- [Andrew] His adoptedbrother murdered his mother.

- Had the knife under the math book

and saw the knife and screamed

and that's when he killed her.

- [Andrew] at all he desired was revenge.

- From that point on, I decidedI was going to kill him.

- [Andrew] See how he was able to forgive

and become an American Ninja Warrior.

- What are you waiting on,

your life can be completely changed?

- [Andrew] That and more ontoday's 700 Club Interactive.

- Hi and welcome to the show.

Sean Clayton struggled with rage

and revenge after themurder of his mother.

It's all he could thinkabout day or night.

- Sean's dad thought military school

could help put Sean on a different path

but all it did was fuelhis unhealthy vices

like drugs and alcohol.

- It's just amazing like howfar God can really take you

from being a crack addict on the streets

to run in ultra marathons

and sitting in senators'houses having dinner with them.

We grew up in a trailer.

My dad, he decided he'sgonna send missionaries

and start a painting business.

- [Narrator] When Sean was 12

his parents also made the decision

to adopt three children from Guatemala.

- Two sisters and a brother.

There was the difference in languages

but they started homeschooling with us.

They seemed happy, theywere happy being a family.

Me and my older brother, Ugo,

had started to work with my dad.

Ugo has trouble 'cause he wasn't waking up

to go to work like he was supposed to.

- [Narrator] The quiet dayof work was interrupted

by a phone call from the police.

Something was wrong at home.

Ugo was asking neighbors for help

and their mother was bleedingon the kitchen floor.

- Me and my dad were driving home

trying to figure out what was going on.

We're flying down thehighway, I was crying.

They'd already taken my brotherUgo back down to the house

to start getting his story.

He said that he walked in the house,

somebody was in the house with a bandana.

They ran past him out of the back door.

He saw my mom land on the ground bleeding

and run up the street.

Then I noticed things weren't lining up.

- [Narrator] By that night,

police had piecedtogether the real events.

- Around like threeo'clock in the afternoon,

he was playing a Nintendo,playing video games.

My mom told him that heneeded to go to school.

He ended up bringing the math book in

had the knife under themath book and she grabbed it

and saw the knife and screamed.

That's when he killed her.

He's 14.

He ended up getting charged as a juvenile

and he got sentencedto 11 years in prison.

I thought my mom's life was worth

more than 11 years in prison.

And so basically from that point on,

I decided I was going to kill him.

I would get a premeditated murder charge.

I would either go to prisonfor the rest of my life

or I'd receive the death penalty,

I never even picturedliving pass 27, yeah.

I was pretty angry at God,like I didn't understand.

My mom loved people so muchthat she was gonna adopt them

and take them out of ahorrible situation basically,

and then he just lets my brother killer?

I just couldn't deal with it.

I was mad at the world.

I ran away from home.

I spent my 15th birthdayin the children's home,

started fighting, I started using drugs.

- [Narrator] Hoping to puthim on a different path,

Sean was saying to military school.

- So I get I kicked out when I was 16,

came back to South Carolina.

And my dad was like, doyou need to do something

try and join the military or something?

So I was like, well, ifI joined the military,

I have extra money and I can sell drugs.

Dad signed off on it.

I turned 17 in June

and I went into the military in September.

I was always fighting, Iwas still getting arrested

in the military for fighting.

So I was drinking a lot, smoking crack,

quite a bit right beforeI went to Afghanistan.

- [Narrator] Whiledeployed to Afghanistan,

Sean continued hisself-destructive behavior.

But one night, he went too far.

- I started drinking andI ended up blacking out

and I was just laying on the ground

and so they took me to the medical tent,

to try and get me awake.

And they finally got meawake and I went to walk out.

and one of them grabbed me.

They grabbed me, I hit him

and another guy tried tograb me and I hit them

and ended up with aboutfive assault charges.

- Facing 13 chargestotaling 36 years in prison,

John began to reflect and pray.

I remember just thinking about life,

and how it was just going to go on

and that I really didn't matter.

Like, my whole life hasbeen so self-centered on me

being this bad dude and killmy brother and it was like,

somebody was just all on me.

And I remember justsitting there being like,

maybe like 50 years old,

entire world is gonna go on without me

and it's not gonna make any difference.

I started praying, Istarted reading my Bible.

I remember praying, andjust hearing God say like,

this is the last time I'mgonna get you out of something.

And shortly after that,

I had a meeting with my lawyerover there and they said

if I would take the otherthan honorable discharge,

that I would leave the military,

I would end up spending 30 days in jail

and I would like to losemy pay for two months

and then I would have theother than honorable discharge

and I would leave the military.

- [Narrator] John served his time

and was immediatelydischarged from the military.

- I came back,

I was definitely likedealing with PTSD stuff.

I stopped sleeping at night.

I didn't have a job and Idid start drinking again

and smoking weed.

- [Narrator] Feeling trapped,

Sean eventually acceptedhis father's invitation

to attend church.

- Yeah, I think I wassearching for answers.

The pastor was preaching on I John 4,

where it's talking abouthow can you say you love God

whom you have not seen

and hate your brother whom you have seen.

God was just thinkingabout like my brother

that he killed my mom

and I know it's talkingabout your neighbor

but for me, I was like,

how could I love my brotherafter he killed my mom?

And so I started wrestlingwith that for a couple weeks.

I remember it was almostlike every day or so,

I'd be like, you knowGod how can I love him

after he killed my mother?

How can I forgive himafter he killed my mother?

Just one day I was asking that question

it was like almost, it wasn't audible

but it was like the answer I got back

was how could I love youand you killed my son?

And I just understood the weight of my sin

that Jesus had died for me andI understood what love was.

From that point on, I have to forgive him,

like (chuckles) who amI not forgive somebody

if this is what I've been forgiven of.

I've been forgiven for the death of Jesus.

So I knew I had to forgivehim and that was a big point

and that was a bigchanging point in my life.

I stopped doing, I stoppedsmoking weed all together.

It wasn't getting drunk.

Like, I wasn't out looking forfights or anything like that,

like that was all gone.

I got married at 18right before I deployed.

It was so changing that my wife was like,

what is happening to you,

like she just didn't understand it.

We started going to church regularly.

And I was growing a lot.

I was starting to do evangelismstuff, outreach stuff,

and trying to get my lifeback together really.

- [Narrator] Sean was stillsearching for a challenge

and larger purpose when a managerat work suggested an idea.

- He said that he wasgonna go run a marathon

and I was like, wellthat sounds pretty cool.

And I found half marathon,the Spartan Beast,

and they're like, this isthe hardest event ever,

it's gonna kill you,

you're not gonna finish blah, blah, blah.

So I started doing obstacleraces and loved the challenge

and I started getting better.

So Ninja Warrior, my familytold me that I needed to do that

they told me it's justa bunch of obstacles

and I was getting obstacles.

Put a video together, sent it in

and they were like we wantyou to come on the show.

It's definitely cool see likewhat God did with all that.

I was meeting police chiefs,I was meeting mayors,

they were giving me certificates

for being an outstandingcitizen and being a role model.

Here I am this ex likegangman, crack addict,

and like I'm sittingin the senator's house

having dinner with him, like,only God can do that stuff.

- [Narrator] So a few years later,

God restored Sean's military standing.

- I ended up getting mymilitary discharge upgraded

and they upgraded it to honorable.

So I don't even know but Igot all my benefits back.

I have a successful marriage

and I've been married 11 years.

I have kids that are happy.

I'm still very busy, full-time of school,

working and training but Ihave more opportunities now.

It really is a God thing.

I never could have imagined

those are the things that Iwill be doing after the life

that I did live.

The people that are out there like I was,

what are you waiting on?

Stop running from God, give him a chance

and you're like can be completely changed.

- It's so easy to love God.

It's so easy to thinkwe've got it all straight

when everything's going well, isn't it?

When it all lines up and when every day

goes the way we'd like it to

and provides the thingsthat meet our needs,

whether it's emotional,psychological, physical

and then those things happen in life

that just kind of strikeat the very heart of us.

In Sean's case pretty dramatic.

An adopted brother kills his mother.

I mean, I think mostof us would understand

the anger that he felt,the bitterness that he had.

The problem with anger is it becomes rage

and rage becomes uncontrolled violence

whether it's against ourselves or others.

Counter to this is whatJesus said he came for,

he said I came to set the captive free.

Sometimes we get stuck inthat place where we are bound,

we are captive to ouranger, our bitterness,

our resentment, our unforgiveness,

and we feel like it's justified

because of the significanceof what was done to us

or to someone that we love

without even realizing thechains that it places on us.

And yet, the Bible saysthat we have the choice.

It's always the choice, isn't it?

I mean, that's the freedom God's given us

as thinking creations of his.

We can choose to be free of it.

It's so contrary to what we feel.

And yet he's asking us to makea choice that brings life.

And sometimes with forgiveness,

we feel like we're exonerating the person

who did this horrible thing,

we feel like we're somehowsaying it wasn't such a big deal.

The truth of the matter is

we're unlocking the cagethat we're stuck in.

It doesn't really have anythingto do with the other person

but it begins with us andit always begins with us.

Today there may be some of you out there

who are watching Sean's story

and you're saying I'm stuck too

and I just want to be free.

Do what Sean did, get before the Lord

and understand the pricethat was paid for you.

We all sin, I acknowledgethat murder is a very big deal

but we are the ones whocaused the death of Christ

that our sins might be covered.

And then he turns, and inhis love, and his mercy

and his grace, he says, forgive,

forgive so that I can bring life into you.

Look at Sean today.

Look at what God's done.

But it always begins with the choice.

Surrender your life to Jesus Christ,

it's what you were created to do.

When you do how do you grow in him?

What do you do?

We've got a great little packetfor you called the New Day.

if you just like to browse through this,

or if you've already prayeda prayer of commitment

and you'd like to know, whatdoes it mean to follow Jesus,

this is our free gift to you,the numbers toll free too,

it's 1-800-700-7000.

Andrew.- Thank you, Terry.

Well, coming up,

he's the Senior Vice Presidentof the NBAs Orlando Magic

and one of the world'stop motivational speakers.

He's Pat Williams and he'llshare his core virtues

that build leaders and produce success.

Don't miss it, that's right after this.

(upbeat music)

Well, the world is certainlyin need of good role models

and the Orlando MagicSenior VP Pat Williams

believes there are 12 corevalues that can help anyone

become a successful influentialleader with character.

Take a look.

- [Narrator] President ofthe NBA's Orlando Magic

and one of America's topmotivational speakers

believes that leaders with goodcharacter are made not born.

while speaking at West Point,he came across 12 benches,

each highlighting a core virtue.

In his book, Character Carved in Stone,

Pat Williams shows us how these virtues

can lead to success notonly on the battlefield,

but in any area of life.

- All right, our friendPat Williams is here.

Welcome back sir.- And nice to see Andrew.

- Good to have you.- How are you?

- I'm good.

I remember having lunchtogether a couple years ago

when you were here for anotherbook, one of your 110 books,

and you were so excitedabout this project,

you were just glowingin enthusiasm with it.

What excites you so much

about this West Point scenario here?

- Well Andrew, first of all,

when you're on the West Point campus,

you're immediately justcovered with history.

When you think thatEisenhower, MacArthur and Grant

and Omar Bradley and Matthew Ridgeway

and Norman Schwarzkopf,

I mean, they all walked thosegrounds, they were all there.

I mean, you're justcovered with that history.

I think that's the firstthing that hits you.

- And did you know these12 benches existed?

- No, I did not.

I was invited to come up

and speak to the sports teams at army

and I had a great time doing that.

And then after that, theygave me a tour of the campus

and we ended up in this littlepark called Trophy Point

and I looked around,beautiful little spot,

and then I noticed a bench.

Well, that's not unusual.

Except I kept counting andthere were 12 of these benches.

That was unusual.

And then I thought, I'mgonna take a closer look,

I'm glad I did.

Because what I found was aword carved into the stone

on either end of the bench.

And I kept checking and yes,

all 12 benches had aword carved into them.

So there were 12 differentwords on the 12 benches.

And I immediately thought,this is fascinating

but what a well-kept secret?

I never heard of that,

and I'm not sure many people had (laughs).

- [Andrew] What were some of the themes

that really struck you?

- Well, first of all, you saw compassion

and then you saw courage

and you saw words like dedication

and words like integrity,and loyalty, responsibility,

perseverance, service,trust, those kind of words.

And there's a backstory.

The West Point class of 1934,

when they had their 50th reunion in 1984,

they decided to have a class gift

to the school 50 years later,

and they gave these 12 benches.

And somewhere in that process,

they decided to have these 12 words

engraved in those benches

because they thought those were words

that West Point students,

future military leaders,should live their life by

and lead by.

And so that's the storythat we came up with

and then decided, boy, thishas some meat to it, so.

- And in your book,

you find graduates who lineup with some of those themes

and right now we're inMarch Madness, of course,

Duke is always it seemsto be their Coach K.

Tell us how he fits in all this.

- Well, Mike Krzyzewski

was a youngster growing upin the south side of Chicago

and Bobby Knight who was inthe head coach at West Point

came to visit him and recruithim, convinced his parents

that this was the best spot for their son.

So, Bobby went there, MikeBobby went back to his college

and Mike followed him andbecame a basketball player there

and a student and a graduate.

A few years later down the road,

he became the head coach at West Point.

So Mike Krzyzewski has West Point

just coursing through his bloodsystem, he loves the school.

And we thought he would be the perfect guy

to do the foreword for the book

and he agreed immediately to do that.

So when you watch Mike, youthink it's Duke, Duke, Duke,

but really deep within him,

it's army, army, army West Point,

that's the makeup of Mike Krzyzewski.

- And the first theme youmentioned was courage,

or excuse me, that's what Iwant to get to in a moment.

The first thing youmentioned was compassion.

- Yes.- And you picked

an interesting person forthat, Ulysses S. Grant.

- Well, you wouldn't think ofGeneral Grant in that light

because he was leadingin a very vicious war

and he was leading the Union troops

to try and just finally end this thing

and did it with relentless power.

But Grant was a compassionate man,

he cared deeply about his troops.

He cared about his family,he had a wonderful marriage.

And he cared about the horses,

so much of the civil war was on horseback

and one day he's riding along a path

and he sees this soldier ofhis on the side of the road,

just whipping, and beating,and pounding on his horse.

And Grant erupted with anger,

came over to this young soldier

and threatened him towithin an inch of his life,

if he ever saw him do that again.

So we found that was kindof an unusual look at Grant

but I think he was trulya compassionate man.

Maybe another way of phrasing it Andrew,

simply your people skills.

Great leaders have peopleskills, they care about people

and they have a heart for people.

- He treated people withdignity even his enemies?

- Oh, I think so andwe saw that of course,

when Lee, General Lee- Surrendered.

- Did surrender and theway that Grant treated him

and insisted that all his soldiers

treat the Southern soldiers with dignity.

There's a lot too generally.

- Now, as we--- And General Grant, excuse me

- Yeah, as we conclude here,

I mentioned courage a moment ago,

and so many people struggle with fear,

just on a daily basis,irrational fear often.

And one thing in yourbook that stood out to me

was you said to conquer yourfear, do what scares you.

And courage is so important for us

and you brought that outof a World War II story.

- Well, I did and wetalked about this man,

Alexander Sandy Ramsey Nininger Jr.

That's a neat story boardin Gainesville, Georgia,

and people will enjoy reading that.

- Courageous against the enemy.

- Yes, yes, but herethere's physical courage,

there's moral courage, andthere's emotional courage,

and there's intellectual courage

and there's spiritual courage.

- [Andrew] Really break it down.

- So we really dig deeply intothis whole topic of courage.

But John Wayne probably have said it best,

courage is being scared todeath but saddling up anyway.

And that probably summarizesit quite well, I think.

Well, courage, we need itevery day to do hard things

to do tough things.

And once we show andprove that we can do them,

well that's whereconfidence comes from Andrew

and when you're confidentyou're gonna be successful.

- Well, we look forward,

next year I'm sure you'll have

your 111th book probably.(Pat laughs heartily)

So it's always great to have you here Pat.

- Sir, thanks for inviting me.

I'm so glad to see you again.- Thanks for being with us.

If you want to learn more, Pat's book,

Character Carved in Stone

is available wherever books are sold,

and we're gonna go over to Terry.

- Well, still to come,

this woman went to 20 different doctors

and was on 22 different medications,

and still nothing helped

until she tried functional medicine.

- Functional Medicine is a newway of thinking about disease

that gets to the root cause.

It doesn't focus so much on symptoms

as the question of whyyou have those symptoms.

- See what functional medicine entails

and whether it's right foryou, when we come back.

(bright music)

Functional medicine is a newapproach to treating disease.

It takes away theemphasis on your symptoms

and focuses on the root causeof what's bothering you.

CBN News Medical ReporterLorie Johnson introduces us

to a woman who suffered foryears until she found a doctor

who treated her with this new method.

- [Lorie] These days Cindy Tedrow

enjoys life like playing with her dogs.

That wasn't the case

when she faced horrific health problems.

- I would pray, Lord, if youwant me take me, just take me.

- [Lorie] For most of her adult life,

she suffered frominfections, fatigue and pain.

- My legs felt like they were cement

And it took that much effortto pick them up and move.

- [Lorie] She also struggled

with hormone issues and obesity.

- I could not lose weight.

I could not lose weight,no matter what I tried,

I could not lose weight.

- [Lorie] Her seizuresmade life unpredictable.

- I would make a commitment andthen I would have to cancel.

And I know people didn'tunderstand that and it was so hard.

- [Lorie] Seizures eventually forced her

to stop driving and teaching

- And I loved my job, I loved my job.

I just couldn't do it anymore.

The hardest thing was,

is I couldn't go to church a lot of times

and that really, really was hard.

- [Lorie] On Cindy and her husband.

- I could see the fear on his face

and I could hear the fearin my mom's voice too.

- [Lorie] In searching for answers,

she visited 20 doctors andtook numerous medications.

Nothing helped.

- They would send me from one specialist

to another specialist andthey'd give me medication

for that particular symptom.

And so one time I was at 22 prescriptions.

And getting worse,

I was just getting worse.

- [Lorie] With nothing to lose,

she decided to try a different approach.

She went to the Cleveland Clinic's

Functional Medicine Center,led by Dr. Mark Hyman.

- Functional medicine is a newway of thinking about disease

that gets to the root cause.

It doesn't focus so much on symptoms

as the question of whyyou have those symptoms.

- [Lorie] Cindy got better and fast.

- In a very short time,

she had already lost anenormous amount of weight

but was able to end herseizures to recover her energy,

to end her brain fog, and tobe engaged in her life again.

- An estimated 80% of all health problems

are caused by an unhealthy diet,

too much sugar and processed foods

and not enough vegetablesand healthy fats.

Once Cindy started eating

the prescribed anti-inflammatorydiet, she lost 80 pounds.

- The weight just meltedaway, it just melted away.

It's not hard, it is not hard.

I basically just stick toreal meat, real vegetables,

I have to stay away from the carbs.

- [Lorie] Functional medicine doctors

often recommendsupplementing a healthy diet

with things like vitamin D,fish oil and a probiotic.

- The gut microbiome

has been linked to depressionand cancer, and heart disease

and diabetes, and obesity,and autoimmune diseases,

and allergies and asthma.

So that doesn't make sensegiven our current model

of describing disease.

When you go to the cardiologist,

they don't ask you aboutyour gut microbiome, right?

They want to know theyshould put you on a stat

and/or a beta blocker, an aspirin,

and not think about whyis there inflammation,

why is there high blood pressure,

why is your cholesterolabnormal, and fix that?

- Functional medicinedoctors advise their patients

to take steps to feel more peaceful,

because stress is at the rootof so many health issues.

- Thoughts, stress, exercise, sleep,

and also community and connection

because many of us are isolatedand many of us are lonely

and that promotes disease.

And in a faith-based world,it's really about connection,

community belonging, meaning, purpose,

those are also ingredients for health.

- They told us about meditation, and,

I didn't do meditation,but I was already praying

and that has made a tremendous,tremendous difference.

- [Lorie] The medical world pays attention

to results like Cindy's.

- Which is something we see routinely

in functional medicine.

It's something that oftentraditional physicians

are surprised thatbecause these are patients

that they've tried for decades

to try to help and mitigate symptoms

but we don't go forsymptoms, we go for causes.

- [Lorie] Compared tothe conventional approach

of simply relying on big pharma,

functional medicine often focuses

on significant lifestyle changes.

While that's moreresponsibility and discipline,

people like Cindy Tedrow,who've tried both,

say the extra effortpays off in the long run.

Lorie Johnson, CBN News.

- Well, if you'd like somemore health news from Lorie

make sure you check outher show Healthy Living.

You can find it at 9:30pm every Tuesday

on the CBN News Channel,

head to cbnnews.com for more information.

It's kind of like the big picture

but at the same time thelittle picture (laughs).

- Yeah, I saw something interestingin there the doctor said

it was a little bit buried,

was the fact that we need community,

we need community connection.

And then of course, so much ofour community connection now

is through social media,the digital experience, etc,

and that God designed us forfellowship with each other.

- Absolutely.

You gotta watch thattechnology stuff (laughs)

that'll raise your blood pressure.

- Right, and of course the stress

is such a huge factor in all this

and that piece remindsus really the basics.

- Absolutely.- Exercise, eat well, sleep.

- It's not that hared.- Sounds easy, right?

- Yeah (laughs).

- I don't want to giveup the carbs though.

- Yeah, or the coffee, can I just say?

- All right.

We leave you with ascripture from Exodus 18.

Furthermore, you shallselect out of all the people,

able men who fear God, and of truth,

those who hate dishonest gain,

and you shall place these over them

as leaders of thousands, of hundreds,

of fifties and of tens.

We thank you for joining ustoday, we'll see it tomorrow.

(bright music)