go to
the jail to get my clothes,

because I was gone.

And what I heard was that
the effect it had on him was

it was almost like him going to

a hospital or something to get
my clothes, because I'm dead.

And that was the feeling
that he had that,

I gotta get my son's clothes.

He's gone now.

And that had an effect on him that

I didn't realize til years later.

And even with my daughter,

when I was arrested,

I went to prison and I wrote her

a letter because the year

previous was the most time
I had ever spent with her,

when she came to visit
in Chicago and I was

able to be with her and my son.

But I wrote her that
letter when I got

to the prison and she wrote
me back, she said, “Dad,

why is the only time I hear
from you is when you were in jail?”

And that affected me
because I realized it was true.

She lives in Detroit
with her mother and

other family members and I lived
some of everywhere: Chicago,

Detroit, St. Louis, California.

I was always trying to stay a step

ahead of the police and
the warrants that I had.

And so when I wrote her
that and she wrote me back,

“Why is the only time you
write me is when you’re in jail?”

That messed me up,
because it was true.

And so when I'm in prisons,

talking to the men in
prisons when I go,

and I share that story
with them, let them know,

“No don't make the same
mistake that I made.

The stuff you're doing is
not just affecting you,

it's affecting your whole family,

your children, your little siblings,

your brothers or sisters.

You are hurting them more than

you think you are
hurting them.” And so,

yeah, it was a real negative
effect that I had on

my family and my friends,
even to this day.

It was well over

$200,000 that I had spent during
the time of my addiction,

and it might've been
even closer to $300,000.

I had spent so much
money on the drug.

And one thing that I
did realize later in

my addiction was that even if I
wanted a job or wanted to work,

I couldn't afford to
work because there

was no job that was going
to pay me enough to be

able to supply the drugs that
I needed just to function.

And so, yeah, it costs
a lot monetarily

and as far as relationships
and even my freedom.

Yeah, drug addiction costs a lot.

Besides the heroin and cocaine,

and I was addicted to
alcohol cigarettes,

sex, I think I was even
addicted to crime.

It was just the rush sometimes

with some of the criminal
activities that I was doing,

the con games that I was running,

especially when I was in
California and in the Marines.

I got a high from that,

just being able to,

to talk people out of stuff.

All of the males in my
family were alcoholics.

My father, my grandfather,

all my uncles, cousins,

they were all alcoholics.

My father was a heavy
drinker and alcoholic.

I think the only thing that I
saved him from that his call,

when God called him to the ministry.

And then God delivered him from that.

But I remember growing up as a child,

all I saw was alcoholism especially

from the male side of my family,

both sides of the family, my
mother's side and my father's side.

First high I experienced
was an aerosol can.

About seven years old,

and from there, everything took off.

Before junior high, I was probably

a stoned alcoholic, drug addict,

whatever you want to call it,

but it was never addressed
because I was the fourth child.

I felt my mom played favoritism
over all five of us.

And I'm okay with that, I was
known as the black sheep,

so I continued on.

Before I was 16, I
formed my own gang,

got into the streets
and by now crack and

everything else was out there.

The first elicit drug I
fell in love with was

the PCP and angel dust.

And from their on, I
spiraled out of control.

Each time I disconnect from

people that's going
to mean me some good,

I wind up going back.

If this is your first treatment,

spiritual whatever type of treatment.

Each time you go out,

you double your dose and
you triple your pain.

This, this is crack cocaine

seized a few days ago by drug
enforcement agents in a park,

just across the street
from the White House.

It could easily have been heroin or

PCP it's as innocent
looking as candy,

but it's turning our cities into

battle zones and it's
murdering our children.

Let there be no mistake,

this stuff is poison.

We’re going to be
approaching an area now,

a place where back in the day,

I first started smoking crack.

As a matter of fact,
this is the first place

that I smoked crack at,

crack and also PCP,

what people call water.

It’s all boarded up now,

but that was the place
where I first started

smoking crack and PCP,

what they call water.

The person, who I will not name,

he had several houses,

drug houses, in the St. Louis area.

But this is where he started.

Even when I was on my knees
in the alley that night,

the alley looked
something like this one.

On my hands and knees,

looking for a syringe and

a needle that I had thrown
away hours earlier.

I’d thrown them away
because I promised God

that I would never shoot drugs again.

But here I was in that
alley on my hands and

knees looking for that
syringe and that needle,

instead of being on my hands
and my knees and asking God to

forgive me and to deliver
me from this thing.

My marriage failed because I

chose drugs and the lifestyle
that I was living over my family.

What I mean by that is that is,

it's the choices that you make.

You can choose to be with
your family and do what you

can to be a father of
your husband or whatever,

or you can choose to

do what you need to do in
order to support your habit.

And if you, the habit that you have,

it's gonna cost you something.

As far as your
relationship with folks,

take for instance, you

might have an appointment to go

somewhere to be somewhere
at a certain time.

And you decide before you get
ready to leave home, to get there,

you said, okay, I'm going to
take a hit first before I go,

just take the edge
off and I'll be good.

Okay with that hit, it
leads to another hit.

And then that leads to
take an another hit.

And that hit leads to
taking another hit.

And the next thing you know,

you’ve been there
getting high and doing

drugs instead of going and

doing what you supposed
to be doing and now,

after taking hit,
after hit, after hit,

now it's so late that it's
too late to get there,

to do what you were
supposed to been doing.

Whether it's supposed to be at one of

your kid's ball games or something,

or graduation of whatever,

instead of doing what you
supposed to be doing,

you’re self-indulging,
that's a choice

that you have made and then
so your family suffers.

I remember a friend of mine,

a friend of mine whose mother

had passed, now she loved her mother.

Her mother had passed and she had had

gotten to the funeral home in
plenty of time for the funeral.

Matter of fact, she was
there for the visitation.

And sometimes during the visitation,

she decided to step outside,

and her and a friend
of hers was sitting in

a car and they started
to smoke some crack.

And they were sitting there,

getting high, smoking crack.

But the way crack is

one hit leads to another hit
and then to another hit,

then to another hit.

And before they even realized
that the funeral was halfway

over and they’re sitting
outside in the parking lot,

smoking crack while their mother’s
being funeralized inside.

And now, it's not because
she didn't love her mother,

but the choice that
she made was to start,

was to take that first hit.

And one hit led to another.

And so that's an example
of choices that you

make that affects your family or
it affects people around you.

And it would affect you
later when you realized,

man, what was I thinking?
What was I thinking?

Mom is in there being…

A funeral is going on and out,
sitting on the car, getting high.

But by the time you realize that and

think about that, it's too late.

My daughter was graduating
and I was supposed to be at

the graduation and I'm

out here getting high or
trying to get some money.

Other stuff that's going on,

you made choices, it’s a bad choice.

And somewhere down the road,

that's going to eat that shoe
and eat you up, and consume you.

I was trying to escape reality.

I lost so much by the
decisions that I had made.

We all have dreams,

I had had dreams when I was,

I was a child growing up and then

I started achieving
some of those dreams.

Like I said, at one point I
was a functioning drug addict.

But even before I
started using the drugs,

when I was preaching before,

I was a sought after teenage
preacher around the Midwest.

That was gone. I was

a successful businessman in

the retail industry
and retail management.

I messed that up. I was an
upcoming politician in Chicago,

working for one of the first
black United States Congressmen.

That was gone. I’d gotten a raise,

I made all the way up to
Sergeant in one of the toughest,

most respected branches of
the military that there is.

I messed that up.

God gave me chance and
chance after chance,

and I was able to achieve this
and that and I messed it up,

threw it all the way because of

some choices that I made and
the addictions that I had.

And there was, and I was sitting,

I think back up, man,

I had it. I had it.

And then I would get
so discouraged and

disgusted because I
know those chances,

those opportunities,
they’re never going to come

back. So what am I now?

Just a junkie. That's all
I'm ever going to be.

Now, just another
junkie who was steady

hurting folk and so you get
so depressed off of that.

I heard people say that
people do drugs for

two reasons: one is to feel good
and another is not to feel.

When you first start shooting
drugs or doing drugs,

you're doing it because
it makes you feel good.

But later on, you're doing it
because you don't want to feel.

You don't want to feel the pain
that you caused to everybody.

You don't want to feel
the disappointment that

you are having yourself and how
you disappointed other folks.

You don't want to feel
that. So you medicate,

you just keep doing more
drugs and drug after drug,

because you don't want to feel.

I get a lot of people who call or

contact me because one
of their loved ones,

their son or daughter or whoever is

strung out on drugs and they know
how God delivered me from drugs,

so they want me to talk to them.

And I'm glad to do that.

But what people have to
realize is that they're not,

if they're not ready to quit,

they're not going to
listen to me because

they think that they
got it under control.

They think they're using
because they want to use.

You hear people say,

I can quit anytime I want to.

I'm just not ready to quit.

So until they realized
that they are ready to

quit and what's going on,
they will never quit.

But one thing that is good,

is that you're able to plant seed.

And so that's what I do
sometimes I plant the seed.

Just like the Bible says,
even about Christianity,

one person might plant a seed and
the other one might water it,

but then God gives the increase.

If I plant a seed for someone
and then something else

happens down the road to reinforce
the seed that I planted,

in other words, they watered it.

And then so when time comes,

then when they start
feeling like, okay,

this ain't what I signed up for,

maybe it's time for me
to rethink this thing.

But sometimes it might be

kind of late because
they've lost some stuff,

different people have rock bottoms.

For some it’s going to jail,

for some was a loss of a loved one,

for some it’s being
homeless or whatever.

Different people have
their own rock bottom,

but then when they get
close to that bottom,

then it starts sinking in that,

okay, this is not what I want.

And it took a while for me
to realize that myself.

Again, what started affecting me

was when I saw how I was
affecting other folk,

but until I got ready to quit,

I don't care who came
and talked to me

about what, I wasn't hearing it.

My cousin who's passed now,

I loved her, Rose.

She had tried to talk me cause

she had been on drugs before herself,

and God had delivered her,

so she was trying to help me.

But I wasn't trying to
hear that at that time.

I just wanted her to just leave
me alone, I know what I'm doing.

I’ll quit when I'm ready.

I remember early in my addiction,

I went to a drug house.

It was in Chicago

where they sold out of a
window that led to an alley.

You tap on the window and
you tell them what you want,

and then they get the bag or
two or whatever you wanted.

I did that one night
after getting off work.

And I was headed back to my car.

And then I saw someone coming
up through a vacant lot.

And when I saw them,

I didn't know what it was.

Was it a police of what?

I dropped the bag when I
realized what was going on,

because the person had a gun
pointed at me and he said,

“Okay, give it up!”

And acted like I didn't know
what he was talking about,

I said, “What you talking about, man?

What you talking about?” He said,

“Give me the dope.” And I started
trying to play it off you know,

like I ain't got no dope,

they didn't have any, or whatever.

And he put gun closer
to me and he said,

“Don't make me shoot you.

Give me the bag!” And so
after hesitating and stuff,

as long as I could, I said, “Okay,

this dud looks like
he’s going to shoot me.”

I dropped the bag on the ground.

And I was in, I was hoping

that at first he wouldn't see
it cause I put my foot over it.

And so I was still trying to talk to

him and tell him that
I don't have anything,

but when he cocked the gun,

“See, I told you I dropped it.

It’s right there.”
I was hoping in my mind,

that he was going to reach down and

pick up the bag and when he did that,

I was going to kick him in the head.

He didn't do that, he
told me to get him a car.

And I said, “Okay.” And
so I had another plan.

I was going to get in the car

and then I was going to run over him.

But when I got in the car
and by the time I looked up,

he had vanished into the dark.

I drove around looking for him.

I know that sounds
crazy, he got a gun.

I ain't got no gun,

but I was driving around looking
for him over a $10 bag of heroin.

That's one of the
dangers that you have,

and that wasn't the only
time that I faced stick-ups.

There’s been several times,

but that's one that
stands out in my mind.

So there are a lot of
ways that you can,

that you’re risk in
your life when you,

when you are doing drugs.

One is overdosing.

The other one is just being robbed or

shot or getting killed
in a drug situation.

My father was never able to see me,

the new me or the real
me, or the delivered me.

The one after Christ delivered
me from my addiction.

My father never gave up on me.

He, as I stated earlier,

when I was going through
all of this stuff,

my father was always with me.

A disappointment my dad
really had was when I

was really getting to
my worst one time.

And I got to my father's house
and I knocked and rung the bell.

Dad lifted the curtain.

Normally when he’d lifted
the curtain, he see me,

he swings the door
open, “Here's my son!

Come on in here, boy.” You know,

but that time they had

lifted the curtain and
was just looking at me.

He said, “What you want?”
I said, “Dad,

it's me.” He said,
“I know who you are.

What you want?” And I can tell
then the dad was really, really,

really disappointed
in me, but even then,

he couldn't hold it that alone.

Dad loved me.

And even though he didn't
live to see the change in me,

I know it was because
of the prayers that he

prayed constantly on my behalf,

was one of the reasons
that I am who I am now.

He was trying to rid

the neighborhood of the drug
activity and the drugs.

Dad was the kind of person he would,

he would go and talk to folks.

Everybody neighborhood
knew who Reverend Barr

was and when people were,

the drugs was going on,

he'd go try to talk to him.

He was trying to get the drugs
out of the neighborhood.

One Saturday, I remember
dad had called me,

and we had talked for a while.

And then he said he was going to

the grocery store to
get his groceries.

I asked him, did he want me
to drive him to the store.

He said, “No, you know,
that's how I get my exercise.”

And so we hung up.

A little bit later,

I was on my way to get some drugs.

I didn't drive, I took the
bus cause I didn't want

auntie to know that I was

gone cause she would figure
I was going to get drugs,

but anyway, I saw a crowd

that was gathered around

right there on the corner
of where dad lived,

where I grew up from, grew up at.

I got back to the house
and then later on,

someone came over and told me,

“Hey man, you better
get over to the house.

Reverend Barr was just ran over.

Hit by a car. It don't look
good.” And what had happened was,

witnesses say that when

dad was crossing the
street with his groceries,

someone intentionally ran over him,

they pulled out like almost like
you see on the movies and stuff,

they was sitting there one
day across the street,

they pulled out and floored
the car and ran over him.

He was in the hospital in a coma for

about three days before he

passed away but yeah,
that's what happened.

People think it was some of

the same drug dealers
that dad was trying

to talk to and trying to get
them to change their life.

I guess they felt like he was
interfering with their business,

and so they ran him
down and killed him.

I was never the point where I
didn't want to live anymore,

but I had gotten to the point
where I knew that if I kept

going the way I was going and
that the things that I was doing,

I could end up dying.

And the thing was, I didn't care.

Not that I didn't want to live,

but I didn't care if my died,

if that makes any sense.

When I was in Cook
County jail in Chicago,

even though I was in jail,

I longed for a time to get out
of that so I can get back to

my regular activities,
of getting high.

But it was this one
particular Sunday.

It was a prison ministry preacher
that came through the jail.

His name was Reverend
Jerry Hodges in Chicago.

I was standing there
in the cell block,

in the outer area of the cell.

And he came up behind me and
he said, “Hey, my brother.

Why don’t you to come on
down to the Bible study?

God’s got a word for you.”
And I went down to the,

I really didn't even
care about going,

but I didn’t have nothing
else better to do this.

I sat in the back of

the church service and when
Reverend Hodges was talking,

he had said something that
got my attention that was,

as I said before, I was wondering,

“How come I keep going to jail?”
Like when you asked the question,

about how many times I’d been
arrested and I was saying,

“Why I keep going to jail?” There
was the time that I used to get

away with all this stuff now I'm
getting arrested for everything.

Stuff that my friends
were getting away with,

I'm going to jail for it.

Why I keep going to jail?

And he asked the question,
no, he a statement.

He said, “I bet a lot of
y'all wonder why you here in

this jail.” So I started listening.

He said, “The reason
that a lot of y'all in

here is because when you
were running in the street,

doing your thing, God couldn't get

your attention. You
couldn't hear Him.

So sometimes what He does is,

He allows you to be put someplace to

slow you down so you can hear Him.

And he does that
because He loves you.

And what you got to remember is that

no matter what you've done and
no matter what you’ve become,

God still loves you.

And that was the beginning
of our turnaround

because I had always thought that

I had done too much wrong
for God to ever forgive me.

I'd hurt too many people.

I got too many people
strung out on drugs.

Some of the women who
were prostituting,

and I blamed that on myself
because I got them strung out.

And now they are strong out and are

prostituting because I
got them strung out.

It's a folk who had OD’d and died
because I started them on drugs.

So I'd done too much wrong
for God to forgive me.

Reverend Hodges said, “No
matter what you've done,

God still loves you.”

That was the beginning of my turn around.

That's what did it. I surround

myself with people who
hold me accountable.

Dr. Ronald Bobo,
pastor of this church,

has been my pastor for 23,

25, 20 something years.

One of the people who
holds me accountable.

He knows my life, he knows my story.

He knows everything about me.

He's the one who put me
over the prison ministry.

It was sometimes that

I got weak and slipped for
one reason or another.

Like when my mother
passed and I was falling

into some stuff that

I was going to have me going
back to that lifestyle,

and he had his arm around me.

Let me know that,

nah, you ain't got to do that.

I got you. And not just him,

other folk in the church here.

And so you got to surround
yourself with people,

with positive people
who got your back.

And they're not always going to
tell you stuff you want to hear.

They'll tell you stuff
you need to hear.

And you gotta be able to
accept that and listen to it.

That's what keeps me going.

My pastor and my church for church,

family and my family as well.

My niece, Christine,
my cousin, Patrice,

they, those kinds of people
I need to be around.

Cause I was saying,
when I left Chicago,

when I left Chicago,

I left to get away
from that lifestyle.

Growing up, I'd always
heard my parents say,

“stay away from so-and-so.

Don't go around so-and-so.”
I had gotten to be so-and-so.

What people were
telling their children

to stay away from.
“Stay away from Bub.

Let's stay away from
Barr. Stay away from him.

You don't want to end up like him,

stay away from him.”

And I was that person that

everybody was telling the
kids to stay away from.

And so when I decided,

no it's time for me to leave,

I knew that the only
way was to get out of,

not just out of the neighborhood
I had… I left Chicago.

I came to St. Louis.

The thing is, there’s
drugs and St. Louis too.

So that wasn't gonna
solve the problem,

just leaving St. Louis.

I had to leave the kind of people,

cause the same kind
of people were here,

were in St. Louis, or Chicago rather.

But when I got here, I
didn't seek them out.

And when that element
came toward me now,

I didn't fall into that trap here.

Even before I got into church,

and when I got into church
and Pastor Bobo heard

my testimony, people accepted me.

People expected to something from me.

My friend, Ron Cohen,

he was a professional drug counselor.

And it was sometimes, you know,

like when I started drinking,
cause when my mother,

when I was going through
that stuff with my mother,

I blamed my mother's death on myself.

And he held me accountable.

He taught and it was other
folk from the church.

When I started straying
away at one point,

I kind of disappeared and
they wouldn't let me do that.

If they didn't see me in
church after a few weeks,

they were in my house or
they were calling me,

“Man, you all right?” Okay,
that's what I'm talking about.

You’ve got to have people
who care about you.

And I found that this
is what worked for me.

You got to find what works for you.

So as the saying goes,
“Different strokes for different folks.”

This is what worked
for me. This was my stroke.

Whether you're talking

about in the 12 step
movement or churches,

you don't not, you don't
do this by yourself.

You always have people that
are like-minded around you.

So you have support.

You have an accountability partner,

James five 16 says,

confess your faults one to another,

let yourself be open
to somebody and say,

look, I'm struggling right now.

But let that person is not

somebody who's going to,
co-sign your insanity,

but somebody who's going
to support you and

strengthen you and tell you
to hold on and pray for you.

For those people who
are tempted to try it.

I would only say that the

devil… That getting out of

something always costs more
than getting into something.

You know, certainly
there are people who

can have a couple of drinks and stop.

There are people who can smoke one

joint or blunt or whatever
the terminology is and stop.

But there's also people who,

once they start trying
something they're

hooked and you don't
know which one you are,

you won't know which one you
are until it's too late.

The drug issues didn't come
about until later on in life.

And when we first met each other,

I don't believe he
was in drugs at all.

I believe it was
after the 35 years of

not seeing each other and not
communicating with each other,

that his life took a spin.

And when he told me about it,

I was a little taken aback

because I was like a
little afraid at first,

but I started listening to him and I

did have true compassion for him.

I was… Before I left Chicago,

I remember was in November of 1991.

I was on my way to a drug house
in Chicago when Sunday morning.

And I went in and bought a bag
of heroin and a bag of cocaine.

It was a church across the
street from the drug house.

Matter of fact, there
were two churches

right there on that corner.

And I remember walking back
past the church with drugs.

It was a little, it was
drizzling then, light rain,

and it was a sermon that was
being preached inside the church.

The door was open.

I don't know why, but I can
hear parts of the sermon.

I can hear the sermon
was being preached,

it was about a Prodigal
Son, and the sermon,

it was getting to me.

I knew the story cause I had

preached that sermon
myself several times,

you know, before I left the church.

And so, but anyway, it
was different then.

And I sat there.

It was raining out and I had drugs
in my hand, heroin and cocaine,

and I sat on the steps
and listen to the sermon,

and it hit me.

And I was saying,

“Lord, I'm so sorry for the
life that I’ve been living.

Please forgive me for the life I've

been living.” And I threw the drugs

away and I walked away from
the drugs that never went,

well I can't say I
never went back because

a month later I had relapsed.

But that was when I quit.

I remember I was telling
you about Reverend Hodges.

This was in '85.

And I told you before about
how sometimes someone

plants a seed and then
later on, it’s watered.

Even though Reverend Hodges
planted that seed back in 1985,

it wasn't till 1991.

When I was going through this,

this real backhand of
my drug addiction,

that it really hit home.

And then it capped off by hearing

that sermon in the rain
that Sunday morning.

And then that's what
was when I decided,

no, I can't do this
anymore, and so I quit.

I put my faith in God.

God is the one that delivered me

from the drugs in the
first place, it wasn't me.

It was God who delivered me,

so I trust in him

to get me over any rough spots
in life that I'm going through.

Again, it’s surrounding yourself with

people who will hold you accountable,

people who love you.

When I messed up, I slipped
back the first time,

cause I was clean for maybe a month.

And I was thinking that I could

go and be around the same folks
that I used to hang out with,

and it wouldn't affect me.

Not true. I remember when I
was taking flute lessons,

when I was living in San Diego.

I was a jazz fan.

I wanted to play like Herbie Mann and

Hubert Laws and Yusef Lateef.

And I started taking flute
lessons every Saturday.

After a couple of weeks of lessons,

I remember on one of
Herbie Mann's albums,

it was pictures of him
playing the flute.

And he's his hands,

his fingers were going way up
and down, way up and down,

and so when I was taking that lesson,

I was doing the same thing.

My fingers are going to
weigh up off of the keys,

and my teacher told
me, you can't do that.

You gotta have your fingers right

on the keys and just
play them like that,

but I was saying, “Now Herbie Mann…

I saw a picture of Herbie Mann,

now his fingers were way up
off the thing!” He said, “No,

you have to have your fingers close.”

Now I wanted to do like Herbie man,

but like the thing was,

Herbie Mann been playing was
playing flute for decades,

I was playing for a week or two.

So the point I'm trying to say is,

I couldn't do the same
stuff he was doing

because he was experienced

at it and had been
doing it for a while,

so he can let his fingers fly around.

I'm just starting this thing.

So it's the same thing with someone
who is trying to be drug free,

what happened was, okay,

I've been clean for a
month and I thought that I

can go around folk who
were still using it,

and it won't affect me.

No, it don’t happened that way.

I can now, because I've
been clean for decades,

but back then, I'd been
clean for a week or two.

And so, no, surround
yourself with folk

who are not living in that lifestyle,

you have a better chance of being
successful in your recovery.

You know when you,

when you grew up in

the streets or been in
the streets for so long,

that's what you know, and
then to come out of that,

it's almost like a whole new world.

Like what, you know,

and then those old
insecurities kick in.

And then we tried it to cope
because we cope with drugs.

You know, that that was our
coping mechanism, you know?

So whenever it costs,
as long as we live,

it's going to be problems,

it's going to be disappointments.

It's going to be violence you know,

in the way we used to cope
with it was to go in use.

You know, God gives us another
alternative, a better alternative.

The 121st Psalm,

I remember when I was deep
into my addiction, my father,

one day, he told me to read
that scripture every day.

And I did, it was 121st Psalm.

I would lift up my eyes to the hills,

my help comes from the Lord
who made heaven and earth.

And going on… and I
remember every morning

before I would go to do anything,

my Bible was always on

the dresser and it was
open to that scripture.

And I remember a
couple of times there

was friends of mine who
come up to my room,

we getting ready to
shoot up and get high.

And they wanted to close the Bible.

No, don't touch the Bible,

leave that Bible open right there.

You know? Cause that
was just a thing.

It was something my father… I
felt like my father gave me that.

And so that's my
scripture, 121st Psalm.

And I remember when I was in

the prison and I forgot
which one I was in,

I think it was Centralia.

It was after I had,

it was after incidence
with Reverend Hodges.

I was walking around the prison
yard one day by myself and I was

praying and I heard the
voice of God clearer,

or as clear as I've ever heard Him.

He said, just like I said,

Reverend Hodges into the
prison to rescue you,

I'm going to send you back into

the prison to rescue
my other children.

And at that time I wasn't preaching,

I was still in prison
myself, but He said that.

And so I wouldn't feeling it,

cause I wouldn't even understanding

it because I wasn't a preacher.

I wasn't even back
in church, for real.

I mean, not on the outside anyway,

but then that's what happened.

And being clean, I'm
able to do stuff.

I'm able to help people.

I'm able to help other folks who are

going through the same
stuff that I went through.

I can help them to get
past their addictions.

I can give them advice.

A lot of times what people need
when they come out of prison,

a lot of people are in jail,

in prisons because of drug addiction.

A lot of them were not really,

they're not bad people.

They did some dumb stuff
because they were addicted.

And so if we can help
them get past that point,

then we can help them do a
lot of other things in life.

My biggest regret is

the hurt and the pain
that I caused my family,

that I was always going to jail.

My family had so much hope for
me, and I disappointed them.

At first, when I was
doing criminal stuff,

I was… I called myself
“Nickel Slick” you know.

I was able to talk folk out of stuff,

but when it came down toward the end,

the way that I used to
make money by ripping off

other drug dealers and ripping off

banks and stores and doing all
of that, and that was fine.

I got to a point where

I wasn't making money off
of the dealers anymore.

I wasn't ripping off the banks

or the stores or the businesses
and all of that anymore,

I was ripping off my people,

my family, the church,

my father's church, my aunt’s church.

And that was something that before,

a long time ago, would
have been unacceptable.

I was no longer that
slick talking con-man,

now I was just a drug addict,

a dope fiend who would
steal anything from

anybody to support my habit.

And looking back on that,

that was the beginning
of where I said,

“Okay, this has gone too far.”
That was my rock bottom.

When I started… When I was stealing
from family the way I was,

and I was hurting
family the way I was,

that I couldn't… That
was unacceptable to me.

I never stopped believing,
stopped believing in God.

And I know that looking
back on things,

that stuff that I thought that
I was able to accomplish,

even during those
times… Case in point,

when I was in prison, it

was a lot of guys that were
getting messed over, messed up.

People getting shanked,
people getting raped,

people… Stuff was
happening in a folk,

but nothing ever happened to me.

And I thought it was because
of the way I carried myself.

I thought I was carrying
myself with an aura of, “Okay.

Don't mess with me.” But
thinking back on it,

I realized it was God
had his hand on me.

It wasn't how I carried
myself or what I was doing.

It had nothing to do with that.

Nothing happened to me because
God had his hand on me,

because it was guys that
were bigger, tougher,

stronger than I was,

who was getting messed up,

but nothing happened to me,

and it wasn't because of
me. It was because of God.

I was heard of last
December, December 5th,

working for cellular city refuge,

South city over here and I
attracted blood poisoning.

In the next 24 hours,

I was crushed by a 500
yard waste dumpster

and lacerated three fingers,

broke my shoulder, my knee,

my ankle and so on.

I wind up self-medicating
while I was on the job,

going through rehab for

the injury and it was so gratifying
to bring the new year in,

and I couldn't even
wipe my own backside.

One hand was infected with

blood poisoning and other three
fingers had been sawed off,

but you would think
that was God's way of

telling me to slow down. I never did.

I walked away from my
job with the city.

I walked away from a house,

a good woman who held
me up and held me down,

but she didn't deserve
what I gave her.

Each time, I would
revisit those demons.

I would bring those demons
into her life as well,

which she deserved better.

I don't miss anything
about the life.

That was a life that I
thought that I liked,

that I was enjoying
while I was doing it,

but looking back on that,

there's nothing that
I miss about that.

I do miss some of the people
that I was associated with,

some of my friends at the time.

I think about some of
them from time to time,

but I knew that if I really
wanted to stay away from

that lifestyle and get away from
the drugs and get away from that,

I had to separate myself from them.

And that's why I left and
I stayed away from them.

And that whole lifestyle,

a lot of them I haven't
seen for over 20 years.

My friend Red was first
person I was arrested with,

they found him at a hotel
room with his throat cut.

And then there was a Butch,

a friend of mine that I grew up with.

We used to get high together.

He overdosed.

They found him dead
from a drug overdose.

My friend Fuzzy, Fuzzy
was a long time friend,

and matter of fact, I'm the
one that started him to

shoot heroin and cocaine.

Just like Tadpole started
me, I started Fuzzy.

Tadpole was the first one who
stuck a needle in my arm,

I was the first one who stuck
a needle in Fuzzy's arm.

And I found out that I heard one day

that Fuzzy’s grandmother
found him in his bedroom,

laying on the floor, dead
with a needle in his arm.

That hurt a lot,

when I found out about
my friend Fuzzy.

But that's the dangers
of the drug life.

There are others that
I've heard about.

They're doing quite well now,

one was my friend Tadpole,

as I said before,
Tadpole was one of the

first to stick a needle in my arm.

We got high together for years,

and it was on one of my visits to

Chicago that I was
talking to Tadpole,

and I was able to
lead them to Christ.

Sometime later Tadpole gave
up the drugs, even after 20,

30-something years of doing drugs,

he was delivered from that lifestyle.

And he was clean for well over
15 years before he passed.

He died last year,

I preached his funeral,

but at least I know

that he had better quality of
life during all of that time.

I was arrested when… I went
to jail one time and I said,

“Man, I am so tired of going to jail.

I'm tired of going to jail!”
And then I said,

“I wonder how many times I've
been locked up?” And I started

counting and I started counting
and I started counting then,

when I got to 30, I stopped counting.

I got depressed when I got to 30
and I wasn't finished though,

I still had some others,
I just quit counting.

And to answer your question,

I don't know how many times I’ve
been arrested. I don’t know.

I know it was more than 30.

And I remember even now,

when I’m doing up
the prison ministry,

it was one of the prisons that I

was putting an application
to, to go do ministry.

And I fill out an application
and then when they did

the background, check on me,

they called me in to see if they had

to deny my application because I

didn't list all of my
arrests on the application.

I said, “I don't know
of all my arrests.

Most of the time I was
high when I got arrested,

I didn't even know I was arrested!

I don't know.” So to
answer your question,

I've been arrested over 30 times.

I've been to prison three times,

twice I was sentenced and one
was on a parole violation.

But when you asked how many
times I've been arrested,

all I can say was more than 30.

God might tell you to go in a
certain direction and you say,

“I don't know about that.” You know,

but you have to trust Him.

Example. When I was in the
Marines, I played football.

The quarterback would
call the play and

then I was supposed to be
running down the field,

and I had blockers.

I had blockers who was supposed
to be blocking for me.

But the play was I supposed
to go to the right.

And when I get ready
to go to the right,

I look up and I see all
those folks over there,

I said, “Nah, I don't
want to go that way.

That don't look good.”
So I'm going the other way,

but the play was called
for me to go to the right.

So all the blockers are set
up to block on the right,

but I don't like what
I'm seeing on the right.

It looks better down the left,

so I'm going to the left.

And that's what happened
with us sometimes.

God has a plan for us

to go one way but we don't
like what we see that way,

so now we want to, “No,
I want to do that.

I'm going this way.”
But you’ve got to trust

God that he knows what's happening.

He told you to go that way because he

knows what it was over there,

“Oh, that looks alright, right now.

But when you get over there,

then there's something over there

that you don't want
to get involved in,

or you don't want happening.”

So trust God and go to
where he told you to go.

Taking on a heroin addiction,

fentanyl addiction with a crack
addiction and everything else.

I told a girl that I was getting
high with, nothing sexual.

I told her she could leave.

Friend of mine gave me a loaded gun

and God would have

it my little brother opened up
the door and he intervened.

Let me do what I did with

the drugs, finished the
rest of the liquor,

the crack and heroin and fentanyl
and tricked me into his truck.

Proceeded to go to St. Mary's.

He sat on the parking lot to
see if I was gonna leave,

which after they took me to
the back, I felt a calmness,

but I got, I guess I got out of
control once I got back there.

And I told the lady,

if she let me… They let me out
of her in the next 24 hours,

I was going to end my life.

And they transported
me to DePaul Hospital.

And I was bound in a straitjacket
for a day and a half,

on my knees, praying if I

got another chance that
I would go somewhere.

Wasn't going to take my
life and I wasn't going

back to that misery and that storm.

Some of the decisions I made took

me out of God's will
at that point in time,

but never out of his reach.

I've been clean 86 days
by the grace of God.

This is the longest I've
been sober in five years.

Some of these guys, I love them.

Some of them I'm never
going to see again,

but without any of these guys,

I probably wouldn't be where I'm at.

For those who were not able
to beat their addictions,

there are one of several
places that they may

end up: they’ll end up in prison,

or they will end up
dead, an early death.

One thing my father used to say was

“Everything that feels
good to you is not

good for you.” And that's
the advice that you should,

that I would give to
a 20 year old or just

cause the drug feels good,

the high feels good, or
that the drink tastes good,

that don’t mean it’s good for you.

Later on down the road,
you're going to pay for it.

A lot of times we think that
everything is about us, but it's not.

It's about God, God is
the one who delivered me.

That's why there's a
lot of stuff that God

allowed me to go through because
he saw the other side of it,

when I was going through it,

it was painful. I didn't like it.

I didn't like the outcome anyway,

but where I am now,

I'm able to walk in my
purpose and to help folk.

And that's what God put me here for,

and yes, he gets all the praise,

honor and the glory because of
what he has done through me.

Trying to try to stay clean,

is not as, it's not always as
easy as someone thinks it is.

Sometimes you going to have relapses.

You have relapses, but like my

father… I heard him
say one time, “Son,

if you slip and fall in the mud,

don't just lay there
and wallow in it,

get up, clean yourself
off and keep on stepping.

If you fall down again, get up again.

If you fall down again, get up again.

If you keep falling down,

keep getting up.” And that's
the message I want to give

the folk who are trying to
get clean up, stay clean.

Just because they relapse
or fall back or something,

then don't give up,

you know, say, “Okay,
I can't do this.”

No, just get up, clean yourself
off and keep on stepping.

If you fall down again, get up again.

If you fall down again
and get up again,

if you keep falling
down, keep getting up.

Rock bottom was
in December of '92.

I became homeless,
living on the street,

going from shelter to shelter,

and so from 2003 to now,

I've been using the scriptures
as my standard for living.

And I believe the Lord has let me

see recovery throughout
the scripture.

So I've been, whether it was

in the meetings or in the
churches I belong to,

I was always serving in
one capacity or another.

Service to me is a tangible
expression of your gratitude.

And one of the clichés
that you'll hear,

if you stay around
the 12 step movement,

is that a grateful
addict will never use.

I got cleaned at the age of 45.

You know, at 45, I just felt
that for the most part,

most of us have lived more
than half of our lives

and just the fear of going back

out there kept me doing
what I suppose to.

That's one of the things
that kept me doing

what I was supposed to do.

And then, my lifestyle changed
in terms of what I was doing,

who I did it with and where I did it,

the people, places and things.

So those are all key
components of staying clean.

And then, of course you’re tempted.

That's when… Prayer works,

prayer works, prayer works.

Because the evil one will get you.

He's always after you,

but he'll jump on you
when you least expect it.

And that's when you
call on scripture,

that's when you call
on the literature.

That's when you just
hold on tight and say,

I'm not going to use today because,

the urge does subside
the earth does a lessen.

The disease of addiction
would have you

act on your urge immediately.

So if you can defer that,

then you can get it back under,

under arrest, as they say.

Sitting in a jail
cells in the Cook County,

jail and in Leavenworth,

or at Centralia or in Joliet,

I never thought that a
day like this would come.

But I thank God for how
far He has brought me.

I hurt a lot of people.

I disappointed a lot of people.

There are consequences to

your decisions and one
day sooner or later,

you gotta face the consequences to

every decision, every
choice you make.

Because the Bible is full of stories
of people who had messed up,

but God never gave up on them.

The heroes of the Bible,

Peter, Paul, even Jonah,

you know, who ran away from
what God wanted them to do.

David, they've all done things
that were contrary to God's will,

you know, but God still loved

them and God used them
in a special way.

And a lot of the
people that I know of,

not everyone have gone
through some adversity.

And if you learn from that adversity,

no matter what it was,

whether it's jail or prison,

whether it was drugs, alcohol,

or whether it's some other
form of addiction or whatever,

if you learn from that and you're
able to reach others and to

help them recover from whatever
it is that they're going through,

then you’ve done, in my opinion,

what you were supposed to do.

You see it's easy to

praise God when you up and
things are going on, right?

But God wants to know if you
will praise him when you down,

when things are not going right,

when you are hungry,

when you've gone through
one situation or another,

he wants to know if he
will still praise him,

even in that situation.

He wants to know that you will
do what He wants you to do.

And then even in that situation,

we have to lift up our hands

and it is not going to
be easy all the time,

it's not going to be easy.

God didn't promise us that
things would be easy,

but He promised us that He would be

with us and He would hold us up.

He would hold our hands and
He would carry us through.

You see, we can't do it on our own.

Every time I tried to do this
thing on my own, I messed up.

But it wasn't until I put
myself in God's hands,

that things got to be
a little bit easier.

And He carried me through and at
times still get rough sometimes,

but He was still carrying me.

I'm not doing this on my own.

And I'm telling whoever
I'm talking to out here,

you can do it too if you trust God.

Stop trying to do it on
your own, trust in God.

He is the one that can carry
you across the finishing line.

You can't do it on your own.

You have to trust God and
be with Him and be the man,

be the woman, be the child
that God wants you to be.

And then my friends,

my brothers and my sister,

you will be successful and God
will get the glory from your life.

I was thinking back on my life,

is there anything that I would
have changed if I could?

And suddenly thinking about it,

the answer is no.

Even all heartache and
pain that I went through,

I wouldn't change that.

The time I spent in jails and in
prison, I wouldn't change that.

Not saying I enjoyed it,

cause I didn't, but I

wouldn't change it because all
of that made me who I am now.

(crowd applauds)

Being who I am and all the
stuff that I went through,

I'm able to be a blessing
to some other folks.

People who I wouldn't
be able to reach,

people who wouldn't
listen to me unless they

realized that I've been to
what they are going through.

Good.

When I go into the prison,

they know that when I talk,

I'm not just talking about

some stuff that I read
in a book somewhere,

no, I'm talking about
stuff that I lived.

And if I can make it,
you can make it too.

God's no respecter of person.

He doesn’t like me or love me
any more than He loves you.

Your testimony touch me, brother.

So did yours, and all of
the ones I heard too.

Yours over there, North side.

Anytime you do drugs or something,

you are risking your life

because you never know whether
you going to overdose.

You never know whether you're
going to get murdered or killed.

When you're going in
and out of drug house

after drug house or leaving
from the drug house,

you never know what's
going to happen.

So in reality, every time
could be your last time.

Hi everyone. This is Deshaye,

and the question of the
day is what does it take

to survive or overcome obstacles?
Dream, drive and support.

So, first you think of what
you want to do with your life,

and I know at our age, cause I'm 16.

And right now I know my dream
is to become a great performer.

Fame’s not that important,

money’s not that important,

but I just want to become
such a good performer that

I affect somebody with my talent,

change the world in some
way, shape or form.

Even if it's just a little bit,

it’s the little bit that counts.

I was asked recently to put
what I say to someone who,

who was going to do drugs
that at night and then

ended up being their last time.

What would I say to them?

And I'm not arrogant enough to think

that what I can say would change
the situation. I don't know.

I don't know what I can tell
someone who doesn't know me,

not to do this or not

to keep taking changes
chances with their life.

I would ask the person
if I can pray with them.

Now you notice, I didn't
say pray for them.

I said, pray with them.

And that is, and while I'm

praying is that I would pray for
his or her safety and for him

or her to make good choices

and hopefully God will lead me to say

something in that prayer
that they will hear,

and it will prick or
touch their heart to

give them second thoughts about
what they're about to do.

Because whatever I say… Nothing I

say that comes from me is
going to help any situation.

I have to trust God that He
will say something through me,

or give me something to say,

to reach that person or to
change that person's mind,

or at least give them
pause to say, “Huh?

Maybe I shouldn't do
that tonight.” And then

trust God to do what He does.

Heavenly father, I thank
you Lord for this time and

this time together and Lord,

the reason and the purpose
for this documentary.

Lord, I pray Lord
for all of those who

are going through
addictions right now,

whether it's because
of drugs or heroin

or cocaine or crack or
prescription pills,

whatever the addiction is, marijuana.

Lord, please deliver them
from their addictions.

I pray Lord that you will let
something that they see here,

cause them pause to think,

to rethink what they are
doing and let them know that,

okay, there's another way,

there's a better way.

They might be hurting for one reason

or another Lord, ease their pain.

They might be going through
a difficult situation,

whatever it is Lord,
see them through it,

and let them know Lord that they are

not just affecting their own lives,

they are affecting
those who love them.

And Lord, I pray Lord for those
people who are living with,

or who are related to
people who are addicted.

I pray Lord that you will
give them patience Lord,

that you will give them
wisdom of what to do,

and what not to do, and what to say,

and what not to say,
and they will not be

enablers for those who are addicted,

even though they won't enable them
but they would still love them.

And let them know Lord that
the person that is addicted,

know that their loved
one really loves them

and that they really want to see
and do what is best for them.

I just thank You for this time Lord,

I praise you and I bless You
in Jesus holy name, Amen.

(soft piano music)

Burton Barr Junior.

(cheering and applause)

(upbeat music)

(crowd clapping)

That concludes our
Honorary Doctorate of Divinity.

(crowd claps)

Will you please

join me in congratulating
all of the graduates,

for the year 2019?

(crowd clapping)