Williams goes into detail about his road to redemption in a new book, Rescue Story: Faith, Freedom, and Finding My Way Home<\/em><\/a>, that will be released Feb. 27 (Zondervan). The Christian artist has had a string of hits in recent years that have inspired millions, including five that reached No. 1 on the Billboard Christian Airplay chart<\/a>. (Chain Breaker, Old Church Choir<\/em> and There Was Jesus<\/em> — a collaboration with Dolly Parton — stayed atop the charts the longest.) He even won two Grammys.<\/p>\n \u201cMy dad was a worship leader. My mom sang in church,\u201d Williams told ChristianHeadlines.<\/p>\n He experienced God in church as a youngster, he said. Other times, though, he would grow uncomfortable during services and go hide out in the restroom until it ended.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I turned 18, I ran as far and as fast as I could from that for a number of years,\u201d he said of church. Williams became a partier.<\/p>\n \u201cI was one of those guys that for about seven, eight years of my life, didn’t go a day without smoking pot, and it’s just how I lived and functioned,\u201d he said. \u201cMy dad owned a construction business. And for me, it was the only thing that made going and getting on a construction site any fun. It was just like, \u2018If I’m gonna do this, I’ve got to do this high all day long.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Williams then transitioned from marijuana to alcohol.<\/p>\n \u201cI started drinking heavier. I was more of a binge kind of party guy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n His dependance on alcohol only worsened when he formed a Southern Rock band in 2007, Zach Williams and The Reformation. The group released two albums. It toured the U.S. and Europe. He was doing what he had always wanted to do — sing music in the limelight. But he found the experience unfulfilling.<\/p>\n \u201cYou went on stage, you partied, you got off stage, you partied, you woke up in a different city on a different couch, a different hotel room,\u201d Williams said. \u201c…I got myself into a place where I was unhappy with it.<\/p>\n \u201cFor those two or three hours that I was up there, it was really the only time in my life that I felt full,\u201d Williams said. \u201cAnd then I would step off the stage and there would be this emptiness that I would search for the rest of the time. And I think that’s where drugs and alcohol come in is because you’re trying to numb a feeling that you only have for a few moments every day.\u201d<\/p>\n The turning point in Williams\u2019 life and career came in 2012 when he was preparing for a tour. His wife gave him an ultimatum.<\/p>\n \u201cI was leaving for Europe in 2012 and [my wife] said, \u2018If you can’t change for your family, [and] you come back worse than you are, we’re done.\u2019 And I didn’t want to lose my wife and my kids. My wife was pregnant with our daughter,\u201d he told ChristianHeadlines. \u201cAnd I remember leaving for that trip, and we were about a week into it, and I was just so sick of being in those places. And I said, \u2018God, if You’re real, prove it, and if you can [then] I’ll walk away from all this.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n The next day, Williams felt God\u2019s presence.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were driving across Spain on an eight-hour bus ride, and our driver was scanning radio stations, and I hear a song by Big Daddy Weave come across the radio and it stops just long enough on the station for me to hear the lyrics.\u201d<\/p>\n The song was Big Daddy Weave\u2019s Redeemed<\/em>.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd I got to my hotel room, and I looked that song up and I started listening to the lyrics. And in that moment, I realized that God saw me in a way that I would never see myself. And I called my wife and I told her about it. And I said, \u2018When I get home, I’m done [with the band].\u2019 And I came home from that tour, and I quit my band, and I gave my life to the Lord on June 10, 2012. We started going to this church and within a year, they asked me to help launch a campus. And I went to work for them and started leading worship. I started writing Christian music and got invited to Nashville to write some songs.\u201d<\/p>\n During one of those songwriting expeditions in Nashville, he wrote Chain Breaker,<\/em> which spent 15 weeks atop the CCM airplay charts in 2016.\u00a0<\/p>\n Williams credits his parents for loving him through his prodigal years.<\/p>\n \u201cI’m just grateful that I had parents who were an example of Christ — that loved me through, that never judged me, that continued to pray and trust and believe that God had a plan for my life,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The theme of Williams\u2019 life and book, he said, is hope.<\/p>\n \u201cMy prayer is that people walk away from this and see just how much God loves us,\u201d he said. \u201c…If He could do it for me, He can do it for anybody.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/media.swncdn.com\/via\/images\/2024\/02\/07\/34486\/34486-97803103684654004c_source_file.webp\")
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