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Jeremy Weems
For most of Jeremy Weems’ life, he had no plans. Battling with drug addiction and constantly in and out of jail, Weems spent his time following the next high.
But the past few years have been good to Weems. Nearly 3 years clean and sober, he now owns his own business with his wife. The business, which provides building and remodeling services at affordable prices, is called Jeremiah 29:11.
The name comes from the Bible verse which reads, “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
To get to where he is now has been a long road. When he was still in high school, Weems started working for his father’s construction business.
“I was 13 years old when he started picking me up out of school and taking me to job sites,” Weems said. “We would do anything from concrete work, to framing, to electrical, to roofing cabinets. We remodeled but for the most part, and built turnkey homes.”
After he graduated from Dublin High School in 1995, he began working full time, helping out with projects for big name clients and even building houses for millionaires.
By that time, though, Weems had already encountered a vice in the form of drug use. In 1999, four years after he graduated from high school, Weems went to prison for the first time.
He was paroled a few months later, but went back again in 2003. For the next 15 years, Weems was in and out of jail constantly. He moved around the country, living in Kentucky, Mississippi, and Corpus Christi, Texas. “For a long time I was literally on parole or in prison or strung out on methamphetamines,” he said.
After years of this, Weems came to a turning point. “I had always believed in God, but I didn’t have anything to do with church until I went to prison in 2015,” he said. “That year I started just having the desire to read, and then over the next two years I started feeling that there was a God that could do something for me.”
Weems began praying again, and asking God to help him piece his life back together. “I didn’t want my life to be what it was anymore, and there was no other way out,” he said. “I had tried everything in my power to change my life, and in the end, it didn’t work. And the only place I could go was to the Word of God.”
Finally, in 2018, he ended up at one of Texas’ Intermediate Sanction Facilities, places for low-risk offenders who have violated parole. “There was a teacher there who was teaching a cognitive intervention class, and it just really took hold of me,” Weems said. “I was finally able to just get rid of all the trash that I’ve been living in my whole life.”
When Weems got out of the facility, he started attending church regularly at Cottonwood Baptist Church, and got back into working, taking on jobs around town. He helped put up the COVID screens in the Dublin Library and City Hall.
“That was pretty much the beginning of the business, Jeremiah 29,” he said. “God placed me back where I was born. My great uncle Wayne poured the concrete for the city hall years ago, and now I ended up back here.”
Seeing the hardships people are experiencing during the pandemic was also an awakening for Weems. “The first half of my life I was working for millionaires and billionaires building massive houses, but COVID has been a very humbling experience,” he said. “God didn’t give me this talent so that I could work for the rich — he gave me this talent so that I could help people with their needs.”
Currently he is helping his brother build a house, and has offered his services to people around the community who needed help after the freeze two weeks ago. He plans to continue providing remodeling work at affordable costs.
About a year after he got out of the facility, Weems met his wife, Sarah. “I was at church one day, and I had my hands raised, and I was crying, and she put her hands on me,” he said. “God put this love for her in my heart.”
A few days later, Sarah called him to ask for help with a renovation project, and then they started spending time together at church events. “We turned into each other’s helpers, and now we’ve been married for six months,” he said. “It’s been the greatest, most enlightening six months of my life. There is peace now, and it works and everything is in its place.”
Weems and his wife live in a house out on Highway 67, on land that they hope to turn into a community gathering place. “We have three acres behind our house, and it’s under construction right now to become a park and a getaway for believers; a place that people can just retreat and reset.” he said “We’re going to call it Remnant Park.”
The park will include a baseball field for local kids to play in, a garden and outside kitchen, and a gathering area for people to sit and talk. Weems wants the park to be a welcome place for everyone in the community.
“There’s so many people that have been shunned from the church, or shunned by their family, or just shunned by life in general, you know, and, and there’s so many people that don’t understand that are having a calling that are all having the desire to read or to know God and really don’t know anything because of their surroundings,” he said. “Look at me; I have tattoos all over me and my face and everything. And I love that I did that to myself, because it is like an instant stereotype detector. We’re not called to beat our heads against the wall about our past, but to grow and to walk in freedom and to live our lives. That’s what we want to share here.”
When he’s not working, Weems enjoys spending time with his wife and children. Weems has four children from previous relationships, and his wife has four as well. He also enjoys reading the bible, building and restoring furniture, and finding ways to share his faith on social media.
“I used to be an adrenaline junkie, and I chose to do that through drugs and everything else,” he said. “But I was sitting this morning and we were doing our live Bible talk on Facebook and I had so much adrenaline flowing through me that I could barely even talk. That’s my new hobby — I read so that I can strengthen myself and help my brother and sisters.”
And after spending so much time in jail, Weems often finds himself discovering new things that he never had a chance to enjoy in the past. “I’m like a little baby that’s getting to learn life all over again,” he said.
After his tumultuous life, Weems’ advice for Dublin graduates is to not run from God or their responsibilities, but to stay focused on their goals. “Keep your eye on the prize,” he said. “Don’t be led astray by others or what other people say, and don’t wait to seek God.”