The Power of the Prompt: Why One Little Step Changes Everything

Control Alt Redeem is for anyone called to ministry in the digital frontier, gamers, streamers, and everyday believers navigating life online. Each episode equips you to live on mission and the real stories of lives being changed. Reset your expectations, reframe your mission, and redeem the space you're already in. This is where digital ministry gets practical, creative, grounded, and hopeful, one episode at a time.

welcome in everyone to control alt redeem we are resetting the culture and redeeming the space and i have uh b gilbert 85 with me on the podcast tonight so we're doing an unusual one for me we're doing a weekend podcast i don't do those too often and so privileged to be able to have you uh on the podcast friend

Likewise, I appreciate you, you know, setting up this, making it happen and grateful that you took the time to invite me.

Oh, yeah. Well, it's been a while since we've had a chat together, but we did have the privilege of being bunkies, as one of my friend always says, bunkies for Reach Conference, which was a lot of fun and a lot of late nights. So I, that might've been when we first met, I might've known you before that and seen you around. And I was just showing before we jumped on, I do have, and yours might be one of the first stickers that I did get. And then I decided a couple of months later, I am going to be that guy that has stickers all over. So I just wanted to show that off.

Yeah, I think, you know, this past year I was able to bring two of my boys, and I think he saw some of your stuff. And I think you inspired him to start collecting stickers and put it on stuff. So, like, he's done something.

He's doing it? That's cool. That's cool. Like I got a few people that would give me stickers from time to time and I'm like, yeah, I don't do anything with stickers. Where am I going to put them? I've always had that mentality and attitude like on a car, I don't like bumper stickers. It's like, it's a whole bunch of distraction. And if this is what I'm going to say, is this what I really want to say? And I've also heard the, if you have a Mercedes, would you put a bumper sticker on it? You know, that like mentality of something is really good. Why would you mess it up with a bumper sticker? But after I started collecting from a few streamers, it was like, wait a minute, I want to show off the people I know. I want to highlight that there's a bunch of friends of mine out there. And then I started collecting as I went to conferences from all kinds of ministries. So my luggage is working on getting completely covered as well. If you're a friend of mine, you get to be on the mugs. If you're just a ministry, you might be on my luggage. And from there, who knows what I'm going to do after. I've got my laptop full. I've got my two mugs in front of me full. I've got my water bottles on my bicycle I'm working on. And then I keep inspiring or getting excited about, hey, they have stickers on sale. Let me make stickers for you, and I'll send them to you to other organizations and ministries and just say, hey, let's get in the sticker game. I know you've got a couple of logos and whatnot, and I know you spent a little bit of time

emphasis in making sure you had your branding all good so if you want to just highlight that since we're talking about it yeah so so uh you know thinking about the stickers in particular i am a you know i'm a fan of sticker mule they do great work that's who i go to and and you know if you wait they're going to run a promo so you could you know you can get them get them cheap and it's it's quality another kind of the one of one of the things i uh recently did this year is i'm trying to start my own counseling practice shepherding hope so of course i've got some stickers for that as well and um you know you know it's it's kind of it's kind of a catch-22 uh so like you you wear you wear your um your merch and people's like oh you think you're all that it's like no i just want people to know who i am i want to be easily easily findable because I'm, I'm a little fish in a big sea and you know, like I, I get it. Uh, I get how it can be perceived that way, but at the same time, uh, you know, people tend to remember people when something sticks out and if it's merged and okay, if it's, it took the time to give them a sticker. Great. You know? it's usually not the huge things that happen that make those impact. It's always one small thing, another small thing, another small thing, another small thing. And, you know, God's kingdom works very similarly. You know, he always, well, maybe not always, but he often uses the least of us that do a little bit. Okay, I'm obedient here. I'm obedient here. I'm obedient here. And like, whoa, God did that?

yeah it is it is fun on those little steps of faith that seem like they're not much but then you look back and go that one little step there was a fork in the road that i could not see because it just seemed like a small step But a step to the right is not a step to the left and that leads you in a different direction. So yeah, it's you're talking about your kids getting excited about the stickers. I was just in Orlando for exponential conference, which is a church planting conference and got to talk about the church digital there. And I had some stickers around and there were two little girls that were going around to booths. And super excited about stickers. And one of them, you know, I didn't have them out yet. They were going around collecting. I was talking to them. And I'm like, well, when I get the booth set up, I'll have my stickers out. And they had to come over and make sure they've got the podcast sticker. So those are actually the two first people that had a sticker for the podcast. It's two kids that have never listened to it. But, you know, so there's the merch for the podcast. And it's like... If you don't know about it, I'm advertising. And why wouldn't I advertise for something that I'm doing and I believe in? Which I absolutely do because to me, this podcast isn't about me because I don't need to be here because I need the guest here. I want to highlight everybody that comes on because I want to celebrate my friends that are doing fantastic things, that God is at work in your life and in Twitch space and in the digital realm and wherever you might be doing ministry. I mean, today it might be one place. Tomorrow it might be someplace else. Who knows what God is going to do in our lives? And so I just want to highlight and encourage others. I mean, that's pretty much what I'm trying to do. Absolutely.

And, you know, that's one of the things that I try to tell Benjamin. I guess he was kind of inspired with you. You know, at REACH he heard your talk about how...

I'm going to show you I'm not going to stream.

And he's like, huh. And he's like, you know, maybe there's something to this. I'm like, yeah, there is. And, you know, it's kind of weird because, like, I've been so. busy with regular counseling, trying to launch my own counseling practice, and getting ready to go into a maximum security prison in two, well, I guess 12 days, where I will be serving coffee, cookies, meals to 42 inmates that are there, and who knows what kind of impact that's going to have. Stream has been kind of non-existent for the last few months but uh you know my wife is still doing her stream from from time to time and so is my oldest son but you know the lord has kind of said hey i need you to do these other things and i've kind of had to put stream on back burner

Well, in a lot of ways, and we'll get into the how did you get to start streaming and the other things you have going on, but there are different seasons in life where you do more things and they grow into other things and then God opens the door to something else and it ramps down some other area that you were doing things in. I can think about those things in my life where I've had opportunities where coaching has been an integral part of what I did. And I'm not doing that right now. It's just not the season for me. I mean, if the door opens up again, I would love to. And just those that don't know, I've coached wrestling and I've coached state champions. I've coached cross country and I've coached state champion and started a program from ground zero. I've got a niece that runs. I love to go watch her run cross country. And I just found out that my nephew is doing track and the coach told him that he should go do the two mile. And I'm thinking, ooh, If he does well, I need to go encourage him to do cross country so I can go watch him run cross country. And you know, it's just like the excitement about helping someone get there. I love that opportunity as a coach. And so in some ways I'm taking those same skills into the digital space with digital ministry, but the door's not open right now for me to coach. So any opportunities that I have, I'm just like, Hey, if God opens it, great. If not, that's not what I'm supposed to be doing right now.

Absolutely. And, you know, thinking about coaching specifically, that's one of those scenarios that if God opens the door to you, you know, you have that opportunity to disciple to people as well. And so, like, you know, we all that need that Timothy, that Bartholomew and someone who we're pouring into, someone that's pouring into us and someone that's like a hype guy. I'm here no matter what.

Yeah. Yeah. And that's what I like to do here is I'm the hype guy. I'm bringing you on because I want to hype you up. I want people to know about your story, how God has been using you, whether it is in the digital space or not, because you're a person, whether we're together or whether we're online, and God is using you in every space that he has you in. Absolutely. Just looking if there's anything in chat. And if there's anything to see on your side of chat and you want to address it, we're doing shared chat. So the one and only CreepyPro comes in, and he always drops the lurk, God bless you guys, and the bot picks up the fact he says God in there, and it says God settles in with a beverage, a snack, a notepad to enjoy the stream. And I find that fun because, like, you know what god could settle in and just watch this stream like he's just settled in he knows where we're gonna go he's he's here to see who comes in and where we where we uh interact with people and it's like i know it's doing the wrong thing because that's not what it's necessarily supposed to be doing it's supposed to say the one and only creepy pro settles in but because he adds that message It takes God the first word he posts in there. And I just find that like, huh, what a beautiful image of doing something to the glory of God. Yeah, I hope he's watching us right now. I hope he's settled in with a nice, well, he doesn't need a beverage and a snack, but the sentiment is there.

He's got his own man up. But, you know, at the same time, I'm reminded that, you know, where two or three are gathered, we're two that are gathered. Absolutely. He's there with us.

Yeah. Well, I do like to start with our conversations around Twitch because that's how I'm connecting with most everyone that's on my podcast is from Twitch. So how did you first find out about Twitch or end up on Twitch? And if that story is different than, hey, I decided I was going to go there and stream, then focus on how did you get started streaming?

Ooh, we have a really loaded question there. Oh, I like that. so where do i begin with this i suppose i don't even know how i found out about twitch it's just one of those things that i come to come to know organically and one of my friends from back home um in arkansas before before we moved to alabama was with streaming and you know he he wasn't uh he wasn't a christian streamer he i i don't even know if he's a believer to be honest but uh i was like you know that's something i've been thinking about doing and then uh covet happened and i'm like well okay let's just let's just go ahead and do that and you know when when i first started and i've shared this uh message with with those i think at reach but i've definitely shared it on my channel a few times when i first began my motives were a hundred percent selfish i wanted i i wanted to earn a little bit of passive income doing something i was already going to be doing anyways playing video games and uh you know in this world of twitch and digital digital uh streaming politics and religion are quite taboo to talk about yes regardless of what the belief is it's it's a taboo subject so people are like oh we don't talk about that and i was one of those people i was like you know we're not going to talk about politics we're not going to talk about religion i don't want to divide anybody and then i was confronted with that if you deny me before men i'll deny you before my father and i'm like i'm not really denying but i'm much closer to to denial than i am acceptance and so like that really challenged my heart and i was like okay we're gonna we're gonna start talking about God, slightly. And, yeah, slightly didn't happen.

That ended up becoming a full-blown thing.

And, you know, we talk politics. We talk everything on the stream. We just want to be very raw, very real, respectful, of course. You know, if people have different opinions. That's cool. I'm not here to say that my opinion is the right opinion or that you don't belong if you don't think as I do. If I like red, you like blue, or I like blue, you like red. However that goes, you want pineapple on pizza and I don't. I don't know. I feel like somewhere in the grand scheme of things that we as people globally have forgotten how to have tough discussions and to do so with respect. It's not that I'm trying to like... i'm right and you're wrong and by golly help me to understand why you think the way you do and you know in in doing so where's our common ground because it's there if you're willing to seek it out you're going to find common ground

Yeah, absolutely. I think you're right that somewhere along the way, and I'm sure that at some point, scientists or historians are going to help us be able to figure out where, or I should say sociologists, whoever it is, is going to be able to pinpoint what that was. In some regards, I think that the 24-hour news cycle contributed to that. And for sure, suddenly seeing that everything was going on in the world was happening and it made everything feel much more. And like this, this drives me nuts that the news often says that this is the most important thing going on right now. This is the most important. And they'll go, this is the most important in my election in my lifetime. How can it be the most important? I don't know if it's the most important until I look back. So the only way to know what's the most important is to have hindsight and they hype everything up and they sell us on fear. And when we run into people that disagree with us because we're operating out of fear, we now think that there must be something wrong with the other person, and so we either want to attack them or we don't want to be with them, and we start to silo ourselves, and we've lost the great ability to go have a heated discussion, a verbal disagreement civilly, and then sit down and have a meal together with the same person. Like, what do you mean you can meet with the person that totally disagrees with you? I would say if you find me in my town sitting down with a pastor in town to have a beer, we do not agree on very much at all in politics. We're going to vote for different things. But the thing that we have in common is we love our community and we love each other. And that's the only thing I need to have in common. I should say, and we love Christ. So, you know, we've got three things in common that I think are the most important thing.

And I think that's important too. It's kind of funny because I shared the story with you about my pastor randomly text messaging me and I was like, hey, are you familiar with the church digital? I was like, as a matter of fact, I am. And so, you know, we never know how or when that's going to get out there. You know, my, my pastor has kind of pointed out as, as I've kind of got, it got us into discord and he's like, he's like, I find it funny that there's an application called discord that is bringing more people together.

I love it. I love it. That like, I love the irony of things. And, and one of my favorite, favorite Seinfeld episodes, I don't quote Seinfeld on this stream too often. My other stream I do, but. jerry's returning something and they're asking the reason for why he's returning it and he says for spite and it's just like it's just so honest that they can't accept it and they won't let them return it why change my mind it didn't fit no you said spite you're stuck with it you're stuck with spike because that's what she is like We sometimes just take ourselves too seriously around a lot of stuff. And so to be able to not take yourself too seriously, but to take your love of God very seriously. And to go back to when you were talking about earlier, the deny me before men, the other side of that, that... I've tried to approach is, I think it's 1 Peter, that is always be ready to give a defense for the hope that you have. But if I'm not giving hope, I don't ever get asked for the reason for the hope I have. So I can't be hiding my faith because then I'm not giving hope to anybody. So different approach, different thought there. But I was just thinking that as you were mentioning another piece there.

I like that you mentioned that one because, I don't know, probably about two years or so after I started streaming and I changed my rules. We're going to talk about God and yada, yada, yada, yada. I was doing a Bible study of sorts. I don't remember which one it was. It might have been the F-260 plan, but that verse kind of was part of the plan, and it resonated with me. I'm like, okay. You know, not a, was I, I don't know, borderline denial, but I also wasn't like proactively opening that door for, you know, for somebody to ask that question. And it's kind of funny thinking about it because there's a lot of people that... either either think i'm a pastor or think i'm supposed to become a pastor and i'm like i don't i don't think that's god's plan for me and and like even still like you may you met benjamin at reach conference he's uh all the time he's like i think god's you know god's wanting you to be a pastor i'm like i don't think he does like I think there's a ministry for me, for sure. And, you know, everything I've ever done, nothing has ever felt like ministry until I left my IT job doing cybersecurity. to become a counselor because God called me into that about four years ago. And that has felt like ministry. And it's been really amazing. And praise the Lord. Because counseling is one of those also kind of oddly taboo things where they recognize that religion, spirituality is super important. It's good for the healing. But, oh, we don't talk about that. why why would you acknowledge this is important but don't talk about it and then of course i'm like how do i do this because god has called me into this i can't not talk about god and you know as it so happens we get to if the client engages in on that so i pray for those opportunities and uh god is faithful to answer those prayers because you know i've had clients outright ask hey can we make faith a part of our counseling session yes absolutely so you know just being able to do that and to, I don't know, it's so cool to see where

how and where god drives that we sometimes think that a pastor has to have a degree depending on your denomination they have to have an ordination they have to have this really specific event or honor or whatever it is and we forget at times that sometimes we serve in the role of shepherding people without a title of shepherding people and so to that degree maybe he's seeing that skill set within you now maybe he's thinking you should preach because he likes to hear you talk and and those things and you know what there are those opportunities you don't have to be a pastor to be able to preach or to teach or to do any of those things so maybe there's a giftedness there so you know the fact that we have gotten to the point and i've said this on a few podcasts and who knows maybe eventually i'll write something more concrete about this and and fully form my ideas but the The fact that we've gotten to the point that we sometimes default to clergy to do the work of ministry, I think is a detriment. And what I see right now is, I don't know if it's going to be a reformation, but that's what I think it is. I think we're at the beginning, potentially, and only down the road will people be able to see that God has been taking the work of ministry out of the hands of clergy and putting it into the hands of the people. And that's what I see going on at Twitch and in other digital spaces, that God is moving in so many people right now. And the church is going to, in the next 20 years, have to figure out how to respond to it. But we're not going to be able to stop it. We're not going to be able to control it because the Holy Spirit is leading people and saying, hey, you know what? There's people over here that you could touch. How about you share your faith with them? How about you start caring for them? Yeah, you don't have the counseling degree, but you're going to over-shepherd them and care for them and guide them with what you already have. And you're going to rely on me instead of rely on an education. Instead of relying on a degree, you're going to have to be relying on the Holy Spirit to... be a disciple maker, to be a mentor, to be a shepherd, to be whatever role he's pulling you into, which I see, depending on the personality, he's doing all of those things in digital space right now.

Yeah, and that goes kind of in hand with, you know, what they talked about REACH this past year with some people being bards and some people, you know, we all, we're not all hands, we're not all feet. Some of us are smelly armpits that holds everything else together. And, you know... I also think it's funny that you use the term shepherd because as I've shared with Benjamin, I don't see myself as a pastor per se. And I know shepherd and pastor kind of, I don't know, in a lot of ways. I do see myself as a shepherd. And I'm like...

it's it's it's very well one reason i try to use the term shepherd is because it's more of a role that you are filling as opposed to when someone says pastor they have the idea of a preacher and so that's why and and if i you know if if you know the the a past apostle prophet evangelist shepherd teacher i fall under shepherd teacher and so i actually like shepherd teacher and coach as a title more than pastor but i use pastor because i am ordained and i don't want people to find out later that oh you're that kind of a person so you know that's one reason it's you know in in my name when i stream is i just don't want to have people find out later and then say oh you're baiting switching me nope you know right up front who you're dealing with i am who i am and i don't take myself more seriously than i should At least I hope not. I mean, my name is all tongue in cheek to be funny and fun and not to be super serious.

Yeah, absolutely. I think you're spot on. And, you know, as far as like... The shift dynamic and kind of thinking about the role of pastor, like there's a lot of people that are in the church walls. You know, a majority of churches across the U.S. are going to be full tomorrow when they're not normally full, just because it's Easter. Praise God for that. But at the same time, there's a lot of people that go to... church within the church walls that thinks it's the pastor's job to do this this this this this this this this this this this one person can't do all that um you know they they need they need need elders they they need deacons they need they need they need they need people to be the hands and feet every church out there needs needs volunteers they they need the laymen to kind of step up and to fill the gap because the pastors are a lot of them are over worked um And Beloved Bison, I think, spells it out perfectly there. Preferring apprentice of Jesus to follower.

Yeah, I was just seeing that too. Beloved Bison. I love that idea. Saying, I prefer apprentice of Jesus to follower of Jesus. I like that idea. I'm going to play around with that thought in my mind. I don't know if I'm going to fully adopt it, but I like the thinking of what that makes my mind do. I'm not just following like I'm a tag along. I am an apprentice. I am becoming like him. And I know that's the intent in the original there as well, that a follower of a rabbi, which Jesus was, the intent was to look like the rabbi, to act like the rabbi, to think like the rabbi. So I like that. I appreciate you sharing that.

One of our core values that we comb through during our newcomers meetings is... when we first developed it uh and i by we i really mean my pastor and the college group that kind of kind of came up with this because so we started as a college group and and then like became more but uh there was a be uh be like jesus and then they slashed through the word like be jesus like be be the real you know and and and it's it's it's not like We can sit here and, oh, I just got to try harder. Oh, I just got to try. That's not what it's about. And we miss the message when we're like, oh, I just got to try harder.

Yeah. I, in some ways, like the idea of I need to reflect Jesus. So when you see me, am I a reflection of Jesus? Yeah, I know I'm not going to be Jesus. But is there any semblance of you seeing Christ-likeness exuding from me? And I hope it's more and more, and I hope it's more today than it was last week, and I hope it's more next week and next year than it was last year, you know. Absolutely. Ah, so Beloved Bison saying I can't take credit for it comes from the book Practicing the Way by John Mark Comer. Change your entire mindset. The tagline of the book is be with Jesus, become like him, do as he did. Oh, that's a nice tagline. That's a nice tagline. I know some of his stuff. I might have to go check that out, Practicing the Way. I've heard of it, but I haven't checked it out. And I do have a couple of audiobook credits that I need to spend somewhere, so I'll see if I can get that one.

Speaking of audiobook credits, there's actually two that I think that are worth picking up if you haven't heard them. You're familiar with Dr. Hills, correct? I'm not sure. Okay, so he's a Twitch streamer. He's also a pastor. Started out as a youth pastor. He's in Central Northern Tennessee. I forget exactly where, but he's in Tennessee. He was at Reach the first year that it went. I didn't see him there this past year, but he wrote a book called Courageous that I think is... It's not under Dr. Hills for that one. You're going to be looking for Jeff Evans, but... That's a great book. And then another one that I thought accompanied it very well is a book called Your Story Has a Villain. It's kind of – are you familiar with C.S. Lewis' Screwtape? Oh, yeah, yeah. So it kind of uses a little bit of that in there but phrases it more around the – the spiritual warfare that we are constantly under. And it's a great book to follow that one up with.

Okay. Okay. Yeah, I do know Dr. Heals. Haven't had a lot of conversation with what I have. Yeah, I have seen him around in the Twitch sphere. And I might have to go check that book out and follow up with him and see what he's up to and what's going on there. I love getting introduced to new people and I love connecting people to other people. I mean, that's like my... My kids have always been amazed at some level of being able to connect with different people. And we would like travel to places on vacation. Like we went on vacation in Washington, D.C. And I'm in D.C. running into people I know. Like, it's just like, I can't go somewhere. I mean, I even went to Africa and ran into people I knew who I didn't know were going to be in Africa. Like I'm going to a giant continent, a world away. And I run into people that I know along the way. So it's kind of one of those things. And then I'm always, my ears are always open. And one of the things I do, those that I don't talk about myself very often or what I do, like one of my roles of the church digital is tangible resource director. So that's one of my roles is to know, oh, You have a need in your ministry who's doing things that can help fill the need that you have. What organization, what tools are out there? So being more aware of more things is fantastic things.

And I apologize. I said it was courageous. It's lionhearted. I started rethinking about that. I've done that several times.

But, yeah, it's a great book.

Okay. And then the other one is Your Story Has a Villain by Jonathan Pokluda. He's also a pastor. I want to say he's in Texas.

Okay. but my list of books is always longer than my time to read i just keep adding books but i've always taken the and i'll just say this too anybody that does the podcast listening sometimes you're listening to a podcast and you don't finish and then you start another one and you like i'm all good with that like however far you make it i hope you glean something valuable out of it before you tune out and that's how i treat books if i've gotten something valuable about it from the book. It was worth me picking it up. And if I don't finish, I still got something valuable out of it. And I've had a couple of books that I did not like. And I hung in there for a couple of hundred pages until I got something valuable. And I went, I've got it. And then I put the book down. But

most of the time that's not the case but a couple of times it's like oh i know i'm supposed to get something out of here because somebody recommended it to me i don't know what it is but i'm going to find that gem that i need and then and then be able to apply that someplace in my life absolutely you know and and me you know i'm not really a reader i read because i know it's important yeah so if i can if i can if i can pull it in through through audiobook or you know a video or something like that Oh, it's so helpful. Yeah. Yeah.

I've only just started the audio book thing. So that's where it's like, oh, I've got credits because I just I signed up last year for the first time. And part of that is I'm often traveling and it's not always the most convenient to get a book out, to put the book away, to get the book out, to put that, you know, when you have those little moments. But if I can just hit. listen and start playing and keep going and moving forward with it i will probably get a lot more and then there's some that'll be oh i definitely want to read this not listen to it so it just depends yeah and you know there's there's been a couple that uh i've kind of done both with i'll like follow along and read it while i'm listening to it you know try try yeah i've done that i've done that as well well if i've if like in those spaces where you're doing that and i'm not doing anything else yeah it's easy to and the other thing i'm an incredibly slow reader so if i were to read a book it's taking me hours and upon hours to read i've done speed reading tests i've done training i do not like to read fast My brain doesn't want to process this that way. But listening, I'm up to three speed on podcasts. Like, I mean, if you're listening to three speed of this podcast, I love you, man. That's awesome. You can binge this and a whole bunch of other stuff and enjoy it unless you're here live. And then I'm not going to speed up talking faster for you. I'm sorry, but I don't know how to talk fast unless I get really excited.

Yeah, I'm right there with you. I read slow. And even then, because of my ADHD, if I read it, I'll be like, what did I just read? And it's not that I don't want to get it. It's just I have to read it and reread it and reread it. And you know what? Once it's there, it's there. But that's a task.

Yeah, yeah. There's a lot of things like that. And I love the variety of options that we have nowadays and starting to lean into the places that you learn better from. And there are absolutely some podcasts, oh, there's no way I can listen to them on that fast a speed. I have to slow down and I can't do something else while I'm listening to those podcasts because the concepts are outside of the realm where I have frameworks to hang them. And so I have to pay more attention to them. as opposed to someone just telling me a wonderful story. I can listen to that really fast and just enjoy it and see where it's going to go. So maybe back up here. So you started out with, hey, I'm going to just spend some time on Twitch. I'm already there. Maybe I'll make a little bit of money on the side. I'll get... partner whatever whatever the dream was and then you were you had this confrontation how quickly did you decide to make changes and how was that for your community when you went from no we don't talk about these things to hey wait a minute we're going to address these you know i i gotta i gotta say i'm i'm lucky in that regard because it came i don't know fairly early i'd only been streaming for

six months and you know didn't have a large following um i don't even think i had my first hundred at that at that point in time i was barely an affiliate and uh you know that was one of those things that normally i wrestle a lot like when god called me into counseling i wrestled a lot um but when it came to that i'm like Okay. Hearing you loud and clear. And we're like, I pretty much changed that. The, the very next dream. I was like, so I was like, okay, this is, this is what we're going to do. I don't know how we're going to do it. I don't know how I'm going to be able to maintain it. But I was confronted with this, so we've got to do that. And you know, the community has, has been okay with it. Generally what I, what I try to do just because I do a lot of gaming is I start my streams off with a devotional. Sometimes the devotionals are longer, sometimes they're shorter, but the devotional comes first and then we get into some. some gaming and then we always close with prayer and you know i kind of do that format just because those that don't necessarily want to want to hear the religion They know what's coming in there in the beginning. So, like, if that's not what they want, okay, show up later. If it's what they want, show up early. And, you know, if you're just for the games, that's fine too. You know, some people are, you know, they're, I don't know. They've made up their mind one way or the other. Some people are on the fence and, you know. Again, I just try to approach that with some mercy, some grace. Try to show love and meet them where they are. Just throw them for a loop one day and throw it right in the middle of a stream. You know, I'm not going to lie. I have been tempted on more than one occasion to do that.

Maybe what you do is you put a redeem in there for redeem a devotion or redeem prayer time. i don't know do you have like i have i have on my stream redeemed prayer so that anybody can just like hey i need prayer right now we can stop what we're doing and and pray for that person because i don't want a person in need of prayer to have to wait to the end of my stream i'm not saying you are but i'm saying that's that's my approach to it is to allow it so that Hey, you know what? We're building a relationship and maybe you don't often ask for it, but you start to watch other people ask. And then when you have a need, you're like, I don't know if I really believe in this, but I'm hearing other people do it. So I'm not opposed to it. I don't know if it'll work. I don't know what will happen, but can you? So I've tried to work in that direction. I know plenty others do the same.

Yeah, I love the idea with the redeem. I think that could definitely be an interesting dynamic to change things up and kind of take me out of the comfort zone, but also open up that opportunity for who knows what somebody needs in that moment.

As for prayer, you know, I kind of...

probably should have a redeem there but but i put it in the discord and i kind of use discretion there yeah like you know there's there's there's times where it's like oh this is this is serious i'm in the middle of a match oh well let's pray um and and like you know there's most of the time i wait till i wait till the end but like sometimes it's like this this warrants prayer right now so we're gonna we're gonna pray about it right now and uh i don't know

Yeah, and I think that's one of those things with, you know, trusting the Holy Spirit in the moment. And I'm not, like, I'm just sharing things that I've had other people on the podcast and things that I do and what they're talking about. But it also doesn't mean you need to copy us and adapt what we're doing because that might not be what your community needs. You know, your community might need more of the structure of we have it at the beginning, we have it at the end. no more. So that like you're saying, the people that don't want it, don't suddenly feel like you're changing and putting it down their throat. So, I mean, it's, it's totally like Jay live in some ways does similar approaches to things. Here's where it is. It's over here. The rest of the time we're building relationships. And then if you trust me enough and you want to come for that piece, here's where that other piece is. So if you don't, we're not kicking you out of the community you're part of the community i love that and i think we've said this on many different podcasts the invitation to belong before you believe i think is a valuable valuable thing and i i think i think that's uh that's important because like

you're on the fence or even worse you've you've got religious trauma and there's people that do the last thing you want is here take this yes yes yeah there's definitely places where we have not listened to all of the wisdom of scripture where

b i'm trying to remember the phrasing that it is have a good reputation with those outside the church and if that's how we're treating people we don't have a good reputation out with outsiders with non-believers and so we need to take seriously our reputation with outsiders and that's one of those ways that we can is to treat them you know with the golden rule how they want to be treated and i don't want anybody coming and you know attacking me with their beliefs no matter what they are you know flat earth or what who is the greatest of all time in whatever sports i don't want you attacking me you want to invite me into a conversation where we can we can talk about what our thoughts are okay but you coming at me out of nowhere with no invitation no i i don't want any part of that

Yeah, absolutely. And even thinking about that from a scripture standpoint, we're called to make peace with everybody as long as we're able to. It's not make peace if you guys think the same or believe the same way or anything like that. We make peace. Blessed are the peacemakers. Yes, not peacekeepers, peacemakers.

You need to be the one who is bringing peace to the space if we want to go in that direction.

And it's not always easy. In fact, most days it's very, very difficult. And most days it goes very much against my flesh and what I naturally want to do. You know, that's where I've just got to let God keep working on me, lean towards him, and trust that his way is better than my way.

I tend to find out, not usually right away, because I'm a slow learner at times. I tend to find out later that, yes, his way was way better than what I wanted. And I'm usually really, really impatient, like you, going into this like, oh, I really, I'm like, I want to be partner. Affiliate? Yeah, down. Now let's go partner and let's go at it. And it's like... I've had a couple of conversations, probably at Reach, with a couple of people, because Banana as a Hannah, who's been on here, was blowing up. And so I know it was in the Reach community. I don't remember who I had conversations with. And it was like, I'm not prepared for that. I am not prepared to have that many views and that many messages and that many trolls coming at me. um i'm not i'm not ready for that i don't want that i i think i want the accolades i think i want the finances i think i want the influence but frankly i'm not ready for that thrust i i really know i need to be in this for a seasoning before i get anywhere that way and frankly i would rather have Five people who've been on my podcast that make it to that level, that would be a much better thing for me than me being the one person that could make it there kind of a thing.

Oh, yeah, absolutely. And, you know, I tend to be one of those in a lot of ways that's kind of I'm a doer, you know, a little overzealous, maybe trying to start my counseling business right back to that. And I'm like, man, I should I should have a physical location already. I should already have client number one. I should I should I should I should I should. And, you know, God is saying, wait, there's a season, there's a process. And, you know, he's he's used people like. like benjamin to challenge that hey is is is that really what god is saying or is that that's something that billy wants i'm like oof it's it's me just just my name on the door boom

Yeah, and so, you know. Which is funny because we started out with the, I'll show you and those that don't know. I love to joke around about this and it is tongue in cheek to some degree, but there is truth in this. I did, like when people kept telling me, when are you going to stream? And kept asking me for six months, when are you going to stream? And I'm like... i don't fit into the twitch ecosystem i'm like an odd person here okay like nobody's gonna wanna watch me like i'll prove to you nobody wants to watch me i'll read the bible you know what i'm gonna do sermon prep as like who wants to show up to watch i mean You're not going to watch it. I just could not fathom that people would want to spend as much time listening to the Bible and going through a process. And I was like, I don't know what else to do. I was like, yeah, I'm not good at games. And I keep trying to do this. And it's so fun to go look at my numbers when I'm gaming and the number of people that show up and the number of people that show up when I'm talking. like i'm reading the bible or i'm doing a podcast yep people people show up the numbers steadily climb as the the hour goes on to the next hour and we have engagement and the chat's going on But I still game, like, every Monday on this channel just so that I can tell you when the next podcast is. And so I'm streaming on Monday, and I'm going away. And I get so consumed sometimes in the middle of the game, and all of a sudden I notice, oh, hey, there's chat. How you doing over there? Like, it's so easy for me to ignore them. And, by the way, Supersonic, I'm not ignoring you. I did see that you – and I don't have it on this channel. He's a faithful follower on my other channel. I have a redeem a spot of tea and he loves to come in here and just highlight his message and redeem a spot of tea, even though I don't have it. So a spot of tea for you, friend, a spot of tea. And I am drinking blueberry Merlot this evening. I have a blueberry Merlot, which is a lovely blueberry flavor tea.

I have the delightful diet, Dr. Pepper tea and the water tea.

water yeah yes well i have the empty and and the still partially full so i've i've still got More time to do the podcast until we're empty and then we're out of here. There you go. You know, the little things like that, that just shows like how you develop and build relationships with people. And Supersonic has been on my other channel before doing a collab together, talking different things. And Supersonic was at reach, hanging out at the Airbnb with me at the... So the first year... Big Gilbert and I were bunkies, and then Supersonic was one of my bunkies at the second year. And who knows what next year will be? Or I should say this year. I'm still thinking next year. The next one, who knows what it's going to be. Every time you get to... hang out with people for an extended amount of time whether it's a three-hour podcast and and hanging out or it's three hours you got back to the airbnb at midnight and you're talking until three in the morning it's just so much fun to start to develop deepness in relationships and go in places that I can't plan what's gonna come up on a podcast. No matter if I plan the questions, I can't plan what you say and I get curious about and we go in a direction that I don't know we're gonna talk about. No, some things like, I know you're working towards your counseling degree and all of that. So have you finished your degree, your certification, all that? I knew you were close. You were getting to the end of all of that. So how long, what process was that for you?

So that was probably about a three, three and a half year process for me. You know, it's kind of one of those things when I was 16, 17, I wanted to be a counselor, interestingly enough. I wanted to work with... with married couples and children, which, by the way, is the two groups I don't want to work with now. But, you know, and I think that stems from, like, I had a traditional family, but my traditional family was very broken. My dad would drink all the time and like want to fight me and, you know, praise the Lord. He's he's doing much better now. And, you know, that's something that he had to realize for himself that it was consuming him. And he did. But. So for a long time, we had a very rough relationship. He was there just as the financial provider for my mom when she was battling cancer. And so I wanted to be like, okay, no family should ever have to go through this. No kid should ever have to do this, go through these sort of things. know i turned 17 joined and joined the air national guard served for for 18 years went to iraq in 05 afghanistan in 2012 when my first son was born and um you know i've done i've done a lot of different things You know, I started out working on aircraft and then I went into supply and then I ended up in doing IT cybersecurity, which is what I did for the last several years. And, you know, it paid well, had great benefits. And then God's like, hey, I need to be a counselor now. I'm like.

what what it's like do you god do you know who you're talking to i'm not well spoken i'm awkward i'm blah blah blah blah blah oh yeah i know that conversation i know that conversation i'm in the process right now and i haven't talked about this on the podcast but i'm in the process right now of working on a book where part of of my whole premise in the book is moments of those conversations I don't know if this will actually be the title of the book and when it comes out, but I'm taking the motif of your GPS keeps telling you, recalculating, recalculating. Oh, I like that. Recalculating. So that's the theme is events in my life that cause a recalculating. So we're talking about the steps, the small steps, and this is trying to look back and see small steps that weren't small. They were just in a direction that changed things from the direction I was going. And so it was a roundabout way. It was a detour. It was a, we're not going to like, if we want to go through the Exodus, you know, he went the roundabout way because if they'd have gone up here, they would have seen the enemy and they would have wanted to go back to Egypt. So he takes on the roundabout way while they end up wanting to go back to Egypt anyway. So, you know, it's like, I understand that. Like you try to help it and make it easier for me. And I'm still fighting you. all along the way so i know a lot of people like to look at the old testament and view it as why didn't those knuckleheads ever get it right and i look at the old testament i go i know why they didn't get it right because i'm like them that's like you know if if i were to pick you know of the names in in scripture israel the one who is wrestling with god like i think that's the best name there is in there like i constantly am in that battle with i don't want to give you control of my life i like control i like the thought i have control even when i don't i like to pretend i do and think i do i know i don't but why do you have to keep bringing up and pointing out i don't

Well, and even then, when God says, hey, here's your Joshua, here's your Caleb, oh, no, I got this figured out. I don't need them. It's just like, yes, we do. And when God called me into counseling, not only did I wrestle with that, I had to break the news to my wife. She was absolutely, I don't want to move to Alabama, period. she wasn't working at the time um we we had three boys i was told that my job in the uh arkansas air national guard was going away they would be coming back in two to six months plan on six i was like we we we need something like yesterday and it just so happened to be that like my know my boss at the time was used to do the same thing for the for the alabama guard and uh she's like she was still on the email chain she's like hey i'm trying to fill all these positions if anyone's interested i'm like ooh me so like when i got that call back to um to be a counselor. My wife was like, I thought you wanted to move to Alabama because of the IT jobs. I was like, that was true. She's like, counseling's probably going to pay less. I was like, that's probably true. God's calling me into this. And truth be said, it pays a lot less. I took like a 50% pay cut. But it's been worth it. Is it all good? No. But is it all bad? No, absolutely not. There's been far more blessing than what I was prepared for. The lives that I get to impact, the ones who are open to faith being a being a part of their thing uh you know i really get to kind of be like hey you're you're struggling here and i'm hearing these things that are that you're that you're telling yourself and these are lies these are lies from the enemy who comes to kill steal and destroy here's what god says about this and you know kind of kind of like rebuild them up yeah um as you've been going through this whole process toward towards counseling and streaming

Is there a tendency to want to step in to counsel people that are in your community? Or is there a easy line to say, no, I'm not in that role. I'm just here to be a community developer and a friend in Christ, a disciple or evangelist, whatever role you're fitting for that. Is there an easy line to keep that? Or is there a tendency to kind of go, oh, I could help them?

so so it varies and there there are times when you know just totally to be transparent i do overstep that line you know so somebody says something and i'm like i have to challenge this um and you know and and then there's other times i'm just like okay i really want to but okay i don't know i i had a client that talks about lilith being the first uh the first woman and and adam complained and then things were changed and i'm like philly wanted to butt in but i didn't i'm just like okay and uh yeah supersonic talking about uh will paul being cool um i guess after he crashed at y'all's place for the night he stayed with us after afterwards i'm glad i'm glad he's a small guy because the room we were in says there was room for five and technically that's true but not really and uh so so you know he had his spot on the bed and then i had i'm a large guy i had the rest of the bed but you know we do we made it work And it was a great time getting to hang out and yeah.

Yeah. So let me just focus on Reach because you and I have both gone a couple of times. So where did you first get connected with Reach? Were you one of the ones that, like myself, got invited to do the Alpha course? And did you do that or did you not do it and you just came along for the conference later?

So I was one of the ones that was invited to do the Alpha course. And, of course, I'm like, man, I don't know about this. I'm cool doing my devotionals. I feel like that's stepping out there for me. But, you know, at the same time, there's that little nudge, that little pull that's like God's like, yeah, I know you're in deep water, but I need you to get in a little deeper water. And, you know, as I wrestled with that, you know, I was also coming to terms with, God doesn't call us to be comfortable, you know, and the more we spend time allowing ourselves to get uncomfortable, especially for his kingdom and his work. the bigger our impact is for his glory.

Yeah, yeah. I don't know if you've heard this phrase. Pastors, I know, hear this phrase and use it occasionally. We do a little tongue-in-cheek where you're going through the different things that Jesus said he came to do, which is to comfort the afflicted, and we like to throw in, and to afflict the comfortable. Because sometimes when we get comfortable... Like we need something to come against us because otherwise we fall into the thinking that I'm the one that did all of this. I'm the one that accomplished all of this instead of remembering that it's God who did it. And even if it's my own ability, he gave me the ability. So if I can't directly see that He did it and it was outside of me because I'm not strong enough to accomplish that, if I think I am strong enough, well, He's the one that made me strong enough. So no matter how you slice it, we need to always be honoring and reflecting God's work in and through whatever we accomplish. And so that's one of those reasons why we kind of got to throw that around there, tongue in cheek, and to afflict the comfortable. Because some of us get really comfortable and we don't want to change and we don't want to grow and we just want to maintain But I like to point out if you look at fruit, there are only two stages of fruit, ripening or rotting. So you are continuously ripening until the moment it is ripe and then you are rotting. There is no maintenance of ripe. You cannot maintain ripe. I know you go to the store, you think it is. It's still on the process of ripening or rotting when you pick it up at the store.

The closest you get to that is with cheese.

And even then it's not really the same. We won't go down the rabbit trail of cheese. I could go down that one for a while.

You're a little closer to a cheese country than I am.

You say that, but my favorite cheese is from Vermont. Okay. Well, I shouldn't say. Well, you're still closer to there, too. Yeah. I should say, of cheddar cheese, my favorite is from Vermont. My favorite overall is Welch cheese. You dragged me into it. I tried to say we're going to avoid this, and now I'm going to go down there. Welch Red Dragon cheese has mustard in the cheese. It is probably the most expensive cheese that I buy. There's a lady that is called the cheese lady. That's her shop. She imports cheese from all over the world. I keep trying all the cheeses. And during the summer, she's at our farmer's market. I allow myself once a month to buy it. It is, I want to say, the last time I bought it, like $30 a pound. Oh, wow. Yeah. So I'm not buying a pound of it. I'm buying a little tiny chunk, and it's gone the same day, and I wait another month until I can go buy it again. One of these days, if I ever, like I'm never buying a lottery ticket, but if I ever win the lottery, I'm going to buy a whole wheel of it. Going to buy a whole wheel of it.

I want a picture with a big wheel of cheese, and this is mine. That's probably one of the things I loved about Wisconsin is you go in there and they got... all these different cheeses and they let you try them all well not all of them but like a majority of them oh yeah um all the way up to like 12 year sharp cheddar at 12 years it was honestly too too sharp for me six years it's like oh it's so good but in eight years it's okay after eight years i'm like no it's too much yeah

I think after about eight, nine years, I couldn't really tell the difference anymore in the age of it. But my son was, I think my youngest was 11 or 12 when we went through Wisconsin one time and we did stop and do all the sampling. And we're like, this cheese is older than you. Would you like a piece of cheese that's older than you? And it's just like a mind twist on you to think that something older than you exists and you could consume it. There's a strange thought for you.

They had some that apparently that they kept in the back, but that was over 100 years old, and it was also like $100 an ounce. I'm like, I know what I'm not getting.

All right. I don't know where we were at right before we went on the cheese. I tried to avert it, but you said, no, here's the road. We're going to go down, and I gladly followed you. but let's just talk about as a streamer and this does not have to be limited to online aspects of this what have been some obstacles that you have faced and had to overcome with being intentionally sharing of your faith in the space and you know everything else that's going on in life having streaming be a part of what you do

Oh, man, I guess for me, you know, I've got three boys. My oldest is 13. My youngest is 7. I, you know, was working on school. My wife was working on school. They were in school. We were going here, there, and, you know, things get really busy. And, of course, they tend to stay that way, especially in October for us. It's just like there's something always going and, you know, october and it's like man what when when do i get time to just relax and then you know so i i try to fire upstream and then i'm just like i'm too tired or you know we we hit those we hit stages periodically where it's like man i just i'm not feeling it and sometimes we just got to be honest with our community and be like hey you know i'm i'm wanting to hang out with y'all but i'm i'm so tired or this game is irritating and i'm just not feeling it tonight and you know just trying to be be authentic i guess not feel like you're letting anyone down because like you know in in those moments where you know we gotta prioritize our our mental health we gotta prioritize um what is happening in real life what is happening in in stream and yes we get to impact people through streaming but at the same time if we're neglecting ourselves then we're we're not being as effective as we can in reaching the people that we're meant to reach

Yeah. And I think there is that real danger at times of feeling like this ownership of it and you're letting them down and you're not doing your best when you don't have your best to give and you feel guilty around that. But. You know, I love the example of Elijah, and I tend to think Elijah goes through a mental health crisis. I'm not a skilled professional. I don't want to diagnose him. But symptoms that I see him doing of crawling up, you know, segregating himself from everybody else, isolation, and then crawling up under. a tree not eating and saying i wish i were dead all of that to me says mental health crisis i'm not denying spiritual crisis as well but i i really see that and there are times where like he didn't have it he couldn't give it and then god didn't expect him of it either god didn't show up and say hey quit feeling sorry for yourself and get back to work he sent an angel to minister to him to prepare food for him and then say hey here eat and then did it again repeated that process and then said hey you got a journey to go we're going to go to this cave where you're going to be protected and you're going to be over here and so you can feel the comfort and safety that you need and then god showed up after that we sometimes don't allow ourselves to have those moments of My day couldn't get worse, but I still got to show up for people. And the moments of real vulnerability in stream, authenticity, that's the thing I just, I really love. I never, like, I don't, okay, so I've got a different experience than you. I still have the, oh, wait, am I letting people down? I still have that. But the authenticity of feeling I can be authentic is so refreshing versus being in the pulpit. Because I know at times when I get up in the pulpit, I've had people attack me for being vulnerable. I've had people come at me with being vulnerable about, hey, I'm having a rough week or I'm struggling with something. And like, you can't do that, pastor. You're not supposed to do that. And I have those. And it's like, I don't feel that problem at all when I'm on Twitch. And sometimes I probably a little bit too. Like, I just... had a lego set that i won for you know easter i was building it on stream and i'm voicing my frustration with building the lego set and i'm not shy about talking about like i think this is aggravating and i'm colorblind and the colors of the legos don't match the colors of the illustrations and i can't figure them out and it's just like frustrating and then like I could just hide that. I could just be hunky-dory. But it's like, why? Why would I be dishonest with you? You came to watch me. You didn't know necessarily I was going to do Legos today. I surprised you. We got done reading the Bible, and I'm doing a Lego build for the first time ever. I learned I'm not a Lego builder. This is not what I'm going to do on stream. There are plenty of people if you want to go see them. Mama Brick Builds is fantastic. She's been on the podcast. Go watch her. Agreed. Don't come watch me if you're looking for Legos. I mean, I'm not saying it won't happen again. If I win another Lego set from somebody, then maybe we'll do it again. But otherwise, not anytime soon.

know i i like the fact that you were you talked about how the angels came in and ministered to elijah you know jumped several books forward you know when jesus is being tempted in the wilderness yes and uh you know we we conclude and this this is you know literally somebody who is a hundred percent man and a hundred percent god who gets tempted Tell Satan to get behind him. And, you know, Satan didn't come to him when he was fresh. He didn't come when he was in his best, in his good times. He came when he was hungry. It had been 40 days. He's tired. He's wore out. He's isolated. He's alone. He's yada, yada, yada. And, you know, when he says, get behind me, the angels came and ministered to him.

Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, absolutely. At our weakest, you know, I don't know that I ever plan or know that I'll ever see angels administering to us, but there are several places throughout the Old Testament. And the New Testament says, when you entertain strangers, who knows if you've entertained angels, which is a reference back to Abraham with the three guests that come along, and two of them turn out to be angels going to Sodom and Gomorrah, but he's caring for them. And so You know, there's ways in which maybe I have encountered an angel at times when I've had a conversation or I needed a person and I just thought it was a person, but it was really an angel that was ministering to me. Or it was an angel, which I don't know if you've seen, Keanu Reeves just had a movie where he plays an angel. I can't remember the name of it. I just watched it. The point with it is... his job as a role as an angel is to ride around in cars when people are going to be distracted driving because they're texting and then save them from you know alert them so he keeps touching people on the shoulder and they look up and then they see and they stop and they don't get into an accident and then he doesn't do what he's supposed to after that but that's so i'm not ruining the movie but that's how it starts and it's just like What if there really is times where God does that to people, where he just kind of taps them on the shoulder and you see someone in need, and it's like, yeah, let me go step in and intervene. And it's just an angel that just alerts us to it. It brings our mind. It could be the Holy Spirit, however you want to view that. Yeah, maybe they're more actions and interactions with angels that we don't see and we don't realize. And sometimes it's leading us to do something or maybe it's someone else leading us to them to interact with us.

And I think that's the, that's the other side of it. The equation is you shared or don't realize, like, I think there's a lot of times because there's so many bad things happening in the world. It's like, oh, it's just another Tuesday. I don't think that's on accident. I think we're under spiritual attacks, spiritual warfare, a lot more than what we think we are. Now, granted, there are some times that we're, oh, I'm in a spiritual warfare. No, no, I just did something stupid. yeah you know there there's that too but like there's there's times when we're at war and we don't even recognize it so i i'm inclined to think that there are times where god is like hey and we don't even realize it

oh yeah yeah i mean it's it's one of those things that would be fun to see how often those those things are now i've had different moments in my life where i felt like oh god protected me and kept me out of it so i learned this lesson when i was living in big city and driving all over the place and i would be impatient on the road because people don't know how to drive and They're slow. And I want them to get out of my way. And I get a red light. And I'm just mad because I got a red light. And I get five miles down the road and there's an accident. And that accident just happened. And that accident's where I would have been. And I'm like, okay, I need to stop being upset by delays that are preventing me from being somewhere I'm not supposed to be. Why do I always get impatient? Because I want control. I always wish, like you've seen it in movies or, you know, some of you know that there's different signals that the fire department can send to change all the lights to match so they can go through. Like, I want that. I want to just be able to come up and, you know, or Bruce Almighty, turn all of the lights green and just drive. You know, it's like, that's the power I want.

would abuse it oh you you you and i both and you know i i would like to i would like to say i wouldn't but then i've i've thought about the many times of what what i would do in this scenario and i'm like i absolutely would and you know there's there's instances that i think i would do the right thing but there's absolutely instances where i know i wouldn't I couldn't be trusted to.

It's so easy to fall into what's in it for me and what do I want and to not think about the people around you, to not think of the people coming the other direction, to not think about anybody except I'm going to beat the red light. I'm going to speed up and everything will be fine. Not thinking about the fact that maybe I'm going to cause harm if I don't make the red light. I mean, don't beat it.

absolutely there's a british youtuber that i that i like to watch he's also got reels on facebook and whatnot he's he's a believer he said one of the scary things and he loves america he loves coming to visit america he but he said one of the scary things about coming to america is we give how far is is it from here to here in time increments yes and then proceed to try to beat the time oh yes apparently in um In England, you know, they're like, oh, it's this many kilometers or miles or whatever, you know. And that's what it is. Here it's like, oh, it's about 15 minutes. All right, I'm going to make it in 12.

Well, I've heard other people talk about when the GPS tells you how long it's going to be there, that's what you're going to beat is that time that it says. And, like, how much can I beat that time by? Oh, yeah. But I'll say my frustration with red lights goes way back all the way to starting to drive. And I would drive across town, and red light meant turn right because I wasn't going to sit. I can zigzag all over town. There isn't one way to get there. Red light, turn right. That was my motto. I'm not sitting still. I want to keep moving. I don't like to sit still. Sitting still, like, you know, like if there was a passage in scripture, especially when I was younger, now I can appreciate it. There was a passage in scripture that I wanted to erase. It was be still and know that I am God. I wanted to erase that. I don't want to be still. I don't ever, like, I constantly, like... i'm like why am i still shouldn't there be something i'm doing can i go do something well you know what am i what is there to do where when can i start what's the next thing being still is a learned skill that i still am not good at oh yeah and i thought you were gonna i'm gonna say something 23 but uh but yeah it's it's one of those things being still

Finding time to just be present, to listen, it's tough. And, you know, the enemy makes it even tougher because, you know, a lot of times he's like, hey, check out this distraction. Check out that distraction. And then, you know, we're not even focused on what's at hand. We're instead focused on the distraction.

Right, and thinking of distractions and being still. Like, we have devices whose sole purpose is for us to not be still and to hold on to those. And one of the things, and this happened by accident. I did not set out to have all of the fish that I have, and my stream knows the story. I was doing a message on Jonah and I bought five goldfish because in case one of them died or two of them died before Sunday, I'd make sure I'd have a goldfish that was going to make it to the children's message that I was going to do. And goldfish were only 10 cents, so I spent 50 cents. And then it was like, okay, they didn't die. Well, the kids had an aquarium from like, you know, 10 years ago that just kept traveling around with us when we kept moving. I'll get the aquarium out. So then I put them in there and then it was like, you know, I think I'm going to get a bigger aquarium and I'm going to get some koi. So I got a bigger aquarium and some koi. And then it just went from there to I have a pond now. And my wife loves to harass me. We like to do this with each other. Like when there's something that like, oh, we can just like, it's in love. It's in love. So it doesn't bother me. We do this with this. We have permission to say, okay, this is bothering me now. Please don't say it anymore. So we know that we can tease each other. And then if it does bother, we have permission to say no. So she loves to say, when I go buy something new for the pond or expand again. And how much is this five goldfish going to cost me now? Because without those five goldfish, I don't have this aquarium behind me or these two other aquariums back over here. I don't know how much you can see on stream or not. And then the pond outside, this is the point I was trying to get to. I had to give the back story for people that don't know. I love to sit by my waterfall and pond and be still. That is a space that I have created that allows me to be still. And we're just about the season where I'm going to turn the waterfall on and I'm going to go out and be able to sit there and just... be still and not have to think I have to do something. I can just be and enjoy the sounds and sit there and watch my fish. And so I'm getting excited about that. I was rainy today, but I snuck out there to do a few things and I'm really close to putting the fish in the back room, back out in the pond and starting it up and spending time. But we have to be intentional about those things.

I think it's interesting that one of the things I talk to clients about in the counseling world a lot is what we call grounding skills. And one of the, you know, there's deep breathing and there's things to take your mind off of things and whatnot. But one of the ones that a lot of people do and don't even realize that they do is is they get out with nature. They get out and they go on a hike, they get still by a waterfall or something like that. It's therapeutic just to get yourself out of past thinking, future thinking and just to be now.

yeah yeah i am i am one of those people that is future thinking all the time and so to be in the now is well i will say i love stream for that like we i'm in the now right now i am not thinking about what i have to do tomorrow i'm not thinking about what's coming up this week i'm like i am present because i'm engaged in the conversation where where it's going to entirely go where we're going to lead i didn't know i was going to talk about my fish i didn't know to talk about the pond i don't think i've talked about that on this on this channel um to that degree to say you know here's one of those step to the right or step to the left that led me in that direction because i did a children's message and i bought five goldfish like that's a thing you could not plan that i'm going to Well, my son and I dug the pond myself. And it was a series of, first I got a plastic one. Then my neighbor across the street said, hey, I love listening to the water. We've got an old pond. Would you like that? So I had to put a second layer on it. And then it was like, this is pretty cool. I want to build a bigger one. And we hand dug a five-foot by 14-foot by eight-foot pond. We dug it ourselves. That's my pond out there. And it ended up I had to... shorten it from five foot but you know it's four foot easily and it's like yeah that was i mean just a thing of i think beauty that i couldn't see that path that it was going to be there and i can't see the path like my goodness i was just looking at this podcast and going i could not see a year ago because i'm i'm crossing the threshold of being a year i don't know what my actual first date was i thought it might have been march or april i need to go back and look at the first podcast was but I did not know I was going to make it a year. In fact, when I started, I said, okay, I'm going to do this on Twitch. I'm going to do 10 episodes before I put any out on socials, before I put them out on YouTube, before they go out on Spotify or Apple or any place else because I don't want to start this and then it doesn't go anywhere and it doesn't happen. It's like... No, if God's going to use it and I'm supposed to do this, then it'll happen when it does. I couldn't see, man, what it's become in the last year. And then it wasn't called Control-Alt-Redeem. It was just a generic name. Let's see if we can do this and we'll figure it out later down the road. I mean, I'm super excited about the podcast. I love doing it. It's one of the most fun things I look forward to whenever I get the next one. And then this has been really fun recently is the going back because I wait about a month and then I release them. The going back and creating the clips and I get to relive it. The podcast by listening to those moments and finding the clips to put out is I get to do that about a month later. So it's like I get to have the conversation all over again and enjoy it. And it's like, wow, that was some really good moments that I couldn't have planned. And the Holy Spirit showed up and got to hear fantastic stories from my friends of what God's been up to.

Yeah, you know, I think that's probably the most cool thing about settings like this is it's very raw. It's very real. It's very organic. There's not any, okay, here's what we're going to talk about. Here's these questions and that. And, you know, we... You know, we kind of rabbit tail here and there, but, you know, that's real life. And, like, trying to have everything, this is the way it's going to be. I don't know. It just, it doesn't. It doesn't feel right to me. It's just I'm very one of those, I don't know, kind of loosely plan and then let whatever happens happen.

Yeah, yeah. I'm the big framework of it, and I'm not a detailed person, so I know the framework of where we're going. And I've got my general, okay, I know where I want to direct it when we're done with whatever we end up with. And, you know, I was just talking about some of the blessings of being on the podcast. And so that was going to shift me to go, hey, and what are some blessings that you have encountered yourself personally? Or what are some stories of impact in the people that have been in your community as being a Twitch streamer?

So I've had one individual that, you know, and it's not just through coming into my stream, but several streams like mine and Aki's and several other Christian streamers out there. This individual used to believe when they were little, you know, and generally most people's beliefs are kind of formed or being formed when they're in those adolescence years. Not always, sometimes they come back to or stray away from, but you know, this, this person stopped being a believer because people hurt her. And through getting connected with my stream and these other Christian streams, they were all, they were always kind and like. would allow us to pray for uh for them and one day they're like you know what i believe again i'm like oh let's go and so like that was that was i don't know that's probably the biggest um the biggest reward that's that's that i've had come out and like i said you know it's it's not attributed to to me or or even to them it's a it's a collaborative thing but it was the spirit working on working on her through myself and and the other streamers that that she interacted with you know she she was always she always used family-friendly language and whatnot so she did she didn't really watch a lot of uh a lot of other streamers for for that reason and it was just that reason but that began a seed that then kind of kind of transformed her heart

and i don't know i i think i think that's cool i think oh it's definitely cool i mean to and i love i love what you brought up in in the realm of it it's this wasn't me and i did this this is the twitch community and specifically the overlap of your community with others family-friendly christian streamer community that you get to share across. So it's not just, hey, okay, I know B. Gilbert over there, and he's a good guy, and yeah, he's a Christian, but he's different from everybody I experienced, so I still am going to trust my life experience and my hurt or whatever it was that caused me to stray and walk away from the faith or abandon it, deny it, whatever her term would be. And then it's like, oh, wait, but then there's Aki. And oh, wait, there's someone else. And oh, wait, and then within the community itself, there's others who aren't streamers who also, if you are, you know, planting the seed, they're watering the seed, they're fertilizing the seed, and the Holy Spirit is causing it to grow as all of you are being, you know, to go back to what we were talking about to begin with, hands and feet of Jesus to her in a way that is totally different than...

her experience previously or a specific event whatever it might have been to to bring that grace that mercy that love in a way that's like undeniable yeah and and you know he as i as i think about that you know i recognize that there's times where we as believers as streamers We're not all pastors. You know, most of us are not pastors. There's a handful of us, of you guys that are, you know, yourself and Susie and some others, but most are not pastors. And so, like, that's the one, that might be the one opportunity that somebody gets to see Jesus is. through the lens of just another believer that's dreaming. Which also reminds me, as tomorrow is Easter and we celebrate that Jesus is risen, knowing that you lead a digital church, where can people go and watch that?

I do not lead a digital church. So, I mean, I would have to recommend to other places. And I know that some of the digital churches have all had their services already. So XP Church would have already had theirs. Lux already had theirs. VRMMO may have some tomorrow. They're on an every-other-week schedule, so I don't know if they have some tomorrow. So there are some more friends out there in the community currently lead one. I lead a Bible study that I do on stream. The Church Digital, we're not a church. We are a digital missionary agency, so we help people to be able to do evangelism, discipleship, and be equipped to be a missionary in the space. So we are a ministry coming alongside of people doing ministry. We're not a church in and of itself. So you're connecting dots. I'm connecting dots. Connecting people. I'm connecting people. I'm connecting others to Christ. So because that is the case, I don't know everybody else's schedule that I might know, so I don't have their schedule off the top of my head to be able to say, hey, here's where you could go tomorrow. I'm sure there's plenty of churches in somebody's local area that's going to be broadcasting live that they could at least go do that if they're not ready to walk through the doors of a church. And if you don't have a church home and you would like to walk through the doors of a church and you're trying to find one, Save Point Ministries is one that tries to help people find nerd-friendly churches to be able to go show up in an in-person church.

And of course, I'll also share that, you know, if you happen to be in the Huntsville, Alabama area, Bridge Life Fellowship is open. We'll be there at 10. I, of course, me and my wife, we do our streams there. There's the website. But, you know, we're on YouTube. And, yeah, and I only mention that because I know that there's people that... know they man they may not have a home church or you know rather that's because they're afraid to go or you know some people are just busy traveling and they can't but getting getting connected somewhere is is it's important

yeah i i i tend to focus on the gathering together in christian community not necessarily in person but gathering together in christian community is what we need to be doing and then we can supplement what we're missing from that community in other places so while you you can come to me for bible study you need to go to ukulele for worship for worship because you're not getting it from me or you or you need to go in person for those things so wherever you have the time and space utilize your connections and your relationship both in the physical and the in-person community where you can you know bring yourself and be present in that moment to participate in the body of christ and One of the problems we have in a modern mindset is, well, if I don't like what I'm getting here, I'll go down the road to some other place. Now, I'm not talking about they're preaching things that you disagree with and you want a place that's teaching and you're growing. That's a totally different conversation. But I don't like the tone of voice that the pastor used, or I don't like that he brought this illustration up, or I don't like that we have a female pastor. Whatever it is that you don't like, there's your problem.

Their music is bad.

Yeah, it's, you don't like it. That doesn't mean God's not in it. And it doesn't mean that God isn't using it. And maybe instead of worrying about what you like, what are you bringing to the community that is your gift that you're not bringing? Because our spiritual gifts are for the building up of the body, not for the consuming. So you don't just show up to consume from everybody else, including the pastor. the worship team you know whoever the hospitality people are which i always think are some of the best people in the church like you don't you're just going there to consume and go home And if it doesn't meet your needs, you find another place that will meet your needs. Now, what are you contributing back? Like, if this is the body, wouldn't you want to bless other people with what you have? Like, wouldn't you want to give and invest and be in relationship with them as opposed to just, well, I don't know if you've heard the joke where the dad's in the car complaining about the organist hit a couple of wrong notes. When the communion was happening, the elder spilled the communion wine all over the place, and the pastor preached too long, and he's going on and on and on. And his kid goes, yeah, but that was a great show for 25 cents. You know, I hope that's hit really hard. That's why I let it go. Supersonic didn't get it. That's how much his dad put in the offering plate was 25 cents. Supersonic. So he's evaluating his dad and his dad's observation of it wasn't good enough, but he didn't give enough to maybe make a difference in there.

It's kind of like the lady who gave the two cents, and she gave more than everybody, huh? Yeah, exactly. And, of course, that goes kind of what we mentioned at the beginning of all this, is we all need that Paul, somebody that's pouring into us. We all need that Timothy, somebody that we're pouring into, and then the Arthal of the die guy.

Yeah, yeah. yeah we we definitely need the pouring into other people i mean that's that's what jesus said go but and i actually like the take the nuance and we're used to hearing go and make disciples but it actually with the tense of the greek should be while going So while we're, so it's not a command to go, we are already going. So it is while you are already doing this, you'll make disciples. So the make disciples is a command. The going isn't the command. And that's why we also kind of just go, oh, well, it's the missionaries that go. I don't have to. No, no, no. It's while going. While you are already on your way, wherever you go, make disciples. And the command is to make disciples. It's not the command for the evangelist and the pastor and the Sunday school teacher to make disciples. The command is for every single one of us, which, to go back to what I was saying earlier, is what I see God calling so many people in digital space to do, is make disciples. without title they don't have because it doesn't need a title to make disciples. They are an apprentice of Jesus, to go back to the conversation earlier, and they are becoming like Jesus, and they are helping other people to be Jesus. And so, I mean, it's such a beautiful thing to be a part of.

Yeah, my pastor kind of says the same thing a little differently. He says the gospel came to him while it was on the way to somebody else.

I like that. I like that. Yeah, it came to me on the way to somebody else, yes. And I want to pass it off to the next person so that they have it in the pristine condition I received it. Yeah, absolutely. You had mentioned your pastor earlier had pointed you or connected you to the Church Digital. Does he hang out with the Church Digital in some stuff?

You know, I don't think he does. He's kind of one of those, you know, he didn't want to be a pastor.

He wanted to be, I'm going to be the worship leader.

That's what I'm going to do. You know, and he tried to be the worship leader, tried to be even the youth leader. And, like, one of the other churches was like, no. He's like, God's calling you to start a church. He's like, no, no, no, he's not. He was, but so what he wants to do is he wants to kind of walk alongside people using their skills, using their abilities, their differences from him to reach other reach other people. And he knows, you know, he knows I stream and that you know it's it's a mission of sorts. he wants to help however he can and i guess i don't know i don't even know how he found it but uh he found something he's like hey are you familiar with the church digital it's like uh-huh so so so i thought you know i thought i would share that with you i appreciate that yeah um one one other thing just to

because we're we're in the process of doing this so if it makes sense to share this with him you know go ahead and and do that we are in the process of of trying to start to come alongside of churches that you know like hey we've got our live stream we've got a community we don't know what to do with that community we don't know how to start, how to move in. I know you could probably come alongside and help, but we're trying to develop a program called EDGE to come alongside physical churches. So we're trying to help them figure out how to do evangelism, how to do discipleship, how to teach generosity in the space, and then to do empowerment, and so that people are equipped and are mobilized to be able to go and do likewise. We're just starting that. We're moving in that direction. And so don't share it tomorrow because it's Easter, and he won't even remember if you do. But if there's a time in a conversation that makes sense to talk about that, I'd love to have a conversation and see if there's something that would work out in any way to help. your church move and grow because it sounds like your pastor is open and while he may not fully understand and embrace it he can definitely see that god's at work in you and so therefore there's there's an opportunity that maybe hey that could come back and and help build up your church in some way too definitely and you know he's asked you know to be in prayer about um

You know, cause we're, we're in the processes of trying to get more elders on board. And so, you know, he's asked me to be a prayer about whether that's something God would, would consider me doing. When's the timeline for that? So I can be in prayer. So it was originally supposed to be in January, but the current elder said, is there any reason to rush this? Do we need to rush this? And, and they kind of pushed back and he thought it was a good idea. And I'm like, I support that idea too. You know, cause I'm, I'm not sure, you know, like. at the time okay i was like there's a part of me that was like yes there was a part of me that was like no i i think at this at this stage i'm i'm at yes but like okay at that time i i wasn't and then and then of course you know everything that you're talking about with the the church digital and what you guys do what you guys are wanting to do the vision there those are all seem to line up very well with uh with things that he's wanting to do he was he was an i.t guy served in the air force okay before uh beforehand so You know, huzzah, he gets IT, he gets music because that was his field. So, like, you know, making the connections and all that. That's not an issue for him, but the understanding how this sphere works is foreign.

Oh, yeah. And I understand as a solo pastor and senior pastor that I have been in ministry, a pastor's not looking for one more thing to do. So it's not that, hey, we want to tell him he needs to go do something. It's if he has a heart and he sees that... we should be doing something to come alongside and help the whole church, not the pastor, to help the church be able to respond to God is already giving you a mission field outside of the people that you've been reaching. How do you intentionally do something about the connections that God is bringing to you? So that's all we're trying to do.

And so, and one of the things that, you know, he's, he's graciously allowed me to do because I've talked to him and we've had these kinds of conversations is. Could I, you know, on the third Saturday of the, of the month have a game day where we just come together, we fellowship, we have maybe a mini sermon or, or maybe there's not a sermon. Maybe we just give testimony about what God is doing in our lives and

It's not out yet. I just, I'll send this to you and you can share it with him. I just interviewed my friend down the road who they've been doing a board game ministry for eight years. And so I just did an interview with him, wrote up an article, which I'm sending to the Nerd Culture Ministry Collective to get out in that sphere. and so i will send you the the unfiltered unpublished copy of it because frankly i'm writing these so they get into the hands of people that can use them so talks about what decisions they made why they made them what are some things they learned along the way they started out on wednesday night because it made sense hey i'm already here we're already doing church stuff let's just do it here and then it was wait a minute if we're doing it on wednesday night everybody's thinking about i got to get done at a certain time and i got to go to work the next day they shifted it to friday night and it boomed when they shifted it to friday night because yeah less people were thinking about i got to go to work the next day So I'll send that to you and explore that. It doesn't mean that everything in there is the way you should do it. It's them telling their experience. And also, we're in Western Michigan. Coming into the church building, not a barrier for most people to come in the church building in Western Michigan because their church happens to be a polling place. People are already going in there. There's other community events that happen in there. So it's like people already know the church building. they're not opposed to walking through the church building so i can't say that's always the same in every place and you know if it needs to be outside of the church walls sometimes you know like if you have a local board game shop that you could serve that's another route to go

Yeah, and, you know, we have a building, so I'm in the greater Huntsville area. Within the greater Huntsville area, there is a place that has an Airbnb that they rent out. It's a game place for that sort of stuff. And, you know, I've talked about, like, if this grows, maybe that's something we could look into. I don't know if you got the opportunity at this reach last year to meet Cruciformity or not. Oh, sorry, my lights are shutting off. I warned you it was going to happen.

It's 10 o'clock. You did indeed. I think I probably did have a conversation, but there were so many people I don't remember.

I got that. So good evening, Ninja Pilgrim. How are you doing? What we did do is I guess he knows a couple people that are in the Huntsville area. He runs, I guess, a camp in Missouri. Okay. And so he's a – i guess affiliated with with another church here and so i met up with that pastor and like we got together at our church and we played uh challengers of the realm and just had like a conversation how's things going kind of get to get to know each other and i don't know hopefully more comes out of it if it does uh praise the lord if if not then okay

Yeah, I love the collaboration stuff. And that's one of the things that I'm trying to find ways and opportunities in order to make this work. It's not always easy for what I do on Twitch to just say, hey, let's do this together. And then most of the games I play are single player. I've been watching different people doing collabs and getting big groups together, like, you know, five or six people to play the same game together and all go together. It's like, it's fantastic and wonderful. It's like. Those aren't my genre. Those aren't where I hang out. Maybe I should go ask if there's enough Baldur's Gate people and we could start a Baldur's Gate group together. That might be the thing I see. But I don't know if anybody in the community is doing Baldur's Gate. I haven't played it in a hot minute.

I believe there's a few.

Yeah.

Senator Spreyer, how are you doing, man?

Yeah, welcome in. Um, but I love, I love those collaborations. What I still haven't necessarily found. I mean, I found the church digital. I hang out there, but in the gaming Twitch space, I haven't found my one, you know, yin to yang of we're going to do and spend as much time in each other's streams as we can. I've had plenty of people that I love spending time in and, and vice versa, but I haven't found that one. That's like, this is my companion to be the longterm. We're always going to hang out in each other's and we're going to do collabs and and do all of those things and i'm trusting it'll happen at some point but i'm not going to try to force that you know plus right now frankly i don't have space in my schedule to go do that i mean trying to try to get the podcast try to do all the other stuff i'm doing and like teaching a couple of courses with the church digital on being it you know becoming a digital missionary equipping digital missionaries which by the way i have a church in birmingham that i'm working with them and they have three different people that i'm taking through that course so okay i'm i'm hoping only an hour and a half from me I'm hoping at some point that that could, and I'm not saying it's going to be this year, but I'm hoping at some point that could lead to maybe I go in person to help equip and do some more things with that church. And so I will definitely let you know if I'm in Alabama anytime.

Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, Birmingham is maybe two hours tops, but it's... It's not far. It's well within my comfort zone if you visit.

An hour and a half? I'll come visit you. I got that close. Why wouldn't I? Unless it just timing-wise didn't work out. The other weird thing, so I went to Exponential last month, the church planning conference, and with all the TSA stuff, I end up sitting in the airport lounge, delayed, and the guy across from me is on the phone. talking about everything that he was delayed and all of this stuff and trying to get through and figure out his stuff and he gets off the phone and i'm like oh dude that sounds awful and then he's telling me the story i already heard it but you know like i don't want to you know say too much turns out he's in birmingham and we're talking about stuff and he goes around to colleges and he and he does stuff for them and it's like this is like a great connection so it's like i got another person in alabama to visit if i end up going there so it's yeah that's cool It's cool to just start making and seeing how God just networks and weaves things together. If you're open to, maybe that was the spirit tapping me on the shoulder and saying, Hey, talk to this guy. You need to know who he is.

And you know, that's the other thing about this, this whole sphere with Twitch is, is it's massive, but at the same time, it makes me realize how small the world is, how much smaller it's getting. Like we're, we're very interconnected and a lot of times we don't even, don't even know we are.

Oh, yeah. I mean, it goes back to I don't know if you remember the six degrees of Kevin Bacon. You would you would name a movie. You pick any movie you want. And within six movies, you would get to a movie that Kevin Bacon was in. So you pick a movie that starred this person who was in a movie with this person who was in a movie with this person who was in a movie with Kevin Bacon. And. so i think that's become shorter and i think the how close are we to figuring out that you're only six people away from knowing everybody on the planet well the degrees was just a way of coining a term there uh supersonic so don't think of degrees as in temperature like think of degrees on on a compass like if i'm pointing at something and i'm off by six degrees i'm that close to being next to kevin bacon this much on a 360 degree turn to getting to kevin bacon's Ninja Pilgrim just became a credential pastor this week. And you're pondering on getting into digital ministry space. That is super cool. I'd love to talk more about that. Oh, Supersonic doesn't know who Kevin Bacon is. He was in Footloose. That'd be the easiest thing to say. He was in Footloose, if you know that at all. Yes. yeah ninja pilgrim that's that's super cool congr yeah definitely congratulations what a wonderful time to be credentialed during the easter tide yeah enjoy tomorrow that's for sure you don't know footloose okay it's a popular old movie that and song that um is old apparently i'm showing i'm showing my age i know but it's it's okay thanks i'll just accept that and and not try to defend my oldness i've never been hip i didn't go watch the movie i didn't like the song but i i watched kevin bacon a lot of other things yeah probably before you yeah it's not that great a movie it's also true there's a lot of people that think it was but hey we're not gonna we're not gonna we're not here to talk about the movie we're not a movie review place That would be an interesting thing. I do watch a couple of people who do rate things and, you know, S tier and all of that. It would be funny to take all of Kevin Bacon's movies and place them on a tier list. So somebody, there's an idea for you. Go do that sometime.

Well, we're not going to dive there, but I wouldn't give it the F tier.

No, it's not S tier. But, yeah, it's also not F. You're correct. Well, let's shift a little bit. Do you still have time to hang out for a little bit longer? Okay, what are you thinking about? Because I know you've said part of your time right now has been getting the degree and moving in that direction. Are you waiting on figuring out and listening to what you're supposed to do in counseling before you make plans for the year in streaming? Or do you already have some things in streaming that you're going, here's some things I think my community would be benefited from, or maybe God's leading me into that you're planning or looking forward to this year?

So I thought I was going to be able to get back to streaming on a regular basis on Tuesdays and Thursdays. And then, you know, there was... So I graduated in August of last year. So like just, just before, before reach out just before reach. Okay. Which, which was awesome that I didn't have to worry about homework while I was there on like the first year. But I've, I prayed about it. Actually, I was working full-time doing my IT cybersecurity job and part-time. doing counseling and I put in my notice to do an IT cybersecurity. My last day of doing that was December 1st. And so I've been counseling full time with a counseling organization, trying to start my own counseling organization on Fridays. So far that hasn't. Hasn't happened yet, but, you know, letting God lead. And as I walked down the hall where I work now, I kept seeing jail counselor, jail counselor, jail counselor. And it's like, so it got me wondering, like. would it be like to reach that sort of group and then like i don't know one week one of the guys at my church was like hey by the way i'm doing this thing with uh with kairos ministries we're going to go into into the prison here and i'm if anyone's interested uh hit me up i'm like um me so you know i really haven't had a lot of time to to stream lately i suspect that it's for a season i suspect that eventually God is going to say, okay, here's your clients. Here's your physical location. But, you know, I'm in that kind of wait phase. your tail off preparing to fill because you know I'm not necessarily called to be we're not called to be idle either it's not it's not that God can't say boom here it is it happened but at the same time you know we've got to be good stewards with our time with our money with our energy with the things that he's told us to be faithful with be faithful in a little bit be faithful in much yeah absolutely

So when is the event that you're going into the prison, and what does that look like?

So I am going to be going into the maximum security prison on April 16th. I'll be there. the 16th, 17th, 18th, and 19th. My job is very, very simple. I'm really, really the least of these for this particular purpose. But, you know, I'm going to be waiting on tables and like... getting the inmates cookies. Here's your cookies. Here's your coffee. Would you like cream and sugar with that? Here's your meal. And just really being able to love on them. And I thought about doing either a 21 or a 40-day fast. And I still think I'm going to do that, but it's not going to be until after that event because I don't want to go to this event where I'm supposed to be loving on people. And I'm angry because I'm holding cookies and I can't have any.

So if you do one beforehand, for me, the sweet spot is a 72-hour fast. That's my sweet spot. I love the 72-hour fast, which is just three days. So that, to me, gets me into the spiritual zone deep enough. I've not done a 21-day or 40. I've not gone that long. I haven't either. i have i've done sevens you know or i should say i've done six a number of times i often don't like to fast on sunday because it's the lord's day it's supposed to be a feast day versus a fast day so unless i'm planning a intentional long one and 10 days is the longest i did and i i had intended to do two weeks and my wife was gone and i woke up the one morning, or maybe as I was going to bed, and I felt really weak and dehydrated, it was the point where my body would not want me to drink. And so I was concerned of harming myself by not having someone around. If my wife was home, I would have continued the fast. I just thought, hmm. I might be in a place where this is not wise for me to continue on. It's not a lack of trust or faith. It was, hey, the last thing I need is to have something happen to me and my wife come home. So I need to eat something and stop fasting and, you know. do that it was one of those things where i was just trying to see can i do a two-week fast i got 10 days and i was like no i'm i don't there's i'm not proving anything um i'm not waiting on anything i just was trying to test that and so i was like okay i'm done this is the first time i've gone past seven or six days and uh i don't i i haven't tried again so

Yeah, I've never done anything that I would consider long. 72 has been my longest as well, so that would be new to me. And kind of the way that I've thought about doing it and I've talked about with my wife, it's not like a true fast, but like... I would still drink water, and, you know, I was thinking about, like, you know, they have those communion cups that's got, like, the juice and wafer together, and kind of like that would be, I don't know, my meal and kind of reflect on.

That's an interesting thought. Yeah, I've never done the without water. I mean, I've never tried to go in that direction to do no water whatsoever. People refer to it as a dry fast. I've never tried to do that. I strictly am on no food, no calorie fast. So not a juice fast. The juice fast is not healthy, in my opinion, because you're just spiking your blood sugar and you're not actually giving yourself nutrients. That could probably be one of the worst fasts out there is to do a juice fast because most people are just drinking juice, spiking your blood sugar. You don't have a lot of nutrients. I can see that. So I would not recommend those. Some people do the juice because, oh, then you're drinking and you feel like you're eating. If you're going to do that, do bone broth. If you need to have something a little bit more that's not a caloric thing, but is going to give you minerals and electrolytes and those things, bone broth. If you just want to say no solids, then do bone broth. I didn't know we were talking about fasting. That's fascinating. I do get excited about it. I've... I have gotten out of the habit of it in the last six months and I need to get back into it.

Yeah, I can't say I've ever been into the habit of it. So once in a while, about every six weeks or so, we have what we call the table. And when we have a table service, we don't stream those because they tend to get very vulnerable. And, you know, we want to protect people's identities, protect people's things that they've done. Out of nowhere, I just kind of had this, let me look up the communion cups. And my wife's like, well, what are you looking at? I was like, this is kind of what I'm thinking. And I'm like... I don't know. I guess I was kind of, in my mind, it's one of those things the devil would not ever ask me to fast. So if this thought came into my mind, it's got to be a God thing. You know, I go back to the scripture, which, you know, some manuscripts say weren't a part of the original things. But that being the only type that could be cast out is by prayer and fasting. And that was kind of... That was kind of what I was thinking about, and I don't know. Let's see. Ninja Pilgrim said that he knew an evangelist who was once incarcerated and saw someone giving him a cookie completely changed his life and led him to Christ. We've had a couple people that were involved in Kairos that used to be inmates and now they're leaders.

And it's amazing. Well, it's also one of those things that most of the church has not done. And in some places you can't. So I'm not pointing the finger and saying, what's wrong with you? When I was in South Dakota, the only people that could go into the maximum security prison or to the prison is clergy and family members. So you can't just show up and minister to people in the prison system in every place. We are supposed to go to the prisoners. That's one of the things that it calls us to do in Scripture. So I have had some opportunities to do that. What we did, so when I was in South Dakota, we had someone who was going to be incarcerated. There was an event that happened that he should have been incarcerated before. We didn't think... that it needed to be what he ended up with i wrote letters to the judge you know after before his sentencing after after his hearing and so did other people in the church because between the time that he had had the event and his his hearing he came to the church and he was turning his life around and we were talking about the fact this is the first time he's ever had community around him loving on him and we believe that this will cause him to falter to return back to those patterns he finally has security and stability in his life we think this is going to be a detriment now I'll say this. God knew more than we did. We were short-sighted in that thinking, and God was bringing him into prison, not in weakness, but in strength. He brought the community with him, and here's how the community went with him. There were more than a dozen people in the church that were writing him letters. He got probably, I would say, 10 letters a week from the church. So he has 10 different letters, and people knew he was getting mail. Most of the people in there got absolutely no mail. He's getting mail. So they would come to his cell door. and ask him, what letter did you get today? And he would read the letter for them. He was an artist. He would draw on napkins and give it to them. He would, after getting the letter, hand it out to other people to have a letter of encouragement in Scripture and those things. He became the evangelist in his cell block. Our short-sightedness of trying to think that we were the thing going to keep him together and we had to have him in person was wrong. We encouraged him and strengthened his faith more by having him incarcerated so that all he could do was spend time reading the Bible. and focused on the letter that he got and sharing his faith with other people in prison because that's all he could do while he was in there. And it was amazing to see God firmly root him in the Scriptures and in his faith when we thought he was going to be choked out by the worries of this world, and we were wrong. We are completely wrong.

Yeah, absolutely. And going with this Kairos group, we all belong to different churches, so that's one of the things that it already brings. All of us that are going, we're all writing 42 letters to each of them, so they're going to be overwhelmed with letters. Man, that's beautiful. and um i heard last year when they did this they made 16 000 cookies so there's there's going to be a lot of cookies a lot of meals there's going to be people who have paid to sponsor meals so you know you're going to have have opportunities to share hey you know these people don't know you but they wanted to love on you and and you know provide your meal you know it's just like it's it's four days of like trying to trying to show them that that agape love and like just

you

be real and present and allow them to kind of open up and and not really going in there to to preach or to minister or anything like that but just the love on them and and encourage them that you know if you want to keep this sort of thing going forward you know you guys can study together you guys can read together you guys can pray together you guys can worship together and and you know these are the worst of the worst this is so you know society says they don't they don't belong and

well society says they're not human anymore you know in a lot of ways they they're animals exactly um the system treats them that way and i don't that's what i'm saying system the system treats them that way which then causes those people to interact with them to agree with the system because that's what they're told and trained to do so they do that as well and then it just gets reinforced they begin to act that way because that's how they are told that they are and they're treated so anything that's going to shock the system you know that's going to be light in a dark place they're not going to necessarily understand it but they're going to want to pursue that light so yeah be praying for praying for you guys to just shine the light brightly when you go in man

Yeah, and not to delve into it too much, just for standards and reasons. There were, I guess, a couple of years ago when they did this, there was leaders from, I'll say, two racial groups that didn't get along. And when they first started talking, they were looking at their leader, like, can I have this conversation with this individual? Yeah. And before it was all said and done, before the weekend had ended, the two leaders of these racial hate groups hugged it out and prayed for one another. That's the Holy Spirit breaking balls.

Absolutely. That is the power of grace being given to people who have never seen it before. They can't help but feel it, experience it. I've had similar experiences. things i've i've done with teen challenge and if those that don't know teen challenge often you end up with court ordered go to teen challenge so it's i think it's teen and adult challenge now they i think they changed the name but it's it's a uh addiction recovery program and so a lot of people end up you're going to jail or you're going to teen challenge And so they're very much on the road and someone gave them a little bit of grace to not go there, but they're thinking they deserved it. And then when they have people truly love on them and show grace and mercy to them before finding out their story and then finding out their story and still doing it, it's just like a shock to the system. They do not know what to do with it. And it breaks down all of the hardness of their heart to let the spirit just intercede, which is just fantastic. absolutely wow that is some cool stuff man and i i know you said you were looking at the possibility of whether or not the counseling should be in in the prison or not i'll just pray that this is a beautiful opportunity that either opens your heart up to saying yeah that's where i should or say I don't know, and I'll just be patient. So I want it to help you move in that direction, but I also, I don't want you to get ahead of God. So that'll be how I'll be praying for you is clarity and discernment, but also I know if you try to rush discernment, you end up wavering because you didn't do all of the work that it needed to be done before you get to it. And when you have that answer, I know that that peace that surpasses understanding will be what you feel when it is the right place you're supposed to be.

Absolutely. that's that's kind of where uh where that passage hebrews 12 11 comes into my mind you know every everything we do it's it's a discipline you know the discipline is often correction especially in terms of children but it's not always correction sometimes it's it's being patient learning to be patient learning to love learning to give mercy learning to give grace and you know that's that's often painful before it's pleasant yeah but when we allow god to kind of just be there and we dwell in his spirit that is when that fruit can begin to actually flourish and you know instead of just being a seed it can actually take sprout and begin to bloom into something far more grand yeah yeah oh man that's just so good you know what i'm gonna pray for you right now i'm just feeling we should

God, just lifting up B. Gilbert and his willingness and openness to step into this prison ministry, it's been ongoing. There is a process that they know and understand is impactful, and it's not impactful because they are there, it's impactful because they create the space for the Holy Spirit to show up. More than that, they show up with your love and demonstrate your love. They are absolutely giving people a reason to wonder about the hope that they have because in prison there is not a lot of hope. There are people who are behind bars who have been told they will never see the light of day again. And so I just pray that you will be with this whole group and leading them and guiding them to make an impact for the kingdom. and that you'll be with B. Gilbert, opening his heart and mind and just allowing him to truly love on these men, to share from his heart his love for you with them. Whether that is in word or deed only, may you allow his light to shine so that people are curious and wanting to know more about him, so that you can use him as a vessel along with the others, because it's not him alone, it is the whole team going. Protect their families as they prepare for this, because I know there can be distractions that get in the way and concerns that will draw their mind away from the work you're calling them to. So protect them as they prepare for this. Allow everything that's going forward to be a blessing for the ministry. And just give them the space and the timing as he's thinking about fasting over this ministry. May you give him the time and the opportunity and the timing when that is going to be right for him to fast on behalf of these men and this work. Bless him in everything that he's in need of. And may you shine through him. Pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Thank you, sir.

Yeah, absolutely. And it's kind of interesting just kind of how things go. Kind of what I... ponder from time to time is is my counseling business supposed to be one of those ones where it's a rehab facility that teaches people how to get back on the right track slash here's some tiny homes here's how to cook for yourself how to clean and you know how to how to grow your food and like i don't know but um so we'll you know we'll we'll see and you know we got we're 100 online at least as far as as far as my own practice is concerned it technically exists but uh also technically doesn't have any any clients yet the website the website exists all the you know the the the electronic health records thing nice and set up that's really great like so every everything is is is set to to make it happen it's just got we got to find people and and because my license is what it is while i'm still gaining hours uh you know i'm i'm very limited as to which insurances i can take i'm currently being set up to hopefully be able to accept blue cross blue shield before too long but uh until i have my 3000 hours in um

once i have my 3 000 hours in i'll be able to be able to accept any insurance company i want and that'll open up so many doors but but you know that that's yeah yeah it's not exactly the same however if people probably don't know this dentist my daughter's a dentist when you start as a dentist What an insurance company will pay you as a new dentist is less than they will pay a dentist with five plus years of experience. So you are not going to get paid the same as someone else who's been around by the insurance company. Yet the company you try to go for or you're trying to set it up yourself, you need to get paid the same as the others instead of getting paid less. So it's like the insurance companies are taking advantage of brand new dentists by not paying them as much as they pay somebody with more experience. So there's like those weird things that people don't always know behind the scenes. When you go to a professional, as you're getting started, they put barriers in your way and obstacles to you actually pursuing it and making it your profession. But I will say this for people that don't know, because you're talking about you're set up fully online. I have a really good friend, and I've heard similar things from other people that I don't know as well. But when COVID happened, I was asking how her practice was going, and she said, this is the best thing that's ever happened in my practice. Because rather than people sitting there and not talking about what's going on in their life because they're uncomfortable and they're not in their space and they were just in a fight or something else was just going on and they're watching the clock and now we've got 15, 20 minutes left in our session and they finally decide to talk about things and then they're finally actually getting to the deep root of things and the time is up. They're comfortable and ready the moment they come in because they're in their own space and they don't have that anxiety of coming in the office and anything that got in the way as they came along. So we get right down to what's going on in life. So I'm sure you've probably heard similar things or talked about it as you were going through classes, but I just wanted to share that for other people that are thinking, can you do this just online? Absolutely. You can just do it. You could do it by phone too. You know, Zoom call, phone call. You don't have to be physically in the same room with a counselor. And actually for some people, it's much more comfortable not to be.

absolutely now i found i found this interesting because uh i you know i'm very awkward uh especially like in person but uh i thought i would enjoy online sessions more but when it comes to counseling i absolutely prefer one-on-one right there in front of in front of me and i'm just like that is really weird why is that so backwards know it is and you know for those that that want it online that's that's cool i'm happy to uh i'm happy to engage them as well i think in an ideal scenario i'll get to a place to where i'm able to offer both but yes you can absolutely do that 100 online

And I do, if you're struggling, absolutely recommend going and seeing a counselor. And if you don't feel the person is helping, don't think it's not working, maybe you didn't find the right one. Agreed. My daughter was struggling and going to counselors. And this is, I can't believe they said this, but she heard this repeatedly. You are better than 95% of the people that I'm seeing. I don't have time to see you. i'm here because i'm struggling i'm sorry you have a heavy workload but i need help and they wouldn't help her yeah um so she did that's when i finally reached out to my friend and i said hey can you see her she can't find anybody you know i didn't want to bring it to a friend of mine but you know it's like i know you i know how good you're going to be and so

and i definitely echo that if you you know for anybody that's that's seeing uh see that might be hearing this and you see a counselor if you don't feel like that counselor is a good fit find one that is it's and you know definitely use that crisis line if you if you're going through a crisis 988 super super important and You know, if you're in the state of Alabama and want to do online, I could be your guy. Selfish plug there, but, you know, in all seriousness, you know, whoever it is, if you're not comfortable with that person, find one that you're comfortable with because it is super important that you have a good and meaningful client-counselor relationship.

Absolutely. And in any place you are going to someone who is giving you care, no matter what the care is for, advocate for yourself if you're not getting the care that you want. Thank you for your service, Forged. Thank you. Yeah, Forged is saying the Veterans Crisis Line saved your life. Forged, I don't know if I know the Veterans Crisis Line. If you know that number or if you can just DM me with that, I will include that in an additional one. We do have, just for those who don't know, I put in the national suicide hotline in the chat, so those who are watching this can't see that.

So theirs is also 988. Oh, okay. I think they hit one. Additionally, they can call the VA line. Yeah, he said 988 push one. Okay, did not realize that. Thank you. And then the other one is you can call the veterans line itself, which is that number there. And then I think it's option seven. Okay.

Fantastic. So those that are just listening to this, 800-827-1000, and then 7 after you get to the menu. Yeah, we absolutely want you to get help. There is no shame in asking for help. If you had a broken arm, I wouldn't tell you to get over it. If there's something going on that you're struggling with, with your mental or spiritual health, I'm also not going to tell you to just get over it. I'm going to try to get you to someone who is going to give you the care that you need.

Absolutely. And I want to say it's 741 or 471 twice. But one of those is also the crisis text line. So it's either 741, 741 or 471, 471. I can't remember.

Yeah, I don't remember. And I do have the long email address if you're international and listening to this, which is?

Found it.

It is 741, 741. 741, 741. All right. Thank you. for texting. Well, we have gone all over the place. This has been really, really good. And I do like that we, not that I like the tone of talking about those things, but it's serious. And we're in a space where mental health, addiction, those kinds of things are real. And we run into people who are struggling and we need to know. resources to point people to as a pastor i knew my limitations in counseling my max was three times i'll absolutely see anybody one time we can set a second appointment if i don't and then the second appointment i'm trying to assess is this enough or do you need to go and find somebody else and and i'll see you another time but i am not the expert this is not what my training is in and so you need to go to somebody else who's going to help you i mean the same way i know cpr And that's it. Okay. I'm not doing surgery on you. I'm not setting bones. I'm not doing any of those things are beyond my skillset and my training. And sometimes we need to make sure we know where our limitations are. So I want to know those resources to help point people to it when you need it. Absolutely. Anything that we have not covered that you'd like to just share or talk about?

Not anything in particular, but I would, however, like to pray for the church digital. Yeah, absolutely. Appreciate that. Lord, thank you for this day and just thank you for this time that you have prepared for myself and FLACAP to be able to discuss things. Lord, I just lift up the church digital to you. And Lord, I just ask that you would get them in touch with the right people to ultimately spread your word further for your glory, for your purpose. And Lord, that we can... more connections because we're more tightly knit because you have brought us together. There's a lot of people that feel like cliques are bad, but at the same time, I think cliques are kind of important. Jesus had his clique of 12. You know, at any given time, there's between 8 and 15 people that we have an opportunity to sow into. Lord, I just ask that you would send the Church Digital the right 8 to 15 people that you have in mind for them, for the season that you have intended for them, and Lord, that they would just be obedient to where you're leading, where you're guiding. Lord, that through that ministry, we would just see a great movement, not just across the U.S., but across the globe, especially in those areas that are really difficult and challenging to get Bibles to, let alone even bringing up anything about the gospel. But Lord, just help us. Be diligent, help us be seekers of you, putting our trust in you, even to the point of death. Lord, a lot of us have trouble just saying hello to somebody, let alone going into deeper waters. Lord, I just ask that you would speak to their minds, speak to their hearts. Lord, let them be receptive to your word and for your kingdom and for your glory. We give you all the glory in Jesus' name.

Amen. Thank you. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. It's my pleasure. Let's just think of one thing. Your son, Benjamin, you were telling me he really liked the sticker.

Friend.

Sorry?

So Benjamin's my friend. Oh, sorry. That's okay. He's another pastor. But yes, my middle child liked the stickers.

Oh, okay. I got that confused there. Okay. That's okay. So it was your son that liked stickers. Okay. I can send him one of these. So I'm going to Nerd Culture Ministry Summit in about a week. and so i will put one aside to save for him and i'll see how many i give away and if i have two i can send you one as well but i don't know how many i'll give away so i'll make sure i save one for him to send your son and then i have a slightly better idea you have a better idea yeah slightly okay when god calls you to birmingham we can give it a burst okay i like that i like that We'll do that. I don't know when that's going to be, but there we go. That's okay. I know. It's like there's these connections that are routing me to two cities right now, or I should say two places. One is Minnesota, and the other is Alabama, and they have nothing in common with each other. And those are the two places that God is connecting me with people right now. And so it's like I could see myself going to either or both of those locations in the next, 12 to 18 months but i don't know if that's going to happen there we go uh wrong command there so there's the discord if you want to check out the church digital or if you're actually on um whatsapp why it's late at night i had to think whatsapp uh we also have a community there so you're talking about global we do have a lot of global friends as well that are outside of the twitch space just followed Thank you, thank you, thank you, Ninja Pilgrim. Appreciate that very, very much. We are 15 followers away from 500 followers here on the channel. I'm super excited about that. I'm super excited about that. We're gonna hit it. We're gonna hit it soon. I should start putting a bar on there in the incoming.

You are wasting that. I ran into a guy at Kairos who is a part of this, and apparently he gives Bibles to people or runs a shipping company that they send out those shipping containers, like the ones that are tons of pounds, to India and Africa and stuff like that. You never know how God is going to use it. This is a conversation I started overhearing, and then I was like, you know, I got this young man that I talk to in India on a regular basis on Facebook who's asking me to pray for him and his church, and I'm like, hey, this might be a resource for you.

Yeah, absolutely. That's fantastic. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you everybody for hanging out with us. And those of you who are listening to the podcast, making it all the way to the end, you are a legend. Appreciate that so much. Big Gilbert. It has been a privilege to have you on. Loved this conversation. I'm glad that it worked out to be able to say, yeah, let's do this the night before Easter and everything that's going to happen there. Let's make it happen. And boy, it's been a blessing. This will be out on all of the places you can listen to podcasts in about a month. I'll message you and let you know it's out. And then I'll be putting a bunch of clips on the socials as well. So anything else that you'd like to say before we head out?

Sounds great. Can't wait to see it. Let my pastor know so he can listen in. Oh, yeah, that'd be great. That'd be great. See what sort of nuggets of wisdom that maybe this brings them. Maybe he's like, hey, I want to get connected with the church digital. I don't know. I think he's absolutely open to those things. He's just...

Maybe there's the avenue to say, hey, remember you said, did I know the Church Digital? I was just on the podcast, and here's the episode, and then go from there. That would be good. Absolutely.

And, you know, I think either way, it would be good to get you guys connected, get you guys into a conversation to talk about things, whether anything comes with it or not.

Oh, yeah. I'm always open for a conversation. And if God leads in that direction now, great. If it's six months, great. If it's like, honestly, myself, I had a conversation with Jeff, who founded the Church Digital. and it was i like i don't know what that conversation was about and then six months later another friend said hey you need to have a good conversation with and i go why i already had one and then i the holy spirit said go all right i'll go have a conversation again and i still didn't know why this this this the the jeff that's at uh reach that has the really cool backpack or is that a different jeff that's a different jeff enough It's a different one. This is Jeff Reed. So, all right, you ready to start the raid? I'll count us down to start in three, two, one. And I've got mine started and we'll let those go. We'll be close enough to each other. I'll put my raid commands in and I'll start my credits and we will be out of here.

Yes, sir, and for anybody that's been here watching, I want to say thank you guys for coming by. You guys take care of each other. Take care of yourself. Until next time, God bless.

Amen, amen. Appreciate that. All right, let's head out.