Behind The Mike Podcast
Behind The Mike Podcast is a Christ-centered show where host Mike Stone dives deep into inspiring stories and profound insights from guests who view life through a biblical lens. Each episode offers hope, encouragement and wisdom to help you navigate life's challenges with faith and purpose.
Tune in for conversations that uplift your spirit and strengthen your walk with Christ.
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Behind The Mike Podcast
Nothing Is Wasted: Davey Blackburn's Journey from Pain to Purpose
What happens when one person's darkest tragedy becomes a beacon of hope for countless others?
Davey Blackburn joins us to share his powerful story of unimaginable loss and unwavering faith. In 2015, Davey's pregnant wife, Amanda, was tragically shot during a home invasion. He recounts the heart-wrenching discovery and the initial hope for her survival, offering an intimate look at his journey through the aftermath. Through his harrowing experience, Davey emphasizes that pain is a universal human experience and encourages listeners to find resilience in their own struggles.
Navigating his profound loss, Davey faced the daunting question of how a loving God could allow such suffering. Surrounded by a community of strong faith, he found solace in their collective belief in God's goodness. A divine moment with the song "Nothing is Wasted" reminded him that even in the most tragic circumstances, there is potential for redemption and purpose. Drawing parallels to Amanda's talent for transforming discarded items into treasures, Davey shares how he believes God repurposes our pain for a greater purpose.
In the journey towards healing, Davey learned to confront his grief head-on, encouraged by a timely message from Pastor Levi Lesko to "run toward the roar." This transformative experience led him to create the "Nothing is Wasted" book and the "Pain to Purpose" curriculum, designed to help others navigate their valleys of grief. Davey's path also led to forgiveness and restorative justice, showcasing the power of faith and community in overcoming tragedy. Join us as we explore how, even in the darkest times, nothing is truly wasted when we trust in a higher purpose.
A young pastor comes home to find his pregnant wife shot in their home. Her attacker still on the loose. Now police are trying to piece together how and why Shot in the city of Indianapolis the pregnant wife of a young pastor found shot in the head inside her home. Her young son found unharmed. Indianapolis police have arrested an 18-year-old man for the murder of a pastor's wife during a home invasion.
Speaker 2:Police say Larry Taylor has died, and just yesterday he saw the faces of the two men police say were behind the gun.
Speaker 1:The unexpected happened in November 2015, but for Davey Blackburn, this wasn't the end of the story. Today, he shares how he found strength in the darkest of places and the journey that turned his tragedy into a message of hope. Join us as we sit down with Davey Blackburn and hear his powerful story on Behind the Mic Podcast. I'm always excited about each episode and each of our guests, but today I have someone that just absolutely blows me away. I've just finished almost finished reading his book that's coming out soon.
Speaker 1:This is not a book review. This is a conversation I want to have with my guest today, davey Blackburn. Davey, thank you so much for joining us. Mike, thanks so much, man. This is an honor. Yeah, so, man, I know I heard about your story when it was happening. Um, you were on good morning america, I believe, and shared some of that probably many others that I didn't see, but you have such an amazingly tragic story, um, and I want you to share that with our audience. For those who don't know your story, it's a journey of tragedy you walk through in the book. I can feel how you feel just the emotion, as I read, of what you were going through, and most of us can't understand that or comprehend what that's like. So I want to just kind of use that to set the stage for you to share what happened and um, and then we'll get into the journey and and, uh, the recovery there.
Speaker 2:So you live in well.
Speaker 1:Thanks, mike, for yeah, you guys moved to indianapolis, so that's where you're at currently.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's where you're at currently. Yeah, it's where we're at currently, Um, and and and. Thanks so much for having me on, Thanks for the space to talk about this. And you're right, Everybody has experienced pain, you know, and my story happens to be one that, uh, would people, a lot of people would deem their worst nightmare, especially a lot of um husbands, and.
Speaker 2:But I always say this don't compare pain. You know, when I go and travel and speak, people often will come up and say I've never experienced anything that you have, and that's just their way of wanting to talk about their pain, talk about their story. And so I always say don't compare pain, because you can't. You know, pain is pain and we all experience it, and the enemy wants to get us paralyzed in that pain. And so, even though what I'm about to say is very heavy and it really takes the air out of the room, I want you to understand that, as I've walked out my journey, my journey is one that the story is. God is a really good God. That got me through the valley of the shadow of death. He carried me and he can do the same exact thing for you. And so, even if you pick up, Nothing is Waste of the book and you read it. That's what I want you to see. It I want you to see wow, Davey is such an incredible, heroic guy. It's no. God is an amazing God and he carries us through these valleys no matter what we go through.
Speaker 2:But in 2015, I was a pastor and a church planter in Indianapolis. Um, I was married to Amanda uh, the love of my life. We'd been married for seven years, we had a 15 month old and we were pregnant with our second and our church had just started to take off. We had just kind of reached that place where we're going. Man, I think this church plant is going to take root and it's going to start to thrive, and it was about a four year journey to get to that place. You know, when God calls you to plant a church, he feels like he calls you to plant a forest and drops you in the middle of a parking lot. It's a very difficult road.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But we got to this place where our dreams were coming to life. And but then, November 10th 2015, I left to go to the gym and while I was away at the gym, there were three men who were on a random crime spree in our city. They broke into the home three doors down from me and decided to take that opportunity. They saw me leave for the gym and decided to take that opportunity to break into my home. And Amanda was there with Weston. Weston, my 15-month-old, was in the crib the entire time. But Amanda got caught up in that home invasion and she was shot three times.
Speaker 2:And I came home from the gym to find her and um, just having no construct for or context for a home invasion. I had no idea. I thought that something had gone horrifically wrong with the pregnancy and um, and when I found her, she was still breathing. She was badly beaten up, but she was breathing very laboriously and unconscious. And so I just thought, partially because of this false theology that I had of, oh, as long as we're in the middle of God's will, we're going to always be protected, Nothing bad's going to happen to us, and partially because I was just in complete shock from the traumatic moment of walking in to see Amanda like that. I just thought if we got her to the hospital, everything's going to be okay, and so I called the paramedics. We got her to the hospital. I'm sitting in the waiting room and I'm feeling like I'm in an out of body experience, holding Weston and just shaking convulsively, and I'm like Weston, we're going to be okay, buddy, we're going to be okay.
Speaker 2:And the doctors and investigators came in and informed me that she had three bullet wounds and the prognosis was really grim. And I'll say that I had the most. I mean, I had so much faith that God was going to perform a miracle. But 24 hours later, she was pronounced officially deceased in the hospital.
Speaker 2:And that was November 11th 2015, which was four years to the day that we had packed a moving van up to move from South Carolina to Indianapolis to plant this church. So, overnight, my world was turned completely upside down, Just lost my best friend, my ministry partner, my soulmate. I was now a single dad to Weston and I was trying to figure out how to cope with and deal with this grief that was overtaking me, this rage that I was beginning to feel toward the perpetrators of this, and then also trying to figure out how to pastor my church through this, because they were all very connected to Amanda and grieving heavily so um, it was a very upending and very complex um season and for the next several months it was just navigating and waiting our way through that. And for the next several months.
Speaker 1:It was just navigating and waiting our way through that. So I know you talked in your book about the move and going back to that Like, was this really supposed to happen? And the question that so many people ask, including the one that I've asked many times in my life, is God, how can you allow this to happen? You mentioned it. If we're in God's will, then everything's supposed to go smooth right, but that's not what we read in Scripture.
Speaker 1:I know you'll get into that, but one of the things that really stood out to me was the impact that Amanda had on so many people throughout her life, from people next door in the neighborhood, from back home in South Carolina. It seemed as though everyone she met could sense the presence of God in her life and just the love and the care genuine care that she had for people and you speak very highly of her in your marriage and just the way it should be. I know it wasn't a perfect marriage there is no such thing as a perfect marriage but my goodness, you know, when you have that helpmate, that you marry in the presence of God, that really does just kind of. My wife and I, almost 37 years, I can't imagine, because that's kind of just like you are one. So you're sitting in the hospital very optimistic, faith-filled. What happens next?
Speaker 2:Well, you know, we sat there waiting for test results to come back and you know there are people who are coming in and out A lot of my family, a lot of Amanda's family, our friends. I'll never forget one moment, and one of the things I write about in the book is just the heritage of faith that we both had, you know, and so I'm seeing these people come in and it wasn't just like these people who had this really shallow faith. It was people who had gone through some really difficult things and helped me to in some ways, train for the trial that I had not yet experienced. It helped me to see that God was still good in the midst of you know my grandfather losing his wife when I was four years old and watching my dad wrestle with that and the fact that he lost his mom at such an early age. And you know a cousin of mine who had miscarried just recently and before that, and so it's just different things where I'm seeing and all of the people were gathering around us and you've got pastors, missionaries, marketplace leaders who are missionaries in their own right and they're just. They started worshiping and it was an unbelievable experience to see and to witness that in these moments of crisis where there's no other response that you, that you can have, but to turn to God and say, okay, we have no idea what we're doing right now, we have no idea what to do, but but our eyes are on you and we know that ultimately, god, you are in control and we trust you no matter what. And that was just a profound response for me to witness and to borrow faith in that moment from others.
Speaker 2:And then another thing that happened in the hospital and this is what I always tell people that God's going to show up in very personal ways. He's going to show up in ways in your valley. That it's the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Absolutely. Does he send people your way to minister to you? Yes, and that is tangible evidence that God cares, that he exists, that he's walking you through the Valley. But there are those things that happen where you're like I know that was God, I know that was for me, and it just kind of carries you forward to the next phase of what that is.
Speaker 2:And one of those moments was we were sitting uh, I was sitting on either side of the hospital bed with Amber, as you know, the same sides that we were sitting on 15 months earlier when Amanda was bringing Weston into the world. And so here we are, in a very different circumstance, and just despair. Amber and Amanda were the closest of sisters. We'd actually done a double wedding with Amber and her husband, gavin, who was my best friend in college that introduced us in 2008. And so you know here's.
Speaker 2:Here are the two of us again alone in this hospital room, waiting for these test results to come back, and knew if amanda could hear anything, she'd want to listen to elevation worship. So I put on pandora radio station, elevation worship, at the foot of her bed on a phone, and I'll never forget what happened next. Pandora is one that is. It's randomized.
Speaker 2:You don't get to choose what comes up, the first song, but the first song that came up was the song nothing is wasted, and it was as if god was reaching into that moment personally. Like heaven parted there, like the veil between the two were just, it was split, and it was like god was speaking. I looked at amber there was no. We didn't even need to say anything. We knew, yeah, that god was saying this is not going to turn out the way that you want it to, but I promise you I will not waste this. And then later that week, after we got the test results back and we're preparing for Amanda's celebration of life service, it reminded us this mantra nothing is wasted was the thing our family just held onto as an anchor, and really obviously that's rooted in Romans 8.28. It says he works all things together for the good of those who love him, have been called according to his purposes and we're going. If God can do something good out of this this is the worst of situations that you could think of then we're holding on to that hope.
Speaker 2:But it reminded us of what Amanda did as a hobby she had created into a business endeavor. She would ask me to go and pick up furniture off the side of the road that someone had thrown out and she would turn. She would flip this furniture, she'd refinish it and she would turn it for a profit at like an antique show. Or she also had a shop just outside of Indianapolis and it was remarkable what she would do. She would take this stuff that the world had discarded and said there is no hope for this, this is senseless, and she would bring value back into it. And I'll never forget the first time I saw her do this, I brought a home addresser and I said what are you going to do with this? This is garbage Like there's. You can't do anything with this. And she looked at me. She said trust me, give me a little time and I'm going to turn this into something beautiful. And she did over and over and over. And that's what we felt like the Holy spirit whispered us that week hey, trust me, give me a little time and I'm going to turn this into something beautiful. And Amanda didn't just believe that about furniture, she believed that about people. That was what was so beautiful about her and that's what you referenced earlier that we.
Speaker 2:If you ask anybody who knew Amanda, they would all say Amanda made me feel like the most important person in the room. Everybody thought that they were Amanda's best friend because she just valued people so much. She was one of the most selfless people I've ever met in my entire life, as indicated by some of the journal entries I put in the book, where you see her heart come out, where she is just so focused on. Heart come out where she is just so focused on. I want to. I want to. I want my life to be about God's kingdom and God's agenda and helping people and seeing more people come to know Jesus and helping hurting people to be healed, and that was her heart. You know she was training to become a certified biblical counselor because she wanted to just help hurting people. And, of course, as we were planting this church and she's interacting with people in our neighborhood, everybody she came in contact with knew that about Amanda. She had this like countenance, almost like Moses that came off of Mount Sinai, like she just glowed with Jesus. And that was one of the most difficult things as I was journeying through the healing journey.
Speaker 2:To reconcile Mike was how could someone this pure, this pure hearted I mean, you know, we just take purity for a moment like physical purity I was the first person to hold her hand, like first boy to hold her hand, when she was a senior in high school. She had like made this pact with her sister that she was not going, she was going to be so pure before she stepped into marriage and then she also made a pact that she wasn't going to kiss a boy until he put a ring on her finger, and so I was the first one to kiss her. It was amazing when we got engaged and so she had this purity of spirit, this purity of heart, this purity of body. I mean, it was just everything about her was I am consecrated solely to the Lord, and because of that it became so difficult to reconcile. How could someone this pure have this kind of a horrific ending in life? And, um, and I can't say I came to that Like I can't, I didn't reconcile that or wrestled that to the ground immediately. That's what fueled a whole lot of the rage and anger and sadness and despair that you see kind of coming out that I'm very transparent about in the book. But what was so beautiful is God was very kind and tender as a father to remind me of several things.
Speaker 2:One to point to what you just pointed to that throughout scripture we see the people who are closest to Jesus actually suffered the most.
Speaker 2:It's this paradigm shift, right, god's kingdom is an upside down kingdom that we have this tendency to believe that God's this like vending machine God, especially in Western American culture, that we like the message of Christianity is comfort and convenience, and like we should get what we want when we want it and we just need to call on God and he's going to bless us.
Speaker 2:And there's this like, there's this prosperity gospel that gets conflated because we just live in a prosperous nation. It gets conflated with what we believe about God, about ourselves and about this world, and suffering confronts that and it disorients that, and it disoriented that for me and I'm like wait a minute, god, how could you, how could you allow this to happen? How could you have not stopped this? Why didn't you prevent this? How could you be good and kind? I never doubted his existence, but I doubted that he was kind, that he was good, like this was your daughter, like she was, she was like the purest version of your servant and you would allow this to happen. And then you know, as I'm seeing this counseling and I lay a bunch of stuff out in the book too but I was reminded of those people, the disciples, that their lives ended tragically as martyrs.
Speaker 2:You know, and you've got people in Hebrews 11, where you, at the end of chapter 11, where you see some were sawn in two and they considered it worth. It is what scripture says.
Speaker 1:They considered it worth it is what scripture says.
Speaker 2:They considered it worth it. Well, this is a total reorientation that says okay, this light and momentary affliction that we are going through here on this earth is producing for us an eternal weight of glory that far outweighs the former. You know, and um, and, and then, and then it says the world was not worthy of them. And the only way I've been able to reconcile this is Amanda was such an amazing person. This world was not worthy of her.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, if Christianity, becoming a Christian, was all about that cushy life, everybody would be a Christian, right. But unbelievers don't see that. They see us just like everyone else, if not more, suffering. Um, and I think that's intentional, because I, you know, we've heard the the phrase put some skin in the game.
Speaker 1:I mean, we have to really understand god's grace and what he's done for us and that we repay that with everything that we have and um, you know, and I think that, uh, as this story unfolded, you ran through all um you know and I, and I think that, uh, as this story unfolded, you ran through all the typical stuff. You know, like you said, the anger, the frustration, the questions, um, I mean it w it was everything. And and I and I appreciate you for being so transparent because, honestly, if if people are reading this and they're in the same situation or suffering through you know that that difficult time, um, you know, without that transparency it becomes a little bit polished and that's just not the way life is. So I appreciate you sharing that. Um, so it wasn't long before you got the bad news that, um, she didn't make it.
Speaker 1:Um, you've got this 15 month old son, um, who was actually in the house when this happened, and I want to talk a little bit about Weston in a bit. But you had a great, as you mentioned, tremendous families on both sides behind you. You had a tremendous community, church, community, and I'm sure that helped. I know that helped, but you still struggled greatly. Can you talk about what happened in the immediate right after that?
Speaker 2:You know, immediately there was, it was shock. There was a huge media firestorm and so, you know, fortunately had a great church community and a church that ascending church from South Carolina that really sheltered me from that, but that added a huge layer of complexity. Most people are just dealing with grief, you know, behind closed doors, but now all of a sudden, right, I'm dealing with it publicly and um and so, but immediately it felt like shock. It was like I can't believe this just happened and I was just numb. Now there was some, some darkness that began to really trickle in there and creep its way in there as I started losing sleep at night. I would, you know, lie in bed at night and be. It'd be the first time that my mind is beginning to actually catch up from, like, what happened that day, and and then I would just be terrified to fall asleep because I would have nightmares, I'd wake up in cold sweats. It was just there, was just this darkness that began to set over me and about two weeks into it, man, I became physically sick for about the next month and I couldn't figure out what that was. Now, looking back on it, and you know, after about a month it started to come into clarity that this was grief, ultimately not having any place to go, that my body was keeping the score as as the book goes Right, and so I thought that I had to be strong for Weston. I thought that I had to be strong for my family. I thought that I had to be strong for the church. You know, I just didn't know what to do with this grief. I had not been taught like it's okay to be really mad and angry at God. It's okay to like let what you're feeling like, feel that.
Speaker 2:And so about a month in, I was lying on this couch that, you know, west and I were couch surfing. Our house was a crime scene and there was a family who had teenagers in our church and I thought that felt like a safe place to be, you know, almost like a mom and dad kind of figure, to really walk with me in Weston for a little bit. And I remember being on this couch and receiving a text message from pastor Levi Lesko, and he wrote a book called through the eyes of a lion. I had heard about him before Amanda passed away. I listened to a message that he had preached. I was in awe of how he carried the grief of losing his daughter Lenya. So I went back and tried to regale Amanda on that message. I was totally butchering it. It was like you got to listen to this message and I tried to like preach the message and she's like, no, no, we got to just listen to it.
Speaker 2:So we went to Chicago two weeks before me and before she passed on, like a romantic getaway, and we're listening to this message on this train and we are in, we're just in tears. And she looked at me. She said, davy, I think god is preparing us for a season of pain. She said, honestly, I think we're gonna lose this baby. I hope we don't, but I think that we're gonna lose this baby. And I think that because right now we've lived a pretty charmed life. Yeah, we've had hard with church planting, but we don't know how to minister to people in pain. This is how attuned am Amanda was to the Holy spirit. She just had this like real prophetic, almost attunement, discernment. She said I think we're going to go through a season of pain that's going to prepare us to minister to people in pain. And obviously we had no idea what was coming for us, but I put on reserve in the library Levi Lesko's book Cause I just like, well, maybe I'll need this.
Speaker 2:And it came available three days after Amanda passed away. So, and it came available three days after Amanda passed away, so I'm devouring it. Well, then I get this text message a month later hey, this is Pastor Levi and I just want you to know I'm walking with you in this, whatever you need. So I just start pouring my feelings out to him because I felt like I had some solidarity there, someone that could understand. And he says Dave, I want you to run toward the roar. And that was. I knew what he was talking about.
Speaker 2:I'd read in the book, you know this, this metaphor of running toward the triggers, the things that are really scaring you, like don't stuff them, don't suppress them. And so I knew that there was one thing that was really triggering me, um, that I could think of, and that was, as I get in my car, the Bluetooth that would default is the first song on my playlist, and that was a song that was played at our wedding. And so I'd get in my car, start the car up, that would start to play, and it felt like this sadistic trick. So I'd be so mad and I would just bang the dashboard and turn it off and drive in silence the rest of the way, just clenching my fists. And then when he said that, I was like I need to go and listen to that and I was doing what now I advise people to do? I was seeing, or what I advise them not to do.
Speaker 2:I was seeing my triggers as a villain in my story, as like an enemy to combat or to stay away from, instead of seeing triggers or these really uncomfortable emotions of grief, of lament, of pain as, instead of seeing them as invitations from God into deeper healing. And what I experienced that day, when I actually leaned into it and ran toward the roar, so to speak, is I experienced this just fire hydrant of emotions coming out of me and I was just waves of grief coming out, this biggest ugly cry you've ever you've ever experienced. But then, immediately following that were waves of grace and it was like the, the lord met me there and all of that physical sickness I was experiencing it untangled, it's like it was gone now I wasn't healed in that moment, but all of a sudden I had agency again. It's like I realized wait a minute, I don't have to take this back on my heels Like I can actually, uh, almost now. God's the one that leads our healing, but I can like partner with him in this and go.
Speaker 2:Okay, what's the next one that you're inviting me into? As difficult as this might be, what's the next trigger that I got to lean into and you're going to meet me at? You know, and so I knew one of the next ones was I had to go back into the house. So three months after amanda passed away, I did the same thing. I retraced my steps, walked back into the house, laid down the spot that I found her and I just wept and wept, and wept and wept, and then that weeping turned into worship and then, once again, it all subsided and what happened there was so profound because the house was haunting me. There were so many things in my story that were haunting me and it's like the Lord was leading me to this paradigm shift. This understanding to say nothing is supposed to hold you captive, davey, right.
Speaker 1:Amen.
Speaker 2:Like you, are a slave to nothing and no one except for to Christ, and so it's for freedom that you have been set free. So even these triggers, this PTSD that you're experiencing. I don't want this to hold you captive, but the only way that we're going to release you from this is we got to go right into it, right into the belly of the whale, right into the middle of the fire, and I'll meet you there, I'll be standing with you in it, but then you won't be burned, and that's that really colored and informed the way I approached the healing journey. The rest of the time and you'll notice that in the book there's always these like moments where I'm going, I don't know if I want to do this, I don't know if I can. I don't know, and the Holy spirit's reminding me. Hey, same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead lives in you. I'll walk with you in this.
Speaker 2:You know, though, I walked through the valley of the shadow of death. I will fear no evil, for you are with me, and that's what god did just masterfully, I believe masterfully in my story, what he'll do in everybody's story if they'll let him. Yeah, it's just these moments where he keeps just leading me through like a voice whispering to me. This is the way walking and, as isaiah 30 says, just keeps me, keeps leading me through the valley and then starting to emerge out of the valley and then being able to look back on the valley and have a totally different perspective. Oh, yeah, right, seeing. Yeah, goodness and mercy have been following me. Seeing, wow, from up here, the valley actually looks pretty beautiful and I never thought that it would look beautiful again you know, there's a couple of things that you you mentioned.
Speaker 1:Uh, we'll take the first one or the last one first here and that's the perspective. And I think, as you were saying that, I was thinking you know, if you don't move from that place and you're continually running from those triggers, that PTSD, will you ever experience that? Look back on the valley and say now, I see, and it's not a natural thing for us to do like you had been doing You're avoiding those triggers, you're staying away from those because they're causing pain. Right, and God was saying no, this is how I want you to handle this.
Speaker 1:I think that was one big takeaway from your book reading. That is wow, that was a new revelation to me. Another thing I want to talk about is we'll go back to the hospital room, and you mentioned it a couple times worship and praise Again, not natural things to do in situations that you were going through. But you talk specifically in the book and I won't give it all away, but you talk so beautifully about how that moment in the hospital room with family and with friends, who began to worship in praise, music and give thanks to the Lord, and how God met you all there.
Speaker 1:I think that was another takeaway for me in the book. And again, I can't imagine many of us can't understand what you went through, but I love how you've documented this in the book and allowed that to be a tool for others who are going to be walking through similar things, because we need that. And again, if you're not out there saying this is what happened in my life. It was tragic, but God is turning that around and he's also giving us the tools for others who are in those situations to walk through and be more successful in finding that healing, that restoration, because it's not a natural thing, it's beautiful yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2:It's so good yeah, that's kind of. You know, nothing is wasted the book. It's more descriptive right, it's more, because there was no manual.
Speaker 2:It's not like I could pick up some book. Where I was at on November 11th, after having just gotten the news that Amanda was gone, I couldn't pick up a book and go okay, where are the steps, how do I get through this? Okay, where are the steps? How do I get through this? Right, so it was really just leaning in on the Lord and going okay, god, I have no idea what to do here. So you're going to have to be loud and clear. You're going to have to be loud. I'm choosing, like the disciples in John, chapter six, when Jesus turns to them after having this, he lays out this really strong teaching and all these people walk away. He goes are you not going to? Are you not going to walk away too? And they say where are we going to go? You have the words of life, and that's what I felt like in that moment. It was like I have no idea where to go, lord, I don't know what to do. You have the words of life, so you're going to have to be loud and clear and I'm going to say yes to everything you put in front of me. And so it was.
Speaker 2:I was really grateful for somebody coming into my life early on, who had the wherewithal, on the foresight, to see, okay, this is going to be something that needs to be documented. So, davey, you need to document everything that God's teaching you, everything that you're feeling right now, everything that you're. And so this person shared that with me and had enough influence in the world and in my life that I listened to it, and so I started just document everything, all the stuff, right, that I was feeling every. Every time, I feel a conflicting emotion or something that didn't make sense to me or something I was really struggling with or wrestling with. But then these beautiful insights that God would bring and how he would bring them.
Speaker 2:And so now nothing is wasted. It's like a descriptive. It's like I'm the reporter telling people this is the journey God took me on, yeah, and it's been really cool. Then, on the, on the back end, later, years later, we've been able to develop a curriculum called pain to purpose. That's a little bit more the prescriptive that says like, hey, here's, if you find yourself in this place, this is, these are the steps you need to take. These are the things that you need to do or implement in your life. This is what you're going to have to wrestle with if you're going to move through your valley. Darrell Bock yeah, darrell.
Speaker 1:Bock. So, darrell Bock, you had lots of people coming alongside you throughout this whole journey. It wasn't just this core group there were. God was just orchestrating all of these touch points when you needed them. You talked about the black pastor in Indianapolis who, when you were struggling with that whole issue of this person who was convicted, who murdered my wife, who wouldn't feel anger, but God was orchestrating all these people and bringing them into your life at the exact moment that you needed them.
Speaker 1:And again, just confirmation that God is walking with us through those hard times in life. And look for those opportunities to hear from him and learn from him, because nothing is wasted. What an amazing title.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's so true. I think a lot of times, especially in American culture, when it comes to grief, we still just we go right back to busying ourselves and that becomes a coping mechanism for us. And certainly there were still things that had to be done. Right, it's not like I could just pull back and take the next year off. We had a congregation that I was leading. I mean, I started back preaching in February of 2016.
Speaker 2:So three months after Amanda passed away, I'm back in the pulpit, so to speak. Part of that was because I just felt like I needed to take back territory in the spiritual Like. There was an outworking of like, like I feel powerless, and I know that there's there's so much of this. That's a spiritual thing, and I know, and I know and recognize that the real enemy is not the three men that killed my wife. While I still had to sort through a whole lot of emotions and feelings that I had about them, I knew that the real enemy is Satan, and the only way for me to really get redemptive vengeance on Satan is to partner with God in the work of the gospel, is to fight with weapons of righteousness, and so that was part of my. I've got to get back into the pulpit, I've got to talk about what God's doing in my life. I've got to talk about, you know, and invite people into partnering with God themselves. And I felt like, on some level, I felt like I don't think my congregation made me feel like I owed it to them, but I felt like I'd needed to, like, lead them and guide them in this too, cause they were going. What do we do in all of this situation now? And they were so amazing to wrap their arms around me they would have given me the whole year off if that was the case, but, but the but. It really felt to me very cathartic to get back up and talk about this stuff. I felt like, on some level, the warrior spirit in me felt like I was punching the enemy in the face right Enemy punch. And I'm punching back and I'm going you mess with the wrong family. We're going to see people come to know Christ and we're going to help people heal.
Speaker 2:And as I did that, then our church began to grow, which was really interesting because I started seeing a lot of people coming to our church, going. You know, I've never heard anybody talk about pain this vulnerably and authentically and where God is in all of this. I've always seen it be so whitewashed in church settings, so I think a lot of people felt understood, they felt I just had a conversation with a girl just last week while I was in Nashville doing some media appearances and she was a part of our church at that time and she was like Dave, you remember, there was so many of us coming to your church at that time that we needed healing and we could not find it anywhere else. But there was someone who was finally talking about pain in a very vulnerable way and where God is in all of this. And so it was just this phenomenon that we see, that we saw starting to take place, where God was doing an incredible work in the midst of it. And so I still had these purpose, these things that were purpose oriented, that were also providing healing salve to me, and at the same time back to your point I was carving enough space and had the ability, was given the latitude by our leadership to carve enough space that if I needed to step back for a week and go and see a counselor for a week long, intensive, or go fly out to see pastor levi and just spend time with him or wherever.
Speaker 2:Whatever I needed to do, they were like go do it, because that's where god speaks. And I think that's one of the things we have to understand when it comes to grief. Is that man we want to just like, boom, let's just get back to life or let's just stuff it, let's just not. But it's. My counselor says we want God to work in poof, like right now, and sometimes he does, but most of the time he works and he heals in process and it's process sees a space where he'll speak to you, where you've got to carve that margin for him to move in your life.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I love that. I don't want to. We don't have all day to talk about all the details. I wish we did. But, um, I know you're busy and uh and we got to keep this reasonably uh timed, but I want to. I want to jump forward to um, to. Amanda was a victim of a crime. Those who perpetrated that crime, you've got to deal with that. You mentioned that. How do you find forgiveness? Because this is another whole new like yeah, rabbit trail that you had to go down is how do I deal with forgiveness? First of all, you're a pastor standing behind the pulpit.
Speaker 1:You've preached on forgiveness for years, I'm sure countless times. Yep, all these things about grief, all these things are now in your face and you're like how do I deal with this? Do? I really believe this. I think probably the most difficult one has to be forgiveness. Yeah, how did you deal with that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was the most difficult one and that also is the most difficult one for most people. That's the one where we see as we work with people. That's where we see them get stuck the most. It's also where we see the biggest breakthrough for people, when they finally understand what forgiveness is, what it isn't, how to release that bitterness and really what forgiveness is is. It's my part that I do in the whole equation right, and I used to preach messages before all this happened. It's impossible to experience a radical forgiveness from Jesus and not be willing to extend it as well, and I'm like man that that preaches. Well, that's a really good sermon. You know, we're conduits of forgiveness. We experienced the forgiveness of Jesus. We extend it. We're ambassadors for Christ. We're agents of reconciliation. We've been given the ministry of ministry of reconciliation. I mean, I've got all the scripture for it. I had all the scripture for it until I experienced it and then it was like do you really believe this, davy? Do you really believe what you're saying right here? Do you really believe that the undoing of the enemy's work right here, the key to that, lies in an upside down kingdom and weapons of righteousness and choosing to forgive? Do you really believe that, because your heart doesn't want to right now.
Speaker 2:And that's where I had to come. You know, I felt myself slip into this real dark place of rage and fantasizing about what I wanted to do to these men. And sure that was. Um, I was seeing, it was. It was really oozing out of me. As my counselor said, right, bitterness just oozes out of you, and it was only going to affect me. It was only going to affect the people that I love. It was going to destroy me like a cancer. Bitterness rots the hand that holds it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I had to come to this place where I decided, for me and for the sake of the people that I love, I've got to choose to release this. And this is not releasing or abdicating the men of the responsibility of this. This is trusting God with it. This is saying, god, I trust you that you're the true arbiter and judge in this whole thing, that you're going to make this right. That vengeance is yours, that if I meddle with it, I'm going to totally mess it up. I'm not going to give it the true air that it needs to have, the true weight of justice that it needs to have, by holding on to this. So I've chosen not to hold on to this. I'm releasing this to you, jesus, and knowing that he has the perfect sense of justice, that he knows exactly when to exact that justice, how to exact that justice, and knowing that that's not going to be in my time, yeah, and that his justice is a restorative justice where all parties have a um, a beautiful restoration that takes place, even if part of that restoration is wrath because of unrepentance, right, but there's restoration that takes place.
Speaker 2:So that's what my part was. That's what I had to come to was like. And there's some stories in the book there's, you know one, particularly with how I came to know christ. That is a very pivotal part of that whole equation. That was major paradigm shifting for me. Yeah, but the um that where, where I came down to was this is a date, this is a decision I have to make before I can feel it.
Speaker 2:I'm never going to feel like forgiving. I've got to decide and I've got to wake up every day and decide this, and as I do that, I'm walking in forgiveness, and as I walk in forgiveness, then I'll begin to start feeling forgiveness. Then I can go, not just from like don't repay evil with evil, but I can flip over to the other side and go repay evil with good, which is what scripture tells us. When your enemy's hungry, feed him. When he's thirsty, give him something to drink. You know, visit him in prison.
Speaker 2:Like these are the kinds of things that come out of a heart of compassion and empathy, that are the Jesus way, and my heart didn't want to do that at first, but I'm a living testimony of when you draw the line in the sand and say God, I'm choosing your ways above what I feel right now.
Speaker 2:Then my feelings begin to follow and God, in his providence, allowed me to hear some of the stories of the men and learn some of those stories and begin to grow in empathy, grow in compassion, all the way to the point where, at the end, you see that that I had opportunity with each one of the men to share with them the message of the gospel, to share with them about Amanda, to share with them my decision to have forgiven them. And you see, with a couple of these men, the responses that they had that it's just truly supernatural and um, and now I believe it that there is something supernatural about this, that the only way that we undo what the enemy is doing and we unravel his ploy in our life is by taking the battle into the spiritual and fighting with weapons of righteousness.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's really good and, again, I wish we had more time, but I want to. For those who are listening, I think there's kind of two things that I want to pull out of this, and I know that everybody will pull something different, but I want to go back to the two different topics of making it through what you went through For those who are going through that. Advice for them and also advice for probably a bigger group of us who struggle with forgiveness. What kind of advice would you give? You've already talked about the high-level stuff, which is great, but for someone who's listening and going man, I have this situation Remember my family, a coworker, whomever that may be, that I'm really struggling with, what advice would you? What practical advice would you give them? And also those who are struggling with grief and just that overwhelming sense. Can you speak to those?
Speaker 2:Well, you know if it's an offense that's been done against you, you know you act if you have a perpetrator in your life, which, by the way, there's, I believe, four perpetrators of pain. One is like our own sinful choices, that we live in the consequences of what we've done. Nobody's lied to me, tricked me, deceived me more than me, but. But the second perpetrator of pain is other people's sinful choices, where we actually are a victim, where there are real offenses and injustices that have been done against our life. The third is that we live in a fallen and broken world. This world is ever. There's an ever-increasing unraveling of the world because of original sin, because of adam and eve swapping the truth of god's word for a lie. And then the fourth is spiritual attack, that there is a target on our back, that the enemy is trying to thwart the plan that God has for life. He can't steal our salvation, but he can neutralize us and paralyze us. So that second one, speaking of that, that's one of the most difficult ones, because they're really I mean you, really, it's really unfair what somebody did to you, what somebody said to you. Now you're having to figure out how to respond in that when everything carnal and of this world says get revenge or write them off or right, and so I think there's obviously a whole gamut of situations that are represented.
Speaker 2:I can't foresee into everybody who's listening to this what their situation is, but I will say you know a couple of principles in that is one if you're able to have a conversation with that person and it's a safe it's safe to have a conversation with that person express to them how they offended you, talk to them about what they said. Hey, when you said this, when you did this, this is how it made me feel and and that demonstrates a level of, or a desire for, reconciliation. For many of us, their reconciliation is not possible and we've got to be okay with that. But even when reconciliation is not possible, forgiveness is possible and is the part that we play, because forgiveness is saying um, I'm not going to hold on to this rat poison of resentment and bitterness towards you because it's just going to kill me.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And Jesus said Father, forgive them, for they don't know what they're doing. Recognize, like my wife always says, consider the source. You know, you don't, they don't really know what they're doing.
Speaker 2:So I'm going to choose to release this bitterness towards you, but I am going to make opportunity for contrition, for repentance, for you know so, by expressing to you, like here's how this offended me, here's how this hurt me, and that provides an opportunity for reconciliation to take place. They have to be contrite, they have to be repentant if there's going to be reconciliation, but that's not always the case for most people. Right, that's right. Sometimes you have to choose to forgive and then you still there's not going to be reconciliation, or they're not a safe person to be brought back into your life, or even if there is reconciliation, they're not a safe person to be brought back into the level of access that you've given them. So there's so many complexities within this, but I would say do your part, because you deserve to be the freest version of yourself, and there is freedom and forgiveness.
Speaker 2:Yeah, right, and god wants for you to be the freest version of yourself he desires for you to walk in the fullness of the plan that he has for you and that unforgiveness is only going to be an encumbrance to that. That's right. So that's what I I would say that then you asked the question about someone who's wrestling with grief and dealing with grief. I would say that, understanding that God's heart is absolutely broken and shattered for what you've gone through and I think sometimes we miss that, that you know we shake our fists at God and we go how could you let this happen and why and it's okay to do that he's not intimidated by that. In fact, I think it's necessary. I always tell people hey, I want you to go and wrestle this down with God, like, tell him everything, all the ugly, everything that you feel, everything that you've thought, everything. I think that actually creates the relationship and shows us and reveals us the mysteries of God.
Speaker 1:that begins to peel back our pain that begins to be a salve to our soul.
Speaker 2:I mean, jacob wrestled with God, right, and it's so important in the history of the Israelite people that they base their entire name, their moniker, around this moment where Jacob wrestled with God. They're called Israel. Well, jacob's name deceiver, heel grabber, supplanter was changed to Israel. That's right. And it's all pointed back to this moment where he goes head to head, toe to toe with God. And anytime we do go toe to toe with God, he's so gracious and kind that he doesn't he could destroy us. I mean he could, just that's right. Now he'll remind us of who he is and who we are, and there's a beautiful humbling that happens. He broke Jacob's hip, who he is and who we are, and there's a beautiful humbling that happens. He broke Jacob's hip, broke his hip, heals him, changes his identity from Jacob to Israel and then blesses him. And when you take these really difficult questions to God and you wrestle them down, you're going to there's a couple of things are going to happen. He's going to break you and that's okay, that's necessary, that's what needs to happen, just like Job when he's like hey Joe, where were you when I hung the stars? And Job's like, yeah, you know what? I'm right sized again. I get it.
Speaker 2:But he's so loving and gracious and kind and slow to anger, and he's a good father whose heart is broken for the brokenness of this world. He's the same Jesus that wept when he came on the scene of Lazarus, even though he knew he was going to raise Lazarus from the dead, because he saw everybody else weeping. And he's going. This is not what I meant for my creation. He is the same Jesus who's like I'm going to make this right.
Speaker 2:Jrr Tolkien says he makes. He's going to make all things sad come untrue. He's that same Jesus that, in the midst of the wrestling, he's going to heal you, change you and bless you. And so if you found yourself in grief right now, just wrestle it to the ground with the Lord. Don't do what is happening right now. What is happening right now, and has all over Christendom, is this whole movement where people take their really difficult questions about God that seem irreconcilable. They stuff them in their back pocket and they walk away from God and they walk away from the church. And I promise you, if you take those questions to God man, you will find him and you will find the sweetness and the nearness of the Lord that will carry you through the valley of the shadow of death.
Speaker 1:So good. Wow, Nothing is wasted. Really quickly, talk about the book. Uh, I, I had a, an advanced copy. Um, amazing, I really. I really recommend that everybody watching and listening grab a copy of this, because it's got, man, it's just got such good stuff in it. You've heard a lot of it here. There's so much more in the book. Tell us about the book when it comes out. Where to get it?
Speaker 2:There's so much more in the book. Tell us about the book when it comes out, where to get it. Yeah, actually, the time of this recording we it just came out, so I'm super excited about that. We're on like our second week right now of the release, so it's available anywhere. You can purchase books Amazon, barnes and Noble, target, walmart, all that kind of stuff wherever you like to purchase your books, and so, yeah, I would love for you to go and read it. There's also an audio book version too. I got the opportunity to read that audio book, which was really cool, and then also had Amanda's sister come in and read the portions of Amanda's journal entries for that audio book.
Speaker 1:So it's just a it's.
Speaker 2:It was been a beautiful, beautiful project and a very cathartic one. Lots of new layers of healing, as we've even come to the release of this book and getting it out there to the world, and I'm just so encouraged by how people are being ministered to by it, whether they're going through grief or not. That's what's been so cool to hear is that people who are like I've never gone through anything hard, but this was just so helpful for my relationship with Jesus.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. It really has changed my perspective on a few things that are major shifts, and so, yeah, please pick up a copy of this. It is worth it and you'll want to hang on to it and keep it handy. We didn't finish the story.
Speaker 2:We'll leave that for the book. You'll have to read it in the book. It's a beautiful, beautiful and it's not an ending, right, we all know that the stories are never ending until we see Jesus one day. But man, god has done some incredible stuff in our life and our family.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, tell us really quickly about your family. I want to hear about Weston how he's doing, and you've had a lot of changes since all of this took place.
Speaker 2:And again I always talk about. A lot of people are like, oh, they look at our life now and they go man, god's really redeemed your story. And what they're referring to is you know, I'm remarried and we've blended our family and we've got this beautiful ministry that we get to steward and this message that we get to steward, and we're helping thousands of people right now with nothing is wasted. But I always tell them redemption is not the moment that God brings back to you or replaces to you what was stolen from you, because the reality is there are things in your life that are stolen, people in your life that the enemy steals, that can't be replaced.
Speaker 2:They're irreplaceable. However, scripture't tell us that the thief will. He will make the thief repay sevenfold what he's stolen, right? So I do believe there is a uh cup overflow with kind of thing that happens in our stories, but the moment of redemption starts when you decide I'm not going to partner with the enemy and get stuck in this. I'm going to partner with jesus to take back my story. I'm going to walk with him through the valley of the shadow of death, but then he's so gracious to, like I call it, put the icing on the cake, um, in your life, and he's done that for me.
Speaker 2:I met this beautiful woman, christy, and you'll have to read about in the book this. I'm telling you the connection that she had to our story, to the men. Like it is only God can do this, only God can do this and um, and it's a beautiful thing to to know that God's inviting you personally into a story in a next chapter, right, in a new chapter of your life, that the redemption is not just for you, it's for other people too. Right, we're blessed not to just terminate ourselves, but to be a blessing to others. So we so Christie and I, have been married since the end of 2017 and blended our family Natalia from her previous marriage. She's 11 now. Weston's 10 now and, man, I tell them every day God's got a special plan for your life. And then we have one of our own, cohen, who's four, and it is a beautiful, beautiful thing.
Speaker 2:In the Blackburn household, we live on 13 acres now with all the quasi homesteading stuff getting put in place I mean, it's chickens and it's goats and it's all the fun stuff like that. But we also have three firstborns. So you know how to pray for us, because everybody's fighting for Alpha in our house right now. But it's a beautiful blended family and we're not a perfect family by any stretch of the imagination. We understand the difficulties of blending and co-parenting and all this kind of stuff, and it's hard and God's teaching us new and new things every single day. And God's teaching us new and new things every single day. But, man, we just are so blessed to wake up every day and help other people as they're walking through, whatever trauma or tragedy they're going through.
Speaker 1:Well, davey, thank you. One last thing I want to make sure that people can connect with you. You now have a ministry that they can reach out to Tell us really quickly what those things are, how they can reach out.
Speaker 2:Nothing is wastedcom is where you can find everything about that, or Instagram Nothing is wasted ministries, and you connect with me at Davey Blackburn D-A-V-E-Y-B-L-A-C-K-B-U-R-N on Instagram. But what nothing is wasted is is we help people trauma, tragedy, major life transition and help you find purpose in your pain. You find purpose in your pain. The seminal thing that we do is that we have a course curriculum called pain to purpose. I mentioned it earlier and it's kind of the prescription right, but we're God's blessing it right now where we're launching it in churches all over the country. We're working alongside pastors, ministry leaders, discipleship pastors, you know, care pastors and helping them to create spaces where people can heal in the church, where they can wrestle down those really difficult questions and they can find where God is in their story and then they can begin to rebuild their life and figure out okay, how does God want me to leverage this for this glorious missional purpose that he has for my life? And that's what Pain to Purpose is all about. And adjacent to that, we have this whole ecosystem of content, community and coaching right there at.
Speaker 2:Nothing is Wasted. Co of content, community and coaching right there at. Nothing Is Wasted. Coaching is probably one of the most amazing things that we do, because if you are finding yourself in a particular pain point right now, maybe you've lost a child. If you come to Nothing Is Wasted Ministries and go, hey, I want to get connected with a coach, we'll match you with a child loss coach, one who has experienced that story, healed through it, been certified through our pain-to-purpose curriculum, and most of our coaches now are trauma certified as well through a third party certification. So we have that for almost every pain point you can imagine. You know divorce, sexual betrayal, childhood trauma, domestic violence I mean, you name it. People are coming to our ministry and they're finding solidarity, they're finding a guide or a Sherpa who can help them to navigate through their valley, and it's a beautiful thing. We just, we love being able to do that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's not all just about grief, so go check that out. I'll have all those links and your social handles and everything in the show notes. Again, davey, thank you so much for being open and sharing this amazing story, from tragedy to just how God allowed you to see glimpses of hope throughout all of this, and you're welcome back anytime. Hope the book does well Great job with the ministry and thank you for being on.
Speaker 2:Thank you. This is an honor and I'm happy to come back anytime. Thank you.
