Living with secrets and the cost of hiding
Why men struggle to be honest about their lives
Recovery, confession, and real accountability
Faith, failure, and starting again
Finding freedom later in life
Probably a common injury among soccer players.
Actually, it was a, it was a really rare, you would think that and that. So it was a really rare condition that I actually, I had a doctor tell me he diagnosed it's called compartment syndrome, and he diagnosed me with that after about a month. So what was happening was I would start running. You know, we were in the offseason, so I graduated early from high school, started college early, so I was still 17 when I started college, and started in the off season. And every time I ran, my legs would go numb from the knee like all the way down through my toes. And so I didn't know. I thought I was just out of shape, you know, I'd put on some Christmas weight or something like that, and I was just trying to run it
Off normally when you eat a couple too many cookies,
Anything to convince yourself that you're fine when you're an athlete, where you're like, Oh, that's not a big deal. But anyways, the doctor, when I got tested for it and diagnosed with it, he was like, your career is probably over. Really? Yeah, so that was, again, I hadn't even stepped on the field in a collegiate game. And, yeah, we can try surgery. And you know, it may work a little bit, but this is never going to go away. You'll always kind of have this issue. And lo and behold, he was right. I do
Who gave me a podcast? This is Jeff Allen, welcome to my podcast.
Hey, everybody. Welcome. This is Jeff Allen, and this is who gave Jeff Allen a podcast that is the quintessential question of my life right now, we're going to find you. There's 6 billion of you, and we know where you're at. Today's guest, and I'm looking forward to this is an athlete, and I love talking to jocks. So anyway, Ben is Locke is an author speaker, whose work is rooted in honest faith and lived experience, and you are the author and published author of the book in our suffering. Lord, be near.
Prayers of hope for the hurting. This is a great topic, and I want to get deeper into that, a collection of prayers written for those who are walking through pain, grief and seasons of unanswered questions, rather than offering quick fixes or spiritual platitudes. Ben's writing invites readers to bring their full selves before God, including doubt, anger, sorrow and wariness. And his prayers are grounded in Scripture and shape our personal seasons of suffering, the required endurance, humility and trust when clarity was absent. What a great, great topic my my father, welcome. Ben Locke, thanks for having me, Jeff, Yeah, you're welcome. And my father used the the argument of suffering as why God didn't exist. And I tried to again the platitude that we're in a fallen world and things are broken, and when things are broken, pain exists. But there's also, to me, the well, let's just get a little bit about you. We were talking off air. It turns out you were you from the same town my wife is Tammy, first time ever represent?
Yeah, I grew up in stock village, Illinois, and I would bumped into somebody. It's like 3000 people, okay? And somewhere in the middle of Florida, I bumped into a guy that says, I grew up in stock How do I not know you? We should know each other. Yeah, exactly. That's right. You grew up in Hudson, which, if you're not familiar with Hudson. They lobbed Faberge eggs on Halloween. Very, very well to do, yeah, and Tammy will tell you that she was on the other side of the tracks, but So you grew up in Hudson, and you soccer. That was your game, which I still cannot get my head around,
I'm a child of the 50s. Yeah, and it was baseball. It was literally Little League Memorial Day. Every Park was filled with kids playing baseball.
I did play baseball growing up too, to be fair. And then I got bored, to be honest with you, that's why I don't want to start a fight on the podcast. But yeah, that I had the choice between soccer and baseball, and it was, I just got a little bored. I was a center fielder, and when you're you're eight or nine years old, playing center field, yeah, it's easy for baseball to
get boring. Add, you know, you're in on every pitch. That's right. You're right. Don't get bored. When I was in college, and the coach wanted to give me a rest, he moved me to left field. There you go. And I almost got caught with my back to the home plate because I was out. At one point, the coach walked down the third base line, and he said, you know, Jeff, it would help if you just paid attention. And I said, outfield's not
my I was gonna I might say more about how good I was at baseball that. They were like, Why don't you just go, go play in the outfield.
But well, no, see center field and left field. Right field was for the
true field was, yeah, if you couldn't hit and couldn't play, you went play right field. Yeah, batted ninth, yeah, right. But I just to clarify,
former athlete, former jock. I'm definitely recovering, so it's easy to, easy to I want to make sure that's clear. Yeah, more get into not enough, but anymore your story. But yeah, yeah, there was a pastor I heard a sermon once, and he was a former division one college football player, and said the hardest people to reach with the gospel are gifted athletes, because they have skills, they have talents, and they naively think that the the the end result of their athletic prowess is they may give God the glory for the gift that they have. But he said, to really get their attention injury. He said, You know, you throw an ACL tear or a broken bone in their direction, and then you'll determine whether or not the rubber meets the road. That's kind of your story. You were on a track to playing professional soccer. That was the plan.
Yeah, that was the plan. And I was gonna say that before you did. I mean, there's a certain level of arrogance and, you know, pride, I think that comes with being an athlete. And some of that is internal, you know, I'm the man that, you know, I'm the best player on the team, you know, I'm getting told all these things, and then a lot of that, some of that's external, too. You know, people look up to athletes. You get a scholarship, you're playing at a certain level, and I think there's, there's a feeling of invincibility that comes when you're an athlete. And I was actually, ironically, all the way up until college. I never really got injured, and so I was always healthy. I was always able to play. And then, yeah, my I mean, as soon as I got to college, it took about a month for my first injury to kick in, and then it was just a snowball from there.
So yeah, now tell me about the first injury was probably a common injury among soccer players.
Actually, it was a, it was a really rare, you would think that and that. So it was a really rare condition that I actually, I had a doctor tell me he diagnosed. It's called compartment syndrome, and he diagnosed me with that after about a month. So what was happening was I would start running. You know, we were in the offseason, so I graduated early from high school, started college early, so I was still 17 when I started college, and started in the off season. And every time I ran, my legs would go numb from the knee like all the way down through my toes. And so I didn't know. I thought I was just out of shape, you know, I'd put on some Christmas weight or something like that, and I was just trying to
run it off. Normally, when you eat a couple too many cookies, go numb,
you know, anything, anything to convince yourself that you're fine when you're an athlete, where you're like, Oh, that's not a big deal. But anyways, the doctor, when I got tested for it and diagnosed with it, he was like, your career is probably over, really? Yeah. So that was, again, I hadn't even stepped on the field in a collegiate game. And, holy cow, yeah, we can try surgery, and, you know, it may work a little bit, but this is never going to go away. You'll always kind of have this issue. And lo and behold, he was right, I do, but I was able to, I was able to get the surgery and kind of come back from it. But it was, it was pretty brutal.
Is it a nerve? So it's the the
scientific explanation is the muscle, the fascia wraps the muscle, and the fascia is supposed to expand with the muscle, muscle when you work out. And mine didn't. So it was just pressure. Basically a bunch of pressure build up. So that's why it got numb. And it just, it was brutal. It would take half a day, or a day for the feeling to come back into my legs. And so again, as a soccer player, you gotta, you're running eight or nine miles a game. So it was, it was basically the worst case scenario.
So you're 17, yeah, and you got to process this, that's right. How are your parents throughout this whole thing, within understanding, or would you have a close relationship
with your parents? I did. My parents are incredible. I'm very thankful for them. They're married for 30 years now. Now I had, I'd actually left the house on my 16th birthday. So I had, moved in with a host family. Actually moved away from my parents, not because of anything that was wrong in the house, but because I was pursuing my my soccer dream, essentially. So they were very supportive, you know, but it was from a distance. They lived in Nashville. I was in Raleigh, North Carolina, at NC State. So they, you know, they were as supportive as they could be. But you're when you're a 17 year old freshman and a 40,000 person you know state school, there's only so much you can do. You know, I really it was my trainers, it was my coaches, my teammates. Those were really my the people I was doing life with.
So, so how many people get this?
I have yet to know another person or athlete that's that's had the condition. Yeah, I actually, I heard a story that one of the Preds guys got it, but it was an acute can. It was an acute version. There's an acute and then a long term version of it. But I've never known somebody else to have the same issue. Holy cow,
yeah, I could see why you would might now, did you have a relationship with God at that point? We did you have a faith or so?
I grew up in the church, which is not an answer to your question, but it's my answer to your question. So, so now cultural thing, there you go. So I now looking back, my answer, answer is absolutely not. I mean, I was going to church, and again, my parents, to their credit, they would drag us along whenever, whenever I wasn't out traveling to play soccer. But no, not at the time, definitely not
so after the injury. Obviously, there's depression. There's some doubt. Did you immediately turn towards God and say, why? Or did someone come to you and say the thing that really annoys people, like it's God's will? Yeah, oh
my goodness. Door opens another right? All the bumper stickers, right? No, actually, so I you know part of my story, actually, is after that first surgery, my right after that first surgery, actually, I started my athletic trainer started sexually abusing me, sexually assaulting me, and so that actually snowballed, and kind of, you know, you talk about depression, identity crisis, that compounded very quickly into something else that was taking place, kind of alongside of trying to heal and get better physically and get back onto the field. And so that, that compounded with, with the identity crisis, the injury, the inability to play, I went the opposite direction. I was like, screw this. There's no way I believe in God. You know, I was just frustrated. And at the same time I was also just trying to get through the day. I was trying to just get back on just get back on the field. So I, in a lot of ways, I wasn't really thinking about the bigger picture. I was just like, Alright, I gotta, I gotta figure this out. I gotta get back on the field. I gotta get healthy. I wasn't
really, so you had quite accepted the fact that this was the terminal. That's right, which is not necessarily a bad thing.
Yeah, there was, yeah, that's right, not a terrible thing. And I did believe I could come back from it. You know, it wasn't career ending, but it kind of kick started a whole series of of health issues and injuries that that snowballed in the following years.
Wow, so much in that. Wow, yeah. Again, I I'm 70 years old, and I couldn't process all of that at the same time. It's like a snowball, yeah. That just kept gaining Yeah. And again, the relationship with your parents, did you? Were you able to share about the the abuse or not?
Not right away. So those victims don't, that's right, though, in there, when you're a man, you know, I talk about this a lot. Now, I didn't at the time, but there are all these other dynamics and nuances when you're when you're a man, when you're a division one athlete, you know, and you're supposed to be, again, the guy and strong fit, whatever it is. So no, absolutely not. It was something that that that took place over about two, two to two and a half years that I was there before I transferred to a different school, and it was probably four years after the first incident happened that I ended up sharing it with my parents. But it was, it was a pretty drawn out process. I was I was afraid to tell them. I didn't know how they would react. I was, I wasn't necessarily scared of how they were going to react, but it was a, it's such an uncomfortable thing, it was still an uncomfortable thing to talk about. And so I wasn't sure, how do I, how do I approach a situation where I'm telling mom and dad that this thing happened? So no, it took me a while
to Yeah, I got molested at eight. I never told anybody. Yeah, I didn't even deal with it till I was in my 50s, okay? And I remember telling a therapist, I said, Well, it was consensual, and you were eight, eight, yeah? I mean, that's, that's how you rationalize it, justify whatever. And I was, you know, completely where I knew what was going on. I didn't repress it to the point where it was a memory. I remembered it was if you had asked me, I was, oh, yeah, sure, yeah. And she says, Okay, you have an eight year old, yeah, if some guy did that to your eight year old, I said, I rip his thigh. That's right,
it's funny. What we do, yeah, internally, what we'll tell ourselves. So that's I'm thankful that I got to process it a little sooner than that, and again, that's a credit to my family pushing me. I got into therapy after fighting that for probably four or five years. Eventually I went,
but it's not, did it lead you to dark places? And sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. I mean, like drinking, drugging and so.
So yeah, the short answer is yes, nothing extreme more. So just in conjunction with my athletic career, like I maintained my athletic career, I played five years of college soccer, and then again, I still try to go pro, and that's another story that I'm sure we'll get to. You. Played through the injury I did, yeah? So it was about a four month recovery that first surgery, and then in the recovery process, I injured my groin and my hip flexor, and so I ended up that kind of opened the door things, right, well, and it opened the door for my trainer to kind of continue doing what he was doing. And actually, you know, ratchet it up a notch. And so I had about a 14 month period after that first injury that I was having groin and eventually got diagnosed with a sports hernia in both my legs that got operated on. And then a year after, I had a hip labrum repair. So it was three, three major surgeries in three years, and then I played my first college, college season, basically as a junior.
Wow, and soccer is the kind of game for people who like me, you know, I get bored watching it. You said you run eight to nine miles in a game. That's amazing, yeah? I mean, when you think about it, yeah, you know. And short sprints and
you need your groin flex, yeah, you need a lot of their importance, yeah, that's right, yeah, they're important pieces,
yeah, yeah. You can't, kind of lay down and, you know, you
can't be out in right field just just looking, yeah, you'll be in trouble. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So after college, what was your major in?
So I made well, yeah, I tell people all the time, I majored in soccer. I chose the easiest major. I got a business major. And again, I transferred about halfway through my college career, and so I had a psych minor and a Spanish minor, but I lost that when I transferred, so I ended up kind of graduating by the skin of my teeth with a business major keep us all Ben, yeah, I shouldn't brought that
up. Order cold beer. Gosh, there's so many questions, and we wrote out a bunch and, wow, losses tend to teach you more than wins. You know, again, I hate these bumpers.
I really do. There's a reason they exist, I guess.
Yeah, yeah, I know. But it's like, but I hate them too. Those of us who tend to lean more cynical, yeah, you know, when someone comes, shut up. I don't want that in a Christian loving way, but Shut up. Yeah, absolutely
and but secrets that we carry are probably the most damaging things to our souls. You know, Bible's very clear that things brought to light you're dealing in truth. Then, you know, are you married? Now, I don't even know. I did. No, no, you're single.
Yeah, yeah, all dating, not married.
Gosh, man, you blindsided me with, you know, not at all injuries and stuff for one thing, but then those, yeah, that is just wow, the ultimate violation of a man, yeah, you know. And having dealt with and dealing with and still dealing with that part of my childhood is, you know, so you write a book that say, they say, write them out. Yeah, that's right. So it was the genesis for the book, just your your journey to fight. Was there a road to Damascus moment? Or were you like me? I took seven or eight years just kind of looking for okay, if you exist, what does it look like? What does it feel like? I mean, you know, I don't necessarily believe you exist, but so you When did you move from atheism to agnosticism? Or did you ever just totally not believe in God.
No, I always some part of my mind or heart, whatever you want to call it, always could not rationalize my existence without a higher power, without, you know, I could not rationalize it. I just it was happenstance that I existed that never really made sense to me. So I always believed in a god, or something that I would, you know, you could refer to as God. But the shorter version of the story is so I, after that third surgery, I was able to play again finally. And I was actually, you know, we went to the Sweet 16. We had a couple of really fantastic years, and I was starting to get looks from. Some of the professional clubs you know that hopefully sign a contract after my senior year and I got into a car accident, react. So this is this it. See, I'm glad you can I'm glad you can laugh. It's one of those things where you tell a story and people sometimes don't know how to react. I'm like, it's okay to laugh. It's kind of funny.
No, it's I, I say all the time that that, you know, in order to you really have to go through certain things, in order to view the world in a certain way, in order to find the comedy and things that that's what I believe. Well, they say comedy's tragedy plus, that's right, and it's itself from the pain, that's right. You should find a
humor That's right. So, yeah. So the car accident, kind of really bad. Concussion, damaged my neck, and that was leading up to my senior year. I should have called it quits. God's just working his way up your body. That's exactly right.
He started down here and he graduated. He was like, you can't you're not gonna escape this one was basically what happened. You need your brain. It's funny, and it's true. That's that's how we are, that's how I am. I was so dead set on this thing. And of course, I started playing soccer when I was four years old, yeah. And so to try to rationalize letting that go, it just, and I'm a competitor, like, deep in my DNA picking that up, yeah? And so it was like, I can't. What am I going to do? You know, get a job, go into business that doesn't know I'm going to, you know, I want to run around a field eight to 10 miles a game.
But that, that really was sort of the final nail in the coffin. About six or seven months later, I ended up in the emergency room and was having a bunch of neurological symptoms, and that kind of kick started my faith journey. So I was I got diagnosed with an autoimmune disease at that point, and so finally found a doctor. I probably saw 10 or 11 doctors, and eventually landed on one that was like, Hey, this is this. This is this whole complex thing that's been happening in your body, and it's been sort of manifesting itself and all these symptoms. And so that diagnosis came after the car accident. I was in bed. I was on bed rest for probably two and a half years, like it was a that was a brutal, brutal period of my life. And, you know, we did, we joked about as true, the Lord literally took everything away, to the point where I was like, I said, I was in bed 22 hours a day for about two and a half years. And so I
some important you said, yeah, that thought because 10 or 11 different doctors before you found one. You know, I grew up in a period where we elevated doctors to God, like statuses. So you get one opinion, and they tell you they don't know everything. And when you get into areas like this, it does help to get multiple absolutely opinions, absolutely so were you going to different parts of the country for this? Were you sticking in? Where were you living at this point? Were you
I was here in Nashville? Yes, I finished my my playing career. So we have good hospitals here.
Yeah? Vanderbilt, that's real. St Thomas, a very good Williamson County meadow. That's right, looking for a sponsorship.
We'll take either being good sponsor. Yeah, I so yeah, they were most, I think, all local. You know, I travel a little bit, but not nothing crazy. You want to mention the name of the doctor that found it,
and Dr Eric Potter is his name. He's actually he was a believer. And it was like, bad, rare when you get a
medical profession, unbelievable, which is unusual, because that's right, the guy that mapped out the human genome became a believer after he looked at I said, it's just too it's not good. There you go. Yeah, to have been by an accident,
that is exactly right. So he helped put all the pieces together. I was going in to get treatment three times a week, you know, I was doing IVs and getting different drugs and, you know, supplements. He was very holy. He I can't speak highly enough about him, but the process was essentially a detox, and so it was incredibly painful and draining, like it was like detoxing from anything, alcohol, drugs.
Were you taking steroids and things for the pain, or,
Oh, not for the pain, no, but for just kind of purging my system of what was, what was inside of my immune system and all that kind of stuff. So just a really, really hard period. And so about two years of environmental stuff. It was environmental Lyme disease, so that, that was the the autoimmune stuff, really, yeah, so it was all related to and that kind of stuff, you know, I know this isn't a health health and wellness policy.
We. Do a lot of it, don't we? Oh, there you go. We do it. We do everything, yeah, but it is, I mean, that's
important, yeah? Well, and it's really complex. And so anybody that has autoimmune disease, a lot of times you get misdiagnosed, you know, or you get diagnosed with multiple things that are kind of comorbid. And so there was
a friend of mine who used to do a show, a joke about he saw Dr Heimlich when he was a kid, and he'd go, my throat hurts, and he'd go. He goes, my foot hurts, he'd go. And then finally I had some in my throat. He goes, Yeah, here we go. Like one thing, this is it. I don't want to be known for anything else, exactly.
So anyway, you know, at least you got a guy that was willing to look at the whole body and go, Look, we got, we got to check boxes.
That's exactly right. He was tremendous and a godsend. I mean, genuinely, I got diagnosed with the most ridiculous things. I mean, I would go into doctor's offices and they would, you know, talk to me for a minute and then leave and be like, Yes, what's wrong with you? And, you know, I'm like, You. We didn't even sit and have a conversation about what's going on. So we went through that
with my wife and her breast cancer breezes right by, pats her on the hands, says it's probably benign. And you want to go, boy, what a genius. I mean, why we could leave now, you know, and very flippant, very short, very always looking at his watch while she was asking questions. And she called him up when we got home and said, told the nurse, if he doesn't change his attitude, we're finding another surgeon. Wow. And he completely did a 180 back and said, I'm sorry. He goes. I have a terrible bedside manner. I'm good at what I do. What are your questions? And he sat there for 30 minutes, which is an eternity for a guy like that, you know, like you said, a lot of them are just flipping as many patients as they can today.
That's right. Well, and it's, you know, it's interesting. I've as I've gotten older, you know, I've realized the in part, partially, what happened with my trainer. You know, we entrust certain people in our lives, the things and doctors and sort of medical professionals are one of those people, coaches, teachers, parents, you know. And some of that's good, you know, I trust a doctor more than I trust my brother, you know, who doesn't know anything about health and wellness. And so I shouldn't take his word for it, but I should trust my doctor. But there's a there's a flip side of that, which is there's a lot of power, you know, and those there's a lot of authority, and those dynamics and those relationships. And so the power dynamics can be really challenging. And whether it's, you know, what I went through in college, or something like illness, and trying to make sure that somebody is actually listening to you and taking care of your needs and answering your questions. You know, you have to. You have to find your voice in that and find people that are willing to listen to that.
So that's what Tammy was great at. I don't know if I would have been as a person who despises conflict. Yeah, she, you know, she took charge. Good for her again. You know, she said, This is my decisions. Ultimately, I just want information, you know. So she read, Susan loves book on breast cancer, and it's like the Bible for breast cancer. I think she read it four or five different times. So she she had wanted, she had questions, and they had the answers. She just needed to get him to listen to her. And that was the hard part. Yep, so you you know. And I watched my what my mother went through with with, with her cancer, and she just did whatever the doctor said. This guy was traveling the world, speaking interesting. I got one of the best oncologists in the world, and she Yeah, but he's never there, Mom, you got to be there, yeah,
surrogates to come in, you know? No, he's not actually doing the work. He's not your doctor, you know. Interesting. I had one of the greatest, best internists in Nashville, who, I won't mention his name, because I never saw the guy interesting, and I've learned to trust nurse practitioners. Most people I go to now are nurse practitioners. Yep, they they truly love what they do, and they truly want to get you well, yep, and they're not in it for the money, because the money doesn't that's right, build those big houses in West Haven.I found a very similar thing.
Yeah, we go to Grace point in Franklin, and I have Medicare, and I still they don't take Medicare. They did. It's a concierge, and everything's on a menu. You know what it costs when you go in, which is way healthcare should be. That's a miracle, isn't it crazy concept? Yeah. It's like, you know, can you
imagine going to the grocery store and then you don't know what it costs until you get
or a month later when you get a bill in the mail? Yeah, can of corn, $122 Wow. Like, sorry, this is just the way that it is. Yeah, that's
the way it is. Crazy. Holy cow. This is this conversation went nowhere near where. I thought it was, and we'll get to suffering. Yeah, yeah. We've already gotten to it a little bit. Yeah. We have Yeah. And, what a fascinating thing. Carolyn, well, here, this is great, yeah. And, oh, here's one I love. I love this. And first of all, let's, let's deal with the book here. This is in our suffering. Lord be near. I asked you, and I interrupted you. And I know I interrupt a lot, because people tell me that in the comments, don't read the comments. Jeff
never read them. I never read them. I really, I don't want to say that, because it'll quit commenting, but it's rare, and calling me a douche bag, yeah, really is not productive. To know when you're commenting to artists, you know, ad hominem attacks really don't, don't go very far, you know, because we've heard them all more creative, starting with my parents. If you know, so anyway, I forgive you, bless your heart. So anyway, you didn't go to college to be a writer. English wasn't your obviously. Spanish was your choice, I guess. Yeah, that's how bad my English was. Maybe
I'm gonna do Spanish. But so you decide, was it journaling that started you?
That's what it was. Yeah, again, recommend your journal. My family say, again, that's, that's definitely a theme of my life. And this conversation, I'm sure, is, is my family has been incredible and and at the same time, they were probably like, gosh, we're tired of, you know, tired of listening to Ben wine all the time. So why don't we get him a
let's, let's, you know, this way we won't have to deal with him talking about it as much. No, I, they encouraged me to write, and I never wrote. I never kept a journal, even, you know, growing up or anything like that at this point. So I'm 2324 years old, just out of college. I did my master's. So this is kind of pandemic masters, yeah, again, to play a fifth year, play a fifth year soccer. That's the only reason I got come.You don't do this more often. People always were contemplating, yeah, yeah. And they have to do this.
You'll we'll get that when the questions get a little more interesting. So they, they encouraged me to get a notebook. I did and I started writing. And that was around the same time, yeah, paper. I don't write, I don't type any, anything that I write to this day, pen and paper. And that's also when I got my Bible out and started reading it kind of for the first time. We're just start job. Went straight to job. It's funny. I was like, I know exactly. I know. I've heard of this guy. I've, I've heard a little bit of his story. What? Yeah, that's right, that's true. I read job. And I was like, this is, this is how I feel. And I did not my perception of the were
you getting advice like his friends were giving him? I mean, from people well meaning there? Yes, what did you do? The short answer, smite you with all this well.
And we talked about it too, the bumper stickers. There's a lot of that. And I know people mean well, I also think that it's people don't know what to say, you know. And so one of the reasons that I actually, I've talked about this a lot with my book, is it's not just for people who are suffering a lot of times. It's for people who are witnessing someone suffer, or alongside somebody who's suffering, because we don't know how to talk about it. And one of my favorite stories actually, ironically, because the friends in the book of Job proceed to really, you know, make a fool of themselves, but in the beginning of the book, they actually sit with the Word says that they sit with job for seven days, and nobody says anything.
They just sit in silence and they weep and they cry. And I'm like, that's actually one of the best examples of friendship, maybe in the entire scripture. So anyways, I went straight to job, and then I read the Psalms as well. And so the Psalms, kind of Psalms, is where I saw some of the creative writing that's in my book. My book is poetry. It's sort of this more creative approach to writing. And the Psalms really inspired that. And the story of Job was was, it was affirmation, I guess in a sense, it was validation, and it was like looking in a mirror, a little bit that it just encouraged. I didn't know that was possible. To be honest with you,
yeah, I think the message is that God is in our suffering. He's there. You know, that's exactly, you know, it's funny when you were talking about that, I I never would call friends that were going through hard times because I didn't know what to say. I. Yeah. And I finally called one one day, and I said, I don't know what to say. And he broke down on the phone and said, thank you. Yeah, yeah, just for calling and being here and and I said, I'm not good at this. And he said, You don't, you know. Again, not knowing what to say. I know what you're going through, or I can feel your pain, or I can and you're right. It's it's uncomfortable, especially when you're somebody you love. That's right, you know. And what a blessing to have a family that just basically said you need to write this stuff out.
I can't thank them enough. And presence is a really powerful thing, and that's, that's what you're alluding to. Presence is so powerful. And a lot of times, a lot of times, especially when things are fresh, you know, when they're very when you're in the middle of it, a lot of times silence is the best thing. Now, that doesn't mean you disappear like that's that's why presence is really important. That's why just saying, Hey, I'm here, what do you need? Or do you need anything? But yeah, my I can't speak highly enough about my family. I'm incredibly blessed.
And they, they just showed up, and they kept showing up, and that that got me through some of the worst, and then, and then writing it really was my it was my outlet. It was I could say whatever I wanted. You know, when I wrote it down, there were, there were no repercussions, really, when I wrote it down, and I got to this place where I was like, these are the things I'm thinking, so I should there's no harm in putting them down. And that was sort of an evolution in my faith too, because a lot of times I was hiding the things that I was thinking from God, assuming that he didn't know them, you know, that I could tuck them away and he couldn't see them. But the process of saying, no, these things, these things are there, and he knows they're there, so I'm just going to put them down on paper. Was cathartic for me. Yeah, I
usually use the line when you get on your knees and complain to God about a broken world. His response to you is, yeah, I know that's right. You're not telling him anything. I talk about journaling when I started my recovery from from alcoholism, I journaled and I had three pages of I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate. Three pages. That's all I wrote. I hate, I hate. Oh, and at the end of all of that, I just broke down and sobbed, and I wanted to know why I hated so much. I don't know. I didn't I didn't know what else to write. Well, you know, it's honest. Wouldn't make a good best seller.
Well, you never know. Actually, you never know. There's a lot of people that probably identify with that. Well, I always say, if people read through everything I've written, I would, I would really not want them to do that, right? Let me just say that, because, you know, you've got a prayer on this page, and then you've got, you know, something that I can't repeat on this podcast on the next page, but at the same time, I was actually reading some of the, some of the stuff that I had written before I came here. And that's, that's the process, you know, and that's what's so fascinating about God is a lot of what he has to do is for it's for us. I have to I have to be changed, I have to grow up, I have to mature.
And he just uses circumstance to do that. And that's what he did. He you know. And again, I think a really important distinction for me was God didn't want this. For me, God didn't strike me down with sickness, but he permitted it this. It was part of his permitted will, but not something. The Word says that he can only give good things. And so I had to wrestle with that for a very, very long time, because a lot of my anger was towards the Lord. I was angry at God, right? And I had to, I was taught so much and saying, No, I'm I'm the product of a fallen and broken world.
That's interesting, because that's a mature point of view. But when you're a kid growing up, we grow up with the cop in the sky, that's right, you know, the guy on the throne that's directing traffic down here, and and then when everything is blessed and going, well, it's really easy. That's right, to say the words, that you know, thank you God for this. I was told, when I got into alcoholic in the recovery for alcoholism, that I will, one day I will thank God for this. And I laughed. I said, first of all, I don't believe in God, but why would I thank him for this? And I can remember the day I you know, thank you for this. Wow, because it led me to you, you know. And I always call God the great improviser. We get off his pad, we get off the path, and he's got to kind of figure out how to work things. That's right. And again, this isn't something you asked for the. In your wildest imagination, but in hindsight, would soccer fulfilled you as much as this, or
Absolutely not? And that's, that's a, you know, processing the end of my playing career is something that I think is still happening, to be honest with you, and a lot of that is because, you know, it's, it's tied to the the part of my story that's related to abuse, which is something that I think I'll wrestle with for the rest of my life, to be honest with you, but that's so interwoven with with soccer, and I've, you know, I've since come to find out a lot more about what happened. And there, there are other men that have come forward and praise God for that. But that I my career ended because of that. Basically, I got, I was supposed to be diagnosed with something that, you know, probably a year sooner than what I did. So it really, it cratered my my playing career, and so I could have never I wouldn't be sitting here right now if that path continued to go the way, have you been able to forgive them? What a good question. I Wow. 40 minutes. There you go. There.
Finally, the the answer is yes, I think so. I guess is how I would put it. I I've learned that forgiveness is a forgiveness is a lifelong process. I'm also learning, I think that forgiveness is a choice, and I don't think it's a choice that you make one time, especially with things like that that were kind of catastrophic and just really significant, because there are moments where I just get so angry, so angry about what happened, or so, you know, feel robbed or stolen of certain things, and so I get frustrated or quiet and depressed, you know, yeah,
well, intimacy, going forward will be extremely, that's exactly right, difficult, trusting, yeah, all of that stuff that's exactly you know. You know, there was an old girlfriend of mine. We keep her brother and I are really good friends, and Connie was a singer, and we've known each other since we were 15. So we were talking out in LA, where she lives, at one point, we were having lunch, and she said, You know, I never told you this, but you hurt me so deeply that I've never been able to give fully 100% to my husband. Wow, there's always this part you get to. So when you're betrayed and that wound, even though it scabs up, scars up, heals up, there's still something inside of us. So going forward again, you're single, but at some point you're going to have to share this. When do you come across somebody you trust enough? Do you think you'll know that? Yeah. And I mean,
I'm dating somebody right now, and so I I'll say that, just so that if she watches this, she won't be like, you said you were single. No. So I it is, it's a watch. Yeah, that's true. I'll be like, yeah, really poorly. Like, I don't think you should watch that the trust is really hard for me and complicated.
You're exactly right, and it's very intuitive that you said that it's just intimacy and trust, and intimacy and trust are so related to each other, they're kind of the same thing, or one sort of leads into the to the other. And I am learning, and God is teaching me. I should say that the reality is I have to trust the Lord completely, and that's the only thing that'll free me up to trust anybody else, or, you know, to give myself in a loving relationship, whether that's, you know, love, romantic love, marriage, family, but, but anything, friendship, community, and so again, it's another one of the things in a long list of things that God is is refining in me and in all of us, is I have to trust Him first in order to trust anybody else, I have to have intimacy with Him first before I can have intimacy with anybody else, because then I'm not, I'm not going to anybody saying you have to be the perfect measure of trust. You have to never betray me.
You have to never jeopardize our intimacy or our trust, because that's not possible, and that'll never nobody can ever live up to that, but the Lord can live up to that. And so if there's freedom there, then there's freedom to kind of step into anything else, eyes wide open, saying, I'm going to choose to trust you, but my ultimate trust is somewhere else, you know. And so I say that I still struggle with it a lot, though that's hard on a practical level and continues to be challenging in a lot of ways. Well, I
was seven years old, and I'm still dealing with, yeah, you know, it was interesting, the conversation. I. I just started praying with my wife every night. Oh, wow. 39 years into marriage, wow. We would start it. We'd stop. We'd start it. Stop, start it and stop. In the first of the year, I said to her, I said, I'm going to come to your side of the bed every night and when Leil on the floor, and thank God for you. And so far, you know, we're and the fun part is having an argument earlier in the evening and laying on the side of the bed going, but again, that trust part, yeah, of of God pulling.
You know, this is for you guys. This is the this is what I wanted for you for 39 years, right? And I'm it's it's as intimate as we can get. Again, most people associate intimacy with sex, and the two are connected, but they're not even remotely the same thing, but we live in a culture today that with Tinder and grinder and hookup and where they've convinced themselves that sex is biological, that's it. It's just a biological function. And you know, and I've read a number of of of articles written by people from kids that got through college and said, I never made eye contact, I never talked I never had a conversation with we're at a point in our marriage where the intimacy is coming from just holding hands
and being present While she's talking to me. And again, I'm 70. I know what I felt like at 30. I mean, hormones are raging, and you know so but once you've been violated, yeah, to learn to trust somebody's motives. I admire you at your age to be dealing with this stuff. Some woman is going to be lucky. No, I appreciate that to know you. I guess you can't lie to God. So in those earlier prayers, when you were angry, did you shake your fists at the heavens? Did you absolutely? Yeah, absolutely. So again, God can handle
That's right. That's exactly right. Well, and it's similar to what I said earlier. It's he already knows. What can I hide from the Lord? He knows me, and he made me so I can't, I can't hide anything from him. And looking back and still dealing with some of that stuff, you know, I'm not, I'm not totally separate from that. Now I still, I still have moments of weakness, and many moments of weakness, but there were, yeah, I was weeping, I was I would yell, I would scream.
I, you know, I've kind of done and said a lot of things again, that if somebody would have been watching me in my bedroom, yelling and screaming those things, they'd be like, this, this guy's crazy, but the Lord used that somehow, and I've had to, again, in the evolution, sort of the growth that God has done in my life, come back to a lot of those things and be like, I just misunderstood. I misunderstood what was happening. And at the same time, I was just experiencing my humanity.
I was experiencing what it feels like to be a 2425 26 year old that can't get out of bed every day. And so there's, there's a wrestling there with God's grace and His compassion for for us, and trying to accept that and receive that, and at the same time still knowing that he's God. And there's a reverence there. And you know, the word talks about fearing the Lord, and that's what fearing the Lord is. It's having a reverence for God, but we can't jeopardize one for the other. They both have to exist simultaneously.
And sometimes I kind of shift back and forth, and shifted back and forth between those two things. So I've come to learn a lot about like, when I want to shake my fists at the Lord again, I'm probably angry with some fallen part of the world that I'm living in, which, by the way, I contribute to as a fallen man, I contribute to that fallen world. And there's something good about that. I actually think to identify brokenness in the world. There's something healthy to that, because I'm. Saying this isn't right. And it's, it's, God is going to make all of those things right.
He's wipe every tear from every eye. But right now, it's not like that. And and so if somebody were to come in and say to me, like, Yeah, you were abused. Well, God, you know, God wanted that for you. God gave that to you. And I'm like, What? What in the you would never tell somebody that, and it's not true, right? But what His Word says is he takes all things and He works them together for the good of those who love Him. That's what Scripture. That's different than saying this is a good thing, right? I don't think abuse is a good thing. I think it's objectively a bad thing. It is a byproduct of a fallen world. It's not a it's not a godsend. And so those are two really different approaches, and they do very different things to a person.
Oh yeah, Tammy told me that people would come to her during her breast cancer and at Christian events and say, What sin do you think you committed? That God would give you breast cancer. And she waited 12 years to tell me that, I mean, because she said usually, in a Christian loving way, of course,
ripping her thyroid out. But, yeah, so, but that's a maturity that comes actually through pain. That's right, it really is. And were you? Were you an angry kid? Did you? Did you have that? Because I, I had it. I was angry from the time I can remember
I, I don't know if I was an angry kid, competitive, and maybe that's just, you know, me hiding anger with competitiveness. I don't think I was an angry you would know, yeah, not so much. It's just fits of rage. Not No, but I that's anger is something that that came up later in life, kind of through all this. Well, they
say anger is a cover emotion for sadness. That's exactly right. So you get sad, sad, sad. Then eventually you don't want to feel that anymore with your anger. That's right. And that's what I had to learn. You know, I had to get down to the to the little kid that was just neglected. That's right, you know. And friends were glad to hear that all the time. You know, I was a sad little boy.
It helps you big golf ball. I Well, I actually heard it's actually a veteran. I think that said this, but, but he said helplessness produces rage, and he had worked with a lot of PTSD victims, and it struck a chord for me, because I looked back and I was like, Oh my gosh, all these things that I'm so angry about. The common thread is how I was helpless. I there was nothing for me to do, and everything was out of my control. And so it felt like the only, the only normal reaction was to get angry and to be like, This isn't fair. And so anger was just sort of the natural but you're exactly right. Really helplessness is it's a sadness. It's like, why is nobody stepping in? Why is nobody saying something? Why is nobody giving me, you know what I'm looking for, what I'm asking for. So I learned that too, helplessness and sort of that loss of control can produce some really ugly, ugly emotions.
Do you keep in touch with any of your teammates?
So I have two sets of them. So I have teammates from NC State where I first went, and then my Lipscomb teammates. And so I Yes, is the short answer. Actually got a text from one of my old NC State buddies a couple days ago. And again, there's been a, there's like, a legal case that's happening right now. Some of that's connected to that, but I've got a couple of buddies that I've stayed connected with, you know, as in one of their weddings and that kind of thing. So, yeah,
that's great. Yeah, did they read
the book? They did read the book? Oh, yeah, which is pretty cool. It's a cool thing to share with people who it's cool. It's also a little scary to be like you knew me when I was a very different person. And now I'm giving you a book about prayer and poetry.
That's right. Here's my book of poetry. Yeah, I
went to get into theater when I was in high school, and my friends mercy out of That's right, you know, yeah, and yeah, that side of us, creative side, when you're an athlete, is not nurtured. That's exactly right. Yeah, yeah, so, but it's good to have people who knew you when and watched you go through that, because, believe me, whether they want to tell you or not, they admire you.
I watched a friend of mine, who was very wealthy, lose everything and not complain, once, just confused as to why God put on his heart to do with his money what he did and then it cost. Everything interesting. He really believed that that was God's will for him to do this powerful, powerful testimony in watching him walk through this. And again, knowing, you know, he had a relationship, strong relationship with with Christ and but just as a human being in a fallen world go, I was so convinced, you know. And he since got into another line of work and did very well in that, you know, but it pushed him in another direction in life, and that's why I say God's a great improviser, that's right, you know. So where can I get the book?
Everywhere, yeah. So the book is available everywhere books are sold, is what my publisher tells me to say. So Amazon target. You know all the you're a target. I don't know if I'll be in the brick and mortars. I don't know if I've made it to that level yet, but it's on the website.
It's on my book never made it to target. Well, you might have to have some conversations. I will, with the with the manager.
Do you still stay relatively centered now. I mean, I mean you're, you still haven't had an answer to why all this happens. Sure, you know. I mean, you'll never, Will. You may one day, in a dream, it'll come to you, you know. And again, there's something about time and distance that gives you a different perspective. As you grow, you're not at a point where you're thanking God for this.
I Am I really in, you know, sometimes, yeah, not all the time and again. One of the things that I'm learning, like right now, actually, one of the things that I think God is teaching me is, I'm a very linear person. Some of that's my athlete, you know, the DNA just No. I want things to be clear.
I want it to be black and white. I don't do well in the gray areas. And one of the things I'm learning is the way God sees things is so much different than the way I see things. And I see it right now, and I a lot of times I look back, and so that's kind of how I see things, what's happening right now and what happened, and that naturally leads to a lot of questioning and why, and this doesn't make sense, and this isn't fair. God, on the other hand, is working like a million different things at the same time, and he's outside of time. And so to try to give myself a little more grace to be like, I don't know, I don't know, and I'm okay with that,
well, that's got to be one of the things that it's taught you. Is patience forced. It's been forced for 22 hours. That's right, yep, you learn that, yeah, yeah. Yeah, this immediate gratification is doesn't always come. That's right for someone listening right now who's struggling and thinks that God is not there. God has forgotten them. God is punishing them. God is all of those things that go through your mind when life just implodes on you, what the book is for them, right?
That's exactly right. And first and foremost, that person like you're not alone, and that doesn't disqualify you. Again. I think that's something people need to hear, and people need to know, is that you're not less than you know. Even if you're wrestling with your faith or abandon abandoning your faith, it doesn't make you less of a person, or less of a believer or less of a of anything that doesn't love you any less doesn't love you. That's exactly right. God's love doesn't change. And I would get what I've learned in my encouragement is that in some ways, you lean into that, like you've got to lean into the anger and the frustration. You can't you can't get to the root of your anger without getting to the root of your anger. You have to do something. You have to process it. You have to think through you have to ask people about it. You have to, you know, there's, there's, there's work that's required. And a lot of times that work just looks like discovering and asking questions. And for me, it
was and sitting quietly for seven days that'll
do it too. Yeah, listen, you know, allow some of those emotions to come. And then again, for me, it was writing. It was just, I want to take these things and I want to put them on the page. And for whatever reason, as soon as I would get done writing something, I was like, I feel better. And the only thing that changed is I took the things that were in my head and I put them on paper.
They've done studies that that's that is a valid healing process. There's a difference between okay, I thought about it, I've processed it, right? And another thing of just writing it out, because I journaled as well. And you know, when you start writing, sometimes it's just okay, well, this happened, and that's okay. I forgive and blah, blah, you know. And then the pen gets a little tighter, and it's just, you know, that's right, that's
exactly right, yeah, it's a powerful tool. And and it might not be writing for everybody, but there, there are so many things, having conversations with people, art and it is funny. You know, I was never a creative person growing up. Soccer was, I guess, a way, an expression of that. But there are so many avenues to do that a lot of times. It just takes the the first step to be like, I'm just gonna explore this thing or test this thing out. And that's what it was from this was I never set out to write a book, right? Never in a million years, when I started writing that journal, did I was I like, this is gonna be a book one day. I never set out to do comedy. And welcome. Here you are. Here you go, God has a funny way of doing that, right?
That's what do they say. People plan God laugh. That's right. You want to make
God laugh like this is what's gonna happen. This is what I'm gonna do. Yeah, that's exactly right. Yeah.
I love the analogy. I did a fundraiser for a guy who went to New York to be a hedge fund manager, and when I did his fundraiser. He's in Alabama, in the middle of nowhere, in a small town. And I said, What do you do? And he said, I teach middle class skills to men coming out of prison. And I go, what is that? And he goes, Well, things you take for granted. Your parents taught you this, why you bathe before a job interview, why you buy nice clothes for job, why you work, why it's important, you know, and to tell the truth, and all this stuff that that we were taught, you know. And I said, you always want to do it. He goes, now I want to be a hedge fund, you know. So I was thinking about it, and I said that the literal translation of inspiration is God breathed. So here's this kid in New York going, I want to make millions. Man, I'm going to make man. God goes, Yeah, all right, I'll go to Alabama. So it's a great image of how God works. It's just a gentle nudge, you know. And, you know, somebody once told me, God will get your attention. It's just a question of how much pain can you take?
Well, when you look at the you look at the Bible. I mean, it's just filled with people who I think about Paul all the time, like they were going this direction, and God was like, let me pick you up out of there and drop you in here. And why does he have to do that? Because when we when we allow the Lord to transform us, when God transforms our lives, it's evidence that he did it and not evidence that I did it.
And, and when it's drastic like that, you know, and you asked me the question actually, about playing soccer, and if I were to go pro, most of the people I know and or would have known that would have been like this. This makes sense for you. You know, you're always a soccer but you're always the best player. You were always a good athlete. This makes sense that you're a pro athlete, you know. You want to know what doesn't make sense. You're writing poetry, and you're publishing your first book about God, and it's a book of prayers. And so there's a way that God does things and takes us out of our way and puts us in a completely new way that people look at and be like, there's no way Ben did that. There's no way Jeff chose that path. The Lord had to do that for him. And there's a reason for that, because then it's like, well, yeah, the Lord did this. I didn't do this, you know,
wow, I think we could end on that. That is just my message. I guess. The message of this is just let God work in your life and get out of the way, you know, and we do tend to muddle up things as people, okay, it was nice meeting you, yeah, it really was. And write another book. We'll have you back. That sounds good. And we may even have you back before then, because we didn't get to a lot of stuff. I I love.
This is why I do what I do, and the podcast. This may shock some listeners. I don't make a nickel on this, by the way. Speaking of that, the one sponsor I have, I never even mentioned Nordic wave, cold plunge. I just cold plunged this morning, as a matter of fact, and go to Nordic wave calm, put in Jeff 150 and save $150 and again, that's part of the wellness we do. Talk a lot about that here, and I we tend to lean holistic in our in our medical needs as well. And as a recovering drug addict, I'm always hesitant to just pop a pill to fix to mask pain. So anyway. Ben lock, thank you very much. Pick the book up wherever you can buy books. Target, maybe someday, maybe. Someday, Amazon, Amazon. Well, I'm on Amazon. There we go. I don't want to tell the people, because I sell it for 25 at my shows. Everybody hates Jeff. They can't do that, I guess.
Yeah, they got a discount on my book, but you don't get it signed by me, like you do with the show. And speaking of shows, I am out and about everywhere in my Stand Up Show. And please go to the website, Jeff Allen comedy.com, please like this, share it, subscribe and all that stuff. We we are trying to grow this. And because we get to have people like this on that, I hope and comment on it, and please feel free to share what you're going through. Sometimes it's cathartic, and sometimes there's a community of believers that that will see what you wrote on a comment or something and reach out to there's help available, and God bless you. Man, thank you going forward. I appreciate you having me great to meet you. Please meet you too. Man, appreciate it. See you next week.