EP 45 PART 1 The Author of "The Master Builder's Guide" Shares his Heartbreaking Testimony.

Join us for the first installment of a powerful four‑part series as the author of "The Master Builder’s Guide" opens up about his heartbreaking journey—one marked by struggle, searching, and the relentless pursuit of getting life right. In this episode, he shares the raw, unfiltered story of how brokenness became the doorway to redemption, and how God rebuilt what seemed beyond repair.

This is a testimony of faith, grace, and the God who never stops pursuing His children.

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:05

Hi, welcome Battleground Believers. Thank you so much for being part of the audience. Uh, remember, we are on all streaming sites: YouTube, Spotify, Amazon Music, uh, Apple Music. You can find us all over the place. We have a TikTok account and uh um Facebook account, and we also have a uh email address where battlegroundbelievers at gmail.com. Our tagline is telling his story through your story, and we do that at the uh two-bar blue studio. I used to mess that up and put the S in the wrong spot, but now I'm I'm getting better. I'm becoming a professional. And uh we thank you so much for the opportunity to be here. But today, as we tell his story through your story, we're gonna do that through Aaron Rep Logo. Uh guy that uh comes to our men's Bible study uh on occasion or when we have it, we're able to have it. A lot of weather and stuff has happened. Uh, but really excited about this interview and spent some time with Aaron today. And uh so telling his story through your story, and we're gonna go ahead and let you kind of take control of the conversation and start wherever you want. And we want to hear about kind of how you uh came to know the Lord and and uh see where the conversation goes from there, and hopefully the Holy Spirit leads and uh takes control a little bit, and and uh without further ado, Aaron.

SPEAKER_01 1:26

Thanks, Brad. Uh thanks for having me. Yeah, so in the early 1800s.

SPEAKER_03 1:32

Well you did start out.

SPEAKER_01 1:36

So there were three brothers um with the same last name, the rep logo last name. They came over from Germany. They were what was called at the time Anabaptists, German Anabaptists, and they had a hand in creating um The Brethren Church, right? The Church of the Brethren, yes. Um, that sort of sprouted in the Midwest, and my father, my dad would know way more about this, and I'm actually gonna learn more about it with him soon. But um basically, like Indiana, maybe a little Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, um, there's rep logals spread out, and so if you meet a rep logo, I'm likely related to them. And as it turned out, uh my father pastored um in the Church of the Brethren for roughly 42 years. Um, he is retired now. Um, but I was born in 1983, and um he started pastoring uh the Pleasant Dale Church of the Brethren at the time, I believe it was July 1st of 83, and I was born on August 3rd that same year. And yeah, we just we just grew up. We lived in the parsonage, um, wonderful parish hall across the street, a lot of good memories. We played in the woods, we had stories, my brother and I would be like in the mud pits, and my dad had to hose us off outside, you know, that kind of just did you swim in the baptismal? No, it was kind of small. Um so I didn't get into there until I was about 12 years old, right around the time we left the church. But remember, I do remember um my best friend and I got baptized by my father on the same day in the basement of that church. And I've actually visited uh not not too long ago. Um everything's different, but that little baptismal still at least kind of exists in that building.

SPEAKER_03 3:35

That's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_01 3:36

Yeah. Yeah, so we had uh my brother and my best friend and I had a little group. We'd ride our bikes around uh the countryside and we called it uh God's group. We would play in the church together and just generally have a good time. And so um my father.

SPEAKER_03 3:57

At that age were you a believer? Or do you were you just like, hey, I'd go to church? Or I mean, would you consider yourself a believer at that time?

SPEAKER_01 4:04

I would. I yeah, I would. Um, but I was I was a kid, you know?

SPEAKER_03 4:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:09

So to your best of your understanding. Right, exactly. Yeah, that's what I'd say.

SPEAKER_03 4:13

Okay, go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 4:15

Yeah, so um 1995, my dad calls us into the bedroom, and I sort of knew what was coming before like the the tone and the facial expression and the attitude of like something big is happening. And he told us that we were leaving the area and the church, and of course, I was 12, 10-year-old, eight-year-old brother, and then seven-year-old sister. So we were young, we were devastated, right? Um, and so we moved um to the South Bend area, um, a church called Pine Creek, that um I would finish high school in, and it was a little bit of a smaller church, and my and my dad, we lived in the parsonage um again, and my mom, I think eventually at some point during that time, maybe a few years after we got there, started um teaching. I think once Rebecca got to like high school, that would have must have been 2000, maybe 2002, round it right around the time. Maybe I graduated. Yeah, Rebecca's a sister. Okay. Oh, I'm gonna have to pay her. I just said her name. Um Rotro. Um, forgive me. Um, okay, so yeah, so I went off to college. Um as a boy, I kind of always knew that I wanted to I was into basketball, and one of my buddies that I played basketball with was really hardcore into Purdue, and I loved science and math, so I just figured computer engineer is what I should be, right? So I went to Purdue for that. Um and yeah, um, as a freshman and a sophomore, I got into um what's called the Cooperative Education Program. So that was that would have been about January of 2004. And I ended up getting a job with the Department of Defense. And the co-op program would end up taking me um out to Maryland for uh for a semester at a time. So, you know, the co-op program is like you do a semester of all work, then you come back and you do a semester of school. So I was back and forth between Maryland at Purdue. Maryland and Purdue, excuse me. Um and so that just created new friendships, opened a lot of doors, um, taught me some really interesting things about engineering, and I got into hardware engineering and um VHDL, if you've ever heard of that, that's one of the programs programs, it's um sort of a hardware description language, a little bit different than software they call it, but um right around um May, not around, in May 2005, um a big life event occurred that um I can say rocked my world even more than I knew at the time. I was in Maryland on one of those um cooperative education sort of semesters. I was living with a good friend um and another guy that we loved having around, but I haven't talked to him in years. But the other good friend actually lives in Indiana um still. Um I don't want to go into too much detail about what happened. But like I said, it was it hit close to home and um a blood relative got hurt bad.

SPEAKER_03 8:04

And your blood relative?

SPEAKER_01 8:06

Yes. Okay, yes, yes, bad. And you know, I it was sort of around that time I had I had like known what alcohol was um at the age of 21-ish, ballpark we'll we'll say. And um it was at that time that I started just drifting towards using it more. Um I know that now this the way that this thing that happened rocked me is sort of part of why that started to happen. And at the same time, I was introduced to poker. And so I got into online poker, and that became something I could do to avoid my feelings.

SPEAKER_03 8:53

I had a question. So, as you're talking, you were a young man, you ran the church, you believed you're a believer, you had a relationship. When you hit Purdue, did you like check your faith, or was it still prevalent during that time? Were you were you a Christian or active Christian, or were you just like, uh me and God are good, but I'm gonna go to Purdue?

SPEAKER_01 9:13

Yeah, it's hard to explain. Like, I look back at some of the things I wrote in high school, and it it seems like me and God were good. Well, God is good all the time, but it's it's more of a me problem. Right. Right?

SPEAKER_03 9:28

It's uh it's use it's us walking away, not him, so right, and so I was kind of alone, I think.

SPEAKER_01 9:37

You know, um we'll get to my my high school sweetheart and my wife um here shortly, but I was kind of alone. Like I I went off to college, you know, I I left home, I I took my car with me, and I was kind of like on my own, quote unquote, for the first time. And I I didn't plug into church and in college, it wasn't really a thing, you know. I was sort of my freshman year, I was in a dorm. Now, um my best friend from high school, from growing up, um, he was there, and he was a a really good support to me, and it was really key that he was there. He's was he a believer? You'll have to ask him.

SPEAKER_03 10:18

Okay. I didn't know if that's he kind of took a crush to faith and No, it's a good question.

SPEAKER_01 10:23

So we we don't talk in depth, he and I. Like we're we're gonna get there, I think. But it's it's a process for all of us, you know, and I don't want to speak for him, I guess.

SPEAKER_03 10:37

No, that's fine. I just didn't know if that's kind of where you were you were going with that.

SPEAKER_01 10:41

No, but I'm just he's just saying that him being at Purdue with me, like we roomed together in sophomore year, and we have some great photos and stories I can't tell on here for sure.

SPEAKER_00 10:54

Hundred percent won't tell them on here. I hope he watches this, he'll get a kick out of that. Um, yeah, wow. Okay. So what were we talking about?

SPEAKER_01 11:05

Oh. So 2005. Yeah. And so um.

SPEAKER_03 11:17

Is this when you got add uh you said stated that you got introduced to alcohol and online poker?

SPEAKER_01 11:25

Yeah, so I got addicted what I'd I'd say, well, I don't know if I want to use the word addicted, but it's probably appropriate. Like I started playing online poker too much. And that it didn't cause like undue financial stress. Like it caused like mental emotional stress for sure. Um and it caused, you know, just yeah, undue stress is what I'd say. Like I I I used it as a as an escape, um, and obviously not an appropriate way to escape, right? Not a healthy way. And so that's kind of what happened in 2005. By the grace of God, somehow I still made all A's. I graduated valedictorian.

SPEAKER_03 12:11

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 12:11

At the end. But I was still able to do school and all those things, but in my free time, that's what I do. Poker.

SPEAKER_03 12:20

And drink or just play poker. Well, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:23

Yeah. The drinking wasn't well, you can ask my my wife and friends, but it wasn't as bad. It was bad. It was like not great, but it wasn't like I don't know how to say it.

SPEAKER_03 12:39

Um You pretty much had that drinking under control though.

SPEAKER_01 12:43

Well.

SPEAKER_03 12:43

But every so often you tie one on.

SPEAKER_01 12:46

Yeah, I wouldn't say it was under control, but it wasn't like I was often mean. I was just an idiot, you know?

SPEAKER_03 12:56

More than more than you realize I know exactly what you're saying.

SPEAKER_01 12:59

Yeah, so I was an idiot a lot. Um but then sort of in fall 2005, I forget I forget where I was exactly in Maryland, but I believe I was in Maryland again in the fall of 05. And that's when I got back from there, it was sort of the time that I I felt I felt the the need to um ask my high school sweetheart to marry me. And I didn't have much money, and we now know why. Um but I somehow uh I got a ring, you know, and I talked to my parents, and I I talked to her father, and everyone seemed okay with it. You know, a lot of these like the depths of my online poker issues and stuff were were not completely in the light with my parents. Although I think my dad kind of like had a pretty good idea. Um but you know, it never came out, right? And confessed like in detail. Um so yeah, I don't remember the exact day. I think it was early 06. We were sitting in the parsonage at Pine Creek, and I asked her to marry me. I had this little um this little glass dolphin, and uh yeah, so she said yes. And um we got married um two days after my birthday in August on 2006, August 5th, 06. And boy. I'm just gonna need a second. Um That's no problem. So there's so much to say about her, but we'll get there. Um there's so much to say, but um there we spent um we spent the next year um at Purdue. I finished out my my college degree. Um the last year was at school, so she was working um while I was going to school and doing senior level like um engineering, like senior project for for computer engineering and all of that.

SPEAKER_03 15:26

Were you still involved in online poker at this time or had you moved past that?

SPEAKER_01 15:30

Probably. Okay yeah. Um we'd play poker with friends whenever we could. Um that was a thing that I did, you know. I arranged that because I wanted to play poker, you know. Um but we had we had a rough, like a pretty rough like disagreement about like what we wanted to do next because I had gotten um a good solid offer from a company in Ohio to take a job after college. Uh a good salary, little bonus, you know, all the good things. And my heart wasn't in it. Like I had gone to the Department of Defense, and my last sort of co-op experience there was um it was this really cool office that pretty much no one gets the opportunity to go to because everybody wants to go to this office. But I was fortunate enough to be able to get there and I loved it, right? It's a dream job, and so that's where I wanted to go. Um and so it caused a rift between us for a time, and um you know I got the offer from them to go to Maryland and take it and full time, and we were there. She went with me even though she was against it. Um, we were there in the fall of 07. And we don't have time or space. I have a story like this one time in Bangkok for real. I have a story like that. Um it involves a cabbie throwing a tire iron at another cabbie and speeding off down the street with my suitcase. It's a knockoff polo suitcase, it's called Polango. Um, but yeah, so I spent the years of like between 07 and 2011 working a lot. Um there was plenty of drinking in there too. But I I felt like my dream job gave me purpose, kind of thing, and I certainly probably didn't take good enough care of my wife as I should have as a husband. You know, I was there and I loved her, but I wasn't really present as I probably should have been. And I see that now. But early, well, late 2010, we found out we were being blessed with our first child. And um early 2011, so you know, we you we part of what we're talking about is uh his story, right? God's story through mine, Jesus' story through mine. And when you look at you look back across your life, it's always really interesting to kind of look at all the things that he put in place in your life that maybe you didn't know about at the time.

SPEAKER_03 18:35

Yeah. Hindsight's 2020.

SPEAKER_01 18:37

Oh, yeah. So there's all kinds of things like that. And this particular thing is one of them that my wife had a job working for a family who was an attorney, who she worked for, and she also babysat the children, but the mom was a radiologist. And so when she found out that we were that Vicky was my wife, was pregnant um with our first child, uh, they said, Well, come in, we're gonna do we'll go do an anatomy scan, like at 15 weeks. Because normally the anatomy scans around 20 weeks, right? And so we go in, the the tech is scanning her, I'm standing nearby, and all of a sudden the tech's her her face just goes dark, icy stare, like she's freaking out. And so immediately we knew something was wrong. And so the mom of the family of the radiologist came in and started explaining to us there's a problem with a baby's heart. And that is a long story in and of itself, but um, you know, she was like it it occurs to me now, right, that God put us in Maryland so that this family could help us uh find our way to where our daughter needed to be born. We went to we went to Hopkins and they said, well, they told us about what they thought it was, you know, that she had a three-chamber heart instead of four, you should probably abort the babies, what they told us. So I remember um walking out of that doctor's visit, you know, into the parking garage with my wife having to have had to listen to that. I was just I felt for her, obviously. It's my baby too, but I she was very strong. My wife was amazingly strong, and she said, I want a second opinion. And she'll be able to tell you, but um she did some research, and I believe actually the mom of family, the radiologist, she said, You guys should go up to Philly. Um and so we got there, um, and it was a completely different story, you know. They looked deeper, they did the echoes, they um gave us the full story, they sat down with us in a calm, caring environment. You know, the doctor drew a photo that's tattooed over my heart right now, um, that was done around the time the child was born. And she was born in Philly. They had a special um special unit just for moms with babies like this. Um, I think it was called the The Special Care, the SCU, maybe. But we got there in time. We actually had to live in Philly for about a month. Um a good Christian family took us in for free through a program there at the hospital, and we lived in their house, in their tiny little apartment for about a month, waiting on the baby. And we got to the hospital in time. Came within like 24 hours of us getting there. The Lord had told my mom to come a day early. It's a whole thing. Like my mom literally heard from the Lord, like, you need to go now.

SPEAKER_03 22:11

So the Lord was the Lord was very much in this.

SPEAKER_01 22:14

Oh yes. Oh yes. And and so they were there. They were there about right about the time the baby was born. They showed up literally, I think less than an hour prior. And she was an emergency C-section. Like literally, I was sitting at a table having like a Dr. Pepper and some kind of dinner, watching a show on TV while Vicky's in the hospital bed. The nurses come in, throw me out of the way. They have her on the thing, on a cart. They're rolling her down the hallway. Someone comes to give me like a robe, you know, the smock and the cap. I must have been not 10 minutes later. I'm in there telling my wife it's okay, and the baby's out. Like it was violent. I did not know you could do a c-section that fast.

SPEAKER_02 23:02

That's how my wife our girl was born the same way. Like that as an emergency C-section quick. I was all the way in uh New Haven because they just told us they're like, oh, you can you got time, it's okay, or whatever. And I was like, our dogs have been locked up that whole time. So we're like, I'm gonna run home. My wife's even like just go home real quick. And I'm taking her dad with me. So now her dad's not there, I'm not there. All of a sudden we get this call from mother-in-law, they're taking her in for emergency c-section. I'm like, what? They just told me I had time. Like, what so we jump in the car and I'm going like 90 down to get down to where Rendelli is. That's where they did it. Same thing. I'm walking in, they're throwing the stuff at me, and I'm getting drugged into the yeah, and it is violent. I don't think people realize how violent a C-section, definitely an emergency one. They get that baby out and they get that baby out quick. I can't imagine how much it hurts to recover for the one for the for the woman, you know? Yeah. Yeah, it's in it's insane though. Like I I know exactly what you're talking about when you say violent.

SPEAKER_03 24:02

Do you feel like the during this time did did it drive you to your knees? Did you pray a lot during that time? Uh or were you still just kind of distant and or did you retreat into more poker when you had a chance?

SPEAKER_01 24:17

I had gotten um some sedative style drugs from my psychiatrist. On the up and up.

SPEAKER_03 24:24

Right.

SPEAKER_01 24:24

But I used that in beer to to sleep. I I was I was distraught. I mean, I I was um a shell of myself, you know. I was Well, understand. I was barely, yeah. I mean I was barely I was there, and I was trying to love my wife, but I was a wreck.

SPEAKER_03 24:45

But was there was there con did you talk to the Lord at all, or was it just every so often like, God, you gotta help me, or did you I think I was angry.

SPEAKER_01 24:52

Yeah. I think I was. I think I was angry at God. You know? My dad was there, of course. My dad brought the presence of the Lord and prayed over us, of course, and calmed me down some, but no, I was I was a complete wreck.

SPEAKER_03 25:07

What's amazing is even though you were mad at the Lord, he was still there and he put guardrails in the way to help you during that time. The way it sounds.

SPEAKER_01 25:16

Oh no, no, 100% the case. Yeah. So beautiful baby girl. When you watch this, I want you to know how much your father loves you. It's more than you'll ever know. She was so beautiful, she came out. Red as a red as a rose. Um, and uh, she had to have open heart surgery on day one, like within the first 24 hours.

SPEAKER_03 25:48

Oh wow, I can't imagine.

SPEAKER_01 25:51

Her her anatomy had to be corrected through the course of three open heart surgeries by the age of approximately two years old. And the second one that happened at four months was also an emergency. Um also had a tough experience at Hopkins. I'm not I'm not saying Hopkins is a bad place, I'm just saying our experiences there were difficult, you know. Um but yeah, so um what I can say is that you know, her being born to us there, I was on a government salary, cost of living in Maryland's tough. It just it just became way too much. And I was just like, honey, we're leaving Maryland. She's like, yeah, okay, you know. So that obviously was a huge life event, a circumstance, right?

SPEAKER_03 26:48

And that when you moved, did you move back to Indiana then? Yeah, okay. Well we're gonna do is we're we're getting ready to wind down right now, this episode, but we're gonna continue this conversation and hear uh what took place next. And uh really excited to hear I'm like in it, you know what I mean? Um in in the in the thing. So uh we're getting ready to to shut down. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for being willing to come back next week and and and do this again. And uh to the audience, thank you so much for being a part. Remember, like, share, subscribe. This is more of a ministry than just a podcast. We're not just trying to get famous, we're we're trying to do do God's work here. So uh again, thank you so much, Randy, for making this look so oh so beautiful. Thank you for the two bar blue studio. Matt Carter, thank you for uh being in the studio today as well. Now that you're back, it just kind of feels whole. Aaron, thank you for your time today. Remember, all that call in the name of the Lord shall be saved. Battleground believers, out.