Matt
One Sows Another Reaps
Hi, I’m Matt McIntyre. I’m 60 years old. And I like to say that I am a follower of Christ. Not always perfect, not always good. But I am a follower of Christ. Sometimes I’m hanging on sometimes I’m right next to him. Who’s cleverly disguised as a, I’m a father of four. I’m a grandfather of one coming up to be two. I’ve been married for thirty-three years. God uses me as a business owner, a friend, an encourager, a son, and a brother. I’m a little bit of everything. That’s who I am.
A year ago, I was on my deathbed. I had gone six months with sleep deprivation. I was on 11 pills to try to sleep. I was down to 160 pounds. Today about 205. My wife jokes, not emancipated, emaciated. She says, Yes, you’ve been emancipated, and but you were emaciated. So I have to get my words right. I’d like to share that because that was the most beautiful thing where I was completely helpless.
I liken it to the paralytic man, his friends are carrying him on the mat, and he can do nothing. And they take him up, up the stairs, cut the hole in the roof, and lay him at Jesus’ feet. And Jesus says your friends’ faith has made you well and that’s what happened to me. So I’d like to share that because I think so many of us, were on the goal line, and we’re getting ready to go in, but we think we’re on our own one-yard line. And they just need someone to tell them. No, no, that’s that’s the enemy lying to you. You think you’re 99 yards away. You’re an inch from going over. They just need a little push.
I moved down to the Metroplex when I was 18 years old. My brother Michael, who taught me how to make money was getting out of the military. We came down here, I think it was four of us or five of us in a one or one-and-a-half-bedroom studio in the village. I worked at a McDonald’s next door to a pool hall and a topless bar and learned a ton about business. I was what they call the 10:1 cook. That job at McDonald’s, you want to talk about the Lord saying don’t despise small beginnings, that job probably made me 20 to $30 million. Never made more than $6.35 an hour. I learned business. And I learned how to get along with people that were different than me. So that was kind of a blessing from it.
But then I bounced around and started making some bad decisions. I didn’t understand God’s way was better than my ways I kept trying to short-circuit or game the system. And one bad decision after another led me to be divorced. I had a young daughter and I was a bum. I should have been imprisoned or dead. I was just a really bad guy. Long story short, I burned all my bridges, and I was out of couches to surf.
A family takes me in a young man David Siebert and his wife, Melinda, just godly, godly people, maybe four years older than I was at the time. They had a little house over in Plano and a one-year-old son. So about, every Sunday, they would take me to church It was a Baptist Church. A loving church, preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. Some of this was new to me, and some foreign to me. But it was all weird to me because I didn’t understand why these people were trying to help me. I didn’t have anything. And I kept thinking, what are they doing? And so about three months into it, David, who I think at the time was a deacon at this fast-growing Baptist denomination, laid out the gospel for me, and asked me if I want to give my life to Christ. And I said, “No because I like to have a cold beer now and then. And I know you Christians don’t drink.” And I don’t think David ever drank or then since. But he kind of laughed and shook his head and said, “What if I told you you can still have a cold beer now and then and come to know Jesus?” I said, “Dude, I’m in.” And so that started an incredible ride. I’m always amazed when people say you know, the Christian life is boring, I don’t know what Christian life they’re living or I don’t know what Christian life they’ve experienced.
I can’t remember the guy’s name, I think it’s Erwin McManus. He was a pastor out in Los Angeles and wrote some great books. But I’m paraphrasing him now probably badly. He says look, if the same God who raised Jesus from the dead, who parted the Red Sea, brought Lazarus out from the cave after three days of being dead, and that same God that did that is in your heart. How can you not be different? How can you not be changed? How can it not be a wild ride?
But a cool story I’d like to share with you is that, it wasn’t cool when it happened. I’ve been on mission trips all over the world. I’ve been to Africa twice. I’ve been to Honduras. That was a funny deal. We almost got killed in downtown Honduras. I’ve been to Cuba. I’ve been to Russia. I’ve been to Latvia. I’ve been to China, and I’ve been to North Korea on mission trips. The North Korean trip is great if you want to lose, you know, about 12 pounds in seven days. There you also come back with a great appreciation for God and his provision.
But Latvia I’ve been to several times it’s a little, country just outside of Russia. And there’s a little place called Talsi Christian School. It was October 22nd and I was giving a leadership conference to these high school kids in Talsi. I think it got demonic real quick. I started developing sleep deprivation. Fast forward to Thanksgiving, and I couldn’t function. I was dropping weight. My children were over and I had no joy and I’m a guy generally full of joy. Still couldn’t sleep. Christmas was just I was a zombie.
In the middle of January of 2023, I finally collapsed in the foyer at our house. I hadn’t slept, hadn’t slept, hadn’t slept. Next thing I know my wife, friends, and my brother come over and they’re taking me down to Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas. There they were trying to sedate me, and I think it took about six or seven people. I ended up in the hospital for 17 days, and it was a very difficult period. Complete darkness. Utter darkness.
I got out of the hospital. My wife picked me up and I got back home. This is early February of 2003. We went to a lot of well-meaning doctors they did their very best. I ended up being on about 11 pills. I remember my wife begging me pleading with me. They’d have counselors and these therapists come over. Try to take me out and do all sorts of stuff put my face in ice water and have me walk on the grass with my bare feet. All well-meaning people and trying to do…But I was not having it.
I stayed in that bed and just stared at the ceiling, I’d wake up every day after about three hours of sleep that was pill-induced, wake up, and pray for sundown. I could not get out of bed. I would spend typically 22 to 23 hours a day in bed. I went all the way down to about 160 pounds, which is gaunt for me. It’s about 45 pounds less than I am now. My feet were starting to get numb. I think I was getting you know, I was dying. This goes on. It started in October, and it’s just utter darkness.
About late April of 2023, maybe early May. I got in the car, I got up, had my sweatpants barely hanging onto me, everything was baggy. I got in my car and went for about a five-minute drive. And I came back and my wife who is just a saint, this woman is just a warrior. She’s dealing with me and her mother just had a stroke. It’s just it looks it looks bleak. I mean, we’re going under economically, we’re going under, I’m dying. I’m the leader of the family. I’m the leader of the business. I got nothing. I’m dead.
So I go for this car ride, come back and she says, “Where would you go?” I said, “I just went for a ride.” And I don’t think I’ve driven in probably five, six months. And she said, “What did you do?” I said, “ I just listened to music.” She started crying. She started sobbing. And then it was by the end of April, shortly after that, I didn’t tell anybody. I didn’t tell her or anyone. I’d cut my pills in half. And nothing happened. And I started sleeping a little more.
Fast forward a couple of weeks later, about early June, It was my wife’s birthday, and the excitement of the day I was coming alive. I could see color again. I could get out of bed. I just didn’t take any of my medicine. I remember vividly, we had a great day. My wife’s birthday was June 8, we had a good day with the kids and my wife. And about a week later I went to the doctor. And he said, “Well, you look, you look fantastic. What do you attribute this to?” I said, “Jesus Christ.” He kind of looks at me. And he says, “Well, I think we can taper your medicine down a little bit.” And so I cleared my throat and said, “Well, I’m I’m off the medicine.” And he didn’t like that. And he said, “Well, who told you to do this?” I thought oh, man, this is gonna have me admitted. I said, “I think the Lord told me to do that. I said before you say anything I’ve driven friends down the ER room, who have thought that the Lord told them to get off their diabetes medicine or their high blood pressure medicine.
He slams his laptop down calls his nurse in and starts going through a series of questions. Do you have this side effect or this side effect? No, no, no, no. And he’s looking at me and says, “Okay, I want to see you again in a week.” A week later. I go in and see him. And he’s going through this battery of tests. We’re joking. I’m telling him stock market tips and we’re talking about this, that, and the other thing. And he says, “What do you attribute this to?”
I said, “Dr. there’s a scene in the Bible, about a paralyzed man.” And I said, “Back in biblical times, there’s not ramps there’s not vans. When you’re paralyzed you’re done. You’re finished. In fact, in a lot of parts of the world today, you’re finished. The man’s friends carry him on a mat. You know, Jesus is this rock star, the blind are seeing the deaf are hearing, and the dead are coming back to life. Imagine the commotion. They can’t get in. They’re trying to get their friend to Jesus.
I said Doctor, “What they did is they went up on someone’s roof with the man, think about what it took to do that. They get on the roof, they cut a hole in someone’s roof and then they lower the guy down at Jesus’ feet. In the scriptures, it says Jesus told them your friends’ faith has made you well. Get up and walk. That’s what happened to me. The Lord healed me.”
After the healing, he would wake me up every morning, four o’clock 4:37. I would get up and spend an hour with him. I just had energy to burn no medicine, no nothing. And I cannot explain to you how it went from the darkness to the light but it went almost like that [snaps his fingers]. And the only thing I can think of is tens, hundreds, maybe 1000s of people were interceding for me and the Lord heard it. And Lord said, Okay. That is the only thing I can think.
The other thing is maybe the Lord, you know, I look at how Job suffered. And the Lord allowed it, which is hard for us to understand. The Lord allowed it and Job did commit a sin. And everybody says, “That he was blameless.” I say, “Look at the scripture again, Job said that which I feared has come upon me.” I think I feared losing things, more than I feared losing the Lord.
I didn’t go into it but we were, the business was on the verge of bankruptcy, and my wife and I had everything pretty much in the business. And life’s not all about money but you know, it’s kind of important. I can tell you, another miracle, our business normally should run with a minimum of about five or 600,000 in a checking account. When I got sick, and when I went under, we were down to about 100,000. Today, it’s 1.7 million. I mean, this, the turnaround, you can not attribute it to anything. People will say, “Well, what changed? What happened in sales?” What happened??? I said, “The Lord happened?” Yeah, but you know, and even well, meaning Christians say, “But there’s got to be an explanation.” I say, “I don’t know what to tell you. Take it up with the Lord. He did it.” I can not tell you how he did it.
I’m a guy who’s pretty good at what I do. You know, I can pretty much tell you, the Lord’s given me a mathematical brain, I can pretty much tell you if I pour XYZ money into marketing, it’ll generate sales, which…one plus one equaled 1.7 million? I don’t know how he did it. I have no idea. I know the enemy tried to take me out. And I know the Lord resurrected me that’s all I know. And I can’t I don’t even know what prompted me to get up and move to the car and take a drive and listen to spiritual music. I don’t know.
So today, I’m a year removed from being dead spiritually, physically, emotionally, and financially to here I Am. So that’s kind of been my ride. And I want to close it out with you by going back to the guy who saved me, that Jesus used to save me, Dave. I told you I had a one-year-old boy at the time, and I’m thinking about the risk they took. They had nothing. And that’s everything. When we think we have to have all this money or all this. They had nothing. And they took me and changed my life. My wife’s life, my children’s life, my grandchildren’s life forever.
So this kid calls me up. He’s graduating from Baylor and he’s gonna go, he and his young wife are going to go and share the gospel and LSU where a lot of kids are struggling with alcohol. My wife and I go out with him. And he gives me his whole pitch. I said, “Son, how much are you short each month?” He says, “he was like, short 500 a month or so.” I said, “We’re in. We are gonna take care of it.” He looks at me, I cut him off his pitch. I said, “You don’t remember this, because you were only one year old, but your mother and father were the ones that took me in and led me to the Lord.
Adam, I’m telling you, and I know, you know this, I hope your listeners know this. When you give it all to the Lord and say, “Here it is. Take it.” Get ready. It’s not a boring ride. It’s Six Flags, baby! Sometimes you’re hanging on screaming, and sometimes you might pass out, but you’ll get there. And so that’s all I got to say. And I really appreciate you letting me come and share a little bit of my story.
