“My wife, Diane, and I have four children, Jeffrey (9), Shawn (8), Katie (5), and Grace (3). Three of them are diagnosed with a condition called cystic fibrosis. It’s where the body makes thicker, stickier mucus and it quite literally gums up the works; the lungs, the intestinal tract, sometimes the liver, almost always the pancreas. It’s something we'd never heard of before, and now we have this. Two years ago Jeffrey began having a real problem with a mold that’s pretty common called Aspergillus. He started having a reaction to it. If you and I are tested for this, the normal level is 200. He was at a record breaking 8,000. It’s a very serious situation, especially coupled with cystic fibrosis. So right away my wife and I knew we needed to build a special allergen free clean air house to help Jeffrey empty his jar, if you will, of this mold so that his body stops having this reaction. We wanted to make sure we didn’t have any other dynamic come in and affect the others. We also knew we were not in the financial shape to get anything done, we had no options.” Greg explains to us. “So I literally just prayed and begged God for what in the world to do. He reminded me that I had written some songs. Just all of a sudden I was like in this bubble; all I could see was this answer to this thing, realizing some people had made some money on the Internet.”
That realization led to the beginning of A House For My Kids, (www.AHouseForMyKids.com), an organization to raise money for a ‘clean home’ for his children, a refuge where child and parent alike could breathe a sigh of relief.
“God is so multi-faceted and he deals with each of us where we are and with what we need. I set out to record a CD called ‘The Work of a Carpenter’ of 12 songs I co-wrote like 10 years ago. I have been shamelessly trying to sell as many as I can in order to raise the money to build this actual house for the the kids. ‘The Work of a Carpenter’ was nominated for the 2007 Inspirational Country Music Awards in the Album of the Year category and that’s becoming a powerful tool for getting some more press and again bringing attention to our platform. It’s been miraculous.”
But it’s not just about them. Greg tells us that with their frequent visits to hospitals they have met so many in need of their own miracle.
“Believe me, there are other families with much bigger struggles, I don’t ever want to sound like we own the corner market. There are other families sitting there in the hospital with nothing and our hearts just go out to them. Once our house is built we’re turning this whole thing into a not for profit organization so that we can then continue this fundraising. As we go around playing and telling our story, we’re also going to the nearest hospital and doing for some other family the same thing that’s been done for us countless times.”
It all began some fifteen years ago for the McDougals, and little did they know their life was to become a series of stepping stones, leaping from one to the other on faith and trying not to lose their footing...
“We moved to Nashville to be in the music business, pulling a little car behind packed up to the hilt. Henry Paul, the lead singer from BlackHawk invited us. I bought this Gibson Everly Brothers model from him down in Tampa back in 1988 or 1989 and had played a couple of songs for him. He kept calling me saying, ‘Kid, you got to be present to win. Get your butt up here.’
“There was a band competition in town so there were no vacancies anywhere. We wound up in Goodlettsville and called the number of a friend of a friend. She said, 'Wellcome on over.’ There’s an apartment complex where everybody in Nashville turns up when they get to town on Nolensville Road. We got to her door and she said, ‘I know you.’ She had seen me sing and play in the nightclubs in Florida. My wife got a job and I did some little things like delivering furniture, whatever it took. I played in a couple of bands; I was making $100.00 a night in Florida and playing music. Came here and made $25.00 a night. Some nights when there wasn’t a crowd, they cut the pay in half and paid us $12.50 a piece. I started doing some work for BlackHawk management and that parlayed into doing some roadie work. I left that eight months later because Van Stevenson, Dave Robbins and Henry Paul helped me get a writing deal with Stratavarious Music. I spent two years writing songs there and wound up getting a song by John Michael Montgomery on his ‘What I Do the Best’ album called ‘I Can Prove You Wrong.’ I auditioned for Stephanie Bentley to play acoustic guitar and sing back up with her and spent almost a year with doing that.”
“Then Henry Paul approached me and said, ‘Man, what did you come to town to do?’ and so we started working together. He was going to produce a record with me; he helped me get a writing deal over at EMI.”
...but there is always a loose stone that'll tip you into the waters...
“God got a hold of me and showed me that he wanted me to do something different. I didn’t mean to, but I walked into the office of Gary Overton at EMI and said, ‘I don’t want anymore of this.’ We had had Jeffrey just before that and he was born with a hole in his intestinal tract. We spent some weeks there at Vanderbilt hospital, and overnight I went from a pretty foolish kid running around with no character to somebody with a whole lot of responsibility, somebody who came face to face with reality. The rubber met the road right there. I just spent some time thinking about it and again God showed me that’s not where he wanted me, for a while anyway. I walked away and was on a construction site the next week.”
...though once you begin to drown, Greg knows that God will always be there to reach down and help you back up.
“I spent 7 years remodeling bathrooms, hanging dry wall, and building room additions. During those 7 years we wound up with three more children. In amongst that God made sure we were in his care before we had these children because, I tell ya, this can’t be done without Him.
We’ve had a lot of great people say God won’t put any more on you than what you can handle. God doesn’t put these things on us, but He does allow them. In our case I believe He allowed it because He knew we could handle it and it would cause us to turn to Him where we wouldn’t before. It’s just one man’s opinion, but that’s what I’ve discovered for us.” He continues, “I heard a great sermon from this young pastor. He and his wife had a two year old with lymphatic cancer. He asked, ‘What do you do when you know Jesus can but he doesn’t?’ His answer to that was, 'I don’t know the answers, but I’ll tell you that I get a great comfort in knowing after the deal with Lazarus, when Mary and Martha came to him weeping it says, ‘Jesus wept.’ Think about that, the son of God, the maker of the universe, is on his knees with me during the really rough times, weeping with me because he doesn’t like the way this is going any more than I do.’ Greg hesitates and adds with emotion, “That’s strong.”
“It’s amazing how God has sent individuals our way every single time to stand in the gap. Every single time we’ve ever been in the hospital with our children in the last nine years God has sent his people to provide for us. We’ve had a bunch of hospital stays in the last nine years, six times in the past year alone but they are doing great right now. Jeffrey has a natural knack for playing the guitar and singing. He is his brother’s keeper; he keeps everybody in line. Shawn is wide open all the time. He loves to make people laugh and is really good at it. Katie is really incredible as a singer. We call her ‘little mama.’ Grace is a whole lot like Shawn; she loves to shock you and she loves to make you laugh.” Greg says with the conviction of a proud father.
They are indeed a family who deserves to be blessed, and compassion swells in the hearts of many who have heard of their plight and what they wish to accomplish for others.
“I had this idea of inviting several Christian country artists to join me on a new project, and I ran into some friends from years back. When they found out what I was trying to do they came with investment money to do this. Tommy Branson, the entertainer of the year Mike Hammock, Mary James, Melanie Walker, a whole bunch of Christian country artists are singing with me. I also wound up, miraculously, with the Oak Ridge Boys, the Bellamy Brothers and Tammy Cochran singing on this duet project.” The project, titled ‘Try a Little Kindness’ is available at www.AhouseForMyKids.com.”
“There are two things we are hoping and pushing to happen; first of all is getting this house built, so that we can just deal with the stuff we have to deal with instead of worrying about mold and insulation fiberboard and whatever. The second thing is launching the non-profit organization and funding it so that we can start to pay all of this forward to other families we run across.”
But in the end it’s all orchestrated by the gentle hands of the greatest musician ever. “God gave me songs, he gave me the talent. There’s really nothing here I can boast about. I just get to be the vessel."
| written by Joshua Schrader
