Shaun Newman Podcast - #430 - Joshua Allen

Episode Date: May 15, 2023

He's the Cowboy Preacher and one of the founders of Full Armour of God Man Camp. From one of the darkest places on earth to changing his life completely around. Man Camp https://mooselakepc.ca/man/ Let me know what you think Text me 587-217-8500 SNP Presents: Luongo & Krainer https://www.showpass.com/snp-presents-luongo-krainer/ Substack: https://open.substack.com/pub/shaunnewmanpodcast

This is Vance Crow. I'm Alex Kraner. My name's David John Parker. This is Alex Epstein. This is Leighton Gray, and you're listening to the Sean Newman podcast. Welcome to the podcast, folks. Happy Monday. Hope everybody's weekend.

Well, hopefully you enjoyed Mother's Day. I hope you got to spend some time. If you're married and got kids, I hope you're, you know, you did something with the kids and the wife. And if you don't, well, regardless, we all got a mom somewhere. So I hope you, you reached out. and enjoyed your time on Sunday. Either way, we got an interesting one on tap for you today, and I'm excited to get you there before we get there, though.

This June 10th, SMP presents Luongo and Craneer. Look in the show notes, you can get tickets for that. That's the next SMP presents here in Lloyd Minster, and excited to hopefully see a lot of you folks in the area come out. I think it's going to be a fun night. Canadians for Truth, they're a nonprofit organization, consisting of Canadians who believe in honesty, integrity, and principal leadership.

We're talking about Joseph Borgo, Theo Fleury, and Jamie Saleh. They've been doing live shows all over the place. Shadow Davis is the next one in Calgary, May 25th. They just announced Sarah Palin's going to be coming to Canada, and they're going to be doing one with her as well. So that's interesting for all, you know, for anything you're looking for, Canadians for Truth.C.A., that's where you can find out what they're up to.

Profit River and the team over there, Clay Smiley. They specialize in importing firearms from the United States of America, And I tell you what, the government trying to slide in a few more bands on guns and this and that and everything else, well, don't take it from me. I would say head over to Prophet River if you're not in the immediate area, Profitriver.com, and they can get you situated. They can tell you what exactly is going on. They're always up to date with what seems to be ever-changing rules and regulations, everything like that.

They do pride themselves on getting all the appropriate paperwork, you know, They specialize in port of firearms from the United States of America. So they do all the appropriate paperwork, both sides to the border, make sure that it's legal and all that stuff. And I mean, when it's ever changing like this, you might as well have a team of experts on your side to get what you need. Just go to Profitriver.com. They are the major retailer of firearms, optics, and accessories serving all of Canada.

Tyson and Tracy Mitchell, Mitchco, Environmental. You know, if you're a university college student, they were looking for four-month positions. That was start of May. Now we're part way through. I'm still going to talk about it here for a little bit longer because you can make 20 grand. Now, obviously, that number is going down a little bit by little bit,

and they're always looking for good people. So I would suggest reaching out if you haven't found a spot to land, 780214, 4004. That's Michko Corp. You can go to MichkoCorp.ca. To find out more. Their family-owned business has been providing professional vegetation management services for both Alberta and Saskatchewan in the oil field and industrial sector since 1998.

So head on over there if you're looking to find some summertime employment. Carly Clause and the Timor Windsor Plywood. Well, I tell you what, today's guest, Joshua walked in, looked at the table and went, holy moly. Well, if you're looking for a piece of lumber that's going to do that for anyone who walks in, whether we're talking mantles, decks, windows, doors, sheds, you know, podcast studio table, the team over at Windsor Plywood can get you hooked up. And let me tell you this table years later now, we're going on year five here.

She still has that wow factor. And that's the work of Carlinus team over at Windsor Plywood. Now, let's get on a tail of the tape brought to you by Hancock Petroleum for the past 80 years. They've been an industry leader in bulk fuels, lubricants, methanol, and chemicals delivering to your farm commercial or oil field locations. For more information, visit them at Hancock. Petroleum. com.

husband, father, one of the founders of the full armor of God man camp. I'm talking about Joshua Allen, or as I like to call him, the cowboy preacher. So buckle up, here we go. This is Joshua Allen, and you're listening to the Sean Newman podcast. The guy who built his Carly Clossin, his group of folks over at Windsor Plywood. And in year one, I was sitting in this old basement of a house. and a buddy of mine, Ken Rutherford, had said, like, I got a spot for you to put your podcast

and walked in, there's most poop on the floor, and, you know, you kind of lay on everything. So we just tore it all apart, built a wall kind of like this one, and then just started to put it together. And at the start, it was like an old office desk, you know, like one of them that comes standard in every, you know, corporation building under the sun. And so I just went into Windsor and I said, you know,

I'd be really cool if you could build me a table. And we just did it for, you know, like I gave them advertising and I said like as long as I'm doing the podcast, you know, the table's mine, but I put the podcast and give it right back, you can sell it and you can, you know, you can do whatever you want with it. And at the time, I'm sure he's like, well, that seems like a pretty fair deal, right? And I don't know if you thought I was going to use it for six months, whatever, now we're going into year five, you know, it hasn't gone anywhere. It's a solid hunk of wood.

And the thing is, is like when people come in, you know, through COVID, nobody was coming in, so nobody's got to see it. But when people come in, they all do the same thing. Others appreciate it for what it is more, but everybody touches it and looks at it and like, oh, man, this is something. Oh, I've always loved wood and building all these axe targets that we made for this man camp. We used three by 12, like recycling old tank boards. And this is the fanciest one I've ever seen. But a buddy of mine who was a drilling rig consultant for years, like chains and mud and winch trucks.

and he's taking a passion for doing these resin boards like this. I don't think his are quite this thick, but just this last while he's put a ton of money into it and he's starting to do it all the time. Yeah, well, it's one of the things I always talk about with Windsor and specific, you know, I sound like I'm doing an ad right now, but I've always loved the pieces of wood they get in there, right?

Like they have some just character wood. Like when you walk in, you're like, oh, man. So my goal, eventually, Josh, is as much as I love the long table. So Carly, if you're listening, you know, you got to be on the lookout. I should probably just mention it to him. But I would love for it to be a round table.

Like there's these big chunks of round. You could. And then you do the resin on it. And I don't know how the heck I'd ever get mics. You know, because it'll be a thick, whatever. But like, that's what I hope. Because I think a round table would be more conducive to what I want to have the feel like.

But regardless, I can't, I'm complaining about nothing. Like, this is a beautiful piece. Like, when I walked in this, too, I'm like, oh, man, My studio's got to start to match what my table looks like, you know? Well, your dad's down at the river fixing fence all the time. That's where I met him. Yeah. And tell him to keep his eyes peeled every now and then, like a huge pine, large enough for a table.

No, that's a good idea. Yeah, yeah. Well, I'm going to put that in the back of your brain now, too. I'll keep my eyes peeled. We're down there all the time. Well, give me, you got to, you know, I don't, I don't know. We can talk about this little, you know, how this comes to be, because this is kind of out of the blue, you know. It's a little bizarre, too, because.

just a few years ago I'm down by the river checking the river intake right I look after wells and I see this old cowboy up the river pulling on this barbed wire and ever since I come to know the Lord I pay attention when the Lord brings people into my life right because Lord knows only what he wants to do and I walk up the river and meet this cowboy

he's yarding on this fence that the ice has ripped out and we must have spent half an hour 45 minutes pulling it out and that was the first Newman I ever met. And then just the other day, my buddy Robin at work, he says, man, you got to meet this guy, Sean Newman. You're hardcore like him. And I said, well, Lord willing, I will.

And left it at that. We finished the day. Three, four days later, I'm in at L&L talking to Tyson Moorbutter, who's really blessed us with this upcoming man camp we're doing. And I was sharing just a little testimony of where the Lord brought me from and and I'm truly proof that he'll take a wild animal and turn his life around. And there was another fellow there. And two days later I get a call from Tyson, he's like, man, my friend figures you ought to meet Sean Newman because you got an incredible story.

And man, it was just days after Robin said you got to meet this guy. So as soon as I heard, Sean Newman wanted to actually have coffee and spend some time, I was like, for sure, I'm going to be there. You know, I don't know why even that story makes me emotional. And it's just like it's surreal to hear somebody tell it like that, you know, because lots of, like, I mean, that's how it's been playing out lately, you know, just like, you know, and I, you, my side of the story is I'm sitting at, I think I'm sitting at hockey, you know, a noon hour hockey and Sam's sitting there.

And he's been on the podcast a while back. You know, he played in the world's longest hockey game. And he was sitting beside me. He's like, you got to meet this, Josh. I'm like, this is something. I'm like, well, tell me about it. Just, you know, give me your elevator pitch. Because people come through the text.

Like, it was just this morning I got most likely two more guests coming on over the next, you know, whatever it turns out to be. And it comes from people saying you need to meet this person. Okay. Okay. Well, give it to me. What's caught your eye? And then he goes, well, he's a guy who went from the, you know, I don't know, and I'm going to hear about it. But the dark side, if you would, and found God.

And he goes, and he's intense. And he's got, you know, all these stories and like sounds like my type of guy. Let's, let's hear him out. So, you know, I know Tyson, one text. And Sam's sitting there. He's laughing. He's like, it's that quick. I'm like, well, we don't need to wait on this.

I'm like, in my opinion, if you're telling me, and he was sitting with Tyson. And then, you know, I'm like, it's going to be, you know, we'll see. Like maybe he's not interested. And then you're like, you're not going to believe this. It's him with Robin Noble. If Robin Noble hadn't said that, just two days before I'd have said, well, maybe I can make time. But that type of coincidence doesn't just happen all the time. And, no, I truly am a unique story.

I... Well, tell us about it. We got all the time in the world. I don't have a, you know, memorized script. I just come from riding fence. Well, let's start here. Where are you originally from? I was born in Chauvin, Alberta, and grew up on a farm there.

Farming kind of petered out for my family. You know, the interest rates in the 80s weren't, you know, real good, 20%. And so my dad decided to get into the oil field big time. and I tour around the country following his work and then spent the last 13 years in my life at that point living in Bonneville. I made some poor choices. Working on the service rigs and chasing pipelines,

I decided to make alcohol a big part of my life. Alcohol and drugs and the wildlife, the party scene, and it cost me dearly. It literally filled my life with emptiness and pain. And I didn't come to know the Lord in the church or because I went to some type of a special meeting. I picked up a Bible at a house party and I began to read the Word of God

and something snapped in my head. Somehow reading the Word of God opened my eyes to the fact that there was hope for me. if this Jesus I was reading about was legit. And the more I read the word, the more I seem to hear this like still small voice in the back of my head, kind of directing me to make changes in my life. No more booze, no more drugs, say goodbye to the girlfriends,

and just focus on the life I have for you. And I begin to read the Word of God. And the more I did, I could feel my life changing for the better. And something radical happened, man. I just, I tell people that I'm proof the Lord would take the worst of misfits, a wild animal and turn his life around. And the hundreds and thousands of people that knew me prior will agree with that. I was a hopeless case.

They all figured I'd be dead by the time I was 20. But at the age 21, I found the Lord in, like, the darkest, place. And I also tell him that I was similar to like Lieutenant Dan on the top of Forest Gump ship at that point. After three weeks of being in the Word of God, I found myself outside my four-wheel drive, getting psyched to go to work on a rig. And still in the booze, still kind of lost and hollering at God and saying, you know, if you're real like this book says, are. If this Jesus really can change my life, I dare you to show up and try. And if you can, I'm willing to let you, and I'll serve you for the rest of my life. And it sounds like a religious

fantasy, but from that point on, man, I walked away from that dark life in an instant. And the world around me thought I was actually losing it because I changed that hard and fast. Of course, that's 2001, right? Because I'm 43. Proof that you can actually get free and stay free. Throughout the last 21, 22 years, I thought I could, you know, kind of take lordship back into my own hands a few times. And slowly but surely my life began to unravel again

and like that emptiness and that need for something to fill that void begin to grow and develop. back into that same condition I once had. But the Lord is gracious and took me back every time. He's so faithful, right? Which leads me to now. I have a beautiful wife, Leah. I got four kids.

I'm incredibly busy with cattle and looking after wells. And I'm really struggling two years ago to maintain my marriage, to be the father. I knew I had to be to these kids. And I realized that my walk with God had grown stale. And I couldn't maintain that life that the Lord had built for me on my own in my own strength. So I realizing this went back to the Lord and started back at the basics, more time in the word, taking time each day to look to him.

And asking him to forgive me for trying to really do it in my own strength. And, man, he just poured the fire to it. And this last two years, I've been on fire. I've been looking to him every day to use me. I've been feeding myself on the Word of God like a starving person. And each and every day that I do that, he's been opening doors to meet people and to encourage them and be a part of their lives.

And, well, we don't have time today to talk about all the incredible things the Lord's done in the last two years. But it's impacting the country's around me. It's an incredible thing. For instance, last year, February, I find myself at my church where I go to church here in the Lloyd, working with a group of individuals trying to share the love and the light of Christ with non-profits and different outreaches and things. But the group is almost entirely made up of females, ladies, wonderful ladies. I'm convinced of the body of Christ is held together by females.

They got to be the body and the backbone of the body of Christ at least. And I begin to get a little bit critical that there wasn't more men involved. Men are out there working their tails off, trying to feed the kids and make the bills mean. Life's gotten so busy. They always have excuses. They're not doing things that are wicked or evil, you know, in a sense, but they're always busy.

So they're not really taking part a lot of times or getting involved. And I became critical about this. And I believe the enemy was using it to really make me negative instead of productive. And I was just, you know, in my devotion saying, God, what do I do about this? And it just became clear to me that instead of whining about it

and sniveling about it, I should let him use me to do something about it. And that's where he put it on my heart to start this man camp. And I didn't have time for a man camp. So God, if you want me to do this, you got to make a way. You got to give me like the energy, the zeal, the passion to do it, because I got a lot on my plate. And, I mean, I'm looking to you for strength already.

But as the days went on, man, let's fire in me to do something, to stir up the men around me, to be the men of God. that they created, they were created to be, just grew and grew and grew and grew. And I found a buddy of mine up north. This Yarrow grew Tyson, he's a good buddy of mine. And he also, the Lord's pulled him right out of the fire too. I told him, man, God's put on my heart to do something to wake up the men in the world. He says, me too, man.

I can't explain it. It's so timely you're mentioning this. I've been struggling with this. I said, well, let's pray and we'll see what God wants to do. And in the next week, we'd come up with a plan. And he's involved with a church camp west of Bonneville, this Moose Lake Pentecostal camp. And he's a technically savvy guy and a real business mind. And I'm like a bare-knuckle cowboy that's never done nothing but the oil field, right?

I mean, I didn't have skin on my knuckles for six years of my life before I met Christ. And he says, well, I'm on this camp board. And I think I'll talk to him. We can use the camp to do this weekend. and said we'll call it fishers of men man's camp and we'll put it in God's hands he's going to make away it's like okay all right man I'm on board one thing led to another and um the camp board actually allowed it you know a couple of wild animals wanting to do something at a productive church camp I mean they could have just told us forget it but he says no they're going to let

us do it make a little video so I was checking fence I climbed off my horse, put on a clean shirt, and in 15 minutes, the Lord had given me a word that I, I mean, I never made a video in my life. Only video was on was like a surveillance video. And this word came forth, man, that was like incredible. I mean, it moved me as much as it moved the men, but it spawned this thing. And he posted it on his Facebook, and I wasn't on Facebook. I mean, I didn't have time to have a smartphone, let alone Facebook. And it was encouraging men to show up to be a part of this man camp and to let God empower them to be the fathers, the husbands, the men of God in the community

that he had created them to be. And every step of the way from the speaker to the meals, to the finances, is the Lord just, like, it overwhelmed me how he made away. It just clicked. Like it doesn't click in the natural world. It just came together. And it encouraged me every step of the way when he did that because I'd lived long enough to know that things just don't work out that slick.

And even a religious group of individuals, I'm sure they meant well, they said, well, we've seen a lot of these man-camp things and different outreaches come along. and just don't be discouraged if nobody comes because, I mean, it's kind of flimsy and you guys don't really have a bunch of experience with this and just don't let it bring you down if it fails radically.

And I say, well, no, I understand where you're coming from. I mean, the Lord hasn't put it on your heart like he has ours, but you've got to understand. He's literally confirmed this every step of the way and we're going to fall through with it and see what he has up. Well, 135 men showed up that first day, day, including the staff, would be 140 plus. And we didn't have room for anymore.

No more chairs. No more plates. No more anything. We had to shut the door. And the man of God that had committed to preach, I mean, he was preaching from the word of God. There's no Oprah Winfrey or Dr. Phil involved. This was right from the book, old school Bible preaching.

He brought the word, and I didn't know how the men were going to receive us. A lot of these guys weren't Christian guys. They said, if there's any of you out there that want to be strengthened by the Lord, you want to make a decision to follow Christ. 70 men stormed the altar and surrendered their life to Christ or rededicated their lives to Christ. I never seen a move of God like that in my life. Grown men like transformed. Guys, I never met the Lord.

and some of them with major issues, walked away that day and left this man camp three days later. Completely changed. It started a half day on a Friday, full day Saturday, half day Sunday. We had big bacon egg breakfast. There was a short church service in the morning. Then we threw axes, dozens of axes, and shot bows, and we did a little fishing derby. Because we didn't realize the amount of men were coming, we only rented five, six, seven boats, and we didn't have near enough. But guys were fishing off the dock and the shore, and we had these little prizes.

You know, Richardson had donated a couple of watches, and we had bought a bunch of big fancy leather bibles. This year we got these fishers, we got these full armor of God, like football championship rings for the prizes on the axes and the, the, 12 men tug of war in that but it's incredible now we added canoe racing this big tug of war we bought um more bows and built more targets Tyson more butter he let us use his CNC plasma cutter it's a fancy computerized deal and uh hammered out like a hundred plus axes in no time and then guys just grinding and sharpening these so when is this this camp this year you see Last year it was in September, and so many men left changed that their wives, mostly, and their pastors and people that knew them were phoning to find out what we did,

because some of these guys, 20 years of marriage, these ladies had never seen these men on fire and encouraged and, like, full of joy and peace. A lot of them come to the camp, depressed and discouraged and empty and anxious, and they just went home, charged. So they're all phoning. And when are you doing the next one? I said, I don't know. I mean, I'm new at this.

I don't even know if we're going to do the next one. It took a lot of work and money, like thousands, tens of thousands. And I said, I'll only do another one if the Lord puts it on my heart, like something supernatural. I don't have time for it otherwise. I'm not going to be a part of some just stale religious thing. There's enough of that. If he puts it on my heart heavy, so much that I can't get it off, we'll do another one. And this year it's in June 9th, 10th, and 11th.

Half a day in June 9th, right? Registration opens at lunch, June 9th. Supper at 5. Goes through till Sunday the 11th at noon. Then we're going to have another water baptism. We didn't even think to have a water baptism last year. It just happened. A bunch of these guys, they surrendered their life to Christ.

They're just lit up. They're like, what do we do next? I said, well, you just got to follow Christ from here on, boys. Feed yourself on the word. and you're going to have to get water baptized eventually because the Lord, you know, instructed it in the word. Well, let's do it now. We did it.

We did a big water baptism. It was incredible. This year we plan to do one, the Sunday afternoon. And the families are welcome to come and going to have a barbecue. Actually, a bunch of oil field outfits have donated now their trailer barbecues. These huge barbecues. L&L, Tyson's donated the L&L one for the weekend. one outfit that didn't really want a bunch of publicity or PR, but kudos from Bonneville, Wild Rose.

You know, not to pull you away from what you're talking about, but what I think of is, it's funny, June 9th, 10th, 11th. I'm like, oh, of course, the next S&P presents. The next show that Sean puts on the live show is June 10th. I have been doing live shows at the casino here in town, just in not in the actual casino, but in their, like, event center. And I did my first one in Emmington in March. And it wouldn't have been possible if it wasn't for businesses. And there's some businesses. They didn't, two of them in Eminton didn't, were just like, don't even mention us. I'm like, well, you're the major sponsor of this thing. That's it. It's like, no, no, we believe in what you're doing. And we need

more of it. You're like, oh, okay. They make it happen. Yeah. Like it's, who's got 30, 40,000 dollars to put on a man camp just out of pocket. No, they make it happen. They come alongside you and they contribute and they support you. It encourages you when they do it, right? And when you talk about a man camp, you know, it's interesting. I've been talking a lot about, and I wonder if some of this is where you've got to talk to Sean, right, is I've been talking a lot about men need to get into men's groups.

And I don't mean men's groups where you go and drink beer and sit around and, you know, talk about anything or talk about the oilers I mean they they they in the playoffs and everything but like and certainly that's not like it can't be in there but at the same token you got to start talking about real things you got you know we started a book club five of us talked a lot about this listeners tease me because I've been you know I've been talking a lot about it but I'm dead serious is no coincidence five years ago 2018 we started a book club and has it been all Sun Sunsran and roses no but the idea was better husband

better fathers. That's where it stem from, right? That's awesome. I mean, and if you go back to the first podcast, folks, and the first podcast, me and Ken are talking about it, he's like, do you want to talk about this? Are we not talking about it? It's kind of weird. You know, it's kind of like tabooed. And I'm like, no, we can talk about it. I'm like, even when I look back on it, though, there was embarrassment to be a better husband and a better father. Like, think about that. And right now, I'm just like, when I hear what you're talking about, the only thing I'm not angry about it, I'm like, disappointed in this. Like, sounds super right up my alley.

Like, I'd love to come and experience it, right? Like, to me, that. That sounds like exactly what so many men are after. They're after, honestly, like trying to get around and better themselves. And what does a better husband even mean? What does a better father even mean? Like, how do I figure those things out? What do I, you know, and I just read, oh, man. Of course, I don't have my phone on me.

But I was just, I just had Tanner Nadee in here not too long ago. So we were talking about the Bible, you know. and one of the, if you follow the truth, it'll lead you to the light. I'm butchering this, folks, I'm new to this. But, you know, if you speak the truth or you follow the truth, it'll lead you to the light and the light being Jesus. And so me and Tanner have had lots of conversations about this. He's the way the truth in the light.

Yeah, because it's interesting to me. Like I find it fascinating, you know, I find more so even fascinating, the series of events that lead our two stories kind of together. You know, like, well, what is that? Well, I didn't, I didn't come from a past of being a Christian, you know, in a perfect Christian world. You mind, do you mind sharing a little bit about that, Josh? You know, like, I wouldn't mind if, you know, you say you were in a dark place. I was in a very dark place, but I don't know what that.

To me, I have an idea what that means, but I would love for you to share, because there's going to be people listening to us that are in that dark place, you know? You bet. No, my mother, I was very great. I'm very thankful for a mother that was, you know, encouraging me to look to Christ my whole young life. She was a Christian, and my dad let her be. And I grew up not really wanting to be just like my mother, but more so like my father, who's, you know, never really surrendered completely to the Lord at all. He would go to church when I was a child to more so please my mother.

As years went on, him and my mother's relationship kind of broke down, and they separated them, were divorced just before I was 16. But I'd never, you know, surrendered my life to Christ. I was introduced to him as a little boy. I mean, my mother tried very hard to steer me in that direction, but I rebelled and ran as hard and fast away from God as I could. I wanted nothing to do with it. I had known some men, and that was the way.

of trouble. I focused on people more so than the Lord, but I'd know some Christian men that really let me down. And I said, I don't ever want to be like them. And I think this whole Christianity's a scam, some kind of religious scam or a cult of sorts. And I wrote it off completely. So from 10 years old to 21, I went as hard and fast in the other directions as I could. And I made poor choices. I tried to like find happiness, joy and peace and the things of the world, the women, the, you know, the drinking, the parties, even drugs. And, you know, in my late teens, I got into, you know, cocaine, hard liquor, man, I was an alcoholic. From the time I was 15 to 21, hard drugs and booze, fighting. You know, the Lord made me high energy, you really did.

and really athletic, wired really tight, and I didn't back up good. I don't really have a good reverse. And in that mind frame and in that life, I was probably 10 times as violent as the average person. I remember fighting every weekend for years and training mixed martial arts just so that I could continue to keep my head above water doing this. And yeah, well, yeah. I tried to fill that void with the booze and the excitement of the world and all the things of the world. And it's just like a band-aid.

It doesn't heal it or fix it. It just covers it. And like I said, when I was 21, I picked up that Bible at a house party. Could you go through the night of picking up the Bible? You're at a housepart? I mean... I won't go into great detail because it's quite dark. but I was surrounded by incredibly dangerous human beings

and one of those men was flipping through a Bible and in his frame of mind and with no respect for God he began to tear pages out and wreck this thing and then he hollered at me he said hey blankety blank put your gun down and quit drinking come over here you're in the Bible And I said, what are you talking about? Look here, Joshua.

It says here, Joshua hamstrung their horses and burnt their chariots. So maybe I was in the Bible. It was Joshua 116, the first verse I ever read as an adult. And I took that Bible away from me. You don't wreck a Bible, you're meatball. I almost slapped them. Why do you think you said that? I said deep down, I think I had a respect for the Word of God.

even because of my mother and my grandparents, you know, hammering that into me as a child, even though I'd rejected it. It's an interesting thought, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, it was. But there was a respect for the Word of God. And it was that word that really, you know, essentially, initially transformed my life. I didn't find Christ in a church.

I mean, I had a lot of opportunities. My mother forced me to go to church as a child. And I remember getting spanked almost every time because I was that kind of haywire kid getting in trouble. But I'll begin to read that word, man, and I was still drinking. And the drugs and the alcohol were all over this house, and I was oblivious to it. My life was in shambles. Guilt, the sin, and the lifestyle, it just left me completely cold and empty.

And I'll begin to read this Word of God, man. And the Word of God is lamp into your feet and light into your paths, right? Proverbs 3.6. I'll begin to read it. And like, when your life's that dark, man, that light is so easy to see. Like, I was hunting a bullet. I was in bad shape. Any night I could have been, it could have been the end of the line back then.

And I began to read the Word of God. Something snapped in my head. Something opened my eyes. It says that the... You say snapped and I think clicked. Clicked. Yeah. That's it.

Right? It says faith comes by hearing. Romans 1017 and hearing by the Word of God. So we obviously need to hear. And what opens our spiritual ears is the Word of God. Right? It says that the Word cleanses and sanctifies it. Literally washes off the filth and the lies of the enemy.

That's what happened. I'll begin to read the Word. And, I mean, I could barely read at that point. I didn't read nothing in like five years. And it was incredible. It opened my eyes to how a viable. of my life had become and how filthy the choices I was making were. And it also opened my eyes.

The word in James 1 says it's like a mirror man looks into, right? And that word, it doesn't just point out the flaws in your life and the areas that need to change and all the mistakes you've made. Of course, it exposes them. It exposes sin for what it is, right? The word does. but it also exposes the fact that the Lord Jesus wants to pour out the fullness of everything he lived and died and rose again to give you and all the hope you could have in him

and all the blessings of God that you're not living in like it does a mighty work on your brain so as I read this word things begin to click that I couldn't fathom before and I ended up reading that Bible for like three weeks. Choices I had made back in 2000, almost 2001, had left me in a situation where I didn't want to be out in public a whole lot during the day. You don't get to brawl that much. You're living in the night. And cross the line that much, you know, violence and crime, it doesn't pay. And so I was mostly living that night.

I I uh sorry for button in you know I've been uh I don't know I've been listening to different things where I've been reading the the new testament I've been talking about this lots um or somewhat I guess um but every morning I've been reading the new chapter because I'm like you know I got to the point uh where I'm like at some point you know if I'm going to read all these smart people but Jesus was pretty smart I mean can we just you know you don't have to be a devote Christian to go, can you put them on the level of all these different people? And maybe we should put them a little higher. But at the end of the day, that's where Sean's brain was. So I just started reading the red words, right? Because obviously it's easy to find if you flip open a Bible.

And then, but that doesn't give you the context of the story. And so, you know, then I decided, okay, let's just read this from the start. And I find it very fascinating, like very, very fascinating. when he talks about the, you know, when he gets taken in the middle of the night, you know, for the crucif, I mean, what eventually becomes a crucifixion, it's in the night. And he doesn't have. And he doesn't, it's not, I forget how he phrases it. And certainly maybe you can refresh my memory, but he's basically saying I have no power in the middle of the night. I, you know, this is, you know, I'm not going to stop him or whatever from having power in the,

and you think of like, when do we all make poor choices? middle of the night. Never in the light of day. Very little. I mean, they're trying right now. They're trying to, you know, like, and by they, I certainly mean if it's going to be the enemy, let's just call what it is. Like, it's literally playing out in the daylight right now.

And as long as none of us talk about it, it just continues to get to play. It's like, okay, well, he has no power in the daylight. At nighttime, it's a little different. Yeah. You know? There is an enemy. I think a lot of people make the first mistake. They don't realize that there's a dark.

force trying to literally sidetrack them and play out, you know, his will in the world. The fact that they don't realize they're under attack makes them pretty vulnerable. I mean, I've heard it said the devil, the biggest trick he ever pulled was convincing the world. convincing everybody didn't exist. No, you want to see there's an enemy. You just try, pick up the word of God, try put all your kids and your wife in a car, and take them to a church that's still preaching the word of God on Sunday, and you'll encounter distraction and setbacks and everything. Well, this is a simple one for me. I'm not saying, maybe it won't work for other people, but for me,

this has been my experience with it. I have like a little bit of a routine in the morning right now where get the kids off, get the wife out of the door, they're off, okay, good. And you sit down. And when you try to sit down, two things happen. Your brain starts thinking a million miles a minute. And actually I'm reading the screw tape letters. And as soon as I started reading cold chills everywhere, I'm like, oh, like, that's interesting. And so that's one. Two is everything will buzz at you. You know, I wear a watch.

I take it off because it's hooked to the phone and it wants to tell me that people are trying to get it or emails or whatever, right? And it starts talking. And then phone calls to come in. And it's like, oh, today must be an important day. That's the way I look at it now. I'm like, it must be an important thing I'm about to sit down and read. If that's the way it's going to work because it's stress. You know, I was thinking maybe people can hear this or not.

I'm a, I chuckle about it, but I'm like, the studio is not even remotely soundproof, but I'm like, I've done so many interviews where nobody's ever in the building. Of course, people are in the building today. I'm like, that's, that's interesting. You know, maybe it's just coincidence. Maybe it is, Josh. But I'm like, that's interesting to me because normally this doesn't happen. You can just roll on for, you know, three hours and have nobody in the back, you know, from time to time you can hear. I don't know if that for a second, brother.

Now, you've stepped into my world of weird, like, since I became sold out, not just, you know, attending church once a week, but waking up each day and saying, God, use me. You've, there's men calling for Mancamp as we speak. I got to, like, not answer this phone, but, um, they'm going to have to get a new phone number after Man Camp because it doesn't stop. No. But is that a bad thing? It's a great thing. Right? I've never seen so many lives changed. Literally lives changed every day. Even like not meeting you prior to this podcast

and not even really knowing what a podcast was. I should have brought my Bible. The thing looks like a five-year-old got a hold of it with a pencil crant. It's not a bad thing. I've never seen so much good in all my life. But it's only like, it's only the last two years that I realized and in order to not have my walk with God like a total roller coaster,

I had to continue to acknowledge him in all my ways. And that meant every day, I couldn't just make him Lord for Monday to Friday, three weeks while he got me out. Yeah, some kind of problem I'm facing and run to God. No, he wants to be a Lord of all. If he's not really like Lord of your life, if you're not looking to him or making him priority,

is he really Lord at all? And so I realized this, man. And that's what really changed it. all when I realized that if I had, you know, looked to him every day and fed myself on the word of God and then when I had a decision to make, went to him and looked to him for direction, I could avoid it all the ups and downs because like from 2001 until now, there was like years of my life where I was lukewarm and like totally taking the reins back from the Lord into my own hands and making all the same stupid mistakes again, never getting back into the darkness.

like I was. But still, I'm not being the man I could have been. It's a cautionary tale then. It is. The excitement of when you first pick up and start to read it for what it is, right?

It's very exciting. It's like one of my lowest moments I've ever had in my life came after Ottawa or maybe during Ottawa where I truly thought like the movie's coming to an end. Like this is coming, everything's coming to it.

I don't know how to be more cryptic and not cryptic all at the same time. I just, to me, that's where I got to. And then the most exciting point was going, no, the adventure is just beginning. It is. Like it is just, but in saying that, you're a cautionary tale because, like, you're, you know, how old are you? I'm 43. Jeez, I got to be honest.

You don't, you look pretty good for a 43-year-old. If I had not looked to Christ, you wouldn't be looking at anything because I'd be gone. Fair enough. Well, you think about it, though. The cautionary tale, for me, comes at 21. Yeah. You find it. Something clicks.

Boom. Change your life. But you're saying for the next, you know, 22, so the next 20 years, yeah. The next 20 years. Yeah. You kind of just kind of like, well, just kind of like, falling away. I had a season initially where he set me free. I mean, he rocked everyone that knew me with how much he transformed my life.

And then once I got free and everything stabilized and I was living, you know, free and clear of that old life, I slacked off, man. You can't just look to the Lord in times of total trouble. If you're doing that, you're just going to be looking to them too late, and you'll find yourself in that trouble. But I slacked off about 2003. I went to sleep spiritually for like three, four years. And then when I realized once again that I couldn't be Lord in my life and expect the same results, I come back and he's so faithful to forgive, eh?

I come back to the Lord. I humbled myself before God again. I asked him to forgive me, which is key. I took back up the word of God every day and pulled me up and under that darkness like that again. What was it, if you don't mind me asking? So you mentioned the house party at 21. Boom, you pick up the Bible and it's like something clicks. Then you talk, you know, if I'm following the timeline, right, for a couple years, you're like gung home.

Yeah. Then there's the lukewarm period where you just kind of... That lukewarm period came shortly out. after I decided to get too busy to take time each day to be in the world. So this is an interesting thing of the Western culture. You know, I was talking about this with Paul Brandt. And I know, folks, I don't know if we talked about this on the podcast. Yeah.

Interesting world I live, and I'm not going to lie. I've been to Paul Brand's house and interviewed him there. And it's weird. I was just literally emailed, email chatting with him yesterday. Anyways, it's a weird world I live. And you talk about a weird world. I'm in a weird world. Yeah, you're in it.

And I forget what I was saying. Paul Brandt. Yeah, but what the heck were we talking about now? Well, the stability comes from being in the word every day and look into the Lord in all your ways. Like, when I slacked off on that, I got too busy. The busyness. So Paul Brandt talks about going overseas to all these different countries and they talk openly about the spiritual world. Oh, yeah.

He's like, they don't hide this. All you got to do is leave Western civilization. We're talking, we're probably. talking all of like Canada, North America, like the United States, but we're also including Europe, we're probably including Australia, we're probably including a bunch of different places. Now in fairness, I haven't been to Australia, folks, maybe I'm

wrong there. He's talking about third world nations, he's talking about lower income, he's just talking about where you go to a place and the goal of life isn't to chase fame, success, riches. And what you'll see, and now I'm just paraphrasing

Paul Branden is he goes, they talk about spiritual realm, they talk about what's going on, they talk about that it's not. And he goes, but here we're so busy, we've forgotten it even exists. Yeah. So he goes, how do you, how do you get people to slow down when we're so caught up in like chasing, you know, um, well, working our lives away? And I'm not saying that you, that's a bad thing, right? It's like men, uh, got to provide for their family. I, listen, I get it. I went through, uh, uh, trying to get this podcast going, you know, um, it was, I don't know, three years of like,

up at five, work the podcast, go to work full day, come home, get the kids to bed, kiss the wife, go back to work the podcast, sometimes it's till 11 over and over and over. And now this is the fruit of it. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying don't work your butt off. But I get what you're saying when you get too busy and you're just like all of a sudden you kind of forgot what you've learned. Because that has happened multiple times in my life, I'm convinced that because the enemy

is creative. The choices of, you know, to live that lifestyle and to make those mistakes prior, they were exposed for what they were, and I won't fall for them again. That living in the alcohol and drugs and making those huge mistakes. So they won't work for the enemy longer. Now, he doesn't just jump up in front of me and say, hey, let's go grab a 40-ounceer and have a party. Instead, he gets behind me, I find. And he tries to push me so hard and fast that when the Lord says take a left, man, I'll blow right through the corner and get too busy.

And that's what happened, man. I got too busy trying to be successful, trying to prove I was productive and build a life that I forgot to maintain my walk with the Lord. And I put the Bible down, man, it was six months before I picked it up the first time and I had to wipe dust off it. And then that was just for a quick read because maybe I was facing some troubles they were having a rough day. Still didn't pick it up, never woke up.

Left it down for another six months after a year not being in the word and spending no time in prayer trying to be Lord of my own life. I was in the ditch spiritually, man, and I was floundering. But he's so gracious, I picked it back up, man, and I got on my knees. I said, forgive me, Lord, for trying to do this in my own.

It ain't working real good. Please forgive me. Take me back. Just like that, he's so good. And I realized, oh, I got to be in the word every day. God's breathing life back into me. Good for like five, six years. I'm having kids and I'm married. I got to try to maintain this life and this rat race that I've got myself into again. Like a fool. Put that Bible down and just get busy. Let my life get so busy again that my walk

with God begin to falter. If you don't ever talk. to him or feed yourself. He is the word, right? John one. In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God and nothing was created without the word. It goes on like verse 14 and the word became flesh and dwelt among us. That's Jesus. You don't ever talk to the Lord. You don't ever humble yourself before God and spend time in prayer. You don't never feed yourself on the word. You don't ever follow the leading of that still small voice that lines up with the word. man your relationship's going to fall apart and you're going to be back

trying to do it in the flesh and your own strength and you can't. That's something that's intense. I got to tell you this. This year man camp, right? I've been praying. I prayed like four or five. Every time somebody phoned and said,

when's the next man camp? I said, I don't know if we're even doing one. I mean, I can't do it in my own strength. If God doesn't put in my heart, I'm not doing it. Pray in like seven, eight weeks every day. God, give me direction. If you want to do a man camp, these guys are wanting one.

They want more of what you do. did last year. All of a sudden, December 18th, I'm sitting there in my truck, and man, God pours it out on me. And I can't shake the thought of man camp for like five days. I barely slept. At the same time, I open my Bible and he shows me Ephesion 6, 10 through 17, right? I got to bring it up because I don't want to mess it up.

I know most of it by heart now because it's been heavy on my mind, but Ephesians 6. through 17, actually 18. So he's helping me here because in my own, I can't really pull it off. So here in the NIV, it says, finally be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. He can't do it in your own strength. Put on a full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. This exposes the fact that we do have an enemy,

and he's a scheming and liar. The word in John 1010, I think, says that the thief comes to still kill and destroy i just read that this morning yeah it's not a wonder but the good shepherd come that you may have life and life more abundantly like the devil tries to blame all kinds of trouble on god and he loves it when people buy that you know take the bait trying to point the finger at god for all the bad things that happened in this life and this this this fallen world right but anyways back to the forearm right god this is what he puts on my heart December 18th when i'm trying to get the motivation to do a man camp i didn't have to look for it

I could barely sleep, he put so much on me. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world, against spiritual forces of evil and heavenly realms. It's not even against people, right? It's against the dark force behind the evil and terrible things in this world.

I don't judge people in the world. God judges people in the world. And the word of God judges people in the world. We don't get to judge them. We're against those things behind what they're doing. The thing that puts a thought in their head. We're not against people. Therefore, put on the full armor of God

so that when the day of evil comes, which I think we're living in, you may be able to stand your ground. And after you have done everything to stand, stand therefore with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted in the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.

In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming errors of the evil one. So the shield of faith, right? Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. The shield of faith, it's clear in my mind that it's got to be maintained. You can't just strap a bottle cap to your arm and hope to stop every fiery lie from hell. You've got to be built up and fed the Word of God

and your faith needs to be such that When the lies, those fiery darts of the enemy come, the lies, you know, the manipulation, the thoughts that take you down that wrong path. That shield of faith stops them, right? And then I think from the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit turns out the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God, it says.

Right? That's what fits the armor of God to you and maintains it. It's the only offensive, really offensive, weapon that I can see he gives us the Word of God, right? When Jesus was let off into the desert to be tempted right after the Holy Spirit ascended upon him, he didn't fight the devil with his knuckles or with a machine gun. Every time the enemy come at him, man, he just spoke the Word of God and it just put the devil's fire out. It's this Word of God that's a ticket to overcoming. So he gave me this scripture, Ephesians 6, 10 through 18, right? And I say, God, this is awesome.

You know, I've read this 10 times, and it's never meant so much to me. I mean, you've given me understanding of it, and I'm on board. We'll do this man camp. We'll base it off the scripture. We'll call it the full armor of God man camp. How are we going to get it done? I mean, I read it 15 times, and it never meant too much to me, you know? He gave me Romans 8, verse 14.

And it says, them that are being led by the Spirit of God. These are the sons of God. Not them that once were led. knew somebody that was led by the Spirit of God, but those that were being led by the Spirit of God. So you want to lead them by your Spirit, and that's the ticket to literally putting on the full armor of God, yielding to that still small voice and letting the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, remember, follow their son, Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is literally the voice of God in this world. And when He leads you, I mean, if He's Lord of your life, he expects you to follow that.

that leading, right? It only makes sense. And when you allow the Spirit of God to lead you, this literally enables you to walk in the full arm, right? God. I said, well, how did we miss it? God? I was praying about it for two, three days, right? Because I don't have a degree in hermeneutics. I don't God, Bible school, doctorates, and edgimication, right? He takes me back to Romans 8 again, but earlier in the chapter. I think it's 8. I'm not going to bring it out. up from memory here because I've pondered on it so much. It says that in the flesh it was never possible to accomplish God's will for your life. It really not impossible to even apply the instructions, the laws of God and written in the word to your life. Never in the flesh could you

do it. It's only possible by the spirit of God. Right? And if you're trying to do it in the flesh it's impossible to please god takes me up to first corinthians um i believe it's two verse 14 and it says that uh the mind of flesh can't even comprehend spiritual truths and thoughts so our human minds as incredible as they are you know god made an incredible thing when you made a human mind can't wrap their mind around spiritual truths and the revelation that god wants for us to so we got to be led by this spirit of God. And I'm convinced that the Lord intends to through the many services at the man camp

and the fellowship, it's incredible how, like, what the Lord brings out of the word during the message, John Bounds, who preaches by the Holy Ghost, he preaches right out of the Word of God like a machine gun. He's going to preach three of the four services. what a dozen men's hearts is carried on out of the service into the meals and the fellowship around the axe throwing and everything and it's knit together and the next service it just continues it on. And by the end of the weekend, man, the Lord's painted a picture in men's minds of the hope they've been finding Christ. And it shows men how like saying yes to God and feeding themselves on the Word and all those.

things are like the ticket to maintaining their relationship with the Lord and being, you know, empowered by God to accomplish what he's given them in their lives. It changes them. It's radical. I'm convinced that's what he intends to do this year. I phoned a buddy right after this, no, right after the Lord poured this out on me and kind of put it on my heart, I phone my buddy and I said, man, God finally brought the, you know, the unction, the, the, you know, the, you desire to do man camp. He finally did. He's given me Ephesians 6, 10 through 18. And it's all about the full armor of God. And finally he would be strong in the strength of the Lord's might, not our own brother. And I think he wants to equip men to put on the full armor of God and overcome in their

lives. And he's like, dude, hold on. You're freaking me out. I'm just finishing a book. I'm doing a final review of all the chapters in my new book. I think he's true north. I think he's calling it. It's not even rolled out. It's going to be a big deal. But he says, you're freaking me out. You have no idea what I'm doing. I'm editing the last chapter, or one of the last chapters in my book.

And the entire chapter is based on Ephesion 6, 10 through 18. And I'm in the middle of it now. It's the first day this year that I've even picked it up. Like the odds were astronomical. Astronomical. And he's like, dude, whatever God's put on your heart, man. If it's like last year, down with it, whatever you need, you just let me know because this is incredible.

And that's how he's done it. He's literally taking a hillbilly cowboy, like the last person on the planet that the world thought would ever be used by God for anything. And he's breathed life into me to be a part of this. And then every step of the way, like even with you today, he's confirmed it from the inside out and like gone ahead of it, come behind it. Come behind it. I'll say something to somebody about this man camp. They'll open their Bible five minutes later and God will floor them with the scripture. Somebody not even involved in any way will call them like in the next day and be like, hey, we need to do something for men.

He's like, man, this freak cowboy that used to be hell on earth just phone me yesterday. And he's like, we're doing something for men. Come with me. We'll be a part of that. Now there's hundreds of men come to this man camp. and guys like more butter and all these other guys are just pitching in and if you're sitting here listening to this and you're like oh man this sounds you know like can you still get into it yeah yeah yeah and how do they find it unfortunately we put an

early bird discount on from nobody's going to care no first of march to may 15th and may 15th it goes from being 150 dollars and we sponsored a couple dozen guys already because we want people to be there. So we just like believe God for finances and pay their way. But for $150 registration, they get the six meals and the whole weekend. It just covers the cost of food and rentals. And after May 15th until I believe it's first of June, they can still register at Moose Lake PC, right?

Moose Lake Pentecostal Camp. And what you're getting, what for the listener, What he's going to do is Josh is going to give me the link and I'll put it in the show notes. That way people can just click on it. You bet. You can scroll down and click on it and go right to it. Another thing for Facebookers, like I'm kind of new to the Facebook world. I don't post a lot.

I'm not a really good Facebooker. But my buddy Yarrell has set up a man camp Facebook page just for this purpose. If you search Sons of Thunder, this is the name he's designated for all these men that want to do this, right? Sons of Thunder, 2003, full armor God man camp on Facebook and all the information, the brochure.

Well, I'm going to make sure that I share it. I'll toss it on the page because in my mind, there's so many people wondering where the men have gone, right? Yeah. Where are they? They're waking up.

Well, they're waking up, and they're waking up at an exceptional rate. Yeah, yeah. And you're seeing it, you know, on boots on the ground, so to speak. And if I can help share something that's going to not only benefit the men, but the community that they're in, it's like, well, that's what I'm all about. Like to me. I appreciate it, brother. I believe the Lord will use that.

A cool thing, though, like me, never having anything to do with the religious world leadership-wise whatsoever. I encounter all these different denominations. This is something good. The factions and the different. denominational groups all kind of pulling their own way and doing their own thing. I get to encounter them all, right? Because they're always wanting to see. You want to pull that mic just into a touch?

Yes, sir. They're all wanting to see what I'm about, right? Because they don't want to send their men off to something that's going to be some kind of weird thing. And it's funny, they always ask me one thing. They say, yeah. So if you don't mind, what denomination are you, sir? And I used to say, well, I don't really, you know, have a denomination. I'm kind of non-denominational.

But not long ago I was talking to a prominent religious leader in a certain Pentecostal group. And I said, well, that's simple. I'm a baptismal word of faith there. And he said, what? I said, yeah, well, you heard me? A baptismal word of faither. I've never heard of that.

Is that legit? I said, well, that's just a man that's sold out for the Lord Jesus Christ, filled with the Holy Spirit, and believes the word of God to be true. Oh, well, yeah, that should be good. He said, I'm going to send my guys anyway because the three that went come back so on fire for God,

so encouraged and so transformed that I merely didn't care what denomination you were because, you know, a tree bites fruit. And if a tree bears nothing but poison, bad, toxic fruit, it's probably bad. But if you follow me for five seconds, and you see the fruit that come from a life reborn,

a man that walks away from drugs and alcohol after 30 years or a, you know, a man that kicks depression and emptiness and doesn't look back, that's good fruit. And he's like, yeah, I'm going to be trying to send every man in my church. So anyway, where I was going with that was, so I'm kind of new to this, right? I don't, I've never done a podcast. I never made a man camp video. I never did no public speaking to mention. I just go from place to place, and the Lord opens doors,

and I share what he's done in my life. I share the simple truth that he's no respecter of persons, that he'll literally take and embrace anybody that looks to him as Lord repents of their sin and chooses to follow him. He'll just breathe life into them. He offers them peace, you know, the peace of them. of God which surpasses all understanding.

The joy of the Lord, it's unspeakable and you can't find it at a pharmacy. Wholeness and meaning like you can't find in the world. And then I try to, because my grandfather told me and showed me by example, I try to put a little New Testament in their hands. And sometimes they take that and it's years sometimes. It's only moments, other times. the biggest guy that I ever squared off with a giant of a man

and I beat him the first fight and he'll admit to it and then he beat me the second fight I hadn't seen him in 21 years he showed up in one of my leases the other day and I didn't know if we were going to be friends because the last time it was the police that broke us up and this is back when I was in the world

and I showed up and when I saw he was there, those memories came flooding back. And I went, you know, in my vehicle I went towards the lease he was working on and I began to ask God for courage and strength to, like, face this guy, because these thoughts just come flooding into my mind and he's just going to still hate you and possibly, you know, be aggressive

or anything like that. And I said, no, Lord, just give me strength to share what you've done in my life just like it's anybody else. The fact that he's benching 400 pounds and 6'3-3-and-we-a-hundred-three and we have a history means nothing. Just give me the courage to do what I do. And I went into that trailer. And I looked at him and I said, Greg, he turned around.

I could see the look in his eye. He hadn't seen me in 20 years. He probably thought I was dead. I said, easy, big man. He said, you. I said, yeah, but I'm not hunting trouble. I'm actually not the same guy that you brawled those two times back in the day. I said, I'm proof the Lord can take a total wild animal and turn his life around.

He filled that emptiness that drew drugs and booze and women and bikes never could. I said, but I'm here on business, so let's just take care of business. And we did. And then I ran into him the very next day. and he come up to me and he was in his full gear I couldn't tell what he was thinking, dark glasses pulled off his glove and reached out his hand and he says, man, if you hadn't have fought me twice

and then what were you doing, fight me? You were just a scrawny cowboy rig pig. If you hadn't fought me twice, I never would have listened to you. But that emptiness, man, that you said God filled, I've never been able to fill that in my whole life and I'm made in millions. I said, man, if he takes me, he'll take anybody.

I give him that little New Testament Bible. I said, this is where I found the Lord. You read this. You feed yourself this word of God. It's going to open your eyes to your need for Christ and the hope you can have in him. It's going to open your ears to hear his voice. And he took that.

To go back to his hotel and he read that. He doesn't know how long he read it, maybe five minutes, maybe an hour. When he come back the next day, I tried to talk about work with him. He said, no, man, I need the Lord Jesus. And my wife needs them too. I said, well, we've got to finish doing our work, man. I can't be doing this at work.

I'll be in trouble. He said, well, whatever, man, as soon as you have time. I said, man, I can't hook you up with God myself. I mean, you got to look to him yourself. So you just read this book today. And when I'm done, you know, I'll come over. I'll find you. I just prayed with him.

And he, you know, begin to, pray on his own. It was just like a giant little boy looking to the Lord the first time. Lord, forgive me for, you know, not looking to you and this and that. And I just prayed with him

and led him to Jesus, and he cried out to God on his own man. And he was changed. He was a big man. Like, he picked me right up off the ground. And it was weird. But people, no matter how much money they got

and how much things. and how successful they are in this first world country. They can't fill that void inside of them with all the stuff in the world. And this guy, man, he looked like the Ken doll. He looked like he's just jacked. All the finances and women and toys. Still, man, it wasn't enough. He found Jesus and that was worse more than all that.

This is the biggest guy ever, you know, swap punches with. He's doing it every day, and men are waking up. The things of this world aren't enough. You know, if I could have predicted, first off, it's a beautiful story. Like it's, you know, like... It's not perfectly composed. It doesn't matter. It's a...

We've all... Well, no, I shouldn't say we've all. I mean, a lot of men have, well, those, what, 16 to, for some is 25, for some it's 18, for some is 21. It doesn't matter. There's a period of time where you're... proven ground you know you're you're a they're walk around you're 10 feet tall your bulletproof think we got her to be tough for like some kind of manly guy and you just think you got the you do have the world by the tail but you just

don't realize that you're so far out to launch on certain things it's just it's so it it's a wonderful story I think it's a wonderful story I you can look around everything's hockey I see this lots right studio's hockey You know I got the charter of rights and freedoms now When I watched sports One of the things they always say sports shows we don't talk Politics and religion anything else pretty much goes right. It's kind of what they say and so when I first started this I would say like I kind of embodied that

Unbeknownst to me it's kind of like when you talk about Christianity growing up around it You had respect for the Bible. I kind of had respect for I'm doing this show and we're not going to get bring too many troubles into your life I wasn't sure if you're not sure if you're you were going to let me like, this is what I do, right? Yeah. I owe everything to the Lord. So, I mean, if you were going to kick me out of here, I was going to take it like a champ. Well, okay, so for 100, and I forget what it is, folks, is 160-some episodes.

It's something like that. For the first, until 2021 summertime, Sean talks hockey. It doesn't talk anything else, lots of wisdom coming. through like people's perseverance and their stories of like how they made the n hl or you know different stories like that but then covid just won't relent and so at some point i'm just like i either got to start talking about this or i don't and so sean takes the leap of faith and he started there's no bible there's no one like all you're talking about i just i i i chuckle about

i guess it uh because it just keeps going and when i talk about uh you know um i got to try and it up because it's going to bug me if I don't uh um I wanted to play hockey like I did play hockey as a young man but I was too poor and too aggressive to actually play hockey back before Christ um I got some good buddies that went a long way he's played a lot of hockey a lot of pro hockey dub hockey my nemesis Ashley Langdon I fought him a couple times and he's actually made a decision to serve the Lord and in an in an elementary right now he's a work in progress he's growing but this guy brawled all over the country,

both the states and Canada. Played the Quebec Hockey League. Oh, man. I love hockey. This is the verse I was trying to spit out. And obviously, you know, I'm just, you know, anyways. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light. I don't need the rest, because I read that and I'm like,

so rewind the clock. The podcast, we're not going to talk about anything, religion, and anything politics. I didn't believe in that. But as it goes along, that's what I'm thinking. And COVID won't relent. And so I start talking to, I basically do a 180. For anyone who started here and I was doing the local stories, and I love the local

stories, but we're talking sports stories and everything else. It just overnight, it goes 180. I'm sure the audience was like, what is going on? Some people applaud it. Some people hated it. And on we went. And for, you know, 100 plus episodes, we talked nothing but politics, well, not even politics, more just COVID, doctors, nurses, lawyers, performance.

anyone speaking out like what is going on and then you know this lady named Daniel Smith comes through one I've talked to her and then she's running for politics I'm like well we got to get this right so then Sean starts talking politics and I swore I'd never I was pretty sure I'd never talk politics and I started talking politics you know now she's the premier and you're like so I guess I'll have the premier on the podcast I don't know what that's gonna do this and this will be interesting and then Ottawa happened or and I guess I should back up Ottawa happened before she became premier and Ottawa was like I

I've been, you know, I go back to episode 110, and I listen to me and Judy Reeves, and she, she's like, what are you doing? And I'm like, I'm just interviewing people. I just like hearing stories. It's pretty like a pretty surface level answer, right? No, you're not. You're looking for something. You're digging.

And when I go back, it's almost prophetic her words. I don't know, like, just to me, at least. And I was looking, I knew I was looking. I was looking for truth. I was looking for, like, what is the truth? Is there more than meets the eye or not? And Ottawa, I just take my hand for the listener who can't see what I'm doing and smack. Like, that's what I do.

I run into a brick wall. Shoes go flying. Like, you know, I'm like, what was that? Right? Because it's an introduction to things that can't be seen on steroids. Yeah, yeah. And I come back from there. I'm reeling.

I'm going, what? It just happened, you know? And I, you know, and then fast forward to, fast forward to probably, I don't know, what is it, folks? Three months ago. Like, you know what? screw this we got to start talking about we got to start talking about the bible back to truth we just got we just got to talk about it and i got to see what what i feel about it and what the audience feels about it and we're just going to like we've talked about everything else at this point

i come back from ottawa i run into all these people and they go what happened in ottawa i'm like what story do you want like what do you mean i'm like well i i could tell you that it was stress i can tell you that it was drugs and alcohol i can tell you that was lack of sleep i can tell you that it's spiritual. Wow, we all know it's spiritual. And so then my brain goes, okay, if we all know what's spiritual, why aren't we talking about? And what does everybody say? Well, they'll deem you crazy.

And I'm literally explaining about four or five conversations, Josh, where they, I'm staring at John. I'm going to have to go back and now listen to these podcasts. Well, so I get to this point where I'm like, I'm having these conversations off air with people. And they're saying we know exactly what it is. And I'm going, well, why aren't we talking about it? This is COVID all over again. We're not allowed to talk about COVID. Now you're telling me you know exactly what we went on in Ottawa because it's happening in your life and nobody's going to talk about this.

It's like, well, yeah, but they'll deem you crazy. I'm like, I'm already crazy. Like, they already think I'm crazy. I appreciate that you're willing to like step up. It takes backbone. A lot of people choose to bypass all these topics to fit in with society. My problem is whoever lives by the truth or comes to the light. And it's like me and me and,

Tanner in a day, if you haven't listened to those folks. We talk about this in the first one and the second one. It's like, to me, I'm like, so if you chase the truth, you're eventually going to hit this point where you come back to God. You come back to spirituality. You come back to like, and I'm not saying I got this right by no means. I mess up things all the time. I just know that it's, I don't know, I don't get all the coincidences. I just, you can see it when it's happened. We talked about it right off the hop about these coincidences happen. You start... Well, when you really get involved with the Holy Spirit and Lord Jesus,

the coincidences begin to pile up on top of one another. You can't... There's no way you could be convinced that 15 different coincidences happen in one day. When you go from having one happen every six months to have an incredible, like one in 3,000 coincidence, one in 300,000. like winning the lotto-max type coincidence every day. I shared Christ with a bunch of people up at Mission Hill on 97th and 107th

with this wild for Jesus woman, Sleena Higgins. She loves the Lord with her whole heart, right? I'm preaching and witnessing and loving on these people that are living on the streets. Fingers froze off and ears froze off and all this. And I see this street preacher, and I tell them about man camp. so I'm a heart heavy. And I said, I believe the Lord wants to breathe some, you know, life into you and encourage you and being a part of this man camp, John Bounds is going to bring a word from God, and it's going to build

your faith, and you're going to meet a lot of other people that are going to come alongside you and help you accomplish God's will for what you're doing here. And he said, I think it's an enemy going to try and distract me from my calling. And I said, well, think about it. Call me. And he phoned the next day. He says, yeah, I think it'll just be a distraction from what I'm doing here on the streets. And I said, well, listen, man, you think the enemy wants you to be strengthened, spiritually, encouraged?

You think the enemy wants you making dozens and hundreds of relationships with men around you in your own backyard that are going to help you to accomplish God's will for your life? You think you're going to reach the whole of Eminton like the lone ranger all by yourself? Give your head a shake, man. That's not the, it's not the devil. The Lord wants you to be a part of this to, like, equip you for what you're called to. He's like, oh, well, maybe, maybe. I'll keep praying about it. Half an hour, an hour later, I'm working away trying to help my wife with something

and thought to phone this guy comes to mind. This guy I hardly have seen in years and years and years in Empton. I know he's a Christian. I know it's not the enemy wants me to phone and encourage this guy. Why would he, right? Yeah, keep living for Jesus, man. Keep shining bright. You think the devil wants that?

I'll phone him up, get a hold of him. He said, man, you're doing a good work. You're shining bright. You're doing a tremendous job of showing the light and love of Christ to that city, man. You keep going. I'm not cut out for city life, so you've got to do it. And he's like, well, thanks, buddy. What are you doing?

I said, well, actually, I was up in the city just the day before. And we were trying to love on some homeless folks and, you know, put clothes and food in their bellies. And I met this guy, this street preacher. It was just like so critical and like rung out. I'm kind of praying for him and believing God that he'll come to this man camp we're doing to get strong and get, you know, refreshed. And he's like, is his name Tim? I said, I won't say his last name, but he said his last name. I said, that's him.

Out of how many millions of men in Eminton? He said, dude, this guy's got a session booked with me tomorrow morning. I said, you're kidding me. I said, he's like, no. I booked it two weeks ago, long before he ever met him yesterday. He's slated to sit in my office today and talk about that issue you're telling me he has. I said, well, do your best, let God use you. I'll talk to you later, buddy.

This Tim guy phones me that day after his session, and he's like, hi-ha, how are you doing? I said, good. He's like, you'll never guess what happened. I said, what do you mean? Let me guess. I said, the Lord's confirmed that you should be a part of this man camp, just a shot in the dark. He's like, yeah, yeah, yeah. You never knew I booked a session with that, Mike. I booked that two weeks before I ever met you. If it's okay with you, I'd still like to come to that man camp. You guys still willing to sponsor me? I said, yeah, man, we're welcome to have you. Praise God, you finally decided to come. And yeah, we'll cover all the costs.

We just want you to be there. You're doing a good work. That was like winning the lot of six. 649, you don't just pull a name out of a hat and phone one of the 4,000 preachers in Emmettin and he's got a session booked with him the next day. That's God, man. He can do way more than we think. That's happened 10 times since December 18. That kind of coincidence. You don't find that in the Sports Illustrated magazine.

That's the word of God. So anyways, you go on, bro. Sorry to kind of sidetracked us. coincidence you were saying this coincidence no you don't you you don't need to apologize this is carried away I'm fired up about this like you don't get to be used by God in a huge way and experience God without getting you know it's funny I I uh somewhere in my back my brain I guess I wonder how many people I'm pissing off by having having uh it doesn't it doesn't it doesn't no no just religion in general oh yeah you're probably

pushing the buttons on a lot of people you know but that that's funny like once upon a time like Once again, I don't know where I'm at with all of this, but you can, like, honestly, sitting here, folks, I can feel it. It's like, I get it. Now, I've had my eyes open to an awful lot over the course of a little bit over a year. There's things that went on in Ottawa that I just, I can't even, I can't even begin to put words to it. It's just like, I don't know how to explain it.

Bizarre things. Oh, and bizarre is a good word. Weird, strange. Seeing more of it every day. Yeah, well, I'm experiencing more of it every day. So it's like, do you run from that and just write it off as my mind's just playing tricks? You could be a coward and do that at any time.

That's right. Or do you just go, I get it, right? I sometimes wonder. I hate to play little games with myself, but it's like, how did I write this off for so long? And the God of this world blinds the eyes of mankind. They're ever seeing but never perceiving, we're hearing but never understanding. He literally

bamboozles us and then one day the Word of God washes off that veil and that film from our eyes and we can see clearly and I resent him for it now I look back, I see his tracks all over my life I've seen him rip apart my family

I see him tearing apart families every day I'm kind of mad about it it's like a righteous mad I resent him for what he did to my life he's doing it to a lot of folks I can see I'm a little mad about it. Yeah. Exposing them, eh?

He's not happy about that either. I can bet. Well, I get told this an awful lot. You tell me if you agree or your thoughts on it, the more you talk about it, the more of a target you paint on yourself. Yeah. Have you experienced that?

Oh, man, the minute you stop going with the flow and coasting along with the rest of the lukewarm world and you start fighting back and making a difference for Christ, do you encounter tons of it? But you see what it does is it, you never put on any muscle if you never got nothing to lift. And so when you start bucking it and he starts to put weight on you, as long as you run to the Lord, right? Submit to God, resist the devil and he'll flee from you, James 4-7, right? As long as you're submitted to God, resisting the enemy, he got to flee.

So every time he nails you, you learn to run to Jesus. You learn to speak the word of God. That's how I learned all this. Before Christ, I could barely remember my debit card number, man. I'd be standing at the checkout at the liquor store and have to look in that notes tucked into my wallet someplace to remember my dumb number. Now that the Lord's like tweaked my brain and the Holy Spirit

let me memorize whole Psalms like 40, 50 verses at a time. So every time he nails me now, I recognize it, man. I was born a warrior. I've always been a fighter. Now when he pokes me with a jazz, I slap them silly with the Word of God. And it's the sword of the spirit. It puts them to sleep.

He got to recoil them back up. That's how you fight him. Yeah, yeah, I've hidden the Word of God in my heart, so that won't be led astray by the enemy every five second. So literally, yeah, you start stepping up, speaking up, being bold and courageous with your faith and what you've experienced. You shod your feet in the God. of peace, you start doing your part to reach the world for Christ, yeah, you get hit.

But if every time he hits you, you run back to the Lord, then it just makes you stronger. If every time he hits you, you cower and wine and pee your pants. Yeah, you wins. I'm drawn near to him and he'll draw near to you, right? He says, come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden for I'll give you rest. Take my yoke upon you for my burden is light. My yoke is easy. My burden is light.

you run to him every time the enemy slaps you he just puts a little beef on you spiritually feed yourself the Word of God every day it's a lamp under your feet and light into your path that light literally leads and helps direct you it also exposes all the lies and the tricks of the enemy that's why it's so important we feed ourselves the Word of God it literally lights our path it's the Holy Spirit and the Word

work together they're like one Holy Spirit will never lead you in a direction that goes crosswise of the word, and the word is truth. If it ain't in the word, it ain't the Holy Spirit. And if it goes crosswise of the word, I mean, you can go alongside the word, but if you're getting led by anything that goes crosswise of the Word of God, you better think about it because that's not the Holy Spirit.

I'm going to be fascinated to see where you not end up. I was going to say end up, but like obviously you're not whatever age, I just mean I'm going to be interested to see where this goes. I know of a, just that to off the top of my head, I know of like probably three, four people that really, I think would benefit from hearing this. Whether or not it goes anywhere with them is up to them, obviously. But like, as you talk, I'm like, two things come to mind. One is I'm like, once upon a time, in the middle of a podcast, I just had this epiphany. I'm like, am I becoming a traditionalist?

Like, am I, what am I? And right now I'm like, what are we doing here? You know, like, and I don't have an answer to that. I just go, this is probably going to draw more of a target all over again, you know? Yeah, well, brother. You know? But in saying that, COVID drew a target. And at the end of the day, you know, I can't forget some things that have gone on.

It's like, I just can't. what are you going to do with that got to talk about it because I feel and I maybe fear a little bit too that in the dark days of COVID in the lockdown times so many people felt like they were alone you know they were in that dark place and the dark place is lonely it is debilitating it is crippling yeah and right now if there's people that are walking and don't under like they think they're crazy or they think they've, you know, like nobody else is experiencing different things. It's like, then it's on all of us. And certainly I have an opportunity sitting with a podcast to at least open people's ears and eyes to it to see if, you know, holy crap, there's more out there than I thought. Because at times I'm telling you, I came back from Ottawa, I'm like, nobody's ever going to understand any of this.

Certainly the people in Ottawa, lots of them understand it, but nobody's ever going to understand any of it. and I that that isn't true at all actually I find I'm more shocked at how many people understand exactly what's going on and you're like okay okay right and I think the audience needs to understand that too I'm in a unique place where I get to talk to a lot of people when they all start saying no no I get it so we all get it why aren't we just saying what it is then yeah you're not not just the Christian people are recognizing that this world's coming undone morally and integrity wise I my buddy of

He just recently gave his life to the Lord. I worked for his dad for three years, and he was from kids cutting. I got a phone call. Like, I've watched a lot of men this last while. Financially successful, wives, kids, lives appear to be in order. I've seen him take their lives this last while. I carried this fellow out of the house, and we cut him down.

And we carried his body out of the house. And because I was the only Christian guy and, like, the most hardcore Christian guy that this family knew, I think they thought of it was some kind of a preacher, speaker, pastor, but I'm not, like, I wasn't. They said, will you do this service? Will you speak at our father or our husband's funeral? And I said, I got to warn you, you know, I'm this depression, this is. emptiness, this demonic dark thing that's caused your husband, father, grandfather to take his own life, I'm going to expose it for what it is, and I'm going to point right to Jesus as being the

answer. You know that. Well, yeah, yeah, maybe just don't be too preaching. I don't make any deals. You have me on here. You could have kicked me out if you wanted. I was still going to point to Jesus because it's the only thing I've ever seen really reconstruct lives. I've seen thousands of people try to medicate spiritual problems and put like a temporary fix on them. But then I've seen now dozens just in this last year walk away from conditions that they've been diagnosed with as being like mental health issues and physical conditions and all these different diagnoses. Well, how come when they get filled with the Holy Ghost and make Jesus Christ Lord of their lives, not just playing church, but surrender their lives to Christ. How come they walk away from

those things hard and fast? That's what I want to know. So I tell this family, I'm going to be, if you want me to preach, I'm not a preacher. I've only spoke like preached four times in my life, and it wasn't, I didn't do a great job. I'm not a public speaker. I'm getting better, it seems, but I went to this funeral, and it turns out it's full of oilfield people that I've worked for, consultants from all over the place like two 300 people I didn't even know what I was going to say I started watching the eulogy and seeing the six grandkids he had to live for and beautiful wife and his daughter and the life he had and that got mad I know what kind of demonic thing convinced him he had nothing to live for

what created that depression that emptiness in him to take his own life he had so much to live for. And I got up and I began to preach. And it come from the inside of me, man. It rocked me. I don't know how it affected them. But it rolled out smooth and it wasn't me. And it pointed a direction right at Jesus as being the cure the way, the truth, and the life, right? He says, right, anxiety, depression, stress, all similar things. Philippians 4 verse 6 and 7 says, be anxious for nothing. but in everything through prayer and supplication, right? Taking those things and Thanksgiving. So thanks, thanking them for these things you're asking them for in faith,

giving them your cares, your anxieties, your stresses. Make your request known to God, and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding or all comprehension will guard your heart and mind in Christ, right? Your heart being your spirit, your mind being your soul, your mind, will, and emotions. That's your soul. and I begin to preach from that.

And right, he says in 1st Peter 5, I think it's 6 and 7, I don't have my Bible, but he says, humble yourself before God, that he may exalt you or lift you up in his time. Right, and that he offers you peace. And so this last while, man, seeing these guys unravel, and seeing the stress and strain

that the busyness and the lack of God, the emptiness in our lives is creating. I've been, you know, administering the gospel to these people. The depression, the anxiety, the stress, strain, the meds, they fall away like a scab at the swimming pool. Christ is truly the answer, brother, to almost every situation plaguing mankind. I never realized it until, like, this last couple years,

Like even playing church and my lukewarm Christian walk before that, I was sitting there, man. I was getting spoon fed the word of God by John Bounds for years. And I never seen it clear until I, like, surrendered lock, stock, and barrel to Christ. He's the ticket to every plague on this planet. And he's the only one that offers salvation and forgiveness of sins. This is the ticket, man. We got to actually, I'm probably going too far for your podcast now.

But I'll pipe down on. If, no, I, by now, listeners know this and you're learning this. I don't shut things down. No, I won't go into how. I, to me, this is, this is, well, certain, certain conversations, certain conversations make people uncomfortable. I got lots of them. And they should.

And I got lots of them. This ain't one of them. This is one where I'm like, you know, when, when, and I bring up Tanner Nadeh, lots. But when Tanner Nadee and me get going, what people say is, man, I'd sure go listen to him at a church, right? Is that the, is Tanner the one I met in Tyson-More Butter's office? Or is that Sam? No, that's Sam. Sam.

Okay. Cool guy. Yeah. His dad, a tremendous doctor. Yeah. But for this, it's like, I don't know. I'm not bored. How long have we been going?

hour and 30 minutes oh brother i'd take it all day just like this i got to share christ with this transgender guy the other day right and i've never encountered before christ i was pretty narrow-minded i stepped to my own type and i just blocked everything else out sure and this this ljbq world i don't know a bunch about it but a missionary friend of mine come back from nepal after three years and he says to me what are you doing man what's god doing in you i heard you're like lit up for christ Because, I mean, he's seen me in a spiritual stupor for years. I said, man, he's done a work on my mind. He's, like, working in my heart.

For instance, like, this years ago, I was pretty shallow in so many ways. And, like, homosexuality and transgender, I just blocked it all out. I didn't care about it. I was really negative towards it. And even, like, if somebody was to approach me, I'd be, like, aggressive and, you know, threatening. I said, but God's putting it on my heart, man. If he can deliver me from alcohol, drugs, you know, racial issues, rage, hatred, emptiness, all these things, I believe he can straighten people out in any arena of life.

And I don't want to, you know, I can't remember who was talking about this LGBTQ movement and all this. I'm not out to attack anybody. I said, but I no longer have any resentment towards them. I surely don't want to slander them or maliciously attack them in any way. But the few people in my life, I've known three or four people that live that lifestyle, they all seem to have this incredible anxiety and like brokenness. and they were so confused in so many ways and felt so attacked.

I said, I'm convinced if they were to encounter Christ and sincerely made Christ Lord their lives that he could heal that brokenness in them and I don't think it's any different. I mean, if they're confused or anxious or depressed or discouraged or have any type of mental illness, I believe he can mend and heal any of that. So we end up, we arrive,

at our destination and who comes in first time in my whole Christian walk but this six foot one indigenous male in full drag and John Bounds preaches the message he brings it man he just he don't preach from notes man he opens that word and as he reads the word the holy spirit puts it on his heart and he laser down that's the kind of preaching I got to have because I can't settle for Dr. Phil or Oprah win for any of that stuff it doesn't build my faith I need to be I need the word of them. And where does he preach at? I'm at the Word Church, you know, just like directly behind the New McDonald's on the South End.

Okay. Incredible young guy. A Bible teacher, like, you'll look a long time for you to find another guy that age preaching like that. This fellow in full drag, like an incredible face makeup, like a lot of ladies on the catwalk, probably would have loved to have this guy do with their makeup. Come forward to receive Christ. John Bounds, man, he judges nobody. He shares Jesus with everybody.

Praise with them. You know, introduce them to the Lord. And then looks over at me and says, and now I'd like you to spend some time talking to my friend and associate Joshua. And he's going to pray with you and spend time with you. And man, the fact that I, this is that weird coincidence thing too, right? I had just finished talking to John and my buddy Matthew.

who came back from the ball about the same thing like 20 minutes 30 whatever it was 40 minutes before and I sat down with this guy man and I had nothing but love for him like I felt he was broken and felt so empty and he was going telling me all this stuff and then I had nothing but love for him no no resentment no the Lord had done to work in me, right? And I began to pray with this guy and something ugly revealed itself and something in his facial features transformed. And he come at me and stared into my eyes and his eyes just shook. And I said, Jesus loves you, man. And he offers you the peace and joy and wholeness that you couldn't find in this lifestyle or in this world. And it just put his fire.

man. It was just like a different person. That ugly thing that rose up in that man and called itself Sally. Let Jerome go and just sat back down. And I hugged on him. I give him the manliest backcracking hug he's ever had. And we prayed together another 10, 15 minutes. And him and I were friends right until the service was over.

Like, I couldn't get rid of him. but he felt the Lord touch his heart in that service man as long as he holds on tight to Jesus man I think he can overcome that depression and any of that anxiety and brokenness it's incredible he'd be you know I hear your story and where my brain goes is you imagine talking Jerome now

just seeing what his thoughts are And, you know, let's... Who's this? You said Jerome, right? Yeah, yeah, cool guy. Sitting down and talking to Jerome now. You know, I hear your side of it, but I mean, to... Wouldn't that be fascinating?

Oh, brother. I can't wait to see him again. This would be just a couple weeks ago, right? I won't say his last name. Sure, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. But he, yeah, yeah, as long as he replaces those things in his life with more of Christ, I believe we won't even recognize the guy.

Like he, the joy and like whatever God did in that guy changed him. And yeah, maybe he'll show up at Man Camp. Maybe. It'll be intense. Man, we took a guy off the street. Paul Days, a buddy of mine. I keep saying their name. Is that allowed?

Yeah, absolutely. Solid guy. Did you just say Paul Days? He's a close friend of mine now. Big man, tough guy. Paul Days and me grew up together. literally, like, my closest neighbor on the farm. Paul's like the solidest boss I ever had.

One of them. And I've had a couple. But Paul is one of my good friends. And anyways, his missus, he got a lot of kids, right? So his missus has a baby or she's about to have a baby. Can't come to Man Camp last year, right? Pull the mic back. Yeah.

So he can't, sorry about that. He couldn't come to Man Camp. So he said, I've already paid. I don't want a refund. And I want you to, you know, so I want to sponsor somebody else to go. So we pulled a fellow off the street. We literally, my buddy, you're all went into town. He found this indigenous guy, awesome guy, says, hey, do you want to come to Man Camp?

He's like, wouldn't even talk to him. Like, the guy was broken. Just walking down the side of the road. All you can eat barbecue, awesome food. There are going to be some services, get to throw axes. shoot bows, throw knives, there's a fishing derby. The guy never cared about any of that. And even at man camp, he never, I don't even know if he took part.

And he just sat there and he was like taking it. It was there. This guy Paul sponsored off the street shows up. He never said a word the first two days. Not a word. It was like he was speechless. Halfway through the service on the Saturday night. I said if there's anybody that just wants more of God in their life.

or wants to surrender to Christ for the first time or rededicate their life if they've walked away rejected the Lord or taken the Lordship of their life back into their own hands and you know like let their walk with God fall apart come forward man we'll pray with you this brother come forward right he hadn't said nothing for two days you couldn't get him to talk I said what do you want I want Jesus simple prayer Lord Jesus forgive me or the sin in my life Forgive me for being the Lord. And I let him in this prayer. Forbbing me for trying to be Lord of my own life.

Come into my life like you did his, mine, right? Come into my life like you come into this cowboy's life. I want you to be Lord of my life. And I want you to lead me and guide me from this point. And I forgive anybody that I have anything against. A walk in forgiveness. Like the word says, you don't forgive. The Father can't forgive you.

So I forgive. anybody that's done anything against me or anything I had, anything held against him. In Jesus' name. And this guy, it looked like you flipped a switch on the wall, threw his head back, and he says, I heard the Lord call my name. He says, I've been like under a curse for years. And it's gone.

He never shut up for the last day and a half. half of man camp talking to everybody about what the Lord had just done in his life and and how this curse that had been like keeping him silent and powerless I guess this indigenous brother had ticked off some family of his back in the past and these people were deep into like indigenous witchcraft or medicine he called it he said that they had put this medicine on him and ever since it had destroyed his life when he reached out to Christ and wholeheartedly meant it that came off of him man you thought we'd have plugged him into the wall he testified and fellowshiped with 135 guys over the next day and a half like a different person you couldn't even

hardly recognize him he was one of those guys that won I got to be baptized bro I said well You're like the fourth guy today to ask me if he could be baptized in the lake. Well, there's water. You love the Lord Jesus? Yeah. You plan on serving the Lord the rest of your life? Yeah. You believe he's everything the word of God says he is?

Yeah, bro. I said, no, why can't you have the water? We'll baptize you. Now, this year we got a baptismal service. It's planned, right? You know what I love about it? You sound like such a cowboy. I am.

I can't help it. I can't help it. I hear people say, oh, dude, are you from Texas? I said, no, man, my parents were busy farming, and they had three other kids right after me and one of them, like a set of twins. They left me with my grandpa. He was a veteran, and he was a hillbilly, and I talk like a hillbilly. So that's why people think it's, it's cowboy meets preacher, you know, it's kind of the cowboy preacher. It's, it's unique.

I do break horses and train horses, and that opens another door in the cowboy world to, like, you know, share my testimony and encourage. encourage others I go to brandings and rope calves and do things that's good well you know I'm curious I have this thought come all the way back again did you ever think you be sitting never talking I mean I don't I have no idea where this goes maybe this maybe this gets Sean banned off the airways maybe this goes to the moon about it doesn't matter it doesn't matter to me I'm just like whatever it's another interesting you know one of the the foundations of the podcast when I started was I was like I really want to pick some interesting brains, you know?

And for so long, I thought that, don't give me wrong, would I take Jordan Peterson, yes, but like for so long, I thought it was all these famous individuals. And I find some of the best conversations are with people I've never even heard of before. The river on a saddle horse, that's where I met your old man. Yeah. Like, to me, you just don't know, like, when you strap the shoes on or the boots on every day, you don't know what's going to come in, and you have no idea.

It's kind of like riding on for dear life to a bullet, train because it's like, you know, who's going to walk in today and sit down across from me and rattle off some things and is it going to piss some people off? Christianity certainly is ticking some people off. I hope it doesn't wreck your podcast, but I mean, if it changes one life, no, it won't. You know, it won't. But I mean, if you're coming in here speaking hate, no, no, man, it's nothing. Speaking your testimony of how your life's been changed. It's nothing like hate. It's the opposite, right? I could have stayed at home, went fishing, riding, all this stuff.

If it reaches one person that's walking through this life, hopeless without Christ and at the end of the line, or one father that can't, you know, a husband, his wife, or father, his children, or just, you know, make it another day, he's just hopeless. If it changes their life, man, I'll drive to Toronto. Well, I've been talking an awful lot about men's groups, right? Yeah.

So when I heard you were doing a men's retreat, a men's camp, I'm like, if only one guy hears it and goes, I'm all about, like one guy in his community can do an awful lot. Oh, man, yeah. And you think if you get, I don't know, I don't know if Army is the right word, but like certainly if you get a group of men that start pulling the same drag, it's like how quickly can we really change some things? Like how quick?

And not just that. First, the scripture is just coming to mind, brother. This is not natural either, but first Peter. no, sorry, 1 John 1-7 says, when we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another and the blood of Jesus cleanses us of all sin. I've seen teams that work well together.

Like, look at our Oilers now, they're winning, right? They're putting out and they're putting a puck in the net. They're winning games. Even a team that works good together, when he speaks about this fellowship in Christ, when we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, right? We have fellowship with one another. That fellowship that the Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit brings to a group is even different.

It's more intense. It's like a unity and a bond that's not realistic. You'll see a hundred guys who are all cocky, headstrong, and bossy working together for one purpose. Like this man camp, I don't know if last year there was even one argument. let alone a disagreement. And everybody pulling together, like, what needs to happen and this and this, yes, sir, let's go. And it really is like a well-loyaled machine. When that fellowship that the Holy Spirit brings to a group starts to operate the way it's designed,

oh man, it's like if you could mix that, like you take an NHL team or an NFL team, you get them all filled with the Holy Spirit and living for Jesus, they're probably not a team in the country. that will even compare. They're not all after their own glory. They're not showboating. It's all about working together for a common cause and like bettering the group.

It's intense, man. I never saw it. Aside from when I, and even as a lukewarm, you know, playing church Christian, I never saw it. It's when you surrender to Christ. How is your,

you mentioned married, kids? Yeah. How is your family dealt with? It's overwhelming at first, man. your spouse, when you get lit up by Jesus and you, you begin to make him first place, right, in every area of your life, areas that they once held, they got to kind of surrender to the Lord. But in the end, the benefit and, you know, the blessing of God in your life, when you put the Lord Jesus ahead of everything else, those other areas end up with more.

it doesn't it doesn't it's not realistic somehow it's like tithing right one of the first lies the enemy ever tried to sell me on when i went to church was that they were after my money right then he puts the spotlight on 15 different people that aren't sold out for christ and says they're all like that guy and that guy and this girl and this guy they're all phony so focus on them and take your focus off christ and don't even look at the word of god just look at them all their mistakes and what they're on tithing, right, honoring God with your finances. A lot of preachers won't even touch it now because it might hurt their little group or whatever. When you take that 10% of what God puts in your hand and you honor God with that,

you're left with 90%, right? You sew it into a ministry that's blessing people's lives or you give it to somebody less fortunate. The word says to bring in the whole tithing offering, right? into the storehouse, which is the group of believers that you're involved with. When you take that 10% of every dollar he puts in your hand, and you sew it back into the world, into the ministry, into those men and women that are on the front lines, living for the Lord with a whole heart, you're left with 90%.

He says he'll open the windows of heaven and pour out a blessing on your life. He'll bless what you put your hand to. It'll rebuke the devourer in your life, those things that devourer, you'll. your, you know, your finances, your health, all those things. I thought, yeah, right. The 90% you're left with goes further than the 100% ever could. It's bizarre.

I never, I would have never believed it until I put it to work in my life. Somehow, you put 10% of what God is tithing, right? It's all over the Bible, Old Testament and you. Put 10% of what God gives you back into the head. hands of God as an act of worship and thankfulness to him, he blesses that 90% and makes it do what 100 never could. I can't even wrap my mind around it completely. Right? Jesus himself says, given it shall be given unto you. Press down, shaking together, overflowing. He says in, I'll believe it's 1st Corinthians 9. He says, he who gives sparingly will reap sparingly. He who gives bountifully will reap

He who gives bountifully, we'll reap boundifully. But I don't know. I wish to add my Bible. He says, God loves a cheerful giver. You don't give begrudgingly or out of compulsion, but he loves a cheerful giver. Somebody that gives in thankfulness to him and in honor of him and worships him or makes him lord of their finances, right? I never bought it for a second until I started to do it.

And he takes that 90% you're left with and he stretches it. makes it go further than it ever could as a hundred percent it's bizarre that's what god does in your life when you make him first when you literally make him the center of your focus truly lord of your life the other areas right he says in matthew six 33 seek ye first the kingdom of god and his righteousness was his christ and all these things shall be added unto you i never knew what that meant until i actually made him first place seeking first his kingdom and his righteousness. He began to heal the brokenness in my marriage.

He began to make me the husband I couldn't be. He began to enable me to relate with my teenage sons and I don't know what to do with girls. I got a 12-year-old girl. He began to make me the right kind of dad I needed to be to father my kids. People I couldn't stand at work. I mean, even as a Christian,

just a lukewarm sort of a laxidious Christian, I couldn't tolerate certain kinds of people. I'm beginning to focus on Christ, man, and them people, somehow God worked that's in these relationships at work. I'm getting along with people. I couldn't stand without Christ. So when you focus on him and make him first, he takes care of the rest.

And the Word's absolutely 100% on the money. It turns out I haven't been able to prove that word of God wrong in 21 years. This has been interesting, Chad. I think that's maybe the word I'm searching for. I'm probably ruined the podcast with a lot of preaching. No. No, let me put your mind at ease. You have not.

I'm not. I learned this lesson very early on. No one guest shall ever make a podcast, and no one guest shall ever end a podcast. I believe that to my core. If people don't like what you're saying, they're going to turn it off. If they really hate it, I'm going to hear about it on the text line.

That's good. But the other side of it's so true as well. If people really like this, they're going to share it. That's right. And if people really, really like this, they're going to reach out and text me. This is the way it works. Now, if I have Josh and Sean every single episode, that's a different thought. One episode, you haven't ruined anything.

I appreciate it. If you come down on you, you feel free to just funnel it right back on me. Uh, no. To me, I appreciate a guest who comes in and says what's on their mind. Yes, sir. I don't, I don't want to come in here and, you know, I got offered a really nice compliment yesterday. I got interviewed on a podcast and they were talking about how, um, authentic I was. And I was like, well, I don't know. I don't try to be somebody I'm not. I'm Sean on the podcast and that's Sean.

Is this the same Sean that walks down the street? You want to talk to me about some things? I'm open. I might, I say a bit more on the street because, you know, sitting across here, I try to let the guest, do the speaking if I can and try and learn something along the way. But like, no, there's no, you're not going to, I'm not going to go back through this and edit out things that Josh said. People know that by now. You never knew what you were in for when you're doing.

No, no, no, but that's the excitement. This is, you know, this is. As real as it gets. Sean's going to walk away from this conversation and be like beaming for the rest of the day because I look for conversations like this. Nice. I look for conversations where somebody, is going to stir up some discussion in my own life, not, you know, par for the course and we just

kind of move along. And it's, it's like, no, I'm looking, you know, I want, I want to be, I want my brain to be teased and to think about things and to, to add discussion to people's lives. If I'm not doing that, I'm not doing my job. So you walking in, you're right. I had no idea who you were. I'm like, well, the Lord sets you up, man, because, I mean, Robbie Noble mentioned in your name two days before, some more butter mentioned in your name and saying, hey, you got to meet this guy? He got backbone. He speaks truth. I think he's a Christian. I said, no, I'm on board. I said, the Lord's kind of confirmed it a few days before. I'm going to phone him right away. I've never done a podcast. I'm a little public speaker really to mention. I mean, this is just something new. The Lord's

doing in my life. But I give you credit, man, for you being willing to speak truth and let some wildcard Jesus freak like me in here? Yeah. You're probably going to get a few people ruffled up. But if 10 people's lives are changed for the better, it's worth it. If one person's life. If one, one, even one. Yeah.

I mean, the Lord, he sailed all across the whole Red Sea just for one demoniac. And they kicked him out because, I mean, they weren't real keen on hearing the truth either. But, yeah, I guess I should probably put some focus on the Man Camp. I think if people are interested in the man camp, they got the dates. They got in the show notes. They got the link. June 9th, 10th, and 11th. We have the ability to rent the camp.

The camp beside this camp that we used last year. They said, oh, there's no way we can rent you our camp. I mean, it has nothing to do with your camp. And they've been separate for like 60-some years. My buddy was discouraged. He really tried to get it because we might need overflow, right? And I said, you're not. It's not really our idea to do this camp.

I mean, if God wants us to rent this camp, he'll make a way. And so we'll pray about it, put it in his hands and not worry about it. For a month and a half, we never heard back from that camp again. And then they contacted my buddy, who's like the logistics guy, and said, hey, we've changed our mind, and we'd like to rent you that camp if you still want it. So we have room. We can take like 600 plus guys now because of this other camp.

And so if there's a wave of men that want to go deeper in their walk with the Lord, they want some fresh fire, they want to be encouraged and strengthened in their walk, or they want to just find Christ for the first time. Yeah, you go to that Moose Lake Pentecostal link, you search Full Armour of God Mancamp, and you sign up. We'll make a way. If there's 10,000 guys show up, we'll make a way. We're just going to have to clean out the Hutter-Eight colony in the super store to feed them.

But we'll do it. Where is the man camp? Like, where does it actually? West of Bonneville. West of Bonneville. Yeah, 20 minutes west of Bonneville on the far west end of Moose Lake. There's Franchier Bay,

and then there's this Moose Lake Pentecostal camp. There's a colony nearby, so if like 5,000 guys show up, we're going to clean them out. But come one, come all. Anybody who wants more of Jesus? Anybody who wants to be a part of the manliest church you ever saw?

You come along. Well, let's do this. It's funny, I've been enjoying the chat. You ain't ruining anything, and I want to make sure you leave here knowing that. To me, to me, this is what I do. You didn't know what you were walking into. There's an open mic to say whatever you want to say.

You invited a cowboy from the sticks to come and talk. Cowboy preacher. It's like, sounds like an interesting combination to me. My email address is Jesus Freak. EZ-389. EZ being Ezekiel 3-8-9. He says he's made your head as hard as Flint, harder than Emory, right? That's these preachers.

They said, man, you've got a hard head. You're such a blunt force object for Christ. They give me that EZ-389. And yeah, I'm a freak for Jesus, man. Well, let's do the Crude Master final question. We can go for as long as you want. It doesn't matter. No, no.

I think we've probably pushed it too far. We'll lose people. No, no. Once again, you don't know this. So the crewmaster, I'm going to let you think about this while I talk past it. But the crew master final question is if you believe in a cause, stand behind it absolutely. What's one cause that Josh stands behind? So what's one thing you stand behind?

But while you think on that, and I'm sure it isn't hard to think on, the thing is, is like, I stumbled into a podcast in 2018. It was Joe Rogan, listened to it. I wish I could remember the episode. You know, I'd love to say it was Jordan Peterson for the first time, but I actually have no idea who it was. and I was just like enthralled by it. Now, I drove a lot back then, and I don't drive nearly as much anymore, so I have to find alternative means

to listen to my podcast, right? But I find there's times where Joe Rogan's conversations go three plus hours, and you're angry at the end when it ends because it's been so good and so interesting, and so something you don't normally hear. Listen, I've been,

I've gone church, you know since I was 18 and I walked away from my parents house right was out on my own I didn't you know I can count not count I mean it's not that many times I've gone to church every time it's like ears closed off I'm not hearing what nobody can get through my thick skull yeah just like done with this and your heart and and and it's just it's almost like I just I don't want to be there but I rationalized in my brain like it's an hour Sean just get through it life will go on right and and so it does but I also think back to that

I'm like there was never one person who got up on stage talking the Bible, word of God, everything you're talking and found a way to get through my dense skull and then over the last you know a couple months here you know

certainly Tanner in a day and I bring him up lots because I find our conversation is extremely interesting and he's a godly man and he's young he's 24 and he has a way of quoting the Bible like you've never seen like it's just like It's like, how do you remember all that?

But you, I mean, in saying that, folks, I think we can all agree. Josh has done a pretty dang good job of that as well. So to me, no, the people who tuned in the first five minutes and realized what this was going to be, and they turned it off, they're few and far between. My audience listens to, it's like, I forget what the number was the last time I checked. It's like 90-some percent listens to the last like two seconds. So this isn't where it's like, oh, we probably, it's like, no, they're along for the ride. I'm along for the ride on so many other podcasts, and when you hit the nail on the head,

you get this guest, like, I don't know if I believe all this, but this is fascinating. You don't want it to get. And I'm not saying you talk just to talk, but you should pull that thought from your head. You're on a podcast. I just wasn't sure.

No. I mean, time flies when this happens and this, whatever catalysts comes together to make this work like this. You and I could sit like this all day. I've never listened to a podcast, I'll be honest. I'm the least technological. guy you ever met. Well, I'll hook you up with the first one I did with Tanner today. That way

when you leave here, you got something for your ride home. I'm probably going to be hooked, man, because when I travel, I don't have a lot to listen to. And so this is probably going to be something the Lord's going to use to, like, educate me a bit. Well, I mean, the world set your fingertips when it comes to podcast. You want to find a podcast on anything. Yeah, I know a few of my buddies is totally hooked. Yeah. But, I mean, for me, specifically, if you want to know more about what the podcast is and who specifically, you know, like, I'm going to send this to Tanner for sure. I think this is right up his alley, you know. But at the same time, you want to go, as I mentioned his name, like 10 times,

it's like you want to go listen to a young kid around the area that's... Now I got to meet this guy. I'll saddle up two horses and we can spend the day. Well, you already promised you're going to take me to... I got to get horses road. I need guys to help me. Oh, that's easy. Yeah.

That's easy. Oh, it's good. We'll make a day of it because, you know, there's nothing like... It's incredible. some things and having a conversation. Now, as I babble on, what's one thing that Josh stands behind? Hmm. Well, I stand behind the Lord Jesus Christ now, lock, stock, and barrel. Because, I mean, to find out that Jesus Christ is everything the Word of God says he is, and everything

grandmother told me and my mother told me years ago is absolutely life changing. I mean, showed up in my life and he literally enabled me to route out everything that was destroying me and replaced it with joy and peace and wholeness and purpose and freedom from those things. You can't experience something like that and keep it to yourself. I would be some kind of a heartless, cowardly man to find something that literally transforms lives. sets people free. Bridges the gap between a fallen mankind and God the Father

and not share that with the world. I stand behind the gospel of Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ is Lord. Boliath, that's it. You mentioned your mother. Oh, I put her through the mill, bro. I mean, I'm assuming my mother is listening to this right now, and, you know, I haven't exactly been easier on her either.

Have you talked to your mom or your grandmother? Oh, yeah, they know. But how does that conversation go? Because let's assume that back then, they know what you've known now, right? That's what I'm going to assume. So that means they're watching this go on going. They walked by faith and not by sight because everything they saw said they were going to lose their son and grandson before he turned 20. He didn't back up.

He picked fights with dangerous people. and he lived a life of absolute chaos like a Pantera death metal song on repeat until he turned 21 when my mom encounters ladies who are standing in the gap interceding for sons grandmothers even men and grandfathers that are believe in God to reach their kids

in some way to pull them out of that you know that spiral of death that they're in my mom says you got to see my boy he's living proof like a living Lazarus he's living proof that the Lord can take the worst the darkest the most violent chaotic people and transform their lives completely I got to introduce you to them right you got to you know you got to hear what God did in his life they literally these people my mother my grandmother my my grandfather, for instance, they have, they have a testimony of purity, you know, not maybe not front lines, evangelistic, you know, ministry, but purity. I mean, they've served the Lord

for years and years and years and years. They use my testimony a lot of times to prove that it's not hopeless and it's not impossible. Like for years they prayed for me and I showed no sign of turning. No sign of slacking off at all, like as pedal to the metal, full throttle right to the end. And then all of a sudden, I mean, they had no reason to think that I was ever going to pull out of it. Their prayers were answered. And I didn't just find Jesus. I mean, some of my family wishes that I'd have found a little less Jesus. My wife, for instance, for the first while, like even this last couple years, I think she kind of would have preferred a fight of, you know, found half of what I found in Christ. Because, I mean, she would love to have me love the Lord and serve the Lord, but maybe not make him absolutely foremost in every year of my life.

I know that she's, in the last couple of years, the Lord's done a real work between us. And she knows, like, the fruit of this is nothing but good. so she she no longer tries to you know steal me away from it at all or or try to she's actually come alongside me and encourages me and helps me and

assist me and she gets one more call from guys from Ancamp and has to help them sign up through the online registration she will but I mean she's swamped with that um no that mother, that wife, that grandmother, you know, believe in God that he's going to like intervene in their loved ones' life. No matter what they see, they got to just continue thanking God and faith for doing it. And I mean, that really shows faith in Christ, right?

You ask him for something. And you keep asking him, he keep asking him, keep asking him, keep asking him. But when you start thanking him for it, that's like saying I know you're good for it and thank you for doing what I've asked you. Well, I don't know why the story that pops in mind, he's passed away now, but Ron Harris Jr. I did a series of 49 interviews for the city of Lloyd with the Lloyd archives. And so I was interviewing these, I would say the youngest was probably 60, was his youngest, 60, 65, the oldest was mid to late 90s and got to hear their story and their, you know, and some of their wisdom that came out. And Ron Harris Jr. lately has really been on my mind, I guess, because he talks about becoming an alcoholic.

And kind of wandering through life, just chasing the bottle and how he got into it. And, you know, he talks about, like, young kids. And back then John Wayne drinking him. It was always whiskey. And so anyways, he just talks about how he just kind of went into it. And he was, you know, part of the Lloyd Border. Kings back in the day and not playing for him, but I believe as an equipment manager. And anyways, he ends up, I believe it's in BC and I feel like I'm, I started listening to

it and I don't know why I didn't finish. So I'm going to go do that again, folks, but so I can get the fact straight. But like what always stuck with me is he walks, he walks into this place that he thinks is a bar and it's not a bar. It looks like a bar, but it's actually for people struggling. It's like alcoholics anonymous. It's people. And he leaves because they want to take his beer.

and he's got to walk around with the beer, but then he goes back 15 minutes later, and you can't understand why he's drawn to it, but he gives his beer over, and, but I'm going to get it back when I leave. Yeah, for sure, we'll get back. But while you're here, there's no drinking.

Okay, and so he goes in, and then he starts going there, and he starts going there, and he starts going there, and then he changes his entire life around, ends up moving back to Lloyd and becoming a community pillar to where the city of Lloyd looks at him and goes, you are worthy of being interviewed for your story.

Now, do they know, that's his story. I have no idea. For his works in the city. And anyways, the whole point of this is I go, what is that? What is it where you're walking around and you find by chance, this place that looks like a bar because you want to drink

more and you walk in and it is the complete opposite. And his answer then was my parents never stopped praying. And I don't think I understood back then. I'm like, oh, okay. You know, kind of like what? But the longer I do this and the more people I talk,

to and the more people that I stumble into that have a background and faith and really talking openly about it the more you start to go oh right like to me imagine like having your mom sit here and unless you don't have this coverage because she's been you know like I can't imagine I got young kids to have a child go through that and you go like oh I just I got to trust and I got to have faith I got to pray about it it's like that seems she had no reason to have faith other than her faith in Christ because I never give her any reason. And in the Western world, we're so, I don't know, is it logical? Like we just like, pragmatic?

I don't know the word that is where we're at. We don't put any, and I shouldn't say we don't. Certainly I didn't. And I think a lot of people don't put any weight on the scale for that type of thing. It's all like, well, he got hooked in the drugs at a young age because this happened and this happened, if they would have done this different, and they would have, and blah, blah, blah, blah. And it never entered, unless maybe you're in a church,

then maybe the discussion opens up about that. But nobody ever talks about that. That's it. And it wasn't the drugs that was the real big problem. That's why I say, I'm not, where it says we're not at war against the flesh, the people, we're against the things behind it, the darkness, the rulers of the darkness, the principalities and power. So what pushed you into the dark, like if you were,

to walk back through your early days. Yep. What was the thing that drew you over to that side, wanting to fight and drink and do all those things? Like, was it one thing that you just like, this was it? My dad was a Titan. When he played junior hockey, and he was a real athletic hockey player,

he was a defenseman, and he laid the knuckles down. And I always looked up to him that way. And I, just personality-wise, high-energy and abnormal. aggressive physically like yeah it's it's I guess a bunch of it would be genetic but I looked up to those guys and like you're imprinted by those that you want to be like and as a little boy you looked up to the tough guys you've seen the hockey fights you've seen the the John Wains of this world and you want to be just like him you know what little boy really grew up wanting to be like his auntie I

I had some really cool uncles. That lifestyle since destroyed their lives, but they were drinkers and they smoked and real tough guys. And I grew up wanting to be just like them. But then to be like them, I made some poor decisions and a lot of willful sin, man. And the choices you make affect your tomorrow big time. And I exposed myself to some dark things, man, through, you know, incredible vise. drugs and alcohol. I mean, when you willingly take the bottle in your hand or you consume drugs, willingly you're opening yourself up to a world that's, you just trend

that and look back at people that have made those choices. It's common. It destroys most all of them eventually or take some kind of huge negative toll on their life. And I just continued because I'm so hardcore in most ways. I'm all or nothing like I, I'm either are all in or all out. I'm playing to win. Definitely not even consider and losing. We're going to try our best. But I just compounded that over and over again.

That willful sin, those poor decisions. Surrounded myself with bad company. The word says bad company, crups good morals, right? And I just surrounded myself with people that made me feel comfortable making those mistakes. And some dark things, I'm sure. were allowed into my life. It wasn't the booze and the drugs.

I mean, those did a lot of damage to me, right? But it was the reason I was trying to, like, fill that void with those things. It was excitement. It was the rush. I rode buckinghorses. I fought constantly for that thrill, that pride,

and trying to satisfy that emptiness. You know, the ladies in the beginning, the things, the adrenaline rushes, the sports are like, I didn't do anything that wasn't physical or exciting, right? But it wasn't those things that were my problem. When I surrendered to Christ and found the Lord, he cured the problem that I was trying to use those things to medicate

or trying to use those things to remedy. And I didn't have to fight those things all the other. The problem went away, and so did they. I haven't had to spend time in Alcoholics Anonymous. I mean, I was crushing half of 26 a day. The drugs and alcohol, I couldn't seem to quit them at all. Once I found the Lord Jesus and surrendered to him and realized that he cared for me and offered me a future,

that stuff just fell away. I don't have to fight addiction, nothing. It's true. You seek first-stice. kingdom and his righteousness he takes care of the rest yeah the booze and the drugs and the adrenaline and all the excitement that was just what I was trying to fill it with he's actually the remedy not some kind of medicinal aid well I appreciate you coming in doing this I'll be interested to see I laugh folks but I'll be interested to see what the feedback comes off of

this one is you know uh controversial isn't isn't the word that I think when I think of this. It's just when you see the name Josh Allen on the podcast, as your name fits in with so many different other names, you know, I got listeners across Canada and the States. So they're, you know, like, how did they find Sean Newman? I don't know. At times you just go, I don't know.

But certainly from the podcast, my audience, right, Nobody, the way you get suggested to me is not obscure because this happens lots, but I think it's kind of obscure. It's not because you are on shows talking and somebody stumbled across you. It's because of two conversations that happen, in my opinion. One is Sam is in one of the conversations and then the other one is Robin telling you. And because of that, this happens. It's like, I mean, but how else would I have ever figured this out? Maybe I would have heard of the men's camp and I would have been like, oh, this is a really cool idea.

Like certainly folks, that could have happened. That's not the way it happened. And usually the way guests thrown at me all the time is they've been on somewhere. They've been interviewed and they're like, you need to interview this person. This is super unique. So I'm curious what happens to the phone line, the text line after this comes out, you know, good, bad, and different. And I implore people to, you know, reach out on the text line. I'd be curious to hear people's thoughts because there's a, you know, there's a, you know,

there's a there's a huge portion of my listeners that are feeling called to the Bible specifically. It's something that comes up a lot. I'm feeling called to it, drawn to it. I grew up in a Christian house, but I never really paid any attention. I actually moved away from it, didn't really want anything to do with it. But over the course, specifically over the course of the last couple of years, I've been getting pulled back to it, but it's uncomfortable. And I don't know if I want to talk about it.

And, you know, then they usually thank me for sharing my journey. And I'm like, well, this has been the ride of the podcast since day one. Well, the Word of God is the ticket, really, because before the Word of God, there was a Muslim friend of mine from Lebanon. He was cool guy, tough guy, shot six times during some kind of skirmish between rebels. He said, man, your life's getting dark. At that point, I won't go into detail on how dark, but he was aware. I'd see him every day for meals.

I'd pay my tab a week and be. advance and eat at his restaurant. He said, you need help, buddy, you need to somehow get old to your life because eventually you're going to lose it. And he gave me a Quran. I read that Quran a bunch. There was a bunch of wisdom in there and different proverb-type teachings and stuff. And I mean, if you applied those teachings to certain areas of life, I'm sure there would be some benefit. But when I picked up even Buddhist holy books and things like that. There's always a few truths. But when I picked up the Holy Bible and I began to read that book, man, that book began to read me. That book began to open my eyes spiritually like

nothing else in this planet could. And I began to hear the still small voice of the Holy Spirit lead me, man. He led me right out of hell on earth. And that's what I share with people because that's the only thing I ever seen, reconstruct a broken life like that. Well, I appreciate you. I'm going to say it one last time. I appreciate you coming in doing this. We could probably do this for a few more hours.

We better cut it off. And it's funny, I don't want to cut it off, but at the same time, I'm like, I want to be very respectful of your time and everything else. We'll see what the audience thinks, you know? Maybe they'll be screaming out for a little cowboy preacher. I hope I can call you that. You can, buddy.

To me, call me whatever you want. Yeah, that's, but either way, thank you for coming in and doing this, and doing it in person, you know. I've been getting more and more use out of this place, it seems, day by day, and I ain't nothing better than sitting across from somebody. This has been a blessing. It's a privilege and honor. I didn't know what to expect. This has been good. I look forward to that ride you promised me. Sounds good. All right, buddy. Well, what did you think of that, folks? I am kind of curious, you know?

That's, well, that's one way to start a week off, isn't it? Well, you can hit me up in the text line, as always. This episode has been brought to you by Calrock Industries. When it comes to oil field equipment, new, used, you got her. Calrock Industries. Just go to Calrock Industries.ca, or Calrock Industries.com. com.com.com. For all your needs when it comes to the oil field,

used surplus frack sales and production tanks with new used and refurbished oil and gas equipment and stock. anything oil field look to cal rock just go to calrock.ca you can find all their information there it says cal rock is your best bet when it comes to finding equipment that fits your needs is within your budget and is ready as soon as you need it and they can even custom manufacturer tanks and other equipment for your specific application so go to calrock dot c a couple of things here before i let you add uh lights you off uh you know and onto you the rest of your day if you're enjoying the podcast make sure to share it and you know somebody asked what my advertising budget the other day was and maybe it

should be more but i tell you i rely solely on you find folks to uh you know if it hits a cord and you like it share away because uh that's that's how we we grow the audience and exposure and all that that and um well i mean i've trusted you find folks all along the way and you haven't let me down uh if you like the show make sure to hit subscribe uh leave me a comment a rating all that helps you know uh with the algorithm algorithms and everything else that you we're dealing with these days. Let's make sure that people know what to look for and that they can find the SMP. Either way, I appreciate you hopping in and staying this long along for the ride.

It's been an interesting journey, if nothing else. And that's what I'm all about. So it ain't going to change here anytime soon. And I appreciate you guys listening to the very end. And we'll catch up to you. Well, I guess it's going to be the Tuesday mashup next, isn't it? Ooh, baby. All right.

Until then. Oh, and if I didn't mention this already, SMP presents June 10th, Tom Luongo, Alex Criner, in Lloyd Minster, Gold Horse Casino. Let's just say the night's going to be electric, and I hope to see you all there. Make sure to grab your tickets.

Somebody was asking like, wow, what are they going to talk about? It's like, well, these guys are world stage events, right? So geopolitics, they're going to be looking at banks. You know, everything seems to be crumbling around us. They're going to make sense or try and make sense of a lot of that. the war in Ukraine, China, different things, you know, just how they're all these

all these large scales events, how they piece together. Tom and Alex do such a wonderful job of piecing it back together for us to kind of, you know, take some of the fear out of it and just show you exactly kind of what's going on and maybe some ideas of what to do in the future, that type of thing. And overall, just it should be a fun night to have these two guys on stage. Okay, that's it. Mash up, can't wait.