Just Breathe E-Book

Keith Repult

• Herausgeber: BroadStreet Publishing Group, LLC
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Seitenzahl: 242

Beschreibung

Keith Repult spent his life looking for love and running from God. After growing up bouncing between parents, grandparents, and foster homes, Keith ended up in California in his early twenties—homeless, addicted, and broken. One night he met the owner of a local adult bookstore and soon became a worldwide leader in the porn industry. As a self-made multimillionaire, "King Keith" was living a life of luxury, but was completely empty and addicted to alcohol, drugs, and pornography. Still trying to find the answers, Keith and his wife bought a vacation house at the beach and opened a yogurt shop. That shop opened the door for them to encounter the grace of Jesus Christ. Using the acronym BREATHE, Just Breathe provides practical tools for reflection, hope, and help for those drowning in the pain of addiction. It is also a powerful ministry resource, using the steps Keith took to find freedom from addiction. Not only does God know everything about us, He also relentlessly pursues us with an unfailing love. Keith's story reminds us that we've never gone too far to be made new by the big grace of God.

Leseprobe

My wife and I decided to get scuba certified for our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary. It was just one of those bucket list things we’d always wanted to do—to renew our vows on the bottom of the ocean. We did this using only sign language, of course. Picture thumbs up for “better” and thumbs down for “worse,” and you’ll get the idea. The actual art of scuba is mostly about learning to breathe with a mask on. First-timers suddenly realize they are actually under water, and their natural tendency is to start breathing too fast. In golf, the number one rule is to keep your head down. In baseball, it’s to keep your eye on the ball. In scuba diving, it’s just breathe. Keith’s book brings that scuba diving lesson to dry land. His story seems like something a screenwriter wouldn’t even try to write. It’s one chapter after another of a life’s downward spiral. But somehow through it all, he was able to keep breathing. He’s a walking miracle in many ways, but the first rule of scuba will always ring true for him: just breathe. My hope is that you will see parts of yourself in Keith’s story and realize that none of us live too far away from the grace of God. I hope you will see addiction for the monster that it is and seek some help before it is too late for you. So read on. Keep your mask on. Don’t freak out. Just breathe. And discover the hope you need.

—Tim Harlow,senior pastor, Parkview Christian Church, Orland Park, Illinois; the author of Life on Mission

Sometimes “amazing grace” seems like just a phrase or only the title of an old hymn. And then you read the story of a life like Keith’s, and it becomes clear once again that this grace is a power stronger than death and it’s the hope of the world. Read about it—and come home.

—John Ortberg,senior pastor, Menlo Park Presbyterian Church, CA

Just Breathe is the riveting depiction of a remarkably transformed life. Keith’s journey reveals one of the most powerful stories of redemption I have ever witnessed in over thirty-five years of pastoring.

—Pastor Jude Fouquier,lead pastor, The City Church, Ventura, CA

Ever wondered if God does miracles? Ever wondered if He can do miracles today, perhaps in your life? With Just Breathe, you hold in your hands the story of a real-life modern miracle. Keith’s story can be your story and reminds us that none of us are beyond hope.

—Gene Appel,senior pastor, Eastside Christian Church, Anaheim, CA

Watching God transform Keith and his family has been one of the greatest privileges of my life! If you feel like you are buried under shame, that you’re too far gone or that you could never get beyond your past, this book is for you. There is hope for you! Keith’s story continues to be a vivid reminder to me that Jesus doesn’t just make us better—He makes us new!

—Jodi Hickerson,programming director, Mission Church, Ventura, CA

If you feel like you’ve somehow outrun God’s grace, think again. Keith’s story about his journey to freedom is proof that God will go to any lengths to save anybody, including you.

—Mike Foster,founder of People of the Second Chance; creator of the Rescue Academy; author of People of the Second Chance and Freeway

BroadStreet Publishing® Group, LLC

Racine, Wisconsin, USA

BroadStreetPublishing.com

JUST BREATHE

All Stories Redeemable, All Brokenness Reparable, All Addictions Breakable

Copyright © 2017 Keith Repult

ISBN-13: 978-1-4245-5520-8 (softcover)

ISBN-13: 978-1-4245-5521-5 (e-book)

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without permission in writing from the publisher.

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise noted, are taken are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. Scripture quotations marked MSG are from THE MESSAGE. Copyright © by Eugene H. Peterson 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group. Scripture quotations marked TLB are taken from The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked NLV are taken from the New Life Version, copyright © 1969 by Christian Literature International.

Stock or custom editions of BroadStreet Publishing titles may be purchased in bulk for educational, business, ministry, fundraising, or sales promotional use. For information, please e-mail [email protected].

Cover design by Garborg Design

Interior design and typesetting by Katherine Lloyd | theDESKonline.com.

Printed in the United States of America

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For Drew

CONTENTS

Forewordby George Barna

Introductionby Mike Breaux

From Hard Core to Soft Serve

Part One: The Journey

chapter one

Rubberland

chapter two

“Born Again”

chapter three

Starving for Love

chapter four

I Wish You Were Here

chapter five

Kinky Keith

chapter six

Samantha

chapter seven

King Keith

chapter eight

Yogurt

chapter nine

Real Life

chapter ten

Sold!

chapter eleven

Welcome Home

chapter twelve

Take Up Your Mat and Walk

Part Two: The Tools

chapter thirteen

Admit My Brokenness

chapter fourteen

Relinquish Control

chapter fifteen

Evaluate My Life with Fearless Honesty

chapter sixteen

Make Amends

chapter seventeen

Think a Whole New Way

chapter eighteen

Encourage Others with My Life and Story

About the Authors

Resources

FOREWORD

By George Barna

Life is not easy. If you have any doubt, read Just Breathe, the narrative of Keith Repult’s life. It is a story of one man’s struggle to overcome physical abuse, abandonment, homelessness, sexual promiscuity, loneliness, deceit, manipulation, regret, addiction, and the loss of hope. As you read his story, you will marvel that he lived through it all. And at times you may wonder why he bothered to keep going. At points in the story, you may conclude that his was an irredeemable, unsalvageable life.

But in God’s eyes there is no such thing as a life that is irredeemable or unsalvageable. Keith eventually hit rock bottom—several times—and at one juncture decided to take a chance on God and invite Him to intervene. From that point forward, Keith’s life transitioned to a tale of forgiveness, restoration, hope, healing, purpose, and even joy. There were bumps and bruises along the way, even after God became a vital part of Keith’s daily experience, but the trajectory was totally altered.

This is the kind of life story you might expect from Hollywood—you know, the “based on a true story” bio-pic that is usually more “based on” than “true story.” But Keith’s story is not a fabricated, dressed up Hollywood drama. It is a heartwarming chronicle about the courage of a man and the love of his Creator. It is a transparent account of how God once again proves that He loves all people, even those who spend a few decades denying, offending, and ignoring Him.

Having spent several years researching how God transforms peoples’ lives, a process recapped in my book Maximum Faith, Keith’s story fits the pattern that the research discovered. Everyone is on a spiritual journey, and there are ten stops on that journey. Because God has given us free will, we don’t have to go any farther on that journey than we want to. Most people never get beyond stop three (believing that God exists, but not engaging Him in a life-altering relationship). Most “devoted” Christians never get past stop five (having a relationship with God through Jesus Christ, and being active in a church, but never truly living for and like Jesus).

Keith, however, gave God the license to break and then heal him. That willingness to accept brokenness and then the restoration that God always wants to provide are what have enabled his life to become a significantly transformed one. God invariably seeks to break us from our love of sin, self, and society. He does it to glorify Himself, yes, but to also benefit us beyond measure. For that process to work, though, we have to accept brokenness as an irrefutable part of our spiritual growth process.

Sadly, my research showed that almost all born-again Christians have had multiple opportunities to experience and accept brokenness through specific crises God allowed in their life, but our typical reaction is to fend off those opportunities by either seeking to avoid brokenness or by striving to heal ourselves. We reject brokenness as if it is a mark of weakness or being a loser—unfortunate perspectives our secular society is eager to advance. (Surprisingly, the research also revealed that churches are usually complicit in rejecting the benefits of brokenness, devoting more effort into keeping congregants happy and connected than to facilitating their wholeness.)

When we embrace brokenness as a gift rather than as a curse, God is able to come alongside us and lead us to the next stop on the journey: surrender and submission. Incorporating surrender to God’s control and principles—and submitting to His authority and His agenda—gives our lives deeper meaning and focus. It moves us closer to becoming people for whom our love of God and love of people are evident in everything we think, say, and do.

Because he is fully human, I know Keith will never live a perfect life. But because he has embraced God’s gift of brokenness and is an active participant in surrendering and submitting his life to God, he is maximizing his spiritual and life potential. His story is yet another shred of proof that God is alive and at work in people’s lives, restoring us to Himself in ways we would not choose and perhaps cannot imagine, using processes we cannot orchestrate or control, and glorifying Himself through broken but willing vessels like Keith.

Read the pages that follow. Keith’s life was a mess. God redeemed him and now his life is an imperfect but beautiful testimony to the love of God and how He blesses those whom He restores. In the classic hymn “Amazing Grace,” Anglican minister John Newton wrote of his own experience with brokenness and God’s subsequent rescue: “I once was lost, but now am found; was blind, but now I see.” That could well be the theme song for Keith’s story.

George Barna, New York Times best-selling author

Ventura, CA

April 2017

INTRODUCTION

By Mike Breaux

My favorite flavor is the key lime pie, or maybe the oatmeal raisin cookie. You can find them in a great little frozen yogurt shop in Ventura, California. Ventura is a funky beach town with a really cool vibe. Thrift stores. Surfer dudes. Former Hell’s Angels bikers. Endless strawberry fields and orange groves. Lots of retro and reclaimed décor. And lots of reclaimed lives. My buddy Keith, in particular.

He came to Ventura to open the yogurt shop, but he really came to hide. Hide from his past. Hide from his reputation. Hide from his shame. Hide from himself. Hide from God. Try as we might, though, hiding from any of that is really futile … especially the God part. Not only does God know everything about us, but he also relentlessly pursues us with an unfailing love. In fact, he’d been pursuing Keith for a long time.

I remember the day Keith called me to say how he was so proud to be asked to come to his son’s elementary class on Career Day. It’s that day when parents get up and talk about what they do for a living. I’ve stood there before knowing that I was going to have to follow the fighter pilot, football player, or firefighter. It can be pretty intimidating. When it was Keith’s turn, he passed out various flavors of fro-yo along with the kids’ favorite toppings. He was the absolute hit of the day. Take that you brave, cool astronauts!

It was the first time he was able to stand in front of people and proudly tell them what he did for a career. It was a freeing moment and one he thought he might never experience. Keith and I jokingly refer to his journey as one from hard core to soft serve. For years he had risen to the top of the adult entertainment industry, distributing porn with the rationalization that it was no different than passing out frozen yogurt samples.

But you know that rationalize really means “rational-lies,” right? Keith felt all kinds of guilt about his life. And eventually that guilt morphed into shame. You see, you feel guilt for something you did. You feel shame for someone you are. And he didn’t like who he had become.

Keith surrendered his life to Jesus Christ about five years ago. Shame is the language of the thief, but grace is the language of Jesus. That shame was replaced with unconditional love, a love that met him right where he was … as he was. As a friend assured him, “God knew what he got when he got you.”

It has been an honor to walk with Keith on this journey. To have a front row seat to his transformation has been one of the highlights of my life. I have had the honor of helping him keep track of days clean, helping him recover from relapse, and trying to answer his questions about life and God. Allowing him to teach me afresh about the grace of God has been such a privilege.

On Thursday nights I get kicked out of the house. My wife leads a women’s bible study group, and for some reason, I’m not welcome. So most Thursday nights you can find Keith and me sitting near the beach, watching the tide roll away and the sun sink down (cue the Otis Redding song). We talk about recovery, relationships, raising kids, walking free, and people we know who need hope. We talk about God’s incredible power and his furious love. We talk about how grateful we are that when both of us felt hopeless, like we were absolutely drowning in sin and dysfunction, Jesus reached down and pulled us up to the surface, and allowed us to breathe deeply.

That’s what this book is about. Breathing deeply. Walking free. Surrendering fully and living with hope, passion, purpose, joy, and a peace you can’t really adequately explain to people. No one is beyond God’s reach. No one.

I hope that you find this story inspiring, and the principles helpful. I pray that your journey will be the same as Keith’s. Oh, maybe not a journey from hard core to soft serve, because that’s pretty unique. But I hope it’s one of surrendering to the love and power of Jesus, so that you can break through the surface … and just breathe.

FROM HARD CORE TO SOFT SERVE

“PORN STARS WANTED!” There they were, words graffitied in scarlet letters with red spray paint covering the yogurt shop windows. I walked around the corner to see the banners I had proudly displayed on my new store for the whole community to see: “Coming Soon … Fresh, All Natural … Surf’n Yogurt.” But the name of the shop was crossed out and covered in red: “PORN PRODUCERS.”

I didn’t know who wrote it. I didn’t know why. It didn’t matter. This yogurt shop was supposed to be our starting over. Redeeming this corner of the eclectic neighborhood that was avoided by parents because of the liquor stores and sketchy hotels was going to be our ticket out.

My wife, Samantha, and I had bought a weekend home in Ventura, California, a few years before, looking for a place to get away from the busyness and rush of our lives in Santa Clarita. We enjoyed the little beach town so much that our weekends kept getting longer and longer, blending into weeks. We fell in love with this seaside, surf community. It was such a happy place; everyone exercised—people were always outside running, biking, skateboarding, sailing, and surfing. And everyone was smiling and barefoot; we loved it, and we ended up staying.

We wanted to build something there, so we designed our dream home six houses from the sand, and then my wife had the idea to open a little frozen yogurt shop. We really didn’t know much about yogurt, except that we liked to eat it. We knew a lot about running a business, of course, and we decided to give it a shot. We found this little shell of a building that was 390 square feet and located on a busy corner, and it was perfect.

We decorated, printed up beautiful banners to hang outside, and handed out five hundred bright red T-shirts to the local elementary school kids (the most persuading, free advertising you can find), and we were thrilled. Here we were, living in our dream home, and running a new, little family business; life was good.

Until one night I got a call from my friend John. I heard his voice on the other end of the phone, “Keith, you better get over here and look at this. Somebody did something to your shop.”

Porn Stars Wanted. Porn Producers. Shame. Embarrassment. Guilt. That’s all I could feel; I was overwhelmed, overcome, and buried. I felt sick. How could I be so naive; why did I think we could just start over? I began frantically washing and scraping the windows, and as I washed, it seemed an ironically cruel display of what I had tried to do when I moved here: make all my dirty secrets disappear.

But they hadn’t. They had followed me to this place. I had tried so hard to run, so hard to start over, but it’s like that old saying, “Wherever you go, there you are,” and I had followed me here.

What these people who wrote those words all over my shop didn’t understand is that I am not a bad man; I am a businessman. I like to build things, start things, and dream things. And I had done all three. It’s just that my area of business was a little “controversial.” I remember all the ways we used to sugar coat it when people would ask what we did. “We’re in the film industry,” we used to say. “We buy a product and sell it for more than we bought it for,” or, “We make instructional videos to help people’s marriages.” But the truth is: I was a successful businessman in the adult entertainment industry; I created and sold porn. “Adult Entertainment Industry” always seemed to soften it up, but people knew. They always knew what that meant. And so did I.

I knew it meant people would judge me, isolate me—that I would have to hide. I knew it meant that even if people didn’t know, I thought they did. It meant my kids wouldn’t have play dates and the cop on our street was always watching me and people would feel good about themselves when they spray-painted all over the windows of our new shop.

But, it also meant money, and lots of it. It meant power, wealth, freedom, pride, cars, vacations, houses, and vacation houses. Running this business was all I knew, and I was good at it. We were good at it. My wife was a genius when it came to running the business, and I could sell anything, to anyone. Starting from nothing, with nothing, we built an empire. We owned two companies, the second largest distribution warehouse in the United States and a production company called Devil’s Film. Our film company was in the top ten of manufacturers of adult movies and put out two films a week. We were making around three million dollars a year, and I held the respect of my peers and colleagues. I had arrived. We had all we ever wanted, except the only problem was, once we got it, we realized it wasn’t what we wanted. And we were tired and empty.

Tired of lying. Tired of hiding. Tired of the games. We wanted our newly adopted son to have a different life than we had given our daughters, and we really thought we could find that in Ventura, if only we could keep our little secret a secret.

But we couldn’t. I knew that now. And after washing and scraping away those words all over our shop, I went home to my wife, numb with fear and shame, and told her what happened. I wanted to leave that night, sell everything and get out of this place; it had betrayed me—this once wonderland now felt like hell, and I wanted to run … again. I had started over so many times when things got hard. What made this time any different? But my wife is strong, and in a moment of clarity, she looked up at me, and with determination said, “Go get your bike. We are going for a ride down this street, and we will hold our heads high. We are who we are, and we aren’t going anywhere.” So we did, and as we rode, I felt like everyone who looked at me was judging me—that they knew all my secrets and that they could see right through me. And it felt like daggers to my heart and soul. But Samantha insisted that we stay.

When I think back to that moment and that we might have left, it overwhelms. Little did I know that little yogurt shop was going to be God’s salvation for my family. It was the tool for his perfect plan to change my life.

I don’t really like to talk about my life or my past or let people know anything about me, but I heard this guy one time talking about a story from the Bible—this story where some friends of a crippled man carried him to Jesus on a mat. Jesus told the man to get up, take up his mat, and walk. What I will never forget about this story is that Jesus didn’t tell him to get up and walk and leave his mat; he told him to get up and carry the mat because he wanted him to remember—remember where he came from and what Jesus had done. Carrying his mat, even when he didn’t need it anymore, made people ask him about it, and he would tell them his story about how he couldn’t walk and then Jesus healed him.

I was crippled. I was broken, wounded, helpless, and going nowhere, but now I can walk. I was lost, filthy, and broken, but there was a God who loved me anyway. I was lost in the darkness of the porn industry. I was isolated, angry, and addicted, until somebody showed me the light. And all of it—the new house, the draw to the beach, the washing of the letters, and the bike ride—all of it was part of a bigger story of a God who was pursuing me. This is my story. This is my mat.

Part One

The Journey

chapter one

RUBBERLAND

I never knew what it felt like to be home. Growing up, I wanted to be normal like the other kids in my school, but my chances were pretty slim from the beginning. Born in Memphis, Tennessee, to two teenagers, I moved in with my grandparents on my dad’s side when I was three because my mom’s latest husband made me sit in the bathtub while he took my sister in the bedroom and sexually abused her.

My grandmother’s house was the first place I met God. The God I met there was distant and strict; my grandmother was Irish Catholic and was firm about us keeping the Ten Commandments. She had rosary beads that dangled above her bed, and she and my grandfather never said the word love, which only made my craving for it grow. When I asked her one day if she loved me, she replied, “You show love, you don’t say it!” But I had never had anyone say those words to me, and I longed to hear them.

Our house on Bonnie Drive was small, and we were poor; I never had my own room but slept in the den on a foldout cot that was next to the two recliners facing a black and white TV where before bed we all watched Jeopardy or shows about normal families. My sister shared a room with my grandmother that had two twin beds separated by a nightstand with a loud Timex wind up clock that we heard ticking at night throughout the house.

I had a heightened curiosity about sex, maybe from the years of living with my mom and abusive stepdad, or maybe just from a deep desire to be wanted. I can still remember looking forward to when I was left in the house alone and sneaked peeks at women in their underwear in the Sears catalogue that my grandmother left on the table. Sometimes my sister did things to me she learned from her abuse, and I saw her get money from the boys at school if she lifted up her top.

When I look back on it now, I feel grateful that my grandparents took me in. I was grateful for the three meals a day, for a place to sleep, and for a routine. We went to the mall with their retired friends, and my sister and I watched cartoons in color on the TV at Sears. We ate our dinner, watched the news at five o’clock, and I went to bed every night at the same time. As we got older, my sister and I rode our bicycles up and down the street, back and forth. Mine was an old bike that my grandfather had found on the railroad tracks; he fixed it up for me, and it had a long banana seat with “sissy bars.” He put an ace of spades in the spokes, held on by a clothespin, so when I rode it sounded like a motor.

I remember being driven by my grandparents to school, and I was so embarrassed—not because they were older but because I wished I had a family with a mom and a dad like so many of the other kids. I felt so odd and so different, like an outcast. I wanted to know what it was like to have friends over to my house after school, but I never had one friend over. I never went to anyone else’s house either. I created an imaginary world in the backyard where my sister and I played; we called it “Rubberland,” and you had to bounce everywhere you went. She was the only friend I had in the world; I felt so alone.

My dad was the town bookie and a firefighter. He drove a long, red Lincoln and wore Elvis sunglasses. He dressed sharp, with a pinky ring and lots of jewelry, and smoked big cigars. I wanted to be just like him. On weekends when I visited him, I marveled at his ultimate bachelor pad. He had a dining room set made out of old wine barrels, a fridge stocked with beer, a pet tarantula, bath towels with letters of our last name monogrammed on them, and porn laid out on the coffee table. He had a round bed with a red velvet comforter and red velvet headboard, and everyone called him, “Handsome Jimmy.” He watched sports on the TV all day on Saturday and Sunday, and he cheered for the teams that increased his winnings.

He liked sports, but I was never very good at them. I played baseball once and got the nickname “Smiley.” I stood in right field and was so happy I was on a team, I just smiled. I couldn’t catch the ball or hit it, and I mainly stayed on the bench. I remember my dad’s disappointment once when he threw a ball with me, and I was ball shy. I wanted so badly to prove to him that I could be something and that I could be as successful and as well-liked as he was, but I was a dorky kid with a funny walk and a head too big for my body.

My dad came in and out of the picture. He visited us now and then, but he never stayed for long. On career day at school, when the moms and dads came in and talked about their jobs, I knew my dad’s presentation would be the best, if only he showed up. But he never did. One day he promised he would take me fishing and that night I had a dream of turning over leaves trying to find night crawlers, but we never went.

Once he brought us home to live with him and his third wife. She was not good to us, and we went back to his parents’ place. It seemed like he really wanted us there, but his wife didn’t; it confused me that he would choose this new wife over us, but I tried not to think about it.