When I look back on my testimony, 14 1/2 years of drugs and alcohol and trying to fill all the voids with all the things that didn't work after I asked Jesus into my heart, everything changed and I don't.
Know I'm still trying to figure it out I'm still trying to I'm still I'm still real time trying to figure out like I scratched my head in the morning and some mornings I'm just like.
What has happened?
To me, like what?
What?
Is going on like and.
And some mornings I.
Feel crazy and other mornings I'm just like yes I'm a child of God and I'm changed and I'm good but I know without a doubt that it's Jesus who saved my life.
Your farm is gorgeous.
This is the question I want to start off with.
Do you ever get tired of being introduced as Ben Fuller, the former addict?
Yeah, you do.
Yeah, I do.
Maybe it bothers me so much because I know that I'm a child of God, you know?
And so it's like the former, just anything to do with the former.
They started off on the wrong.
Foot no, but the former me is just like, well, I I just heard someone say this the other day too at a A and they were just like they were talking about that and like, hey, you know, I you know I'm a drug addict.
You know, it's like, no, you're not you're actually a child of the most high God and and you used to be that person.
And so I but it's The funny thing about telling my testimony night after night after night on all these stages is that the Lord is like slowly building so much good stuff that I don't want to even talk about the bad anymore because I'm just like, yeah, I spent 14 1/2 years in in addiction, but Jesus saved my life.
And so let's talk about the miracles that he's just done last night.
You know what I mean?
So I don't know, it doesn't offend me, but it's just like that person, that man is dead.
I think so much of the stuff that people know about you already has been your story coming from addiction being saved by Jesus turning your life around.
But I also think too Ben.
So this is my this is I was trying to get into your head as you share your testimony.
I was an addict.
I'm no longer praise God to the person that's sitting on the edge of your concert.
That is an active addiction.
Does that introduction actually kind of go, I want that kind of testimony?
I have to believe that there are people in the crowd that have something that they're going through and it could be cocaine, alcohol, porn, whatever it is.
And it's just like, hey, here I am.
Jesus has changed my life.
I don't understand it all.
I don't really know if I need to understand it all, but I know that I called on his name and I've been changed.
I was this way and now I'm this way.
And so I, yeah, I have to believe that there are people in the car that are like, I want to have that.
But it doesn't discredit the people that don't have that, you know what I mean?
That don't have that story that are in the that are in the crowd that just came that are like, Oh my goodness, I don't have this grand testimony of wow, I've been delivered from 14 1/2 years of addiction.
But it I think it does encourage them to know that God is working in mighty ways still right now, OK.
Can we talk about the tattoos?
It's funny, I started getting tattoos probably 17 or 18 years ago.
I remember coming home with like the right on the shoulder and I showed yeah, and I showed mom.
It's like a farm.
It's actually a farm.
It's a barn.
I have a barn.
Myself, Mom, that's precious.
And a Maple tree.
And so my mom saw it and was just like, you better not show your father that.
And I remember that like, I don't know whether I was like getting dressed or I'd take my shirt off to throw hay or something.
My dad saw it and was just like, what is that?
Are you going to that?
What is like he was mad.
And then I remember I got another one and it was, it was just hidden like just above a short sleeve so I could hide it again.
And mom's like, how much further you going?
How much?
And I'm like, I think that's it probably, you know, And then anyway, so here I am, here you are.
But I, I don't know, I feel like the tattoos I've gotten recently have been, I mean, Hebrews 10 says we've been made holy in Christ Jesus.
I got Jesus on my left hand.
I got the line of Judah on my right.
And I just, I've done more ministry with my tattoos and said absolutely nothing.
Then I, I anyway, just constantly blows me away because I can go.
One story in particular reminds me, I paid for gas.
I slid a $20 bill across the counter and this woman said holy like what, what, what are you whole like, what are you holy or something?
And I showed her and I was like, yeah, I've been made holy in Christ Jesus.
Like my life has been changed because.
And she's and she's like, how?
And all of a sudden it was like, and she just got done smoking a cigarette and it, and it just like started this incredible testimony conversation.
She started sharing.
I started sharing and it was just, it was just real.
So I love it.
And I just tell people their marks of life and not marks of death.
So yeah, anyway.
OK, let's talk about your parents.
I love my mom and dad so much and I have seen them grow so, so much in the last couple years.
And I remember when I gave my life to Christ and I made it public.
November 10th, 2019.
I come out of the water and I remember like the messages of like, hey, what are you like, you know, it's kind of like, what are you?
So what are you doing?
Like, what's going on with you?
Baptize, You know, you're baptized when you're a baby.
Like what?
What's going on?
And then they started hearing me sing about Jesus.
I was like, yeah, you know, like I, I, I just, I fell in love with Jesus.
Like I'm going to sing about Jesus from now on.
And I'm just just not living this lifestyle anymore.
So it like, I think mom and dad kind of were like, OK, he's sober now.
Like that's good.
We knew he was drinking too much.
They didn't know about my drug addiction until actually a podcast after I got saved.
I was a master of disguise and I could hide in plain sight.
And so I think that's the scariest thing about addiction is that you have no idea.
And unless you're, you have someone really close to you who can read you like a book and who really knows you, like, I just walked around hiding it from everybody, you know, and it took my best friend's life.
And so it's like, why wasn't it me, You know?
But I, I'm witnessing my mom and dad now see the honesty and the vulnerability and the transparency.
And it's like, it's Jesus.
It's Jesus with Ben, it's Jesus.
And now they're listening to like Sidewalk Prophets and they're listening to Big Daddy Weave and Carrie Underwood loves Jesus.
And, and they're, they're seeing all this and they're like, what is it about Jesus?
Like, what is it about his name?
Who is he?
And so I'm watching them like dig in more and more and more.
So I don't know if they've accepted him.
I I don't know where they stand with him, but I have to believe God has done a mighty work in their lives.
Well, you, you're targeting them in your songs because what's the song on this album where you said, you know, my daddy doesn't pray, but he hums along?
My daddy don't pray, but it'll hum my songs.
And it's a song called.
You'll see what I mean.
And so it's basically just like, hey, if you call in the name of Jesus, like you'll see what I mean.
Yeah, I hope he.
I've never heard my dad sing before, but I don't.
I've always heard him hum.
And so, yeah, that's where that line came from.
I heard whispers of this story, not just the song, but a moment that you had with your dad.
Can you tell me first person?
Because I feel like I heard it, like in the gossip room in the cafeteria.
But I want to hear from you what happened.
I wrote a song called Proud with Casey Beathard.
And Casey lost his son here in Nashville a few years back in a freak accident.
And we we were scheduled to write a song and he walked in the room.
He sat down.
I mean, his reputation preceded him.
I knew who he was.
And he looked at me and he said, how's your relationship with your father?
Oh, boy.
And the tears came.
The story came and I told him everything.
And then he just looks at me and he said, well, he guessed.
He he said, I guess making your father proud looks a whole lot different now, doesn't it?
I was just like, Oh my gosh.
So we wrote this song called proud and it basically is like, I couldn't understand my dad, right?
Growing up, we had a tough relationship.
His dad never said I love you.
So therefore he didn't share that.
It was just his generational thing passed down right.
And all of a sudden I've accepted Christ, everything's changed.
I realized I have a Father in heaven who loves me so very much and I can write about it and share.
And so even though I couldn't understand my father here on earth and figure it all out, I now knew that I had a Father in heaven who loved me so very much.
And so I got to sing that song and my dad was in the crowd.
And you want to talk about emotional.
I could barely, even, I could barely even get a the, the opening line is he never hit me with his fists, but he did some damage with his words.
And it was just like, and I saw my dad just like look at me.
And right as I finished the song, I was getting ready to take my guitar off and Holy Spirit said, go hug him.
And he stood up first and he walked down the aisle and he met me halfway.
And then he gave me a hug and he said, I love you.
And it's like, whoa, it's powerful.
That's that's what God has restored.
Yeah.
He is our restoration and our healing.
Thanks for getting me emotional on the farm.
Listen.
Here we are.
Back on the farm.
Again, some mosquitoes.
OK, well, let's move on and talk about your brand new album.
You've got so many songs on this album.
I've got so many questions.
But I saw, I think I saw a sneak peek of this image.
There's a fire, you're burning something in it.
So can we do this?
We're on your beautiful property.
Can we make a campfire?
And can then you tell me the story of what you were burning in that fire?
Did you bring s'mores?
No.
I've got some.
Let's go.
Don't let me fall that I'm nothing without you.
When Jesus, it's true, you're all I'm holding on.
To.
Don't let me lose sight of how you saved my life.
You're the reason I'm blessed.
Jesus, don't let me forget.
Don't let me, Lord, don't let me forget.
So good.
OK, we made the fire.
We made the fire.
There's remnants of boots or something.
Tell me the story.
Tell me the story of what was burning on the cover of this album.
I moved to Nashville in the fall of 2018 for country music, and that's what I wanted to sing.
That's what I was going to do.
I was going to prove something to everybody and I got here and God had other plans for me.
But those boots are so special.
They were so special.
But they walked me down to Broadway from parking garage after parking garage and stumbled me back to my truck day after night after day of looking and seeking and wondering, you know, what was next.
And so when it came time to talk about like the album cover, what we were going to do, all these things, well, these boots have been on my heart.
And I've had them resold like 5 times, right?
Because I've worn poles in the box and it just kept, kept literally coming to me.
Like, man, God has put brand new boots on my feet.
Like he, he's walking me to places that I've never been.
He's taking me to places that I only dreamed of.
It's time to.
It's time to say goodbye to the old boots.
And so I prayed about it.
And I was like, all right, Laura.
These are my favorite.
Boots.
But it was just like, there's something just prophetic about like, hey, you know what?
These boots have taken me places that I'm not proud of and things that that I've done that I'm not proud of, but it's like the old is gone.
And it was just part of this like stepping into the new for me.
And so, yeah, Lord's got me new boots, new boots, new boot.
Kick it in so.
We borrowed that.
Yeah, we, we literally.
And it was so funny because it was like, are people going to think that that it's like AI or something that you just like, you know, like digitally made them burn?
But it's like, no, we, we really, we really, we really.
Black smoke coming.
Off of them.
It was nasty.
Yeah, we really burned it.
But it was just, it was so beautiful also because it was just like, OK, Lord, like I'm stepping into new territory and things and it's with you.
So yeah, it's that's where that all came from.
I think a lot of people been, they hear your story, you know, there's just a joy about you and they might ask that question like, how do I get that joy?
What have you learned in your journey?
It's happened so long and so short, I think all at once.
But the title track is walk through fire, you know, and the hook is, thank God, I had to walk through fire.
And so when I look back on my testimony, 14 1/2 years of drugs and alcohol and just just trying to fill all the voids with all the things that didn't work after I asked Jesus into my heart, everything changed.
And so I, I just knew without a doubt that it was him, you know, and.
I don't know, I'm still trying to figure it out.
I'm.
Still trying to.
I'm still, I'm still real time trying to figure out like I scratched my head in the morning and some mornings I'm just like.
What has happened to me?
Like what, what is going on like, and, and some mornings I feel crazy and other mornings I'm just like, yes, I'm a child of God and I'm changed and I'm good.
But I know without a doubt that it's Jesus who saved my life.
And so I would, anybody who sees or hears this story about what God has done for me, I, I, I think I would just ask them to ask him.
Yeah, I would.
I would.
I would just say ask him and watch him because, because he did it, because he's doing it for me.
Yeah.
You know, one of the things that you've talked about pretty openly as you've come to walk with Jesus is that you've chosen celibacy and sobriety, and those seem to be things of the past, right?
And so this new man, this new creation, why those two things that you value as you walk forward with Jesus?
Oh my goodness, I think they're the things that that came that that I held closest, like as I walked the old me did and when I accepted Christ and I said Jesus come into my heart and change my life, right.
Romans 10/9 believe in your heart and confess in your mouth.
When I did that, there was just a massive conviction inside of me that was just like, stop treating women like that, stop doing drugs, stop drinking, like don't do those things, Ben.
Like, I don't like it.
It hurts me.
And so I was like, and so over the course of two months, like those things just left.
And I, I had made the decision that I was all in for Jesus.
And I was just like, Lord, here I am.
And so it's such a weird thing because it was in all those, those things, I was so broken and looking, you know, and I promised God that when I got saved that I would look at the 16 year old Ben who had a gun in his mouth, who didn't want to live anymore.
And I was, I could say to them now standing on this platform after God has given me the, the gifts and, and, and, and, and shown me that it was him all along, that I can look at them and say that don't waste your time on sleeping around.
Don't waste your time on drugs and alcohol and all the things that that will not fix you.
They won't.
I'm 38 years old.
I didn't come to Christ until I was 32.
Like it took me 32 years to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ.
I had no idea who he was.
And then I heard and everything changed.
And so it's just been a joy for me to tell people and to, to, to show people what he's done for me.
And so my hope and encouragement is just that the younger me, you know, the, the kids, the younger bands out there would be like, OK, he's done that and didn't work.
I'm, I'm going to not do that because it didn't help him any, you know?
OK, I was listening to your song Deeper Still because I had to figure out, I've been seeing on your social media, you keep digging all these ditches everywhere and I'm like, which song is all of those holes for?
So I was listening to Deeper Still.
You're going to have to correct me on the lyric, but it was basically at the end of my strength, I found Jesus.
All I need is for my strength to run out.
Not my weakest.
He was waiting to pick me up where I fell.
Because his love goes deeper.
All goes deeper still, yeah?
There is this sense of like we find Jesus at the end when we just like give it all up.
But I think too often in my life, I don't know about other people's lives, but like we're constantly scrambling like for God, honestly, like, you know, like, I'll, I'll figure it out.
I'll hustle a little bit harder.
God, I'll figure it out.
I'll clean myself up so that that full surrender doesn't come.
What have you experienced in that when you put those lyrics in that song?
Back to the hole digging.
I've dug so many holes in my life.
Like literal holes or what are we talking about?
Like both, yeah.
But I was a landscaped and you know, for 15 years, so I planted trees.
So I dug hole after hole after hole, but I also dug hole after hole after hole and relationships and places that I shouldn't have been digging.
And so that's where with my addiction, you know, that's where all the whole dicking came from.
And then I realized like, wait a minute, it was, I was trying to be so strong, right?
I was physically strong.
I was trying to, but in my weakness, he was waiting to pick me up where I fell.
Like I didn't have to be strong after all.
And in fact, it all happened when I just like you said, surrendered and let it all go and put the shovel down.
Is was when I finally realized it was him so.
Yeah, we could probably save so much time.
Yeah, just let it go.
Well, is it amazing the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony like, and that's just why I pray in in everywhere I go and get a chance to tell my story of what God has done for me and allowed me to put the shovel down and and it and it's and it and he digs.
It's his, right?
He, he makes it all now like it's it's, it's all his.
And before I was trying to make it all mine.
That's my prayer.
That is, you bring these songs to the hearts and minds of people.
Been that people find freedom and they find Jesus.
Yeah.
Yeah, you know, it's those things, like God gives you these things and he's given these songs and right, we prayed and they come and all of a sudden they just fall out and and and you write them with the most talented people and the most talented producing and the most talented musicians and all the things.
And all of a sudden it's like I haven't even had a chance to really fully realize what God has done through this music yet.
Like, and so I still need to like go back and listen.
It's like what?
Like what, what, what are you?
And then and then, like in the song who I am God told me for almost four years after I've been singing it like I was telling you your identity this whole time that you're a child of the most high God.
But it actually didn't physically set into to my brain until almost four years after I wrote the song.
So it I can't even again moving forward.
It's like I'm who knows, so many songs may take years to even hit me, you know?
And but.
But isn't that God?
Like he plants those seeds and then it comes to bear years, years down the road, and things come and we finally have the maturity or the heart that God gives us that time to see those things.
Yeah.
Amen.
So, yeah, my prayer is that God, would you take this album and would you set the captives free?
God, those that are struggling and hustling and those that are doing it in their own strength, God, would you remind them and maybe for the very first time, that they would know deeply in their hearts, their identity, that they are your child, God, and that they can fall completely and utterly surrendered to you.
We bless you God, We thank you for all of these gifts that you have given to Him.
Fire let my love breakthrough if nothing.
Perfect.