DISCIPLESHIP: To See is to Believe
Craig Diegnau
Transcribed by PulpitAI (with edits)
Introduction
I am Craig Diegnau; that’s my lovely wife, Jennifer; and we are from the small city of Fairmont, Minnesota. Steven’s home church, I call it. And that was a very exciting day when Steven called me after that funeral, you know? It’s always hard to hear somebody say that about you, though, that—you know, from the person you were to the person you are now, you know, but I have to live in God’s grace and God’s mercy.
I need to introduce myself. I need to give you some credentials, and I need to let you know who I am and what you have up here, okay?
I am not a biblical scholar. I am not a theologian. I’m not an associate pastor. And I don’t claim to know the Scripture (Bible) back and forth. These little tabs my wife gave me on the Bible is a very handy tool for me.
See, I am just like a lot of you in this room. I’m just an average person. I don’t know the Bible as well as I’d like to, but I can tell you one thing: I get up in the morning, I open up the Holy Word, and I try to learn a little bit more about my Creator every day, and I leave it at that. The next day I get up, and I do the same. I don’t try to give advice on the Bible. That’s why we have guys like Steven and a lot of guys like that that have a lot more expertise than I do that can help that situation. But we can all do our part.
I must introduce, say one thing. When Steven was down to the church the other week, three or four weeks ago, I caught a couple things out of his service, and one of them was—he introduced himself as a hillbilly from South Africa, and I believe the township was… Vala? Welkom. I asked him on the phone the other day, and I couldn’t remember. I couldn’t write it down, ‘cause I was driving. And I thought, “Oh, that’s funny. I’m just a hillbilly from southern Minnesota, and I’m from a township called Verona.” So what happens when you get two hillbillies together? You’ll find out.
The most important thing I must introduce to you about myself and confess and tell you right up front is—July 10, 2015 was the last day that I drank alcohol. See, what you have in front of you, still to this day, is a full-fledged alcoholic. I am no more cured or safe from my disease than I was previous to that date. You’ll find out how I’ve been able to avoid taking a drink since 2015, July 10, in just a bit.
The Journey
So my journey—I want to tell you just a little bit about a background about me. You know, I’m not a kid that was deprived. I’m not a kid that didn’t have loving parents. I can’t blame my alcoholism on my unfortunate home. I was raised by two loving parents. They did everything they could for me. We were middle class. You know, my parents weren’t rich, but I always had clothes to wear, I always had food, I always had a home, I always had everything that a kid needs. I can’t say that my parents could have done any better job at raising me than they did.
My mom and my dad were divorced when I was about 10 or 11 years old. I don’t exactly remember the date. That was around 1980, that’s quite a while ago. But I don’t remember my parents ever fighting, ever arguing about money or anything. They always put me and my brother Chad first. And I’m so thankful and blessed that God did that, because during those times, it was really a confusing time for a young man, a young kid. And I’m just thankful that my parents loved me that much, that they gave me that.
Now, like a lot of you, you know, I finished high school. I’ve known my wife since I’ve been 15 years old. We were high school sweethearts. I’ve known her longer than I’ve been alive. You know, I mean, longer than I’ve been, you know, married. I mean, that doesn’t make sense, but I’ve known her a long time. So we got started with life younger or earlier than we probably should’ve, but we did. We got married; I was 19. My wife was at the university studying. I went to work. We had a child, our first son. She graduated college. You know, we made things work.
She was raised in a small country church out there. We went to church out there. So I’ve been around the church for a long time. My parents were church members too. Long time. But we did get started too young. Or, you know, I shouldn’t say that. You know, it was just perfect. It was just perfect.
We had two other beautiful children. I was quite young. I farmed with my father and my brother. I bought a couple small businesses. My wife taught at school. We made it work. And we were pretty successful. And we had a lot of good years raising the kids. We traveled a lot. We did a lot of things. My wife was very active in the church. We came to the Covenant Church in Fairmont probably when we were, I don’t know, in our early thirties. Active in the church. My wife taught Sunday school, a lot of things in there.
Somewhere in that time—I don’t exactly know where, I think it was probably around my late thirties, early forties—I call it “big-shotism” set in. I started to think I was bigger and better than I was. I forgot I was just a guy that gets up in the morning, puts my pants on, leaves the house.
Crossing the Line
Alcohol had become a part of our life. It had become a part of our Friday night, Saturday night. Then it became part of Tuesday night at a yacht club meeting. Then it became Thursday night. And then it became every day that ended in Y.
Somewhere during that time, I like to call it, I crossed the imaginary line. You know, if there’s a line right down here. See, many of you in this community, you know, you can have a drink when you go out. You can do certain things when you go out, and then that’s it. Somewhere I crossed that line, and alcohol ceased being a luxury, and it became a necessity. I blackout drank most of the time. I didn’t know it at the time, but that’s what I did. I always say that I had Ford Super Duty pickups, and they had GPS in them before it was ever even there, because I don’t know how those trucks got home a lot of nights, but they always managed to find their way in the garage. Usually.
I realized one night in July—now I could bore you with a lot of my garbage, because that’s what a lot of it is. But I realized one night in July that on a Sunday night—see, on a Sunday night at about nine o’clock, all you good average husbands in here, you’re home with your families. You’re home with your wife. You’re home doing the things you should be doing. Getting ready to go to bed. Watch TV. Not this guy. Sunday night, I was still prowling around. See, most nights I didn’t get home till nine, ten o’clock at night, because I knew my wife would be asleep. I could jump in bed, and then I’m a workaholic, so I could be up and out the door by six o’clock in the morning, or five o’clock if I had a bad night, and then I had the rest of the day to let her cool off.
All still denying the physical presence of God. I took space up in these pews. I took space up in these pews, but, you know, that was for you. Not me.
The Night God Became Real
I like to call it, “the night God became real.”
For years in my grandiosity and everything else, I always thought, “Well Jesus, if you’re real, then walk across Hall Lake.” See, we have five lakes in our town. We live on a lake. “Walk across that lake, then. Do something to prove to me you’re real.” For years I used that. It was a good crutch I could carry myself on. And I walked alongside that crutch every day, you know.
Sunday night, July 10th, 2015, I was out to the farm. I spent a lot of time out to the farm. It’s a good place to go. It’s 20 miles away from my house. It’s where I grew up. Everybody’s my friend. “Craig’s just a local boy, Just let him be.” And like every other night, I was drinking out there. I wasn’t your Coors Light drinker. I wasn’t your this and that. I had straight for the whiskey was my choice.
As I came home every night—from the farm, usually—I would take a certain way home every time. And once I got off this blacktop road, I was on 50th Street, and that would guarantee me a straight, smooth ride home. And I was on a gravel road, and on that road was littered with friends, so if I had trouble, I could always get out of it, like I’d done before. For some reason—and I know what it is now, it was the Holy Spirit that night—I missed my turn.
Another fun fact, too. When they put out these signs all over the place around 4th of July and all these things that says, “DWI enforcement,” see that was for you, not me. But I guess not.
I missed my turn, and I took another way home. I thought, “Oh, no problem. I can go up the road about four miles, five miles.” Another blacktop road south. Once I got off that blacktop road, I was safe.
Now, I need you to listen really intently now. This is where the rubber meets the road. This is where Jesus becomes real. This is where everything I’m saying culminates. That night, as I missed my intersection, I turned and went westbound, heading back towards Fairmont. As I came up to that next road, I went to put my hand on my signal, because I was a good drunk driver, and as I pulled my hand off that signal, my high-beam lights flashed like that. They went right back to low. I must have bumped it. The very split second—from that entryway right up there to me—the very split second that happened, all I saw was blue lights. And I went, “Oh crap.” But the grandiose person that I am, I thought, “At this point, I can still talk my way out of it.”
I got pulled over that night. Police officer came up, knocked on my door with his big flashlight. Rolled down the window. Didn’t ask me my name; didn’t ask anything. He said, “Son, have you been drinking?”
And I looked up at him, and I said, “Yes.” And that was the first time I had felt relief in a long time.
Now, we screwed around outside that car for a while, and I finally told him, “Listen, I’ve had too much to drink, and I’m in the wrong.”
He said, “Okay, we can do that.” He put handcuffs on me behind my back, and for the first time ever in 45 years, I felt what it was like to have my hands cuffed. He sensed the fact that I wasn’t gonna be a problem, and he sensed the fact that I wasn’t gonna try to run. First of all, I had flip-flops on, and I had two open drinks in the Jeep. I wasn’t going anywhere. He said, “We’re not gonna have a problem, are we?”
And I said, “No, we’re not.”
He took the handcuffs off. He put my hands around in front of me, and he loosely put a zip tie on, and he showed this unlawful person some grace and mercy and love. And he slipped me in the back of that squad car, and it was like, it was the most darkest place. It was like an abyss. And he shut the door. And what felt like four hours alongside the road and four other squad cars with lights going on everywhere around, I was in there.
Now, this is where God became real. And what I’m gonna tell you next is as true as I am standing up here, is as true as my suit is blue, is as true as your pastor’s name is Steven. As I sat in there and he closed the door, the Rolodex started going off in my mind of all the things that I had done wrong, all the people I had loved, and it just flashed. And it just kept going over and over and over. And I knew for the first time in my life that I had really gone too far. I had crossed every moral fiber that my parents had taught me. I had just pushed the envelope too far.
This was all like an outer body experience, too. It’s all like, I was there, but yet I was there in the corner watching me.
And all of a sudden, at the top of my head, right up here, this warm feeling. I can’t describe it. The only way I can describe it is if you’ve been around a wood stove, and when you walk right into it and your face just hits it. And it made my hair tingle. And it started creeping into me. And I remember when it got down to my neck, I thought, “What’s going on?” And all of a sudden, all I know was, “I don’t want this to quit.” It went down my body, throughout my hands, down my torso, into my thighs. And I remember saying to myself, I remember saying, “Don’t leave!” And I remember watching it go out through my toes.
And then all of a sudden, a voice—as clear as I’m talking into this microphone—a voice came on in that car, and it said, “You no longer work for yourself.”
See, folks, that’s the night Jesus came into my life. That’s the night that the Holy Spirit welcomed me to the Kingdom. That’s the night.
See, we could… My theory about Jesus walking across the water to see me across Hall Lake, splitting the skies, you know, doing something physical? I could no longer deny the physical presence of God in my life. See, I’m a sane, rational person. I even like to call myself a good thinker sometimes. I can follow directions sometimes. I can put things together; I’m a fairly mechanical guy. So when something like this happens into your life, now what are you gonna do? There he was. God said, “I got you. You want to deny me? Go ahead. Try it. But I will prove to you that I am real and I am your Lord and I am your king.” It was pretty crazy.
That night was just a flash. I had to call my wife that night on the way into town.
Now, I got one other one other interesting tidbit you have to hear. I’ve traveled that road for my whole adult life. I’m 54 years old; I’ve been driving since I’ve been 15. Now, we are approximately eight miles out of the city limits. I have never in my entire life seen anything but a sheriff or a deputy on that road. That night, there was a Fairmont police officer on that road. This is how much my God cared and loved for me.
On the way into town that night, the officer could tell I was remorseful and something had changed immediately. And he said to me, “Craig, people make bad decisions. It’s just what you do with those decisions.”
And I thought, “Wow.”
I called my wife. My brother had been calling my phone. The deputy sheriff slid it over to me at the desk that night up there at the police station, and he said, “You’d better make some phone calls; there’s clearly some people that are worried about you.”
I picked up the phone and I called my wife. Now, I was already conjuring up ideas. “Who could I call to come and get me?” I couldn’t call my wife. I knew she was going to be mad. But I called her. And see, she’s already had a relationship with Jesus. She already knows who her king is. And faithfully she sat by my alcoholic side for 20+ years. But for the first time, when I called her up and I asked her if I could get a ride home, she said, “Do I have to?” And I’m telling you, my heart went right to my shoes.
Now the next day, I had to get up, had to go to work. They slapped me on the back and said, “You got seven days to get your affairs in order. Get going, buddy. Good luck, pal.” My Jeep was still sitting alongside the road. I had to ask my wife for a ride to it. When I left that house the next morning, it was one quiet ride over to that Jeep, but I’m telling you, nothing about this world looked the same. It was in high definition.
Now, I could go on and on and on about, you know, all of this stuff.
I have just a couple scriptures here that I want to read about this. One comes from John 15.
“You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you.”
John 20:21,
Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.”
And the Great Commission:
“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
That’s how God came into my life. That’s how the miracle of this happened today. That’s how I accepted Jesus as my Savior.
Doing the “Right Things”
Now, we can do all the right things. We can attend church. We can open doors for little old ladies. We can volunteer. We can be a nice person. I did all of that stuff in my previous life, but that still was not gonna get me into heaven. See, we have to ask Jesus into our life. We have to ask him. We have to seal the deal. We have to ask him to be our personal Savior. Something I was scared to death to do. Why? I have no idea. It’s the best deal I ever had. It’s the best deal I got going on.
And Steven, when he told me earlier in the week that he was teaching on discipleship, I never really thought about me being a disciple of the Lord. Well that’s what we are. You know, and how can I be a disciple? How can you be a disciple? What if you need discipling? I’m looking at this room, and there are a lot of men and women in here, some of us with gray hair in our head, some of us without. Find somebody in this church. Find somebody. Find somebody that you think has something that you want. Call them up. Ask them to have coffee. Find somebody that you can be discipled, or find somebody that you can disciple.
Mentoring has been a huge, huge part of my life, and it is still today. There’s not a week that doesn’t go by that I don’t talk to three or four people, on a daily basis almost. See, this is what happens—I remember the day Steven called me after the funeral. My wife and me were sitting out in the pickup getting ready to leave. It was a pretty emotional day. That was my sponsor that passed away, and it was a good friend of mine. Now, I’d known him my whole adult life and really only got to know him the last eight years. He’d been around since I’d been born, since a child. But this is what happens when God, and only God, takes two hillbillies and puts them together. Because if you do the mathematic equation of what are the chances of a guy from South Africa and a guy from Verona Township in southern Minnesota, and then you throw Duluth in there—it’s impossible. Only God can do that. Only.
Today is the Day
So I like to close things up almost always the same way every time I speak. I do a lot of speaking in the AA community because that’s what I’m in, but I always like to close things up the same way, you know?
A friend of mine in a band called Heartsong in southern Minnesota, one of his things is, “Now is the time, and today is the day.” So if you have not given your heart to Jesus, if you have not sealed the deal, why wait? Don’t waste another day. If there’s something out there that I’ve said, if you’re struggling from an addiction of whatever sort it is—and they manifest their way in multiple schemes. Mine happened to be alcohol. There are many others out there. If you like something that I’ve said, please see me after the service. Don’t wait.
They’re gonna be playing a song here by Ben Fuller, and it says, “Don’t let me forget.” Do not ever forget your past. Do not ever forget our life before Jesus. Maybe you’ve been involved with Jesus ever since you’ve been a child, but don’t dwell on it. But don’t ever forget, he is our Lord and our Savior with everything. So I want to close by saying, “All the praise and glory be to my King.” Thank you.
