Second Chances Ministries

 “Second Chances Ministries” Matthew Linehan February 2020 This is the story of how Jesus Christ, Lakewood Church, Celebrate Recovery and the Lakewood Men’s Ministry saved my life. I was born on January 13, 1967 in Columbus. Ohio. I was put up for adoption at birth because my biological parents were just kids. I was adopted by Tim and Kathleen Linehan and they have always been my REAL parents. We grew up in Geneva, Ohio which is 50 miles east of Cleveland about 10 miles off Lake Erie. We had it great growing up. My dad was a CPA and my mom was a stay at home Registered Nurse. I have an older brother Michael and a younger sister Teresa. We were all adopted from different parents and only 5 years separated us in age. We went to a private Catholic Grade school and lived out in the country on a 25-acre Grape farm. Since going to a Catholic grade school, I was introduced to God through the Catholic religion by nuns. I was taught that if we weren’t good we would go to hell. I didn’t question it or rebel against it I just believed it. Things were quiet growing up and I accelerated in sports and was very popular. Around the age of 13 I had a friend come over to spend the night. I told him that my dad made wine and had two huge barrels of it in the basement. He said, “Why don’t we get drunk.” “Drunk I said? My dad does that but I have never.” So, we proceeded to sneak wine up to my room and drink. I remember feeling silly and sloppy. I don’t think we got caught but I wouldn’t drink until a couple of years later. Around the time I was 15 I noticed something that wasn’t right about my dad. He would drink alcohol to get drunk. While he was drunk he would act very scary and depressed. His drinking got worse throughout my high school years and I myself started drinking alcohol on a regular basis by the time I was 16. That same year I was smoking marijuana on a regular basis and beginning to experiment with whatever drug was available. In June of 1985 I ended up graduating from High School and joining the Army. I was shipped off to West Germany in October of that year and did nothing but drink alcohol for two years straight. I was perfecting my alcoholism. After the Army, I was primed and ready to be catapulted into a world of fast times, fast women and a huge partying culture…COLLEGE! It was around the beginning of college that my dad lost his job. That sent him into serious depression and he was drinking a lot. He bought a Laundromat in a nearby town and my mom went back to work as a nurse. I wouldn’t say they were hurting for money but I knew that it affected my dad emotionally. In the Spring of 1990 our family met in Cleveland for Easter dinner at a restaurant. I was giving my sister a ride back to college after the dinner and we were in the parking lot and my dad turned to me and said, “Son make sure you take good care of your sister.” I didn’t think anything of it and left and took her back to school! A few weeks later, on April 23, 1990 I was in the process of buying a car at Kent State and I needed a co-signer for a loan. I called my dad and he was really drunk that day. We argued on the phone but the last thing he said to me was, “I’ll see you at 10:00 am tomorrow son!” He was going to make the one-and-a-half-hour drive to Kent to co-sign for my loan…I had been drinking that day so I passed out on my bed…. A couple hours later I was awoken up by the sound of my phone ringing in my apartment. I was a little hungover, but I answered and said, “Hello?” “Matt?” It was my mom. “Yes mom?” “Matt?” I said, “Mom what is it?” She said, “Matt Are you sitting down?” I immediately knew that something was wrong with my dad!!! I said, “Mom tell me what he did!” There was a pause and then after that a silence…. Then I heard those words that would haunt me for 24 years. “Your father shot himself!!!” That was it…That was the beginning of my destruction. Nobody teaches you how to handle a parent dying at such an young age. We didn’t know what to do as a family. The only thing that I knew how to do when I was feeling bad was to drink and drug…so that’s what I did. John 10:10 says…” The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy.” So, after the funeral I went back to college but the race to end my life with drugs, alcohol, anger and unforgiveness was on! I harbored something inside of me and I was trapped in that day and couldn’t get out. For the next 25 years I would break down and cry at least once a week over the pain of losing my best friend to alcoholism. I ended up graduating from Kent State University with a bachelor’s Degree in December of 1993 and I moved to Houston in January of 1994. Between January 1994 and October of 2003, I WAS LIVING THE ROCK STAR LIFE. The drugs…the booze…the women… It was like I was in the movie “Groundhog Day”. I would drink, pass out, wake up with a hangover and start all over again. Finally, in October of 2003 I was so severely addicted to cocaine that my drug dealer threatened to cut me off. How bad do you have to be for that to happen? I thought a change of scenery would do me good, so I came crawling back to Ohio. Unfortunately, the only thing that changed was my mailing address. I would get 3 DWI’s in 18 months and lose several jobs. In August of 2007 I started a Nursing program at Marion Technical College in Marion, Ohio. I was a REAL mess in Nursing School. I used Drugs and drank alcohol daily and tried to again kill myself and ruin everything I was trying to build. Consequences??? I didn’t care! I was a total disaster. The crazy thing is I somehow managed to graduate from nursing school in May of 2009 and passed my Nurse’s boards on the very first try in August of 2009. I accepted a job at a hospital close to Cleveland and close to my mom and sister’s house. It was decided that I would live with my sister Teresa and work at a hospital close to her house. After all my disease and the devil weren’t done using me to try to destroy my family and wreak havoc on them. My sister gave me very, very strict rules and guidelines to live by. NO DRINKING or drug use, I needed to attend weekly AA meetings and start to volunteer at a church. My sobriety lasted a month and before I knew it I was back drinking alcohol and using drugs and hoping not to get busted on a random drug test. The next year and a half was pure hell…for me and for my sister and for my mom. Broken promises, fights, calling off work numerous times. Going to work hungover, drunk and drinking at work while medicating patients…that’s right…I did it. I was constantly stealing pain pills from patients and mixing it with vodka that I was drinking out of a water bottle. Yes, that’s right…me! I couldn’t believe it…how did I get so bad? So, I decided to move back to Texas. A fresh start I thought and here we go… I called my friends, well partying partners in Houston and told them I was on my way. I left for Texas on December 23, 2011 and arrived in Houston on Christmas day. Now I was back in the same scene that in 2003 I escaped because of too much partying. I had to focus… I moved in with a buddy and his family in Northwest Houston. He told me that under no circumstance was I to drink any alcohol or I would be kicked out of his house. “No problem I said!” My sobriety lasted about a week and soon I was drinking and doing hardcore drugs again. My drug use got so bad that I ended up getting kicked out of my friends’ house within a month. I ended up in the Psychiatric Unit at the VA Hospital in Houston in October of 2012. “I WAS A MESS!!!” I needed help!!! Again!!! Please God HELP ME!!! After going through another 90-day program through the VA here in Houston I got an apartment in Houston in April of 2013. I got a job at Petco and in July of 2013 I finally started to really work an AA program to the best of my ability. I was doing well by the time December 2013 rolled around. I met a girl at Petco and she invited me to go to Lakewood Church. I immediately said yes because I had been watching Joel on TV for 8 years back in Ohio. Plus, I thought she was cute and I thought that she might be interested in me. We decided to meet in Lakewood by the New Beginnings room. I remember walking into the sanctuary feeling very emotional. I was finally at Lakewood. I remembered when the Worship music started a flood of emotion came over me and I started crying. I ended up crying through the whole service. Crying hard. I had a peace and joy coming into my Spirit and pain and sorrow leaving my body. I remember standing up and accepting Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior immediately. The date was December 8, 2013 and I was finally home! So, I was working at Petco, going to AA meetings and I managed to celebrate a year of sobriety through the AA program in July of 2014. But little did I know that I wasn’t done trying to kill myself yet!! I was volunteering at Lakewood on the weekends…but something was still missing. So once again I relapsed again on Drugs in August of 2014 and until January 5th of 2015 I was off to the races. Nothing that AA taught me defended or prepared me for what was about to happen. I pawned everything I had gained and gave it all away in a matter of a couple of months. Drugs and Alcohol became my breakfast lunch and dinner. In late December 2014, I was a total MESS! I was so trapped I didn’t know what I was going to do. My apartment and my life were disgusting. I had been doing hardcore drugs and alcohol for 4 months straight. My mom feared for my life. Friends would come to my apartment with the Police and Fire Department. My AA friends were begging me to go into the Salvation Army!!! I hurt! I hurt Physically, Emotionally and Spiritually. I never blamed God. I blamed my weakness. Would I kill myself? Would I break my family’s heart like my Dad’s suicide did? Would they find me dead? Would I go to prison? Answers God…What will happen to me? In John 14:6 Jesus says “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me!” The date could have been December 27th…it could have been December 30th I do not know. All I know is that I was lying in filth in my bedroom on a deflated air mattress and I stunk! I stunk of drugs, alcohol, death and I feared the end was near! And then… I’ve heard Pastor Rick Warren say: “You don’t know God is all you need until God is ALL YOU GOT!” Having been in AA for 15 years I had heard the term, a moment of clarity. But this was far more than that. Slowly, calmly and poetically I felt it. The presence of the Holy Spirit. It physically felt like a warm wave of beauty, painless compassion and utter joyful LOVE coming from inside of me. Suddenly everything became clear and I was confident on what moves…what I needed to do to get out of this. I had my last drink and drug on January 5, 2015. My last poison entering my body. Now the healing process can begin. My good friend Jeremey picked me up from my apartment on January 9th and drove me to the SA on Washington. I entered this Treatment center feeling different. Like this was the final chapter. The first thing I started to do at the SA was get up early in the morning and go to the Library and read the Bible. I didn’t know what to read but I knew to read. ***In Matthew 6:33 Jesus says, “But Seek First the Kingdom of God and His Righteousness, and ALL these things shall be added to you.” I discovered later that “ALL” these things meant the desires of my heart!!! I started reading the Bible every morning and thanking God for my sobriety. Then in late January or early February of 2015 I went to the morning meeting at the Salvation Army and they introduced a couple of men from Lakewood! One of the leaders got up and spoke and said they were going to start teaching a class on Monday nights called “Quest for Authentic Manhood.” The class would to teach us how to become better men. I took one look at them and I said to myself, “They came to get me, those are my boys!!!!” I remember going to class that night and introduced myself to the guys. These guys were different…they had this look in their eyes and kindness and calmness in their demeanor. They were excited to be there and wanted to help us. They were loving and caring. Finally, for the first time in my life I wasn’t alone in all of this. I had a brotherhood of guys from Lakewood. So, in March of 2015 I went to my first Lakewood Men’s Encounter. The Men’s Encounter is a 24-hour Men’s Retreat with Jesus and the Holy Spirit held at a Retreat Center in Tomball, Texas. That Encounter is where Jesus permanently removed drugs and alcohol from my life. I started to get involved with the guys on the Encounter team and started going with them to church events. I was constantly reaching out to these guys and surrounded myself with these awesome brothers. I wanted what they had and what they had was PEACE in their hearts. I no longer craved alcohol or drugs…I WAS FREE!!! I continued to ride the bus every day to work, church and back home. I literally was at Lakewood Church 4 days a week. My life was going very well, and I was serving and doing what God had me assigned to do. You never know what God has planned for you though so always keep your eyes and Spirit open. One night I was at a Men’s class at Lakewood called “Maximized Manhood” and before we got started the leader said they had someone who wanted to speak with us. Pastor John Molina, a Co-Leader of Celebrate Recovery at Lakewood got up and spoke to us. He invited all of us out to Celebrate Recovery at Lakewood Church. Pastor John told us that they were going to start a new Veteran’s Group at Celebrate Recovery called “Welcome Home” for Vets! I got this feeling in my Spirit that this might be something that I wanted to help with. After he got done speaking, I went up to John to introduce myself and told him I was a Veteran and I would be interested in helping to start that meeting. So, In September of 2016, we started the “Welcome Home” for Veterans group at Lakewood Church and that got me serving at Celebrate Recovery every Friday night. I soon learned that Celebrate Recovery was the calling that had been missing from my life. Not only was I helping Veterans, but I was also able to minister to men who were coming from the Open-Door Mission and other guys who were struggling with alcohol, homelessness and drugs. I was able to speak into these men’s lives because I have been there. I was finally receiving the desires of my heart, but God was about to TOTALLY EXCEED MY EXPECTATIONS once again!! On April 4, 2017, I was working at Southland Hardware just minding my own business when all of a sudden "SHE" walked into my life! It was just like in a Romantic Movie...the MOMENT I saw her I said to myself..."There SHE is...there's the girl I am going to marry!" Her name is Emily. Our connection was instant, and our love grew stronger for each other each and every day! Emily started coming to Lakewood with me. She soon started attending Celebrate Recovery with me. At first, Emily didn’t feel comfortable at CR and didn’t know if she could help in any way, but of course God had a plan for her too. One night they needed people to help in Celebration Place where the 5-10-year-old kids of the parents who come to CR go. Emily went down to help, and she found an instant connection working with the kids. She really felt drawn to them and them to her. Emily kept serving and kept serving and soon she was asked to lead out in Celebration Place. She started to help with lessons plans, setting up and bringing snacks. Emily has a real passion for the hurting children and so why I served upstairs helping men that are struggling and helping the veterans, she worked downstairs with the children. In April of 2017 I applied to and was accepted to the 2017-2018 Lakewood Church Internship program in Pastoral Care. During my time as an Intern, I was extremely involved in many different Ministries at Lakewood Church. On Mondays, I led out in Monday Night Bible Study, on Friday nights I facilitated the “Veterans Only” Welcome Home group. On Saturday nights Emily and I served at Water Baptism. In fact, in February of 2018 I was able to baptize Emily in front of her whole family that flew in from Hong Kong, Taiwan and San Francisco. Every Sunday I served at Communion and the Welcome Reception. I was able to get up every week at the Welcome Reception and tell my Testimony of how Lakewood Church saved my life. Pastor Joel stated at the beginning of 2018 that it was the year to “Exceed Expectations.” Boy was that true for me. In June of 2018 I graduated from the Lakewood Church Internship program, In August I bought a brand-new car and in October I started a brand-new career with a new job in which I doubled my salary. God exceeded my expectations beyond my wildest dreams. In November of 2018 I was asked by Bruce Gibbons to come back and help in Maximized Manhood on Tuesday nights at Lakewood. At the same time Emily was asked to help lead out at “Hope Night” on Tuesdays. Hope Night includes classes for hurting people such as Anger Management, Divorce Care and Grief Share. Hope Night also includes the Unique Woman class which is the female version of Maximized Manhood. Emily started in the Unique Woman class in the Spring of 2019 and will graduate on February 15, 2020. Emily is really growing in Christ and it is amazing to see all that God has planned for her. On December 4, 2018 it became official, Emily and I got engaged. My wedding party consisted of three of the brothers that came into the Salvation Army to save my life. That is what Lakewood Church and the Lakewood Men’s Ministry means to me. We got married in December of 2019 and we were surrounded by over 200 friends and family. Emily and I are very, very excited to start a family. In March of 2019, Pastor John Bowman started taking Emily and I through the Lay Minister class and we are very blessed to be getting trained for Leadership in our amazing church. God keeps exceeding our expectations and we know that He has great plans for us. We recently stepped back from serving at Celebrate Recovery and are focusing on serving together to help hurting people and growing our marriage. Pastor Joel declared that 2020 is the Year of Overflow and Emily and I are receiving that message. Today I know that my dad is here with me in this room and is very proud of me. The bottle may have ended his life early, but I know that he is waiting for me in Heaven. The Devil tried to end my life too but a group of guys…soldiers in the Lakewood Men’s Ministry walked into the Salvation Army one night and showed me what someone had given to them! They came and got me, and Jesus freed me from a life of misery! I will work the rest of my life to pay that forward to the next person who needs Jesus to rescue them. So, if you are sitting there wondering or thinking that it can’t happen to you, I hope you know that Jesus loves you just as much as He loves me. What I have didn’t come cheap or easy but it’s REAL. There is nothing I need, and I have never been more joyful than I am today. Once I realized that it’s not “something” that will bring me peace but “someone” and that someone IS Jesus…my life began. God Bless You and remember Jesus IS KING! Matthew Linehan 

Matthew Linehan