John White-Spunner has always been active in church, but for years, he didn't get the message. Not until adversity brought him to his knees did White-Spunner's life change for the better.

The Daphne resident runs his family's construction and real estate business out of Mobile. Things were going well at work, and White-Spunner's company had construction projects around the country. But White-Spunner knew something was wrong inside.

“There was no joy,” he says. “I was miserable.”

Then one of his clients in Foley, Dennis Nazarro, asked to meet him for breakfast.

“I figured it was a business breakfast,” White-Spunner recalls, “but when we sat down, Dennis looked me in the eye and said, ‘I want to ask you where you are with Jesus.’ I wasn't ready for that, and I was offended. I told him I was a leader in my church.

“Dennis said he understood about that. ‘That's on Sunday, but where are you the rest of the week?’ he asked.”

At Nazarro's suggestion, White-Spunner attended a Promise Keepers weekend in New Orleans with his father in 1996.

“It was like they were talking directly to me,” White-Spunner says. He began reading the Bible and took a new approach to his business.

“When I got back, I began praying at work and told my people that I didn't want them to do anything for me at work that would interfere with their family life,” he says.

That was a turning point for White-Spunner, but more challenges lay ahead. “I had given my life to the Lord, but I hadn't surrendered everything,” he says.

Just when life was at is best, a member of White-Spunner's immediate family developed a drinking problem. Repeated promises and restrictions didn't help.

And having a family member who struggled with alcoholism strained other relationships within the family.

“As the drinking increased, the rest of us were embarrassed and very scared,” he says. “We wondered what we were doing wrong and what terrible news the next phone call would bring. We each tried to do what we thought was best, but we didn't know what to do. Not everyone was on the same page.”

White-Spunner found help for himself and for his family at The Shoulder, a Christian nonprofit substance abuse treatment center in Spanish Fort.

Debbie Hansen, a counselor at The Shoulder at the time, chaired group meetings, where White-Spunner learned about substance abuse and the role family members play in the disease.

“I found out it wasn't just the addict who was in trouble — I was in trouble, too,” White-Spunner says. “I heard other people tell their stories, and I realized they were telling my story. Each story was unique in the details, but the stories were all alike in other ways. I realized it's everywhere; it's all over. I learned what it is to be a co-dependent and how my behavior affects those around me.”

Now, the White-Spunner family has a new understanding of what's important in life.

“We now talk honestly about things we were once too afraid to acknowledge,” White-Spunner says.

White-Spunner's alcoholic family member is now clean and sober, and White-Spunner himself is living a new life, too — a life where God is first and everything else is secondary.

But White-Spunner says he doesn't think the Lord is finished with him yet.

“I'm a work in progress,” he says.

John White-Spunner will be the featured speaker at the annual benefit luncheon for The Shoulder, Aug. 28, at the Daphne Civic Center. Tickets are $45 per person, or $500 for a table of ten. Call 251-626-2199 for more information.