Success Story

A moment of clarity: ‘I felt the presence of God’

Team member at Van Martin Roofing shares his journey of transformation

XENIA — In the lives of people struggling with addiction, there are few more defining moments than when someone finally sees the light and feels the presence of the divine.

One such moment happened several years ago for Adam Gardner of Middletown, who has been able to turn his life of crime and drug use around and use it for the glory of a power much greater than himself.

Gardner shared his story recently about how he went from living in darkness to the life of joy he leads today, working for Van Martin Roofing and being a part of the ecosystem at the Emerge Recovery & Trade Initiative campus.

“My dad died when I was 12, so I didn’t have a father around growing up,” Gardner said. “My mom struggled with mental health. She had to raise seven of us kids. I grew up in a Spanish neighborhood in Florida. I was the only white kid around. Because I didn’t have any male role models around, I started hanging out with the older guys in the area. A lot of those guys were drug dealers. You can probably see where this is going.”

By the age of 15, Gardner said he was selling drugs and moving large quantities of narcotics as part of a local criminal organization.

“Because I was a minor, I was able to work for them and move drugs without getting caught like an adult would,” he said. “Then, I got a girl pregnant when I was 14. Eventually, I got caught up on a charge when I was 19. I went to jail and prison for two years.”

When Gardner got out of prison, he said he moved to Ohio for a fresh start. By then, he said, he had two felonies on his record.

“I wanted a change,” he said. “So, I went to college. I was in the middle of getting my bachelor’s in journalism and ended up getting wrapped up in a federal case in Middletown.”

Tragically, Gardner said he was caught with a kilogram of heroin, which is a major felony charge in Ohio.

“Back then, whatever I was selling, I was using,” he said. “I did three years but got out in 2014. This is when my addiction truly took hold of me. Because of my record and background, I wasn’t able to deal anymore. But I found myself still chasing the drugs. My kids’ mother and I both were addicted to opiates, which spiraled into heroin and later turned into the use of fentanyl.

“When I got into fentanyl, everything took a turn for the worse,” he said. “I was nodding out in random places. We eventually got a spiked batch that caused us to black out for days at a time. When we came to, our vehicle was totaled. My wife was injured. I blacked out and caused a bunch of chaos. We tried hiding our addiction because we had kids. However, once that came out, there was no hiding it.”

And this is when the house of cards, explained, came tumbling down.

Gardner’s First Attempt at Sobriety Started in 2019

“In an attempt to get sober, I went to the Salvation Army in Alabama,” he said. “They sent me to a men’s retreat that changed my life. I was detoxing. I had eight days sober. They shipped me off to this men’s retreat in Mississippi.”

Earlier that night, Gardner said someone at the retreat gave him a bible.

“I told them what I was going through,” he said. “I did not want to be sober. I did not want to live. I couldn’t imagine a future without opiates. I cracked open this bible – this was March of 2019 – I was sitting under a tree, and something happened.”

What Gardner described next brought tears to his eyes.

“I was sitting out in nature, and I read this verse from Psalms,” he said. “The Bible verse was talking about a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season and how its’ leaf does not wither.”

As he was reading this, Gardner said he was sitting by a tree.

“I was at my lowest point in life and I could hear the water trickling in the distance,” he said. “It was like God was speaking to me. Here I am in the woods, and I feel the wind blowing and I hear the creek. Suddenly, these tears started rushing down my face and this warmth touched me. I was eight days into my detox, hundreds of miles away from everyone I knew. Everything was shit in my life. I had nothing. And this moment changed my life.”

Instantly, Gardner said he felt a presence and a warmth come over his entire body. Tears rolled down his cheeks as he told the story. That moment, he said, changed his life.

“I ended up sleeping better that night than I had slept for years,” he said. “I woke up that next morning and the withdrawals were gone. I felt amazing. I had the best weekend of my life. I formed this brotherhood with these guys overnight. The weekend wrapped up with the ceremony at church, and people were getting saved. You could feel the presence of God in the room. It felt like I was spiritually fulfilled for the first time in my life. God had me exactly where I needed to be.”

Gardner said for the first time in his life, he felt amazing without the use of drugs.

“In that moment, I realized there was something more than just me – there was something bigger than me at play in life,” he said. “I felt the hand of God. I completed my program at the Salvation Army. I did the 21 days and I was cut loose. My wife ended up getting sober on her own. However, I went back home to the same environment that I left. And that whole foundation I had built crumbled beneath me, and I was back in self-will.”

Five days later, Gardner said he relapsed.  However, he said, this relapse was different.

“But this relapse was different because I was miserable for those whole two weeks,” he said. “My brother, who was seven years sober at that time, was a part of this Outcast Sober Living in Dayton; it’s a motorcycle club. I didn’t tell him I relapsed, so they brought me in.”

They realized quickly, however, that he had zero days clean.

“When I got there, they could tell I didn’t have a month sober,” Gardner said. “They still took me in even though I had relapsed. The owner put me in his apartment for five days. That act of kindness was amazing. God showed up in my life again and did exactly what was needed at the time even though I didn’t realize what was happening. I moved into their sober living after five days, but I had already been touched by the Lord. I was so miserable during that two-week relapse that I was willing to do anything and everything to stay clean.”

This included getting a sponsor, working the steps, and attending as many meetings as possible.

“I was terrified to go back to that miserable life,” he said. “I just keep trudging through, pushing through, doing whatever it took, building up time away from addiction.”

Eventually, Gardner said he started building up time in recovery keeping the focus on himself.

However, when he reached 90 days, COVID-19 hit, and all the meetings were shut down.

“We ended up going against government orders, and having underground meetings,” he said. “We had motorcycles parked in circles to give us light as we met in back alleys. Those meetings were amazing. I started taking a leadership role. I ended up taking over the house manager position shortly after that. I realized this program is so much bigger than me.”

Eventually, Gardner stepped into a leadership role at the sober living program he had been a part of. He stayed there until March 2023, when they found another house manager and he moved up into more of a leadership role over that manager.

Today, Outcast Sober Living has 17 different sober living houses with 70 male residents.

The organization is widely known throughout the recovery community in the Miami Valley Ohio area.

In addition to Outcast, Gardner said Emerge Cofounder Doug Van Dyke and Van Martin Roofing played an essential role in his recovery.

With three years of sobriety today, Gardner said another pivotal part of his journey was learning a skilled trade, roofing, and getting connected to Doug Van Dyke and the team at Van Martin Roofing.

“When I got sober, I started to learn roofing and that’s how I got in touch with Van Martin. That was in 2022,” he said. “Before that, I worked for roofers who only cared about making money. Van Martin was a huge step in the right direction. The company holds itself to a high standard. They care about their people. They help people. They care about their customers and the community. I learned through Van Martin that there was a better way to roof.”

Gardner said he wouldn’t be where he is today if it hadn’t been for the company.

“Because of the training they gave me at Van Martin, I can provide the best life for my kids,” he said. “That’s because Van Martin invested in me. Today, I am doing all types of roofing work because they taught me and helped make me into a great roofer, training me.”

He said he is currently on the fast track to becoming a foreman and having a vehicle and helper.

“I love working for Van Martin,” he said. “I know Doug pretty well. I don’t think there’s any other company like us because of who is in charge. He gave his lead at our speaker jam.”

What makes Van Dyke and the other founders at Emerge unique, Gardner said, is the fact that they have been there in addiction themselves.

“They’ve lost everything and gained it back,” he said. “If anyone else was doing this, there might be some complications. But Doug, Kip and Chris have been there. I love working out of the Emerge campus now.

“Emerge is such an oasis!” he said. “I am big in the recovery community, and this is where it’s at. This is an amazing place. You guys are investing in people. You guys are truly changing lives! At the end of the day, we’re all just trying to be better!”

The promises of sobriety, Gardner said, do come true!

Today, Adam and his wife Amber, who is 38, have been married for 12 years. They have three children, Kris, 21, Leann, 15, Alexis, 10. They live in Middletown, and the couple has the same clean date – which is January 7, 2020.

“We are happily married,” he said. “Life is amazing today. I can look in the mirror and appreciate who I am today without any mind-altering substance. Today, I am a valued member of my community instead of a plague who sold and used drugs. I have a community of 300 people whom I can call any day because of the second chance I was given. I have a trade today with a clear path to success. We are living our best lives, being the best versions of ourselves. These are absolute miracles happening in my life. I remember what it was like to just exist and try to get by. Today, I get to thrive.”

When asked about the Bible verse that led to his spiritual awakening, Gardner teared up and said that it was like a prophecy spoken into his life.

“The verse that was a part of my spiritual awakening has come true in my life in every way,” he said. “The spiritual growth. The prospering. It all came around full circle. Those who properly respect God’s word enjoy spiritual prosperity and spiritual success.”

That verse was from the first Psalms; it reads as follows:

“Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful, But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on His law, he meditates day and night. He shall be like a tree, planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth its fruit in its season, whose leaf also shall not wither; and whatever he does shall prosper.” — Psalms 1:1-3