Beyond the Stroke: Being Grateful in the Crisis

hey there and welcome to what's the story we're an inquisitive bunch of hosts on a mission to uncover stories about faith and courage from Everyday People in doing that we get the privilege of chatting with amazing guests and have the opportunity to delve into their faith Journey the hurdles they've overcome and the life lessons they've learned along the way if you enjoy our podcast don't forget to subscribe and sign up for our Weekly Newsletter at our website what's Theory podcast.com it's your direct line to the latest episodes and detailed show notes delivered straight to your inbox what's the story is brought to you by crowd Church who fully understand that stepping into a traditional Church might not be everyone's cup of gel crowd Church provides a digital Sanctuary a safe space to explore the Christian faith where you can engage in meaningful conversations rather than just simply spectating so whether you're new to the Christian faith or in search of a new church family visit cra crow. church and if you have any questions just drop them an email to hello crow. Church they would love to connect with you and now let's meet your host and our special guest for today welcome to what's the story beside me on the screen if you're watching this is a very old friend of mine Mr Rob Brown all the way from Nottingham the land of Robin Hood if you're listening to this on audio you can't see him but trust me is is just next to me on the screen it's great to have Rob here we're going to get into a whole bunch of stuff with Rob about his Christian Journey challenges he's had to face and all that sort of stuff but yeah Rob lives in KN him he's doing TED Talks apparently he interviews people for a living he's written a book so I feel slightly nervous in fact he's interviewed a thousand people or more on what makes good people great thousands of people he is a stroke survivor he's got epilepsy he's a committed Christian he has a black belt in kickboxing so I just need to watch my p's and q's apparently play chess and B gam as well robing your in your quiet time which I think is quite fascinating you love I love this you love orange chocolate is that terce chocolate orange or is there a different that is my go-to Mt definitely I can devour a whole one in one go yeah I'm with you bro there's something that is so addictive about that terce chocolate and do you do the Terry's chocolate orange which is literally the orange in the box or do you do the individual segments that come in all the different flavors are you disappointed with those I'm very versatile but it's got to be milk chocolate I Terry chocolate orange are diversifying their product offering so you can get it in all kinds of ways but yeah my go-to is the original I don't know if overseas listeners of this will get this but it's a it's chocolate wrapped up like an orange with little segments in it in a orange wrapper you would know it well Matt yeah that is My Kryptonite really a thousand calories I think in one of those I've never actually checked I was in the states a couple geez it's Flame by I was in the states six seven months ago and my gift to take to them was a whole I just filled my suitcase with terce chocolate oranges wow did they get it did it go down well oh yeah loved it yeah that and cabis dairy milk celebrations I don't know if you've tried that one that's the one with popping cand I've got to say that the chocolate in the UK is better than the chocolate in the USA let's put that out there right now let's get controversial straight away as is the coffee my wife Amanda says the Americans can't do a decent cup of coffee but let's not start an International inent here the Americans throwing their pans down that's so wrong that's so wrong listen Robb it's great to have you on this uh podcast you are a podcast to yourself like we said you've interviewed thousands of people and so I'm I've been looking forward to this com just because it's always nice to chat to you if I'm honest with you it's going to be fun that's that's very sweet and it is a privilege to be on the other end of an interview if you like because I'm usually the one doing the questions but as you and I know it's it's more of a fireside chat and a conversation like that isn't it because I'm sure I might fire a couple of things at you and get your take on things but yeah lovely to talk about life men don't talk about life much actually do they men don't have best friends we don't confide we don't share we we don't make ourselves vulnerable so it's good that we're doing something like this and putting it out there absolutely absolutely let's get started let's start not obviously right back at the beginning in terms of childhood but let's talk about your Christian faith always like to start off the show just by asking people how what was it that caused you to become a Christian were you born a Christian were you was there something quite significant along the way I tell you what didn't make me become a Christian was going to Catholic schools my whole life I grew up in I'm sure you're not the only one in that boat to be fair yeah grew up in Hull went to a Catholic Primary School a Catholic middle school and I was even head boy of my Catholic senior School in the sixth form there small school there was a few priests doing lessons but I never grasped the whole Faith thing I did it by root and in many ways it turned me off God because there's a lot of man-made stuff particularly in the Catholic church and the sacraments and the the confession confession booth and the rosary bead and all of those things so I couldn't see God in that so I went on my Merry way after school having no faith at all Meandering around the world looking for loads of things and it wasn't until I was probably early 30s I wound up in Charlotte North Carolina so I lived in Hong Kong I done load of traveling and a good friend of mine that I met in Hong Kong was from Charlotte North Carolina in the USA and I'd got to Crossroads in my life where I thought what am I going to do I'm nearly 30 I've tried a few different things I've been a teacher I've left that behind I've done some coaching and you asked yourself the question is this all life has to offer am I doing what I'm supposed to be doing so a move to the US was as good as anywhere and it hit that wall where you say if I don't make a decision now I'm going to be lost for the next 10 20 years because you look at a a CV a resume if you like and if it says you've been all over the place you're basically unemployable yeah yeah here's a Drifter he's a Wanderer he's tried a bit of everything we can't tie this guy down so I was asking myself the question what have I meant to be doing with my life now most people become a Christian if they're not born a Christian and born into that life and I I really wasn't most people become a Christian because they hit a rock bottom they hit a dilemma a tragedy a loss A betrayal a a diagnosis a situation something and they don't know where to turn I actually was the opposite in that I had too many options okay I was a qualified teacher I could have lived anywhere I could have married anyone basically I I wanted to settle down I wanted to be that guy my brother was married with Children and I envied that I I had to so many things I could do yeah and so many options and now was free to choose the more but it's bewildering isn't it the the Paradox of choice they call it the more choices you have the more you feel unsatisfied with the choice you actually make I heard a lovely story about do you remember a few years ago you could go into a a clothing shop and buy a pair of jeans and you'd have maybe a couple of sizes to choose from and you'd have to wear them for a couple of months and wash them in but eventually they fit nicely these days you go into a shop to buy a pair of jeans and you've got 50 different cuts 50 different colors 50 different styles and you eventually make a decision but you come out thinking did I really choose the right one there yeah yeah so it's called the Paradox of choice I was very much there I didn't articulate in that point but that that was that was the fork in the road that I came to and I felt in English terms I was at a roundabout which road do I take from here and I had that sense that if I took that road there doing that job with that person stayed here or I went there I'd be looking back towards the roundabout thinking did I take the right Road should I have taken that other road that other exit which means you'd have to go back to the roundabout and start again so it became really critical that I chose the right path and I was bewildered by the choice and the responsibility of that choice and that was when I started to my my roommate back then Eric was a Christian he was going to a church in Charlotte and this is Billy Graham's Hometown Matt yeah yeah Charlotte North Carolina we know Billy Graham one of the greatest evangelists of modern times I went to a Billy Graham crusade and he filled a football stadium with 80,000 people and there were 8,000 in the choir that's how big was wow wow that's I went on my own I was right up there in the rafters just curious I hadn't gone to a church I didn't want to go back that way but I did have some questions ultimately the question was God if you're out there you're the one person that's likely to have the answer to the question what am I meant to be doing with my life yeah I wasn't praying for a miracle I wasn't praying for Redemption I wasn't praying to be saved from anything I wasn't at Rock Bottom like I said I just wanted a simple answer to the question what next yeah and given the enormity of that decision and all that weighed on it it was something that I had to get right so you go to the ultimate source and I really wanted God to be real and give me me that flash of light so that was the first bit of the journey and I didn't get an answer them but I did go down to the front they do the altar call if this message has affected you and you want to make a change and I prayed a simple prayer but nothing happened what did happen is a few weeks later I'd obviously got something and I felt maybe God might be staring but I didn't believe he was real at that point and I'm early 30s here so I went to church where Eric went I don't think I went with him actually that day and they did a funny thing where this is a big church M so you're probably looking at five 600 people yeah big Auditorium very well done Baptist Church oh in the south of the US and they're very fervent but very professional and they asked the question if you're new here just stay in your seat and wait for 30 seconds and at that point everyone that wasn't you in the church stood up so the only people that sat down are the the newcomers so immediately everybody knew who you were and usual wasn't it because they didn't say you stand up because you feel really conspicuous I'll put your hand up if you've not been here before no it was stay what stay as you are yeah and everyone else stood up and as soon as they saw somebody sat down I had a ton of handshakes and welcomes and great to have you he is and they gave you this little card that said if you'd like anyone to chat through any questions you've got then let us know and we'll send somebody around now I had a ton of questions so I filled in this form and a few days later it was Tuesday 10th of October 1996 three people knocked on my door this apartment in North Carolina we're from Hickory Grove Baptist Church wow you filled in the card we'd love to come in have a coffee with you and answer any of your questions and share some things with you and it was very subtly done it wasn't A Hard Sell but they did sell it wrong in saf faras as they started talking about Jesus and God and I'm saying why should I believe they said you get eternal life and I said look I don't I'm not interested in eternal life I want something right now I want an answer now yeah and I did the usual Gambit of listen I believe in this God of yours if I see this flash of lightning I see this miracle I see something I see a sign and the biggest thing they did to get me over the line was they said and it was actually guy called Lawrence Bey he was an old guy he'd come to the Lord at age 57 he'd been hospitalized many times through alcoholization he' got to that end of the road where there's nothing else but God now and he had a wonderful testimony but he said to me this he said Faith doesn't tend to work that way you've got to believe in God first and then he'll show you the signs it's a blind step of faith it really works with people we can think of Paul on the road to Damascus where he gets the sign first and then he believes yeah but for most of us Mortals you've got to take that step of Faith first and God will show himself so I said okay I I'll do that I entered into the game if you like but I did pray with a an open fervent heart and they stood with me right then and we prayed the prayer Lord I bring you into my life I've messed things up I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing yeah I know that I've got stuff wrong if anyone can help me is you please come into my life and guide me and be my savior and many people listening might recognize some kind of believer's prayer like that yeah but it was that blind step of Faith mat and whil I'd love to tell you that there was lightning bolts and stars and angels singing and everything else it wasn't that but it was a sense of Peace around me that I've done something good there that's a step in the journey that I want to go down now and I can tell you with all honesty that in the next few days a real peace came about me that I'd done the right thing that God was in my life and I started to see God everywhere even in the trees and the sky and the in my mind and it became that there was something bigger than me and that was such a relief it was such a piece that I didn't have to make this decision on my own so it didn't all fall on me if I got it wrong yeah and I can look back on it now and think do you remember Moses when God Called Moses to release the is I and go to Pharaoh with a staff and Moses felt completely inadequate to handle that task but God said you won't be doing it on your own I'll even give you Aaron but I'll be there with you as well and I'll give you these Miracles and I'll give you these signs and I'll give you the words to say so I felt like I wasn't on my own and pretty soon after that I'll stop talking in a moment I'm sure youve got a few questions but God told me to go back to the UK go back to where I came from go back to the start and be a teacher which CR my craft so I'm already getting answers of what to do and where to do it and that was a great start he didn't show me all the answers then but he gave me a couple of pieces of the jigsaw was fascinating there was peace in that yeah fantastic Fant that's amazing and the reason I'm smiling a lot is because uh as you're talking I'm realizing we have probably more in common than I initially thought because really yeah I well I wasn't in my mid-30s but I did go live in North Carolina wow okay I did become a Christian in North Carolina goodness me because I went to a Baptist Church in North Carolina now it wasn't Hickory Gro Baptist Church this crazy is it yeah it's funny I took a year out from University before going to University and ended up working in a children's home Inland no in North Carolina how did you get out there originally I wanted to take a year out we at my school we had I remember we did this assembly and a guy came around and talked about the virtue of taking a year out before going to University and I thought that sounds really good and so I actually wanted to go to China teach English because I wanted to go study Kung Fu because I was really into martial arts and that all fell through and the organization that I was doing it all with said listen we can't get you into China but we can get you into this Children's Home in North Carolina I'd been to America once and I said sure why not at least they speak English and they've got Chuck Norris I think which is the nearest you get to it's not quite China but it's yeah CH Norris you know what I love all the Chuck Mar Morris memes that go around on Instagram they're hysterical but yeah that's how I ended up over there and I was working in this Children's Home wasn't really looking for Christian faith I have to be honest with you if I if you'd have asked me if I'd a Christian i' said yes I had some kind of belief in God but that was about it and I went to the children's home I had to take them to church every Sunday that was part of my d Beauty oh okay and so you got to hear the gospel every week and it just had a profound impact on me over about three or four months so yeah so you were more of a slow burn then weren't you but God got you where he wanted you to be to hear that message it's funny how God does that yeah funny funny how he does that but yeah it certainly threads of our life in common and you got God in your life when you weren't particularly looking he does that as well doesn't he to some people yeah yeah absolutely God when go when when he's good and ready there's a lady in our office she's lovely bless her she's she wouldn't call herself a Christian fact she probably call herself the opposite but she always knows in as when you run a company things are up and things are down and when things go down she always comes to me and says you just need to pray because that's what we need we prayer prayer seems to work and so when you pray God seems to answer and things happen and I'm like why don't you pray it's just I'm not going to I'm like sh listen you may as well stop running because at some point he's going to catch you and it'll just be much better for you if it's sooner rather than later I'm just he's pointing that out don't wait till the last minute you can but why would you it's so much fun in the meantime I'm curious point there that there are people in my life that would make really good Christians my business partner Martin he's very philanthropic he works in the food banks and things when he's not running his business he does a lot in buying up debt and setting people free and he would be a huge asset to the kingdom of God but he he doesn't believe he's very open to it my brother who's passed on there but he was another one that would have made such a great Ambassador for the Lord but there didn't seem to be an itch in his life that God could scratch at least anything I was bringing to him he wasn't interested in eternal life and he had all the things he wanted he was fairly comfortable he had a wife two great kids and but would have made such a wonderful evangelist or eventually God would have got him over the line I'm sure he had a Christian wife who went to church and took the kids but yeah things in common for sure yeah fascinating fascinating and actually you don't live that too far away from my mom because you're in Nottingham she lives in a sort of small village between Derby and Nottingham I am now I never saw you in any kung fu movies so was that the end of your martial arts [Laughter] career oh it's brilliant in fact it's interesting actually for the when I became a Christian I still carried on doing martial arts and there were some very lovely well-meaning but very uh unhelpful Christians around you at that time when you were early in Christian faith telling you that you can't do martial arts and be a Christian kind of thing and I I listened to him but I didn't I carried on and I remember for me one point I was walking down a street there was three of us two guys and a girl we were walking I can't remember where walking from but we were walking back somewhere and this group of this gang of kids let's just say they were kids I don't know how old they were but gang of teenagers swarmed around us and started pushing us around and I managed to get the other guy and the girl away I'm like go and take her get her away and I'll stay here just to keep this group entertained a little bit while you get because it was a bit frightening for a blesser and I remember I remember it really clearly Rob I remember I was standing around these people and as I turned around to make sure they were gone one of them punched me in the face now I turned around and I don't know if you've ever been in a situation like this but in that situation I looked at them my whole body changed in an instant I went into a stance and I could see myself in my head in an instant I knew what I was going to do to the first five people around me I knew the moves I could see I trained for so long I could see those moves happening and I remember very clearly in that instance the Holy Spirit saying to me I've got this and so so my whole body then instant relaxed and the person in front of me could see it cuz they thought oh man I'm going to get a good ey in now this guy's really hacked off and I said I just I remember pointing at him and I said listen I'm going to start praying that's what I'm going to do yeah I said I don't know if you believe in God or if you don't but let me tell you you need to thank him because he has just stopped me from absolutely going for hell for leather on you cuz he was the one that hit me and I was going to take them out first I was so angry and I'm like you really need to thank him and I think in that instance I then stopped doing the martial I it wasn't intentional it just happened from that point on until maybe my kids were I don't know two young boys and I thought actually it'd be really good for them to start to learn some of these things and so we went and we did martial arts every week and we really enjoyed it my middle my middle child my youngest son Zach particularly enjoyed trying to hit me every week it was like cathartic it was like therapy so yeah that's my story that's straight out of a you could make a movie out of that we see these scenes in movies whether it's Bruce Lee or Jack Reacher or insert your own superhero there where they're surrounded by a group of ill meaning Ruffians and evil villains and they all put the guns down and fight nicely and come at you one at a time and such is the way mus I've never seen or heard of response to a potential fight and how obedient and courageous of you to actually handle it like that that's Inc it totally diffused the situation and you know what um just to finish the story off a week later I saw that person that same person walking down the street and you know what I had in my hand my Bible okay so here I am thinking cuz part me is going back going okay God I could see what you're doing there but I really wanted to hit him yeah which is completely normal yeah completely normal sort of thinking and I I remember walking away thinking I don't know if I did the right thing and then I saw them a week later and I had my Bible and they recognized me and I just said to them I really hope you have been praying and I really hope you have started thanking God but if I'd have if I'd have got into a fight and then he'd have saw me with the Bible I'm not quite sure what that would have said but yeah it was fascinating fascinating yeah yeah but you got into kickboxing black belt and was late to the party my one of my daughters Georgia my eldest played in a football team and one of her teammates went to a kickboxing class with her dad I said to Georgia why don't we go along and join them was a daughter dad type thing and we went to a local kickboxing class in a sports center and we enjoyed it we bought the pads and the kit and started playing with it and this daughter and dad fell away but Georgia and I kept going and at this I was probably 46 47 well and I'd had my daughters got married quite late after I came back to the UK it was within a year probably a few years that I've met my wife in a hall so that's my hometown so God brought me back for that reason so we did this kickboxing stuff this other the pair fell away Georg and I kept it going she stopped at her blue belt she got but I'm now 48 and I'm thinking why don't I just keep going could I get my black belt before I'm 50 and it took me three or four years but I did I kept it going and even after George would fell away and it became a real goal for me not so much that I wanted to be a fighter or anything else but I thought this is a great thing to attain and if you're a father of two daughters the old cliche of they bring bring a boyfriend around oh yeah yeah and you show them your knife collection or your gun collection the US I wanted my daughters with me as the ultimate protector to say this is my dad and by the way he's a black belt and kickb yeah yeah totally that was a motivator but for myself as well but which led to another thing I'm we'll come on to but uh yeah we we need goals as we progress through our life and I wasn't young like you were and there was kids doing kickboxing that were in their 20s and they could throw fast punches and run rings around me but I could hold my own to a point and it's the Cs and things isn't it you'll know that word where you go through the routines and that it's not so much it's what it makes of you yeah as a person that Journey that disci I think it's good discipline yeah that's the word isn't it it's discipline and that's why I was keing the kids did it especially the boys I Zoe did it my daughter as well and she got into the whole martial arts thing to the point where if when she does bring a boy home if she's if he's actually got far enough to come home yeah like he's probably okay because he's she's got two older brothers that he's got to get through and then there's I remember one time I don't know if I should tell this story but we were I was back home in Derby and my cousin who's not really my was it my cousin I can't remember if it was my cousin or somebody like someone close to the family her boyfriend was coming around to our house to my mom's house and this was a few years ago and there was three of us stood outside there was me my brother who is ex-military right he wasn't at the time he was in the Army at the time and my brother's best mate and so this guy came around and we're like we're going to meet him we are going to wait outside and we are going to meet him because I know what I was like when I was a teenager and none of my girlfriend's dads at the time took me aside and said I'm not being funny Matt you do anything crazy I'm going to break your legs not that Advocate that level of violence obviously but I think that's probably what I needed and so I took this we took this s guy turned up and uh Stu the guy that was with us uh said to him okay this is Matt he's trained to save you because he always calls me the Vicor and this is his brother John he's trained to kill you it was just a very funny comment and this kid is like what do I do and I just said to him I said you behave yourself that's what you do because you don't want to get caught not and now I get it very protective of your daughter very protective of my daughter rightly or wrongly and I wish more dads would have those kind of conversations with young boys because there's there's a lot of Cockiness and arrogance of Youth yeah probably you and I felt back in the day where at 20 you feel you know everything but looking back you realize you know nothing nothing essentially true nothing you know nothing yeah you are nothing yeah a bit of humility at that edge is the Dad's job to instill in in the young men that get around our children yeah absolutely and listen you have a great time but if you step out of line in any way there are consequences and I think that's an important thing the line I used once was don't touch my daughter anywhere that I wouldn't yep yep that just sums it up it totally sums it up it's exactly right and I think these conversations should be had I remember pasted a friend of mine he his daughter was going on a date and this is in the states and they were going to senior prom and this was the first time she'd gone on a date and the guy had come around to pick her up and the dad knocks on the door he knocks on the door and the dad answers it Eddie and so Eddie's come on in dude and he's all dressed up black tide and she's just going to finish getting ready but let me show you something while while so he leads him to the garage and shows him this brand new car a big shiny car that they had had the license plate Glory one I think from memory the bizarre detail of the story anyway Big Shiny car and he said would you like to borrow the car this evening I can I can give you the keys to my brand they were talking about the car what do you like it would you like my new car love the car and all that sort of stuff and then he ends the conversation by going would you like to borrow it would you like the keys and the young man quite right he said oh no I wouldn't take your car out and Eddie's like why did you not want to take my car and he says it's a new car it's brand new he says it's really it's it's expensive it's worth a lot of money and Eddie said I just turned around to him and said you are taking my daughter out tonight she is worth more to me than this car is worth and it is like in an instant that kid understood was really clever I thought it was very clever so you've got a black belt in kickboxing and I said in the intro and one of the things I do want to talk about is the stroke that you had because you are a stroke survivor is what we said in the introduction there and when we were doing the preacher I asked you what's one of the biggest challenges that you faced in life that God's helped you overcoming you immediately talked about the stke just run us through that any near-death experience Brushwood mortality has got to be up there hasn't it so I was a a little bit of context I trained as a PE teacher physical education teacher and I did maths as a second subject so you're not teaching hockey on the cold plane fields of England in your 50s that was the think so I trained there and I've always looked after to myself rugby player and and cyclist and did triathlons and things like that never drank my dad was a drinker and he pushed me away from drink never smoked and eat well look after yourself that was my upbringing so in my mid 40s late 40s I'd got my black belon kickboxing i' I was doing boot camps as well the outdoor exercise things the par with a few people and you swinging some kettle bells and I'm doing all this and feeling good for my age and that's a vanity thing about men as well isn't it you don't want to be an old man with a beer gut and Y so a bit of vanity helps with that so I got my black belt and I laid that down actually I don't know how far you got but once I was presented with the black belt I didn't really go back you go on to your second down and your third down and how far do you go with this and some people did but it for me it was that attainment I got that so I laid it down and I I looked for some other things did a bit of jogging and rowing machine I've got but probably I did some damage because I started to get some migraines this is maybe about 18 months after I'd quit kickboxing and I'd hit my 50th birthday yeah and I got I I would get margarin as a child MK maybe one a year my mom got them too but I went through a period Easter 2016 where I got 28 migraines in 30 days geez and these were not just migraines if you were to put a Pain Scale up where 10 is you your head's exploding and you're rolling around on the floor and the one is just a mild headache I was up in the eights and nines I was on the floor now I'm a Christian at this point so you can pray as much as you like but the pain is still there and we knew something was wrong so I went for some tests and they offered me a the scans but they said we can have a look but these scans are like a thousand times more powerful than an x-ray do you want to be doing that to your brain so they talked me out of bit so I went down a journey with my wife of changing my diet am I stressed am I looking at screens too much what's going on here now we didn't know it but I had I was having some mini bleeds in my brain right so without getting too medical there's a network of capillaries around your brain arteries and veins and a an artery had shunted into a vein and opened up what they call a communication now they're not supposed to be joined arteries and veins so this was starting to pump High Press blood into a low pressure vein and this vein couldn't cope and it started to leak a little bit and that was the migraines we didn't know this at the time so for months I'm changing what I'm doing and got some slight relief but I was still getting migraines and I said to my wife look I'm just going to let's just go wear in Holiday I'll come off screens and we went to a place in New Yorker and Got a Lovely Hotel and I just had a swim one morning and I got out the pool and laid on the sunbed and I had another migraine and I could not get up and this was the last two or three days of the holiday so we're thinking this is serious now I didn't know but I'd had him a brain hemorrhage I'd had a bleed on the brain at that point because this vein had just gone boom m it couldn't take it anymore so that was happening inside my brain so I'm riding on this bed a doctor came to see me and we need to get me home and I wasn't fit enough to fly wow but he gave me an injection I managed to get on the plane I was looking I was in really bad shape I'm Shuffling around I've got shades on I'm dehydrated because I was vomiting I couldn't keep anything down but I got on the plane and when I'm checking in the steward there is saying is this guy all right and my wife said I was just scared of flying but it wasn't true I was in a bad way so the journey and the elevation the height the rarified air I took Hill on plane so it was oxygen MH thankfully we was set at the front it didn't cause too much of a ruus but I was given oxygen on the plane and at the end of The Journey back to Nottingham paramedics came onto the plane the hos the hospital sent an ambulance and had vomited on the plane too right there was no way I was coming off that plane without being in an ambulance no because something is majorly wrong yeah so they I bypassed passport security I got into the country without showing my passport and I went straight to hospital and it was bank holiday August bank holiday M if you're in the K UK you know that everyone's on holiday there so I got to a hospital and at one o'clock in the morning and they put an IV in me and got some saling in me because I'm not drank for a few days and I'm totally dehydrated they had nobody there to assess me so I came home uh in a taxi at 3:00 in the morning uh still with a pounding headache and Amanda called our doctor the next day and said look we've got him home but he's still in bad shape and the doctor came to see me at my home and he said you need to get him to the hospital right now so we went back to hospital and I collapsed at the hospital Waiting by an elevator to go and see somebody and a nurse came up to me and my wife and our pastor was there actually Kate with us too and and they said are you okay my wife said no he's collapsed and she pressed a button in the lift and a crash team came to me these emergency team Y and now I'm in the system so they scanmed me straight away I'm basically unconscious and they found this massive bleed on the brain the blood was rushing around my skull and they put dye in you as well so they know exactly where it is and they operated pretty quickly on me a neurosurgeon knew what was going on and any kind of bleed or block AG in the brain is deemed a stroke that's the generic term yeah we often think of people getting paralyzed down one side or their mouth or the side of the face so I didn't get any of that actually but it does come under that umbrella so I was operated on they blocked the communication as it's called they blocked this artery vein communication with glue it's called Onyx they fire it in through your growing it but they had so they didn't go through my skull but they had had some brain surgeons and with laser guns and drills standing by just in case it required that wow and there were 16 people in the operating theater at the time of my procedure just in case and I was under for four or five hours and then in intensive care for a few weeks and to bring it to the end of the story I did come out I was healed but I found out later I had some scarring in the brain and the bleed had damaged some nerve cells so I lost some Vision I was a bit blurry eyed for the next few days but as it all calmed down I realized that I couldn't see a quarter of the world it's called quadran inopia if you think of your vision as four quadrants my eyes were fine but the quadrant that transmits the nerves that transmit what through the nerve endings into the brain they were damaged right so I'd lost Vision in my top left quadrant because the bleed was in the back right hand side of my brain a neuroptic neres cross over yeah so once this was diagnosed there's a quarter that I can't see and I wasn't allowed to drive so I had to have that surrendering of my driving license and then we'll come to it I'm sure but at covid a few years later five years later I was diag I had a major epileptic seizure where the scarring in the brain had caused some electrical imbalances so I fell unconscious with a major seizure was taken to the hospital by an ambulance and woke up there and they said you've got epilepsy what caused it and the scans they showed had come up in this area of my brain these electrical imbalances so w they said to me you won't be able to drive now and I said actually I've not been able to drive since 2016 because of the vision problem so I was used to that and we can talk through that but that is that's the journey that was the major episode that was the moment if you like not a moment but a that near-death experience wow and we can talk about that what that means for me now and what I've learned from that but it gives you a different perspective on life M ultimately as you imagine oh I'm sure it does there's no doubt and I'm c one of the as you're talking I'm listening to you talk thinking I remember doing an interview with Mark Mitchell the guy that owns Mitchell Mazda okay I don't know him but yeah Mark Mitchell of pin Chester away similar story yeah did he have a he had something wrong in his brain I don't remember if it was a bleed or whether it was something else but his story very similar if things went very wrong is life has changed as a result now I'm curious with you though Rob because you're quite a capable guy right in a lot of ways you're you are the kind of guy that will just get them and go I no I'm going to get my black belt in kickboxing because that's just what I want to do I've got this goal what I want to reach I'm going to grow this I'm going to do this I'm going to do that and it strikes me that in that instance that feels like it could have that ability see did you still have that was that taken away from you and I'm curious how you viewed God in this whole scenario because I think I've seen people either press into God from a very Christian term isn't it either lean to God more or withdraw a little bit because God why have you allowed this to happen to me thing when I'm going through this you do pray I prayed a lot my wife wife prayed with me my pastors at the time Alistair and Kate came around and put oil on my head and we did all of that you're praying God take it away I can't handle this and the verse that came out for me was uh 2 Corinthians 12:10 which is when Paul had an ailment it might have been a vision thing but he prayed three times for God to take it away from him do you remember yeah and that verse starts with and and the Lord said no for my grace is sufficient for you yeah my power is made perfect in weakness and then Paul said that's why I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses for when I am weak then I am strong so I got this real sense that when I'm weak and this is me on the floor with another migraine or as I'm recovering when I'm weak then I'm strong so God was picking up the slack if you like now I prayed that my vision would be restored I prayed that I would no more migraines I pray that I'd have a long life like many men you you want to feel in control of your you want to live a long life you want to be strong towards the end you want to run a good race but that's taken away from you in a way you're no longer in control you're no longer fighting the fight on your own it becomes in God's hands now I was very blessed to come out of a stroke with all that I still had and that was my lesson actually we'll come on to but I was very grateful to still be in the game because you hear of people having heart attacks and strokes and cancer and everything else and and that that's a terminal diagnosis that's it or they come out with major impairments in a wheelchair they can't walk properly they can't think properly they can't they lose motor function and there's all kinds of outcomes and Bless the people that have those it's tough the fact that I could still see something and I could still function almost like I used to but with the the throttle turned down I was still in the game yeah I could still work and so thankful for that and I became grateful for a lot of things that this is the lesson really if we're free to move on to it that You' become so thankful and instead of asking why me you say I've had a great life why not me there's a one of my good friends Richard Holmes he's been diagnosed recently with motor neuron dier last couple of years yeah and he did an event just recently in Sheffield interviewed by Walker from the BBC who used to do Focus who goes to that church in je and talking about his journey with MTO neuron disease because it's a brutal illness and Richard's life is disappearing before his eyes for his wife and kids as well it's really difficult so he was asked the question are you angry he said no I'm not angry you would expect me to be angry and think why me but if it's not me it would be somebody else and why should it be on them yeah he's a man of faith and he said I've led a good life I'm thankful for so many things that have already happened and God's going to do a new thing here and he's told me it will be brutal but there will be Beauty and there will be things to appreciate throughout this journey and I could resonate with that because it does knock you back it does take a Sheen of arrogance off your life because you're relying on God there's a lot of humility and gratitude and appreciation of for the smaller things than the ordinary mundane things in life and that's the point where I got to that God was showing me something and stripping layers off me and snipping things off like the vines yeah yeah yeah they're right it's just about God now walk that walk that's where I got to so the because this was the like I said I'd like to ask everybody what's the one thing that you've learned over the years in all of this and you've quite quently said I just became more grateful says in terms of that Journey you first get the you're having the migraines you you you you have all this drama on the plane at what point do you switch from anxiety from Fear uh into gratitude or those two things going side by side the whole time I'm curious to know what happened to you in that that's a great question I tell you a moment that was of massive relief for me when we are in the hospital I'm semiconscious and the the consultant there had looked at my scans and he said I know what's been happening to you and my wife's there and the my pastor Kate is there as well and he said you've had a bleed on the brain you've had a hemorrhage and I started laughing okay good response probably and my wife next to me was obviously horor stricken because you're looking at brain surgery and is he going to survive and all of those things but I was so relieved mat that finally I knew what this was that I've been going through for the last three four months yeah I'd had a diagnosis I I had an answer and once you've got an answer you can deal with it once you know your enemy once you know what you're up against if it was a stroke or a cancer diagnosis or whatever it was I would have been happy that at least I could deal with it and I knew what had been going on in my head so I laughed and such relief so that's when God started to come into it that there was no anxiety Amanda it's hard for your partner isn't it sometimes because I'm in the eye of the storm barely holding it together just trying to focus on me and I went into my own little world and Amanda's on the outside running my life picking up all the pieces dealing with relatives dealing with the diagnosis yeah and answering our two very young daughters who are saying his daddy going to die taking care of all of that stuff and I'm just focused on the procedure that will allow me to get through this going into surgery signing a disclaimer all of that with a very shaky signature and then being prepped for brain surgery there was a calm about me I think that I I knew finally where I was I knew what I was dealing with I didn't know what life would look like on the other side but the the surgeon said we can stop this bleed so after that I'm in intensive care and then I'm in rehab and there's blood still in my brain and it takes six months to dissipate back into the body because it doesn't go anywhere unless you release it from the skull I was in a a season where I couldn't get my pulse above a 100 wow because the body's under huge stress so I'm actually putting on weight then but I'm staying very calm thankful that I've got through this that there was life on the other side of this and I was fairly normal I knew then that I lost vision and I'm coming to terms with that but through it all there was a certain relationship with God a bit like your Holy Spirit moment with that fight with God saying I've got this yeah I am with you we'll get through it together and and in your weakness and my strength we've got a team I remember this story from this is going back a little bit but John mackenro you remember the tennis player he was a fantastic doubles player and he played with a guy called Peter Fleming Fleming and mackenro that was the dream team they won lots of titles it's back in the 70s early 80s and Peter Fleming was once asked who's the best doubles pairing of all life of all time and he said John mackenro and anyone this is great answer yeah he said as long as you've got John mackenro in the doubles PA and you'll do fine and I relate that story to God God Plus anyone is the Dream Team it's the majority isn't it God plus me it will defeat all comers yeah it is the majority and I felt like that that God was with me and he would help and he has helped me get through that and I've been so grateful so appreciative of that that I've never taken things for granted and here's another thought and Richard Holmes brought this to me he said I've seen my life in thirds and I always thought I would live till 90 like a footballer you'd get 90 good minutes on the pitch yeah in a soccer game so the third the last third of my life would be 60 to 90 years he said I'm here I am at 58 59 and I'm now in the last third and the last third might be the 40 to 60 range if I get past 60 it's a bonus and he said I just want my last third to count yeah wherever that ends whether it be 90 or 60 I want it to count that was his legacy now that he wanted to shine the light on God and do something That Matters by being a witness to God through what he's going through I've not articulated it like Richard but having thought I would live till 19900 it might be a lot less now who knows what's going on in my brain but for those that last third the season that went for that to count however God wants it to count that's where I'm at now yeah that's actually quite a liberating way to think about it as well I would have thought it's quite it's quite powerful isn't it just to go no and I want this to count and I think it's interesting because when you certainly the older I get the more the questions in my head change from what can I do to be successful to how can I make an impact God how can I build your kingdom right yeah whatever that looks like and whatever mechanism that is how do I glorify you how do I build your kingdom and becomes less about you doesn't it our egos fade away when you feel more Mortal yeah yeah yeah and I imagine this whole event has made that even more so for you yeah any any serious incident like this and and there isn't anybody that can't be brought to their knees sobbing on the floor with with a diagnosis with a phone call with a piece of bad news with an accident an illness we like to think we're Invincible particularly as men that's our whole identity isn't it yeah it is true yeah yeah we're in control we've got the power but really we're all contending with something we can all be brought Chinese you look at the isn't suicide the biggest killer of men under 40 yes it is yeah and we've got that thing going on with men that we don't share stuff and mental health starts to be a a premium currency for men we don't talk things through none of us are moral our bodies get older and you like I have must become a lot more humble to say I can't do this on my own now I need people around me I need God in my life I'm not as strong as I used to be I'm not as fit I'm not as fast I don't think like I used to I'm not 20 anymore yeah and it's that mortality where you start to look for some more meaning and it's less about the ego yeah very true Rob just in closing um I don't want to treat this like a church because I don't think it is but I do wonder if someone's listening to the podcast they're listening to your story and they're going through something right now um that is it's horrific um for them what would your advice be what would you maybe another way to phrase that question is what would you go back and tell yourself as you're just about to start this migraine season God plus one is a majority I when Richard was on stage they did a Q&A at the and I was really Keen to put my hand up and say how would you have dealt with this Richard without God in your life because he spoke a lot about how God had held his hand throughout it all and he continues to do and even with my stroke I I wonder how I'd have dealt with it without God it's a certain peace that comes from knowing that God is in your corner and the battle is the Lord's that the Bible says and in and in your weakness there is strength I would talk back to myself if I was talking back to a Christian you could you would say stay close to God because where else can you go yeah do you remember in John 6 where people were falling away from Jesus he'd fed the 5,000 he was giving them bread and fish but when he started to talk about I am the way the truth the life anyone that drinks my blood eats my flesh that was really tough teaching yeah and people fell away and he said to his close 12 will you also follow away and leave me and Peter said to him where else should we go where else what else is you alone have the words of eternal life so speaking back to anybody as a Christian I would give them that message but speaking to non-christians I would say that we can't do this on our own nobody escapes trials and challenges and bad news and nobody can say with any certainty how their life is going to go you plan things out but trials are going to come to us all so who are you going to fight those with because you can't stand on your own two feet and keep swinging so there's that sense of who's going to go with you for the journey and God must be as good a choice as any where else are you going to go what is left it's a privilege to grow old is it not everybody gets to grow old yeah and you get grateful in thinking the job I'm bitching and mourning about right now might be somebody's dream job yeah or me still being in the game and not being able to drive might be fantastic for somebody that is in a wheelchair that hasn't got through that part of the stroke so as much as I might complain about what I haven't got there is so much to be thankful for that I have got so my ultimate message would be wherever you're at in your life and whatever you're contending with and going through there are so many things to be thankful for if you just look for them if you're open to them and count your blessings and be grateful for what you do have left and what's still going for you if you start to look at that instead of the size of the problem and you start to look at the size of your God instead of the size of problem that's the ultimate takeaway for me and that makes everyday count in the end I keep a little Journal of Blessings Now just things that happened to me and around me it's not quite that was a great Sunset but I had that lovely walk and that was great with my daughter and we got through that and I did that pre at church and that went well and little things like that might seem quite mundane to people but if you start to count those up you feel that God is for you and not against you and that's a wonderful feeling of Peace absolutely oh mate powerful stuff powerful stuff if people want to connect with you if they want to reach out to you what's the best way to do that I am most active on LinkedIn inst or Twitter or anything else I quite like Tik Tok but you wouldn't really find me on there it's for the younger generation but I I'm still in the game business-wise and will be for a few years so LinkedIn if people want to have a conversation that that's a good reach out but I'm not the Rob brown.com go there and see all my talks and buy my books and everything that's a season long past I'm quite happy to be in the background and hear other people's stories Fant what have you taken from this man oh mate loads I just love your whole attitude to the whole thing I've not had a Stoke we've gone through some horrific stuff in life and like you I think the the you come away from it going I have the option to get really angry towards God here because he's not come through how I thought he was going to come through how dare he not play your game exactly don't you know who I am God and it's that kind of thing isn't it but then you realize actually know God's God and is and I think sometimes with time really helps when you can look look back when you're not in that instant pain but when you can look back 3 or four years later you go actually no God you were right and I see the plan and I see the purpose in this and forgive my arrogance because and I think you're right with God you're in the majority and I don't get it right I don't always hear him or understand him in the instant but if I look back I see his hand on my life and I and and like you I'm just super grateful for that super grateful and I think the older I've got the more grateful I've got and we only hold a couple of pieces of the jigsaw don't we it would overwhelm us to see the big picture so much going on there that would be frightening I think it would just be one of those things where you just go that's it I'm out I'm out yeah I'm out give me a couple of pieces I can just about hang on to that that's good but as much as we want to know what's going on and why we want to know the why don't we we feel we've got a right to know the why but we don't have a right like job he wanted to know know the why but he didn't have the right and he acknowledged to God in the end I was speaking about things I had no idea about yeah so know the why until we get up there maybe the why won't matter but it's in the journey that God is doing the molding and the shaping and the the Snipping and the clipping turning us into a a good work and we're thankful for that amen Rob listen thanks man you're a legend absolute Legend love talking to you I really appreciate you coming on and sharing your story and just being so candid with us it's been phenomenal absolutely phenomenal it's been a wonderful conversation bless you and just like that we've reached the end of another fascinating conversation crowd church is a digital Church a community a space to explore the Christian faith and a place where you can contribute and grow to find out more check out www.c crow. church and don't forget to subscribe to what's the story on your favorite podcast app we've got a whole lot of inspire iring stories coming your way and we really don't want you to miss any of them what's the story is the production of crowd Church our fantastic team is made up of Anna Kettle Matt Edmonson Tanya hudac and myself sa fayan we work behind the scenes to bring these stories to life our theme song is the created work of Josh Edmonson if you're interested in the transcript or show notes head over to our website what's Theory podcast.com and sign up for our weekly newsletters to get all this goodness delivered straight to your inbox that's all from us this week thank you so much for joining us and we'll catch you in the next episode bye for now