Travis Hearn - Senior Pastor of Impact Church and Author | The Fire Is For You

I wouldn't be who I am today without it. I always say I went from jail to Jesus. So I just discovered my purpose in life. That was a wild day. Travis Hurn is the senior pastor of impact church in Scottsdale, Arizona, a fast growing church that began as a Bible study for the Arizona Cardinals. When I was a senior in high school, a basketball coach called me and he said, want to go celebrate? I'm buying all the alcohol you can drink tonight. It takes some room. I pour it in a mason jar and then put a bunch of Coca-Cola, the rest, drink it. Then it was time to leave, so away from my house, red and blue lights go off behind me, so he puts me in jail. Got suspended from my senior, your baseball team because of this that night. My mother picking up from jail, she was like, hey, you want to stop by my pastor's house. That was the trajectory changed my life. As team pastor for the NBA's Phoenix Sons and a former chaplain for the NFL and Major League baseball, Travis has spent decades guiding professional athletes and communities alike. The more connected you are, the more protected you are. I'm on my back. I look at this one firefight and I go, what do you think I should do? He goes, I think you should go to the hospital. That is amazing. I didn't know this man. I didn't know him into my church. He didn't know whose house he was walking into. If he did not say, I would have been dead within the hour. With over 25 years in ministry, multiple books and a powerful new release, the fire is for you. If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change, there's nothing in life that you'll ever go through that the Bible doesn't already talk about. Travis continues to inspire through faith, leadership and resilience. This is Pastor Travis Hurn and this is his story. Welcome to success story. I'm your host, Scott Clary. 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For me, I always start with my mom because my mom, my mom is everything, man, like I like everything. My mom is my mom and my parent. Like she's my mom and my dad. Like she's, she raised me and she had a tough life, man, she was born in Frisco and never had a dad. She was honestly, she was born out of an affair. And then never knew her dad, never had a dad, never knew the dad. And then when my mom was 13, she lived in Southern California. And then her mother was raped and murdered and found in the hills of Southern California. And so that's really what got us to Arizona. So it's interesting because I'm not even alive yet. But then my mom moved to Arizona to live with her grandmother, her only, you know, person she could live with, a family member. And three years later, at 16 years old, she had me. And dropped out of high school and she worked, or she worked her butt off like my whole childhood. And so my mom has been an anchor for my life. And she's a woman of God. She wasn't always, she wasn't always a woman of faith. But around my middle and high school years, she really got like this fire for the Lord. Like she's going to church all the time. I was like, dude, this is, this is weird. Like I thought it was weird. I'm like, my mother is at freaking church every night of the week. Like she's a radical. Like who is this woman? And I was an athlete. So I think I found through brokenness, my mom's first marriage, a lot of alcoholism, a lot of a lot of stuff abuse, the verbal abuse, anger issues. But they were young and they were dumb. And they eventually figured it out. And that marriage didn't last. And the next marriage, my mom was in her second marriage. And I have two half sisters out of that marriage. But then he, in year 13, she didn't own my mom and got another woman pregnant that my mom worked with. And so that child is now in his mid 20s. And my mother took him in like one of her own children. I mean, she's, when I say incredible, dude, incredible, like incredible. And really shows love like what I think God would show love. Like, you know, just, so yeah, I grew up, I think I found therapy in like my affirmation in sports. And so I was the best. I was the, you know, the quarterback of my football team, the point guard of my basketball team, the catcher for my baseball team. And I don't know, like back in the days when we could all play three sports and not have to play one all year around. But I think I found like something that I needed because of the brokenness in my life. And I was like, dude, if I'm great at sports, then people like me. People love me. And realizing how surfaced that is. And man, party to high school, middle school, drinking part, I mean, smoking like many. Yeah, you know, you have fun most, probably like most. And yeah, man, I mean, just really was that kid from the outside looked like maybe I had my crop together. And I really didn't. And I was kind of chasing the wind. And like, you know, then when I was a senior in high school, it was a crazy story. But my basketball coach for one year, that one year, 45 year old man, he called me and he said my car broke down. And he's like, bro, can you give me a ride to the all whatever selections, all state, Arizona, all state selections. It's like, yeah, you know, sure. So I give him a ride. He comes out and he's like, an hour later, I can't go in there because I'm a student athlete. It just coaches voting on players. And he's like, bro, you made, you know, whatever it was. I don't remember what the exact name of the award is because they always change all state, all conference, all read like whatever. But he goes, you made and I said, man, that's awesome. And he goes, yeah, he's like, you want to go celebrate? And, you know, I mean, I'm, but you're, you're partying and drinking up to this point. It's not like no doubt. Yeah. But, but in my head, I'm 17. He's 45. He's a teacher at the school. He's a coach of a basketball. You know what I'm saying? So, and I'm, I'm kind of like, is this a setup? I'm like, you know, I'm kind of like like, like, and so I was like, you know, well, you know, what do you have in mind? And he's like, why got this, this girlfriend? He was a single dude, lives down the road. And, man, I'm buying all the alcohol you can drink to, like, it's our me and, but it's just you. He's us. He's under us. Me. Oh, that's weird. Yeah, that's really fucked up. Really weird. So, and at 17, I'm like, I mean, okay, like, I got a buyer. Like, at 17, you're trying to figure out who's going to buy my alcohol. So, I'm like, I got a buyer. Let's go. And so, we did be into this house. And, and, man, I just remember he was gone. I don't know what he was doing. He was in some back room with this girl. I think he was using probably some sort of drug. And so, I'm left out in the kitchen in the wet bar by myself. And don't really know what I'm doing. You know, this is all this liquor. It takes some rum. I pour it in a mason jar. And it may be 25% and then put a bunch of Coca-Cola, the rest. Drink it. And I'm like, man, I didn't do anything. You know, so next next round is like a half a jar of rum and half coke. And I'm like, that didn't do nothing, man. Like, I'm a machine. Like, give me some more. So, the next one was it was literally just an entire mason jar of rum. And, and crushed that thing. And so, then it was time to leave. And it's an hour drive home. And so, I'm like, let's go. We get in the car. I get about 30 minutes away from my house. And on a Saturday night, almost midnight, red and blue lights go off. Behind me, pull me over. You know, they give me every test that they give you. I mean, failed every one of them miserable. Like, I'm drunk, dude. Like, do we need to do this? And so, he takes me to the Phoenix Police Department, puts me in jail. And, and, and it was bad. I mean, it was a, it was a bad thing. Like, I got suspended from my senior year baseball team. Because of this, I got, you know, hit with suspended drivers license for a year. I got hit with 280 hours of community service. So, so that's, that's where I come from. And it was that night that my mother picked me up from jail. And I told you she was like, dude, crazy on fire for this dude named Jesus. And that night, she was like, Hey, we got back home. She picked me up and she's like, Hey, you want to stop by my pastor's house? And it's Saturday night, you know, 12, 30 PM or AM. And I was like, okay. And I didn't know what that mean. Men, all I know is that, you know, I've kind of screwed my life up here. And so, man, that night, I made a commitment and pray, pray to prayer to acknowledge Jesus as my savior. And that was the trajectory that changed my life. It's so interesting how like, you know, the people that sort of come in and out of our life, especially at a young age, they're so they can radically change the course of our life. And you would have hoped that as a kid playing sports, a coach would be a positive influence. And already the whole situation with him asking to come drink at his house alone is already very weird. Yes, it's already very weird. So all those days, a guy has like a slightly off moral compass already, because that's just not appropriate. Yes, but it's also interesting how when I've had other spiritual leaders on this podcast, and it's an interesting conversation that I love to have. And I'm sure that you have strong opinions about it. And this will sort of like, I think, probably weave its way into this chat. But I always find that when somebody does not have God, they find God in something else. And you were very young. And what I mean by that is they'll have not God in like the spiritual sense or the religious sense. But if they do not have God or spirituality in their life, they'll find it in in something. It could be it could be for you. It was it was sports and it was potentially partying. It could be it could be work. It could be women. It could be drugs. It could be gamble. It could be anything. But the concept is people find it somewhere. So I think that I think that when I speak to anybody who sort of leads a spiritual community, I always find it so interesting to just understand from your perspective, like even over your own life, how your version of God has has changed and who you look up to and what you hold like dear inside you. And I think it's actually, you know, hindsight's always 2020. I was even looking on your Instagram before and we're going to talk about all the things that happens to you. And there's one very traumatic health event. And you even said that you would never change that and not go through it again because it made you who you are. But the experiences that happened to us and shape us, I think it was actually very fortunate that it happens to you at a young age and that you weren't injured and it coupled you over as opposed to you killing yourself for someone else. And again, hindsight's always 2020. But at the moment, it feels like shit. But ultimately all that that is kind of what saved you for lack of a better definition. Yeah. I for me, exactly. I think like before that moment, like I didn't believe in God. I mean, I was like, you know, I'll be that typical like in the house like God, if you're real, turn the lights on and I'm like, see, see, like, yeah, you're real like see, you know, and like, like, I think like all of us, we'd like to know there's a search. There's a a search for it for purpose. There's a search for fulfillment success. So if you read, if you ever read through the book of Ecclesiastes, right, it was written by a guy named Solomon. It's considered the one of the wisdom books of the Bible. So like Proverbs is a wisdom book, you know, but so Ecclesiastes, the whole book is about Solomon on a quest to figure out purpose and fulfillment. So it's like it's as old as humanity. We all want it. I want to know what I'm supposed to be here for. Like I ended up on this earth. I didn't choose to be here. You didn't choose to be here. Like what, what am I supposed to do? What, what, what is it? You know, I always say that I'm created for purpose on purpose for purpose, right? What everybody is. So Solomon goes to all those things you just said, that's the book of Ecclesiastes. I know that. Yeah. It's litter. Like, dude, I'm going to try women. Like I'm going to try money. Now I'm going to try success. Now I'm going to try earthly possession. Now like the whole thing is like I didn't, he goes, I didn't, there's a script that says I didn't, I didn't, there's nothing that I didn't allow myself to try. You know, and I end up, I end up still like empty. It's a swing in a mess. Like what the freaking am I here for? What am I here to make money and die? To grow my Instagram, you know, numbers and die. Like what am I here for? And that's what I, that's what I found in, in my relationship with Jesus Christ. And I think like when you think about, when you think about that for a minute, think about this, there's, there's this story of how a hunter would hunt wolves in the snow, right? And what he would do is he would take, it's true. You know, it's, it's what, how they will hunt wolves. So you take a knife blade and coat it in animal blood and then freeze it. And then coat it with another layer of animal blood and freeze it. And then one more level of animal blood and freeze it. And then the hunter would go out and stick the knife in the snow, boom it in the nighttime boom, right? With the blade sticking up. So the blades up and the wolf can smell the animal blood. Doesn't know it's not an animal. And it goes over and it starts licking the knife blade and it goes to the first layer of, of ice. Then it gets to that, that, that blood. And it's like, oh, let's go, baby, like, let's freaking go. And then it gets through the next layer of ice and now more blood and now the third layer of ice and now more blood. Well, by this time, the wolf's mouth is all numb, completely numb, he can't even fill him somebody can taste the blood. Well, at the end, he's now licking the keen edge of the knife blade. And he's lacerating his mouth and his tongue and his, he bleeds to death, right? There's like this morbid story, but it's like, that's what we do in life. Like lick the knife blade, like, oh, dude, money, money, money, money, or success, success, success, success, women, women, men, men, men, relationship, drugs, drugs, drugs, alcohol, alcohol, and, and, and, and we end up kind of kind of like killing us, killing us, because we don't know, we're trying to figure this thing out. And, and I think that for me, that, that was what I figured out, man, like God's grace, God's forgiveness, God's unconditional love. I don't know if anybody's ever thought about that, but human love, human love, they're, it's all conditional, all of it. Dude, I'm a pastor. I've married hundreds and hundreds of people. We get on the, you know, the alter and it's our drivers take you Natalie to be my spiritually and lawfully wedded wife, and to have and hold a love and share, we say, for better, for what we don't mean for better, for we had to cut that out out of the vows, because worse can be really freaking bad, worse can be there. And we've all been through some worse, yeah, right? I mean, marriage is tough, freaking stuff, dude. I'm a pastor. Been married 27 years. It's still tough. Like you take two people, put them together, and it's like, dude, here we go, you know? And so I think like, man, it's, if, if, if we're real about it, the unconditional love part for me, for me is like, God loves me anywhere, anyway, that's the, that's the true unconditional. He loved me anyway. He loves me, inspire the fact that I failed and failed. And we'll fail today. It won't fail tomorrow. And we'll fail next year. And like he, he loves me anyways. And you know what I'm saying? It's like if I'm, if I'm, if I'm, you know, if, if I'm cheating on my wife, if somebody's cheating on their spouse, that's probably going to end. And, and it's going to take a lot of unconditional love for it, not to, you know? And so I think in a world full of hate, man, the light of love, just, it's, it's, it's, it would, it would shine so brightly. Honestly, it would fix, it would fix our, our nation. You got to, everybody pitted against each other, not everybody goes to the thing is. So it's bringing back to your story. You know, it's an interesting point. Not everybody goes through super traumatic life events. I think that most people die by a thousand cuts, kind of like the, the, the wolf story that you just mentioned, but like true, like in life, like, I mean, they, they lose themselves. And it's not that they lose themselves. It's not, like, this is not like a, a, a, a religious podcast. This is like a business podcast. But like, to drop parallel from what you're talking about to business, they lose themselves in their business because it's like one more deal or one extra comma. And then it's one less day with my family and one less day with my kids. And then all of a sudden, even though when they were 20 to 30, they started out with the right mindset, I want to build a business. I want to make some money. I want to take care of my family. Then it's like multiple wives later and broken family later. They look bad. But they have not because it's not because one event, you know, it's like a million events. So I want to just, yeah. So let's keep telling your story. I think it's very, I mean, your story is fascinating. And actually, I want to bring this part to your story. So you have the DUI. This is a pardon the pun, like come to Jesus moment, where you go to your pastor's house. I want to take it back to sort of your story for a second. And I want to bring in something that I always find interesting. So you're writing a book, The Fire is For You. And that's really focused on your journey. And, and when somebody chooses a title for a book, it always has a lot of meaning and significance to them. So as we go through your journey, The Fire is For You. What does that mean to you as a title? And why did you choose it? But what does it mean to you as you go through all these inflection points in your life? Like, for example, when you go through that point where you have your DUI, you go to do your your mom's pastor's house for the first time, connect those dots for me. Great question. The Fire is For You title. The book, the book is not, it's not a, it's not a book of, it is about what happened and things that I've been through. The book is for you. The book is for the reader. The book is because every one of us, every one of us go through fires. Right. So you just said, like you have a business in or, you know, you're, you're, your chase, we all do that. Man, like, man, I want to build a great company. The church is a business. The church is a ministry, but it's a business. It is a, it is a corporation. It has money coming in, money going out. You know, we've got, I've got 50 full-time employees, probably another 50 part-time employee. Like, the church is a business. You growing the church. Yes, it's ministry, but there is this business. We have HR department. We got, you know, conforming abide by laws and all these things. You know, so impact church, my church, it's entrepreneurial, entrepreneur, birthed out of a Bible study for the Arizona Cardinals. So the Arizona Cardinals football team start, you know, start a Bible study for the football team. Eventually, open it to the public and the rest is history. So going back to your question, my church is flooded with people going through fires. So is this nation? So is this world, I'm going through depression. That's a fire, anxiety, fear, guilt, worry, shame, shame. Oh my gosh. The times that we've done stuff in our life that we're not proud of and we know other people that hurt them and we can carry this shame, this guilt. And so those are fires, man, cancer. My stepfather was diagnosed with cancer given two to five years to live. It's my mom's, you know, third marriage, first great marriage. He's a good man. That's a fire. My sibling who is fighting fentanyl addiction. That's a fire. Like we all go through fires. Man, addiction, alcoholism, brokenness, divorce, failure, my business, dude, I, this is the fourth time I've tried to get a company off the ground. And all four of them have like, that's a fire, right? So what, what, what I have learned in my own life is that God, God, there are no wildfires in life. There are only controlled fires, meaning scripture, whether somebody believes in it or not, you can't, you can't deny the things that it says, the truth, the little nuggets of truth, like vow shall not murder. Maybe you don't believe in God or Jesus, but I mean, that's a pretty good rule to live by. No matter if you don't believe in God. Yeah, just don't murder. Don't commit adultery. I mean, that's kind of good. Don't lie. Don't cheat. Don't steal. Don't, you know, but, but one of them, one of those scripture, a couple of them, but that it talks about how we, we get put in the fires to be tested in that fire purifies us, right? It refines us. So the fire of brokenness that I went through, the fire of that failure, that's going to refine me because I'm not doing that ever again. So that's refining me, right? The fire of whatever and fidelity or the fire of cheating or and I get you get caught. Okay. Well, that sucks. We're human, man. We all, we have all done human stuff, but hopefully we learn from that and we go, man, I need to change some things about who I am. Maybe I need some therapy. Maybe I need some, some counseling, right? And so the fire, the fire being for you, it purifies you. It hopefully it burns out the, your own wings doesn't feel like it though. And the moment it's hot, it burns, it feels like the house is going to burn down. See in the Bible, it uses three metaphors for trial. It uses storms. It uses valleys and it uses fires, right? And so the fire is for you, is a book for people to go, dude, I've gone through some some hell and this book is going to help you get through your hell. I've gone through some hell too, you know, being a man of faith doesn't exempt you, doesn't put an umbrella of like, you know, like, dude, this is life. This isn't heaven. The, you know, the, it rains on the just and the unjust and good things happen to bad people and bad things happen to good people. And so going back to your story, the, the fire is for you. That's what, that's what that title means to me because like two years ago, I went through the fire of my life. My, my family, we went through the fire of our life and, and it almost killed me. So, and I want to, we'll talk about what that fire was in a second. I don't know whether they're just yet. I just want to, I want to just point out. So even when you're getting that DUI and kind of just like, talking back to something that I mentioned about, if it didn't happen, who knows when it would have happened, right? And that's like the perfect example of fires for you. And I think that without the, the, the, the biblical analogies, I think that when people go through stuff, when people go through really hard times, the people that I repeatedly see come out of that successful, because everybody goes through like, you might, everybody does, it's not like, uh, hopefully it doesn't happen to me. Like, life's going to have to have you and life's going to have you. Fire's going to happen. You're very harmless. Right. But it is how you come out on the other side of it. So, so how did you, how did you come out on the other side of, of that DUI? But I do want to, and, and I'll answer that question. I do want to say you, you literally just, you literally, you just, you were a preacher for a second, because, because here's why, because you said, he said, it's not if it's when. Yeah. Right. Well, David said and saw one of the most famous chapters in the Bible, uh, that, that every rapper has done a, uh, a segment on this chapter, is even though I walk, even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, right? I shall fear no evil for you, you, you are with me. What does he say? He says, even though I walk, he doesn't say, I hope I don't. He doesn't say, maybe hope. Like, it might, no, he says, even though, and, and, and, and those are valleys. And so going back to that DUI, I wouldn't be, who I am today without it. I always say I went from jail to Jesus. Like, like, that was a wild day. I went from like, I had this cool accolade and, you know, got an award to like, dude, I got arrested, put in jail to like, dude, I just discovered my purpose in life. And, um, and yeah, it did, it did, it did, it did shape me. It did define me. Um, God, God has no, this is what I've learned, dude. I'm in the people business. Yeah. I, I have, I have billionaires in my church, you know, 500 millionaires, 200 millionaires, like, it's Scottsdale. It's the entrepreneurial hub of the nation. It's a very, they'll have a very wealthy city, very wealthy city, very effluent. Um, that I, I, I pastor pro athletes. I have for 23 years, um, the biggest names in sports, um, are in my church. They're in my phone. I pastor them, right? This, this is the thing when, when you talk about mine, mine was jail. I was like, dude, I, I screwed that up. But a lot of times, people have everything. And it looks seemingly good, realizing, dude, I have nothing. And a great example of that is, um, a friend of mine that I had on our stage in year three of the churches Rev. Run from Rundy, M.C., right? And I interviewed him and I go, dude, like, when did you become a Christian? Because he's obviously very vocal about his faith. And he goes, my top, he goes, my top was my bottom. And I go, tell him, he goes, you know how a lot of people, they hit rock bottom. And then like, oh, I found God and I found real. I'm like, yeah, that, yeah, I know about that. I know. And he goes, well, mine was the opposite. I'm run Rundy, M.C. at the peak of like, Rundy, M.C., right? He's like, dude, I got everything you can buy. I bought it. I've got everything money can buy. I've got any, any earthly thing that you want in this world. I got it. And he goes, and I felt so spiritually bankrupt that in my bathtub, I write then and there with a pile a pile of weed on the bathtub. He's like, I said, you know what? I'm going to give this, this Jesus thing to try. You know, and I think, what, what are we trying to do? I can tell you story after story after story Scott. I could tell you hundreds of stories of people who are trying to chase what many of us are trying to chase. And they've got it. I can tell you the hundreds and hundreds of people that have gotten it. And they go, dude, this is empty. This is lonely. I'm broken. I have 30, 40, 50, 100 million dollars, 200 million dollars in the bank. I'm broken. So what actually is the meaning of life? You know what I'm saying? And that's what I discovered from from from from me being put in jail. You know, it was like, dude, and it wasn't my first time in jail. Did I, I told you, I partied my face off. I, you know, I got, I got in trouble for stealing and I got in trouble. Like he's just broken this. And so the fire is for you is like, yeah, that was a fire. The DUI was a fire. Disappointing my mom. Man, that was dude, like that was a fire. And but at the same time, there was a fire going on before those moments and the fire was just like, dude, who am I? What am I supposed to do? Why am I here? What is this? What it's about? When awards? Get on a starting team. Be a star. That's what life is about. And I can tell you star after star after star NFL, MLB NBA, WNBA, who they look, they're all stars to us. But like, I know the truth. I know what's going on in their lives. You know what I'm saying? And like, life is tough. Man, hurt people, hurt people, broken people, break people. Like that's what life is. And so for me, the fire is for you is not about me. Yes, I'm telling many of my stories, but it's giving people tools to get through the fires that they're going through right now, tools like real tools. Like, how do I do this, man? How do I do this? Like, I had a player went my first year in the in the in pro sports. And I won't allow Iostring. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm 25 years old or something like that. And you know, I'm walking in the hallways of an arena. And I'm like, dude, there's Shaq. There's Kobe. They they're on the Lakers and they played the Suns that day. And I was stars, you know, like any I'm like star struck. I'm like, dude, that's I'm 25. I'm like, this is my first time ever doing this. I didn't sleep the night before I was like, this is crazy. And I called Natalie. I went around the hallway. I'm like, dude, Shaq's the biggest dude I've ever seen in my life. Like, I'm literally as big as his leg, you know, let Natalie's my life. And and so I'm star struck until like the third game. And we in the NBA, we have chapel before every game. By the way, the NBA is a business. Then I fell as a business. Major league baseball is a business. The WNBA, it's a business. They're a business multi, you know, million, billion dollar businesses, right? I think it's fascinating that they make space for like people to like have have a little devotional. I think it is interesting. I've never heard of this before I before I heard of you to be quiet on it. I didn't know I didn't know that exists. I didn't either until it, you know, until I got invited to be a part of it. I didn't even know it was a thing. But like both so for the NBA before every game, one hour before every game, we have a little 15 minute window of chapel and it's both teams come or invited. And you know, in that moment, we'll talk maybe a verse scripture, but just like you're getting centered. They're about to go perform. So no matter it's all it's all it's all centering. It's all like it's centering. It's routine. So hey, I'm my own a company. I'm my own a McDonald's. I'm my own an Arby's. I'm my own 15 of them. I'm own 3000 of them, but like, but, but don't, don't miss out on this, this, this kind of power to go, but you know what? I do need, I need to center myself because we just go. And then, you know, and then pretty soon, like what you said, we're going and blowing and then it's like, dude, now, like, man, I lost my marriage. I wasn't there for my children's games and, but man, I made a lot of wealth. Yeah, but then you wonder what's it for? And then you're wondering what's it for? You know, you mentioned like, okay, so you lay out a whole bunch of tools. I think that what is really interesting is throughout your life after that point, obviously, then you kind of have this upwards trajectory where, like, I'm sure that a lot has happened since that age, but you're, you're building at a church, you commit to this full time for lack of a better word on that journey. What is the thing? What does the thing that keeps you from maybe delineating from that path? Because I think that again, if people have these moments where something happens and they want to be better, I find that a lot of people just go back to their old habits. So I know people that have DUI is that definitely just keep drinking and go down. And now everyone who gets a DUI and gets arrested builds a great church and a life out of this, right? So how do you, what's the, what's the tool at least when people do have this moment and they're and they get dumped because they're cheating on their spouse or whatever it is? This is so great. Okay, so here it is. Sorry, look, look, look, look, this is so great because because there's a guy in the Bible in the New Testament. His name is Paul, the Apostle Paul, who wasn't a believer. He was a persecutor of Christians. He would drag Christians out of their house and go door to door and and would have Christians imprisoned and murdered, right? Well, then he then he becomes one and it becomes the greatest like Christian evangelists ever walked the planet, right? Well, he says in this book called Romans in the Bible, in Romans chapter seven, here's your answer. This is crazy. You're part of your answer. He goes in Romans chapter seven, he goes, I don't understand why I do what I say I'm not going to do and I don't do what I say I'm going to do. And then he goes, it's like this wrestle between sin and it's like this war in me, dude. Yeah, right? All of us, all of us pastors included, priest, popes, bishops, like everyone, everybody like we all have that that wrestle. And so like you said, a lot of people go back to it, what's the answer? What are the tools? Here's some tools. First of all, you got to get sick of yourself enough to do something about it. You got to come to a place where like, I'm tired of this. I'm sick of this. Then you've got to make sure that first of all, it's humility, humility. And then it's accountability, but you can't have accountability without humility and you can't have accountability without vulnerability. So those three things, humility, accountability, vulnerability. I'm going to say, hey, Scott, there's this area of my life that I'm struggling in. That's that's humble, man. To tell you like, dude, I got to, I got to issue. That's humility. To pick up the phone and go, I need to, I need to call a therapist. That's human, that's dude, that's humility, right? But once I, once I lay out that humility because I'm vulnerable, you can't, you can't have accountability without vulnerability. I can say, dude, I'll hold you accountable because you're never vulnerable enough to tell me you're crap. So you won't even know what to hold me accountable for. Yeah, exactly. And that's scary. It's vulnerable. It's, you got to walk in humility, right? But that's the key. So, so, so when I, when I decided to, you know, to go on this, Jesus route and like be called Jesus freak, like, I'm out playing basketball, you know, three, four weeks after that at the gym. And I'm, you know, trying to shake him, bake this dude and cook him and he reaches in and he fathom it hurt. And I said, like, and he's like, you mean shoot. And I looked at, because he, he was, he was a, he was a pastor. Yeah. Yeah. And I go, no, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm finished. I said, you know, I said, that's not what I meant. And, and but that accountability, like surrounding yourself with people that are also for you and not against you. And there's that man that, that's tough to do, especially, you know, because everybody has motives. And what's your motive for wanting to be my friend? You know, what's my motive? So I think that the, the people that you, you, you're around, you, you got to be careful, careful about who's, who's in your circle, right? The old saying, show me your five closest friends. I'll show your future. It's the same with friends. It's the same with business. Hey, somebody's spouse make or break them. Somebody's wife make or break them. Somebody's husband make or break them. Like, dude, the, the, the people that, that you're around. So I think those three things, the, the, the, the humility, you know, the vulnerability and, and then the accountability is not the, the people piece is tough. People piece is very tough because I think that you mentioned like everybody has incentives. Everybody, everybody has like a motive, excuse me, everybody has it. But that's a great word too. Incentive. And then does all that other good work. When you think about the people that are impacted your life, what would be the main difference in the people that ended up being like a net positive versus in that negative? Like, how do you find those people? Because again, like, we're going through life. We don't always know until we know. And we, we trust the wrong people a lot. Yeah. Yeah. More often than we should. So when you look back at all the people that have had major impacts, I would say the people in your life have had not just like minor impacts, they've probably like, change a trajectory for better or worse over different seasons of your life. So what do you notice in those people? Or even in, you know, a concrete thing, our friend, our mutual friend, you know, Cody, we just had this, we just had this, this conversation this morning on the way over here talking about that very thing. The people that have, I was telling them, I said, Devon Booker's, Devon Booker's, you know, the star of the Phoenix Suns, one of the top 10 stars probably in the NBA, when, when Devon was interviewed about, I think it was a year ago, a month and two years ago, but I saw him say that the reporter goes, you know, you know, who's some new friends you've made this year and Devon goes, I don't make new friends. Just as serious as a heart attack. And I felt that because, you know, when, when I'm a nobody, then this friendship is it's pure. And I got nothing to offer you, but like who I am as a human being, you know, when you become somebody in the world's eyes, now it's tricky. Like, so yeah, who does, who would, who would a pro athlete that single date? Who would a celebrity go, yeah, like, you know what I'm saying? It's a, it's a tough world because of motives or incentives. What do I get out of it? And so my, my circle, dude, is super small. And, and I don't make a lot of new friends. I love everybody. You know, Proverbs talks about friends, a lot about friends. It talks about two types of friends, right? There's close friends, casual friends. You know, casual friends are a result of circumstance. They're on my team. They're in my club at the gym. They're in my family. I get lucky. I get to stay from, I don't own that person, but they're in my family. And they're a result of circumstance. And then close friends, they're a result of choice. I'm going to choose you to be my close friend. What am I, what of my choice dependent on is going to be your character, who you are as a human being. My pastor, that, that, that was my pastor at 17 years old. He's still my pastor. And he's not some big name, big celebrity pastor. He pastors a hundred people. Man, he is the most in, in highest character, man of integrity, still to this day that I know. Like, if he, if he were walking across the parking lot, and there was a gun wrapper on the ground, he's picking it up. Like he is, he is humble. He's just a people person. You know, so I've got a group like that that I've had man for 30 years, and it's still my group. They're still my people. My wife, you know, the Bible talks about not, this is do not be unequally yoked. Now in the Bible, it's talking about like, if you love God, you should probably marry somebody that loves God if you believe in church, but, but that's true for everything. Equally yoked in business, it could be like, well, I think this way, but I think that way. Here are my moral compasses of business owner, but I'm thinking about partnering with this dude who has no moral compass, right? That equally yoked also hold you accountable. So my wife, dude, she was a crystal meth addict coming out of college with the University of Arizona. She had the same experience where she discovered a relationship. We're quite well. We came together. You know, well, the equally yoked isn't just the God thing. It's like, okay, we're not going to drink. We're not going to use drugs. Not that we have a problem, people drinking like that, but we have a problem drinking. I mean, I got arrested. She turned into an addict. So it's like, what's right for me? Not might not be right for you. So that equal that equally yoked part. It's a big deal, you know, like, I'm running the same direction you're running. And I always say, listen, if anybody, the single that's watching and you're, you're looking to mingle and but your single like a pringle, you, you, you want to find somebody that's running the same race and preferably at the same pace. Now you got a beautiful marriage, man. I mean, I'm 28 years on, a 27 years into my marriage. And dude, I couldn't do it. And I wouldn't be where I am without Natalie. I mean, she is incredible, incredible. I think that it's so interesting how all the wisdom is already, all the wisdom is already there to help people live their life. They just need to discover it sometimes, but it's not like you have to reinvent the wheel. Sometimes you have to look back or it's already been discovered. So let's sort of keep going through your life. You've built one of the largest churches in fact, that's one of the largest churches in Arizona, right? Yeah. Yeah, so like, let's even like just talk about that career arc or that, that professional arc, how did you do that? What is the, what is the X factor that you brought to the table that allowed you to build something in half the time? 10X is big as whatever one else was trying to build. So I find that very interesting. I know nothing about the business of churches. I swear, yeah, no, most I don't. Yeah, I mean, yeah, yeah. So what's the, what's the thing like the secret sauce when you build something like that? There's so many ingredients, right? But, but because I could just do the super spiritual thing. Oh, God, but like it, it's, it's, there's a lot of ingredients. So one is who you're doing it with, who's your team? I, I, I did not build this church. I mean, I was a part of it, but like a team of people that came together had, you know, equally yoke the same synergy, the same outlook, the same what we're trying to do as a, because you know, every church might have a different like might be about obviously God or whatever, but it might have a different, hey, we're a big on missions or we're big on, you know, you know, our, our local domestic missions, or we're big in this area of that area, discipleship and really go on deep. And so there's all kinds of different, but for, for, for impact church specifically in 2002, I became a pro sports chaplain. So in 2002, I started working with Major League Baseball. Arizona's like, you know, the spring training heaven of the nation, other than Florida, but so I started with Major League Baseball in the Phoenix Suns. So I'm still the, you know, pro chaplain for the Phoenix Suns. I let baseball go because the church got too big, but I did the Kansas City Royals spring training for eight years, majors and minors, and then I did the Oakland A's for four years, majors and minors, and the church has got too big, too many services. I had to let it go. And, and so I met a guy, Andre Wasworth, who's from Florida. He was a Florida state walk on. Nobody gave him a shot. Andre Wasworth, he not only becomes a walk on and earns a roster spot, he ends up earning full ride for the next four years. Then he ends up being the number three draft pick in the NFL, which is insane. Like a guy that didn't get recruited to, you know, four years later, it's the draft pick is Peyton Manning, Ryan Leif, Andre Wasworth. So Andre had a heart for for God too. He started a Bible study for pro athlete, for his friends, teammates, catered it, you know, did it NFL style. It's a big money cater, flying in preachers every Wednesday night. And so eventually around 2009 Andre and I met and I was helping the church before that. But then Andre and I met and dude, it was it was fireworks. I mean, it was like we're the we're like the brothers from another mother that never knew each other. Like, and then here you are. It's like, dude, this is this we're we're going to ride this thing out. So he and I started together. We had a Bible study together called impact pro athletes. And we had cardinals and sons and, you know, baseball guys and golfers and whoever's a pro athlete. And, and, and then so, so I wanted a one word purpose statement as, as the name of the church. That's where impact church comes from. Our Bible was you study was called impact pro athletes. I'm like impact like that's perfect, right? Like God would impact me and then my responsibility is to impact you, man, to like love you, to be there for you, to serve you, to honor you, to build you up, right? So that's the idea of impact. And we just started my first Sunday was, you know, we had 204 people July 25th of 2010. And it just kept growing. And so the business side of church like anything else, like if you got a great product is not going to just grow, you got to market it. You know, you got to brand it. You got to saturate it. And so we've done all of it, man, from news, you know, clips to commercials to billboards to mailers, direct mailers. And of course, all the digital and, you know, ads and this and that, like, and, and, and, and, you know, it just started to grow. It started to grow. It grew rapidly, but it started to grow. I just want to take a second to thank the Housebot podcast network for supporting today's episode. Now, if you like success story, you're going to love other shows in the network. One of my favorites is the Hustle Daily Show. It's hosted by Juliet Bennett Ryla, Rob Literist, Ben Berkeley, and Mark Dent. It's brought to you by the Housebot podcast network, which is really the audio destination for business professionals. Now, the Hustle Daily Show brings you a healthy dose of this a reverent, offbeat and formative takes on business and tech. I was just listening to an episode to give you an example of what they talk about. So they broke down how this 100 year old organization has created one of the most successful business models in the world. Not only does this organization teach young entrepreneurship, they generate over a billion dollars in annual cookie sales. And what I really love about the show is they take these stories and these businesses that we think we know. And then they reveal these surprising angles that we never considered. So I really think that you should go listen to the Hustle Daily Show wherever you get your podcasts. It's one of my favorites. You're not going to regret it. It's so interesting to me because I'm Canadian. I don't know if you knew that I'm Canadian. And like these very large churches, they're not really a thing in Canada like they are in the US. How do you balance that? I don't know. The best word I can think of is like modernization of a church with people that look at religion is something more traditional. Because there has to be that balance or that sea soft. I'm not in 100 percent. I don't think there's a wrong. I don't think there's a wrong like if you're doing the Lord's work, however you're called to do it, like do it on for you. So if that's a real traditional, I have no problem with it. I was born and raised going to those loosely, but like just real traditional, real, you know, they're trying to do good things. They're trying to do good things. The big churches, such as ours, you don't set out and go, this is going to be a big church. I'm just trying to help people. And then people like Scott go, dude, I freaking love that guy. And I'm bringing my friend and I'm bringing my co-worker. And then they're bringing their, I'm not. I had a guy ask me like, we grew from 200 to 400. And he liked the 200. And I did too. At 200 people, we had church and then we went to the park and barbecue together. Like then it's 400 is a little bit harder to throw a barbecue, but you know. And he's, well, what's your, you know, how big do you want the church to be? And I said, that's not, I have no idea. I don't have an answer to that. All I know of is one more person in the world than he's hope. Then they need to be one more person. So going back to your thought, though, yeah, there is a balance. You know, the balance is like, it's not about traditional or modern. It's about, it's the same message presented maybe in a different way. So even when you say traditional church, Canada or wherever in the U.S. or around the world, Canada is all Roman Catholic. That's all of that. Yeah. So it's a very traditional way. It's much like Europe and you know, and I preach in Europe and things like that. So I understand that. But their tradition today is cutting edge from tradition 100 years ago or 400 years ago or 500 years ago or when Jesus walked earth. So all of that's relative. It's like how you do it. Does it work? Yeah, it's working. How I do it. Does it work? Yeah, it's working. So to me, there's no wrong answer. It's like, do good work, man. You know, go. I'm for you. And I think that also, you know, I also think that in society, there's definitely, I think society is used towards more secular and less God in 2024. So I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing to find new ways to say a message and to attract people, something that is like a net positive in there. So you know what I think about that? I think you're 100% right. But I don't think the world necessarily has an issue with the idea of God and his moral compass. I think it's church, not God church because churches, we have done historically a really bad job of representing the love of God, the grace of God, the forgiveness of God, trust and religious leaders. It's been broken, right? So I've found with our church, I can't keep people out of our church. So yes, what you're saying, I think, you know, society is that way at large, but I'm not experiencing that in Scottsdale, Arizona. Did we can't, we don't have enough room, we need more room now, like yesterday, like we're blowing out the scenes with people, right? I mean, now you, we, you know, we bought, you know, a fleet of Mercedes printers because we got a overflow park people and we've got 15 golf carts that see, you know, eight people, what I, so I'm not seeing that in our area as you're solving for the trust factor, I think that's the big one. And that's what I think. And, you know, I would say there's stuff we call church hurt, you know, and I think, I think we're all sick of that. I think we're all sick of that. I think we're sick of the religious and the, you know, the hypocrites and the scandals, the scandals, the financial, the sexual, the all the grossness, like we're, I'm sick of it, we're sick of it. So I don't blame the world for being like, you know, that's real talk. That's about as real talk as it gets. So for us that are in those roles, we got, we got to rise up. We got to rise up, man, and, and be true. And, and, and, and that's where we are as a world today. But I think, I think we, we don't want to sew the, the, the baby out with the bath water. Yeah. I agree. No, I think it's, I think it's, like I said, sort of bringing back to that first thought I had. If you don't have God in a traditional sense, I think you find something else. Something you don't, you're, you're fulfillment. You're gone. Yeah. And I don't think that's also very healthy for some people. So, okay. So you, this church is, is going incredibly well. In fact, it's going incredibly well. But this is where you had that sort of that second, you say the second major fire in your life. So talking to me about that, talking to me about what happened when you feel like everything's going in the right direction. Life is good. John, I'm so glad that you, you, you're talking about this because this is, this is the craziest thing I've ever been through and experienced in my life. The hottest fire, the craziest fire. On November 11th, which is a Friday night, impact church. So the way church works, like you have church of a preacher, you have a, like a worship team, which is the music team, a music leader. Well, ours is really good, man. They're fire good. Like they're so good. Like they're, I, I feel like church should be fun. Because church, for, for me, is historically like been painful. Like church has been like, you know, it's more fun to watch paint dry. Like church has been rough. So like when, when, when we decided to, to, to start this church, it was like, let's, it should be a fun, it should be a God-sized party. Are we here to celebrate like the resurrection? Like, like, let's have some fun. So our music is really good. And, and, and 2000 and 22. On November 11th, we released our first song that we ever wrote. It's called He Is the Miracle. And we, we wrote a song. We produced it recorded. It's the first time we've ever done this. We're like, this is fun. We, we, it went out on all music platforms. So it went on, you know, Spotify and Apple Music and everywhere. YouTube, the video of it. It's called He Is the Miracle. We are so excited. So then on Sunday, I preached a sermon titled, He Is the Miracle. And this is what I opened my ear marks with. So I said, I believe God still does miracles. Right? I believe it. I just still believe He does modern day miracles. And then our song, it started, it started to chart on the iTunes chart. So if you go in, if you go in like iTunes and go to the charts and then go genre and then they go to the Christian music genre, our, our songs started to chart. It went into the top 200 and we were like, dude, this is freaking cool. Like, what? Like, we didn't even know what we're doing. Like, this is fun. And then it went into the top 100 and then it went into the top 50 and then it went into the top 25 top 10. And it went all the way to number one on Sunday. Congrats bro. I know it was, it was wild. So like, man, life, what we were on cloud nine, we're like, you know, we're like, this is like the ultimate emotional and spiritual high. Like we're like, do we never done this? Look what, look, look what, look what's going on. Then Monday, my wife and I got up, we're exhausted from a long weekend of church. We go get ice plunges. We go sitting these, you know, metal tubs with sheets of ice and Dr. supervise and you gotta sit there for two minutes. I'd never done one. First one I've ever done. And like, I'm a competitor, dude. And he's like, you don't have to get to two minutes. I'm like, oh my god. I'm getting the two minutes and I got to two minutes and then almost died a few hours later. So, so I get to two minutes and then and then we leave and a couple hours later, we pick up my daughter, Jazzy, she's 12 at the time from school and we go to the church. And we get to the church and we're just hanging. We're never, we're never at the church on Monday. That's our day off. A lot of pastors, Mondays, they're day off. So we go to the church and Natalie, my wife, she's going to do some work that she needs to take care of and I'm going to take my daughter, Jazzy, to target. And she wanted to buy some stuff for school. So I have a handful of grapes, like big ones, like big green grapes. The land is, yeah, yeah. And I'm eating these grapes and then I dropped a grape right out of the bottom of my hand and I'm like, I just like my hand felt a little like sluggish. Like it, I thought it was like from maybe the cold plunge. So now I dropped another grape and I dropped another grape. Then we get in the car and we drive to targets about 10 minute drive and I'm driving, but I'm still dropping grapes. As a matter of fact, I saved them. They fell between the seat crack. Those grapes, they're now two-year-old raisins, but I saved them. But I'm dropping. I dropped maybe five grapes. Then we're walking into, I said, you know, I'm on text Natalie and I pull out my phone and I'm like, I said, babe, I just want to let you know, I don't know, it's weird, but I'm dropping grapes. She calls me and she's like, trap, trap. You need to go back to the car. I'm coming to get you and I'm like, why? She's like, read back your text. Read back what she said to me. So I looked back and I thought I had said, I'm dropping grapes, but it was more like I'm grape and drops or I'm draping drops. It was confused. So I'm like, okay, but I'm thinking like, you know, she's just a protector. I'm thinking like, my wife's just like, she's crazy. I'm fine. She picks me up. She didn't want me to drive. So we go to the house, which is four minute drive down the road, but but she's thinking this. She's thinking that this is what's happening. She's thinking I'm having a stroke. I have no idea that she's thinking that and I don't even know how she's thinking that because I have other than I dropped some grapes and I did drop my cell phone at the house. There's no symptoms. I'm not slurry. My face isn't hanging. I have no headache. There's nothing. There's no, there's no symptoms. I was stroke. So I'm like, babe, I'm gonna go lay down. She's like, no, we need to call 911. We need to call 911. I'm like, Natalie. I said, babe, I don't, I'm not going to the hospital. I dropped some fruits and fricking grapes. Like, I'm gonna go lay down. Please, Travis, please, please, she's begging me, pleading, please, please, please, please, please go to the hospital. I said, I'm gonna sleep for one hour. If I still feel weird in an hour, then we'll call. So, mascot, I laid down for five minutes and I'm like, um, sounds not right. What do you feel? Super sluggish. Like, like, almost like a hungover sluggish without the headaches and all the weirdin' it, but like that. Like, like, I just feel heavy. Everything just felt like heavy sluggish. So I get up five minutes later. I didn't sleep and she happened to walk back in at the exact same time. She's like, I'm calling. I said, okay, she walks around the hallway and I hear her go, I think my husband's having a stroke. And dude, I was like, what? Like, I'm gonna have a stroke. And then they said, well, if he's have, if you think so, he needs to lay down on his back. So, I'm laying down on my back. Dude, paramedics were at my house within three or four minutes. That, that, that, like they must have been, happened, chance down the road because they were there so fast. And I got paramedics in my house. They do all the tests on me. I test out perfect. They even do a stroke test. And I, I passed the stroke test. So now Natalie's begging them that I should go to tell me to go in, you know, because she knows I'm, I'm not going in. So I'm on my back and I look at this one, this one firefighter. And I go, what do you think I should do? And he goes, pastor, tribe, as a member of your congregation, I think you should go to the hospital. And dude, that, that is a miracle. I didn't know this man. I didn't know he went to my church. He didn't know whose house he was walking into. And so he got inside my living room and saw me. And if he did not say, I think you should go, I, I would have been dead within the hour. If I would have taken a nap, they said I would not have woken up. So when he said, I think you should go. I said, okay, let's go. I'm on the stretcher getting wheeled out of my house. My wife and my daughter right here. I said, my oldest daughter is in San Diego. She played college basketball. My, my sons at Grand Canyon University going to college. So my wife and my younger sister. And I'm like, hey, I'll be okay guys. Like, I'm trying to comfort them. Like daddy, you can just get checked out. I'll be right back, you know, and, and brother, I got on the ambulance, put in the ambulance. I don't remember anything. That's how fast. That's one of the actually. Yep, five minute, five minute rides to the hospital. They do a brain scan. They call Natalie and they say, your husband's brain is aggressively bleeding. Um, this is a bad, bad situation. Um, matter of life and death, we need to helicopter him to a level one trauma center that specializes in, you know, neurology. So my wife met me at the hot at the helicopter. And I told you, Andre Wadsworth, who's my best friend. And, um, they were both at the helicopter. I don't even remember much of that. I mean, I do remember them being there. But I, it's almost like, it's almost like, the way I can know the stripes, like, you're, you're so drunk, almost blacked out, but not quite there yet. That, that's, it felt like I'm in there, but I'm like way down in there somewhere. And I'm like, um, I can't talk. Now I'm like, look, look, look, look, look, look, like, like, I've lost my speech. I lost my cognition, my memory, my motor skills, my wife took a picture of us right by the helicopter because she said, um, dude, I do this every time. It doesn't matter how many times I tell this story, I cry. But she said, um, I didn't know if it's the last time I was going to see you. I didn't know if it was the last time, the last picture, the kids would see you. You know, that's, that's how freaking crazy this was. So I get to the other hospital and, um, you know, they're, they're, I'm hospitalized. I'm an ICU. And, um, the very miracle we sang about in the very sermon I preached on, I needed it in my own life the very next day. I needed God, if you are really who you say you are, I'm in need of a miracle. But I'm in the state of a vegetable. So, you know, on, on one of the days, I don't even know what day because I, this is all what my wife has told me and other people that were in their doctors and stuff. They said, hey, listen, the particular stroke your husband had, it's the worst stroke you can have. It's in the worst area you can have it because your, your brain, you could bleed here and it might affect your memory. Bleed here, it might affect your, you know, your speech. Mine was in the basal ganglia area, the brain stem, the top of the brain stem. So it affects everything. And there's nothing they could do. They, they couldn't go in and do anything surgically or anything because of where it was. How do they keep you alive? I don't even know, man. I mean, they, they, you know, they, I was on medications. I was very closely monitored. They, they told the dark. So when I, when I can't talk, but you know, I can't lift my arm, my leg, I can't, I can't remember. I don't know anything. They told my wife, hey, we, we just want you to be warned that the effects of this particular stroke are irreversible. I can't imagine being by your wife's side or I'm just like a wife being by our husband's bedside and your doctor goes, yeah, by the way, this is your new husband basically. Meet me, you know, meet your new husband like he's, and so my, my wife is, is a woman of faith and belief in God and she was not going to own that because words are powerful and doctors are powerful and smart and they, you know, they're experts in what, what is normal. But so, so my wife said, I went to the Bible. This is crazy. Dude, this is crazy. I went to the Bible and I just needed something. I needed something like God, give me something hope and she was led to this verse in Acts 316 and it says this, dude, it says, by faith in Jesus' name, this man is made strong again, whom you all see and know. And it's the faith that is through Jesus that is given this man perfect health and the presence of you all. I mean, it's a big book, dude. It has a sea open. It has 66 books in a book. Yeah, that's what she, and so she opened that up. She actually posted that. She's crawled into bed with me on the hospital bed. There's a photo of that and end up on every new station in Arizona, you know, 3, 5, 10, 12, everybody covered it though. The media covered that newspaper covered it is that picture. It's Natalie in the bed with me. I'm snuggled up on her. My Yahweh tattoos, you know, it's showing for everybody and she put that picture with that verse in her story that day. And I'm here to tell you that I'm in the fire of my life. The doctor came on like a Wednesday or something and said, the way they do stroke tests is they test you on the hour every hour. So they can't, you know, do a brain scam in my eye every hour. So they come in and they go, touch your nose. And I'm like this, you know, lift your leg, lift your arm. And I couldn't, I mean, it was just, they were just like stuck. And so the doctors, what's your name? What day is it? What year is it? Who's your wife? What's your wife's name? What's your children's name? He said, what's your, I didn't know. I'm just like this. And this is gibberish. And then he said, what's your children's names? And I said 40. But I made a word out is the first like I formed a word 40. And then I knew like it, well, I knew something deep down inside knew this was not good. And I started to weep. And I looked up at Natalie who's standing right by my bedside and I said, count it all joy. And the doctor goes, what did he say? And my wife said, because I said it plain as day. And my wife said he said count it all joy, which is a scripture from the Bible in the book of James that says, count it all joy when you go through various trials. Because those trials, they perfect your faith and bring you to maturity and wholeness. So the, the, the fire is for you is that, I mean, I'm like, dude, come on, that's crazy. I can't remember my kids names, but I can remember a Bible verse in context of what's actually happened. Like this is bad. This is a trial. This is a fire. And, and, and then, you know, by Friday, dude, miraculous. I got released from the hospital. So I went in on Monday and by Friday, five days, five days, five days, five days. And you quoted out a scripture that was directly relevant to your situation, plus your wife just opened the Bible on the random page that had another. And chapter one of the fire is for you is chapter one is called count it all joy. And I think that's powerful because count it all joy when you fall into various trials. Man, we're in some trials. Do we got trials? The world's got trials or marriage's got trials or kids got trials or wife got trial. We got internal trials. He says count it all. That's tough to do, man. It's like, okay, I'm going to be happy about this because I know, I know there's a bigger picture going on. There's something, man. Like, like the, the, the L.A. Tribune asked me, they interviewed me about the book a few weeks back and they said, they said, hey, if you could, if you could rewind time and go through it again, would you? And, and, and I thought that was such a fascinating question. And I said, yes, like, like, it was a quick yes, but it's a terrifying yes. And it's a hard yes because the yes wouldn't just affect me again. It would affect Natalie again or to affect my kids again and everybody that that that loves me that I know my mother. And, but the yes is because it's changed me for the better. And this book is, is about how to take your trial and turn it into triumph. The book is, dude, I'm in a mess, but turn this into a message, right? The book is, this is a test. How do I turn this test into a testimony? And that's, that's, that's the ingredients, the tools of the book because we all go through the other stuff, but usually what we do is we bury it. Do I've been through hell? I don't want anybody to know. I'm struggling with addiction, but I'm going to bury that. I went through a failure, whatever that failure, I want to sweep that under the rug and forget about that, but the power is when you're able to take it and use it to help other people, right? And so I always say, I ain't never wasting a pain, man. If I go through hell, I'm going to flip that thing and I'm going to use that that hell to help other people. That's the book. That's what the book is about. It's about, man, God, God, God can do big things with the stupid crap in our lives. He can do big things with our pain with our, with our, with our valleys, with our trials, with our storms, with our fires, and I truly believe, man, and the power of God and the power of people, man, I was surrounded by incredible people. I went through six months of therapy, six therapies every day for six months, minus Sunday, and we go on to physical therapy and hyperbaric therapy, speech therapy. I couldn't speak well. I'm a preacher, dude. Like, I kind of need that, you know, my, my, I, I type, write sermons. My whole, you could have stabbed me. My arm, I wouldn't even have known it. My leg, numb, talked to bottom. Absolutely, you know, you could have lit me on fire, and I wouldn't have known it. So I'm out two years later, and the whole right side of my body, it's, it's still got numbness, but it's not still now today, you still, still now, mm-hmm. But I mean, you function, you're, you're living. Yeah. And, and it's like figuring out how to do this, the, the same call a different way, right? Like, like, we, we reinvent ourselves, but the, the, my, my purpose is still the same. So it's like, dude, I'm getting frustrated writing these sermons because my hand doesn't function like it used to, you know, and I can't type, and I can't think it just comes out. Like, now I'm like, ugh, you know, so now I got this little headset, and I can talk and type, so I can be like, you know, hey, it's got, Claire, you got the coolest podcast on the face of the planet. And by the way, we had a great time hanging out, and it spits it out just as fast, you know, so it's just like kind of like, you got to, so many times in life, we got to pivot. This is the first thing that happened to you that you would consider a miracle. No. I could write a book called Miracles. My wife and I have been married 27 years, we got married, she got diagnosed with a female disease called endometriosis. Yep. And she's 27 years of dealing with it stills this day. Uh, it's bad. Doctors told us you'll never, you know, you're not gonna have kids. Well, we had, we had kids, you know what I'm saying? So like, I could go on, and on, and on, and on, and on about the miracles. What do you say to somebody who listened to your story and it's super inspiring, but they're like, they're kind of like you when you were a kid, and you're like, listen, I haven't seen a miracle yet in my life. I'm kind of just going through it. Life's okay. It's not great. So what's the message to that person? Life can be great. We are built to be overcomers, and we are built with the resilience in us, and for me, and, and, and, you know, thousands and thousands and thousands, like, you know, six thousand, six thousand people have been water baptized at impact church in the last 14 years. What that means is they go, I'm gonna try this Jesus thing, and then they get baptized. That's where a baptism is like, I go into the water, come up. It's like a symbol of my sins are washed away, and I'm dying to the old Travis, the old Scott, and I'm rising up in my new man in Christ Jesus. That's the whole point, right? So, so, so, so here's my thing. If, if you feel that way, give Jesus a try. That's my thing. We've tried it all. We, we tried it all. Man, we did, it didn't work. Alcohol didn't work. Prescription drugs didn't work. Depression doesn't work. Fear doesn't work. Worrying about life all day long doesn't work. Like, that doesn't do anything for us, right? I mean, I mean, you know, women, men, don't work, infidelity doesn't work. Like, we, we, I've done it. We, you've done it. We've all tried everything the world, the earthly, the one thing that I have found for me, and I will stand by it, and it's why I still do what I do today is is for me, Jesus Christ worked, man, it worked. And so, I would just encourage whoever might feel that way. Like, dude, stand strong. Know that life can be amazing. And, and give it a shot, man. What do you got to lose? You know, give it a shot. Like, if it doesn't work, you go, well, I didn't work either. But like, you can't say it doesn't work. If you've never tried, tried to, tried to let them work, right? So I think for me is, and I make sure you're surrounded by good community, man, good people, you know, that, that's, that's very important. Like, if you're around negativity, if you're around, or if you're isolated, man, don't get isolated in life, that's where our mind starts playing track. I don't know, that's under in COVID. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, COVID, no doubt, isolation, we're all going crazy. And the world's in a state of depression and stay connected. I always say like this, the, the more connected you are, the more protected you are. Right? So if I'm connected to good people that are there for me and not against me, and they love me for me, not what I can do for them, I can be vulnerable, I can be accountable, and, and I can walk with, with humility. So, man, you're, you're circle, keep your circle tight and keep them close. I want to take a second and thank Range Rover Sport for supporting today's episode. 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Whether or not you're navigating city streets, you're exploring back roads, the Range Rover Sport combines refinement with a sense of adventure. It matches your own versatile lifestyle with features like adaptive, off-road cruise control, you can tackle challenging terrain with confidence, the dynamic air suspension always makes sure you get a smooth ride, a response to road conditions for optimal performance. So from daily commutes to weekend getaways, the Range Rover Sport is ready for whatever you have planned. It's more than just a vehicle. It is a companion for all of your journey. So if you're ready to elevate your driving experience, visit Land RoverUSA.com and configure your Range Rover Sport today. What would be the message for somebody who is never considered God at all? Not just somebody who is dabble, but somebody who's never considered God, somebody who is focused on making money, even supporting their family. Not the benefits, that's something like two sales, it only the word benefit. What's the practice that that person should include into their life that they're missing and why? Great. So first of all, it's okay to make money. It's okay to have great business or 500 businesses. It's okay to be insanely wealthy if that's the goal you have for your life. I look at this way. I've been teaching out of the Bible for 30 years. I didn't know anything about the Bible when I made this move at the end of my senior year in high school. And I've learned about it. And I'm still learning about it. There's nothing in life that will, here's the answer. There's nothing in life that you'll ever go through that the Bible doesn't already talk about. All of it, you know, all of it, everything. The challenge is the Bible's a big book. It's an ancient book. You know, once you're like, where do I even start? What am I looking for? And so I would just say this for those that maybe don't, maybe I was that guy. Like God, turn the lights on if you're real. Yeah, I see you're not real. Think about this. What we try to do is we try to logic or intel it, you know, we were trying logic. We're trying like like we have to yeah, yeah, we're trying to figure out our finite minds are trying to figure out like an infinite beam, right? Which is impossible. So you can be the smartest dude in the world. And you're gonna, you're gonna make we're skeptical as humans. We are like, I mean, I mean, I gotta see it to believe it. Well, that's not faith. Like what I would say, think about like that here's just a small thought. Who is I work with celebrities. That's a lot of my, you know, big name people. Who is today in 2024 the biggest name on planet earth, the biggest name? You can have your pick. You can do the Kim Kardashian or the Trump show that you lawns, but there's some, there's some big names that huge name. Yeah, huge names, right? Is the name Jesus Christ bigger than those? I'd say so far bigger, far bigger. Yeah, he's substantially better. In 2000 years from now, will anybody know the name Donald Trump? No, because they've already, they've already started forgetting the Queen of England already. So if you don't believe, I'm just saying I get it. I've been there, but that's pretty wild that 2000 years after this man walked earth. You know, we're in Florida today. I live in Arizona that people all over the planet all gather on a Sunday to not get an autograph from Jesus Christ, get a selfie, but to worship him. That's crazy. So it's either the biggest lie on the face of the earth and we're all that stupid to believe it 2000 years later, or it's the truth. And he is who he said he is because nobody's, nobody's going to remember. Like you said, nobody, maybe 200 years from now, 300, like let alone somebody that his public ministry was on three years, three years from Jesus. He was 30 when he started. You want to talk about building business? It tells you in the Bible. You want to talk about building business? It tells you building character, building marriages, building children, building people. The Bible's a book of building, you know, a book of building. Strategy talks about the Bible. The people you surround yourself talks, but like that's what I'm saying, like there's nothing it doesn't touch. We just get in our own way, I think at times. And you know, man, just seek, like just seek, search, discover for yourself, start knocking on some doors, especially, man, if somebody's like, hey, life's man, you know, life doesn't have to be man. You know, I'm a living, breathing, walking testimony of that. And that book, that book will definitely help people discover exactly what I'm talking about. Last thing I want to touch on is the concept of reversing the irreversible. You speak about that. And also this is the concept. So we sort of like tackle this from multiple angles and I love it. Because you're such a great storyteller. And I appreciate that thing that really helps drive the message home for people. But he's spoken about somebody who is sort of dabbling with faith, somebody who has no faith at all, talking about reversing the irreversible kind of like what you went through in the context of when your faith is testing. So talk to me about that. Because I'm sure there's moments when you were lying there and you're like, well, I thought I like gave up my life, not in a bad way. And like, this is what I can, you know, how does this happen to me? But you came out of it. So there's a lot of people who was partner, there's their parents, their kids, they pass away in this horrible fashion. And they don't come out of it. And then that's when it's like, well, how do I, how do I make, how do I, how do I fix this, how do I reconcile my faith when my kid was just taken away from me, hit by a card, God forbid. Yeah. So how do you, how do you, so I grew up with a mom, that's your life. That's my, that's my, my mother's life, you know, you never had a father. You were abused in every way you could be abused as a child sexually, physically. Then when you're, you know, 13, your mother's raped and murdered and left deadness streets of California. Three years later, you have a child at 16 years old, you know, me. And then, you know, you go into marriage, then you go into a second marriage, you've done, you've done your best, you're trying this marriage breaks and falls apart. That marriage, they call, I didn't choose to be abused. I didn't choose to be cheated on. I didn't choose. Now, I had a stroke in, in November 14 of 22, three months later, my nephew, my mother's grandson, 12 years old, died. This, this was three or four months after, three months after my stroke. You want to talk about bad things happening to good people. Like, my family's been through hell and back and we're in hell still to some degree on earth, you know, and what I've found is this is that, is that if you allow, if you allow God to do what he's trying to do, there's still a reason even as hard as it is. There's a pastor in California. He's pretty, pretty well known, his name's Rick Warren. He's a friend and a mentor of mine. He wrote the book called Purpose Driven Life. It's a big book. He, he passed her to church in Orange County. He's retired since then, but he's still crushing it in the ministry. And he said, he, his son, Matthew was 28 and Matthew took his own life. And then Rick took four months off, you know, I mean, dude, devastating. His first sermon back, it was titled, it was titled this, how to get through what you're going through. And bro, if anybody, I mean, it's, it's Rick's not mine. It's so good. Like, if you're going through Google that sermon, it's so good how to get through what you're going through, which is really what the fire is for you is about like the fire is not against me. It's not here to burn me down. It feels like it, I want to curse the fire. I want to pray the fire away. I want to pray the fire, like, give me out of this thing, God. And, and, and, and, you know, we have, we have to understand that, you know, this is earth. It's not heaven. Bad things happen. And there are bad people. There are bad actors. And then there are great people where, where tough things happen. And, and I think for me, watching my mom firsthand be the anchor of our family, even though hardship comes, hardship is going to come. And then you're going to get through it. And then it's going to come again. And then you're going to get through it. And it's going to come again. And instead of asking why I ask what instead of me going, why guy? Why me? Why do I have, like, I go, okay, what? Because just like, if I, if I give you a million dollars and I go, it's got, I want to give you this, but I want, I want you to manage it well. Make it, make money. I'm going to give you this million bucks, but put it to work. You have this responsibility of stewarding what I gave you, right? Well, the same is true with God. God gave me a wife. My responsibility is to steward as a, as a husband. He gave me kids, but, but we always think of stewardship and managing in terms of great stuff, right? But you, you still got to manage a business even when it's bad. When an employee leaves you and it's your best friend and he's been rocking with you for eight years. And then he goes off and starts a company just like yours. And then, you know, gives you the, the, the, the, the bird, I'll call it the Christian bird. Yeah. The Christian bird. But, you know, I'm saying like, and, and, and, and you still have to manage it, right? Bad things are happening, but I still have a responsibility to, to steward this, right? And I think the same is true with pain, heartbreak, like, like cancer, like, dude, my, my stepdad's got cancer. And they give him two to five years to live. And it's not looking good. Um, how do we manage that? If you talked to him, his name's Kyle, he'll be like, I'm okay. Drive. I'm okay. I'm loving on the doctors, and I'm loving on the nurses. And I'm just showing him God's loving. I'm like, that's crazy, dude. That's crazy. And the perspective, have you ever heard this saying? If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change, no, I've never heard that, but I like it. I like it a lot. Yeah. Perspective. And, and I think that's what the Bible does is that it gives you that perspective. Okay, here's, here's, here's one quick story. I'm not trying to be all Bible, but it's what I do. It's the business that I built. The business, hey, of the Bible, you know, I'm saying, but listen to this. So the Apostle Paul, I told you, you went from, you know, nonbeliever, persecuting, murdering, to preaching Jesus. And the greatest event has ever lived. He's preaching Jesus. He goes on these three missionary journeys throughout, you know, scripture, he ends up getting put in prison. He's in prison, chained to a Roman guard for preaching the gospel, right? And in prison, chained to a Roman guard, he writes a book in the Bible that we know today. It's called Philippians. Okay, it's a letter that was written to the Church of Philippi at the time. So Paul, he ends up being an author of 14 books of our Bible. So 14 of the 66 were written by Paul because he was put in prison. We would not have some of those great words of wisdom today. If Paul, if Paul would have kept running around preaching audibly around the people, though, and he said, he said in scripture, he goes, I'm chained in prison. But while I'm here, people are giving their life to Jesus and finding hope. So is it really me in chains? Or is it really me being here so that my chains can set people free? Bro, come on. Like, that's good stuff. And any listeners that say, whatever I still don't believe are great. I mean, we are, well, human man, we can go our own way a lot of, there's a lot of, there's some crazy stuff in a lot of stuff you can pull from that. There's something to realize that I like to do. I'm in chains, but it's actually, I'm in chains to help just set you free. And then so the book of Philippians that I was talking about, it's only four chapters long, but you know what it's known as, it's kind of nicknamed as the book of joy. And he's doing it in prison. He's doing it in being wrongfully in prison for doing nothing. Like, you know, like, that's pretty cool. There's so much wisdom though. There's so much wisdom. So I think to the detriment of people when they hear stories, when they try and bring religion into their life, it's they look at it through the lens of this, this is only applicable to people that believe. And then they don't understand the actual lessons out of that. But if more people went through life with a mindset like that, like even when the shit is happening to me, there's things that are net positive. When I'm dealing with the fire, whether or not it's net positive, I can incorporate it into my life, because there's always things like that. But there's also things that I'm going through this right now. And that's wisdom that I can teach to other people. So they don't have to go through it again. That's just a beautiful way to live your life. But people don't listen to that message. And they don't understand that somebody's already sort of put out the playbook. How to do that? Playbook. We were just talking about that very word this morning, the playbook. And it is because it and not even just for others, but like I know for me personally, me, it that almost dying this near death experience, the miracle of God, the grace of God, like, dude, it changed me. And here's just like one simple way. I have an empathy now that I never knew existed until then, because before that moment, I felt pretty invincible. Just being honest, you know, I felt invincible. I had no health problems. I'm not on any medication. Zero. The Thursday before the stroke, dude, I was going through a life insurance application to update my life insurance. I got a plus rating Thursday, four days later, I had a stroke. Like, so, so, you know, so that I felt invincible. And, and when I mean, when I mean God did like, I'm on no medication today, none, nothing. I mean, no, no, anything. I know, man, and I'm just saying like, that that's how powerful that is, you know, you should be dead. You should be okay, you said reverse the irreversible. Well, you know, it's like when the doctor tells Natalie the effects of this particular stroke are irreversible. Well, he reversed them. So, so, you know, my first two sermons back after the stroke, one, my first one was counted all joy. And I preached a whole mess. And my second one was re-reverses the irreversible. Now, think about this, because some, the we're in our own way, man, we're, I think religion, we, we religious people have given it such a black eye, right? Like, because it's like, get away from me, like, stop preaching at me. Like, don't judge me. You know, we're all defensive. And we are. I mean, I am, I am too. I'm like, you get off. Like, like, dude, go easy on me. But like, the, the idea is like, Jesus said in John 316, forgot to love the world that he gave his one only son, who never pleasing him, never die, have eternal life. But at the next verse, he goes, for I did not come into the world to condemn the world. And I think that's where we need to change our kind of our societal disposition on like God. It's like, he loves us. Man, he created us. He gave us life. We may not always understand everything. I don't, you know, there's an element of faith. It's belief. It's like, I don't understand it. But you know what? I'm, I'm going to step in faith. And so I think God reverses their irreversible. Like, you know, we all, we all talk about generational curses. But like, what about generational blessings? Nobody talked about generational blessings. Well, in my family bloodline addiction, you know, drugs, alcohol, all like, dude, so much curse. So like, reversing the irreversible is every day I try to turn to side. I'm not drinking alcohol. I'm reversing the irreversible because it's been irreversible in my family bloodline. Same with drugs. My mom's sister died of a heroin overdose. Her younger sister, her other younger sister died of drugs for only two siblings, you know. My cousin, he died of a heroin. Oh, like, dude, it's crazy. So reversing the irreversible is, yeah, listen, you might have gone through something tough. You might have gone through a divorce. And bro, that's, that's like two tearing. That's tough, man. That's hard. It's hard on marriages. We're on him, hard on hearts, hard on kids. But okay, okay, okay, we're through it. We're through it. So we're going to look forward now. And now, now we're going to learn some things that we maybe didn't know that first go around or that second go around, you know what I'm saying? But like, like, try to get into a state where we just go, man, not only do I believe in the supernatural power that God can reverse the irreversible, but also that we can play a role in that. I'm doing therapy, physical therapy, whatever the role is, like, man, we all have a part in making this world a better place, not just making money. I think that's part of it. I think that's why believing in something is good because then you realize that your purpose is not just to suck as much wealth and from the world or suck as much energy from the world is to give back to. And I genuinely believe I'm even a non-religious lens that people operate in their best self when they are teaching and helping people that are in a position that they were in like five or 10 years ago or even six months ago. I genuinely believe that's when you feel the most fulfilled. And I don't even think I realize that even like on a podcast right now. I don't even think I realize that. So I started doing this and then people started saying, oh, the, the, the stuff that you're talking about, the information that you're giving over in the, in the podcast and the content you create is helping me with X, Y, Z in my business and my life. And I'm like, damn, that's like rewarding making money yet ever felt that good. Yeah, yeah. It is because now, but now the money is like, that's cool. But like there's, there's so much, there's more purpose that it's about the purpose of it. And you're, you're, you're, you're right on with that. I mean, when you're a kid, it's almost Christmas, it's Christmas evening. I can't wait to see what I got. When you mature, you're like, I can't wait to give this. Yeah, because you want to see me. Yeah, I can't wait to eat. You know, the, I'm a wife free. I just want my kids react. And that's the heart of it, right? It's just like, man, how can I help? Is it a podcast? Is it training? Is it workshops? How, how can I give what I've been given away? I do, I had this crazy story. I'm on a plane. My best friend's little sister, she was 28 years old, a triathlete, a law student in Gonzaga. She got stomach cancer and four months later died. And this was, you know, 15 years ago or something like that, 17 years ago, devastating. So I get on a plane to flap the Spokane wash. It's like a last minute flight. So I mean, it's like, there's no seats at Southwest. It's like, you know, it's hell in the air. And so I'm like, I'm crying. I'm like, God, here's a funny one for you. When you don't get what you pray for, I'm praying, God, I just, I'm, I'm crushed. Dude, I'm crying. I'm broken. My heart's broken. I'm like, this, a God itself, freaking West. I do not, I don't want to sit by anybody. I mean, if there's any way, like, could I have an aisle to myself, right? And so I get on this plane. It's dude, like sardines packed. And I'm like, oh, so I go all the way to the back. And there's three seats, but it's not, you can't recline. It's the wall. It's the bathroom. It smells like urine. And I'm like, but dude, I'm by myself. Like God is good. And I'm sitting there. And nobody, you know, when you're like, please nobody else get on the plane. You're like 1000% you know, yeah, I'm like, God, and please, like nobody else get on the plane. Like this is, this is exactly right. I just want to, and nope, sure enough, the biggest dude, flash, yes, flamboyant dude, walks onto the plane. He's got his hat on. He's got a big gold chain. I mean, he's like, you know, talking to everybody. I'm not, dude, I am not exaggerating. And he is like flirting with people and chopping it up with dudes. I know there's only two seats left on this plane. And they're right by me, right? And I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. Like this is God's sense of humor. He's up there with Moses, you know, like watch this. Watch what I do to try to. And I'm like, no, dude. So he comes and he sits by me. And dude, I got the biggest set of headphones on. And my, you know, got, you know, sunglasses. I'm like, just don't know to me. They don't talk to me. Ignore him. How's that for pastor tribe? Like just ignore this human being. And he sits, he sits down and he goes, hey, what's your name? Like really loud, super loud. Like I felt like the whole plane could hear it, you know? And so, you know, like in sales and stuff, if you, if you do the opposite, hopefully you can kind of pull him down. You know what I'm saying, right? Yeah, you try to, yeah, yeah. So I'm like, I'm like, you know, my, my, my name's Travis, you know? And he's like, ask me mine. And I'm like, no, dude, no. And I, I know, this is how I go, I go, what's yours? And he goes crocodile. And I'm like, dear God. And, and I go, when I meet you crocodile and he goes and ask me why? Oh my God. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I go, why? And he goes, because baby boy crocodile gonna make you smile. Like this is, this is the beginning of the flight. And I'm like, dude, I'm just trying to go support my family, man. Like we, we lost our baby girl. And so we talked the whole flight up. Well, it turns out he's, he was, at the time, he was Mike Tyson's trainer. His name, yeah, his name's crocodile is Mike Tyson's trainer. He's got a big tattoo of Mike on his, says teen Tyson and, you know, and then we're talking. And he's like, he's like, man, you know, he said, you know, well, you're a pastor. And I said, yeah. And he's like, oh, my, you know, it ain't so much I'm a pastor. Somebody's got a connect life to me. So like, you know, my great grandma, you know, like she had a Bible. Like it was like, I'm like, that's cool, man. We're, we're literally the same. Like bro, are you kidding me right now? And so anyway, great grandma, out of Bible. We had a great time, you know, and he said, uh, he said, well, you know, I served some time. I served 20 year, I go 20 year. And I'm thinking in my head, like, this did just somewhere. That's what I think. And I go 20 years. I go, what'd you do? And he was manslaughter. And I was like, oh, yeah, man. But, you know, he was like, man, this dude crossed one of our friends. The girl, you know, basically beat him. We didn't, we weren't trying to kill him, but he died and selling this story. And the whole time, like, dude, how selfish am I to go? I just, I just need me, I just want to be by myself. And then there's this man who like, dude, he just need some love. He just needs some love, man. So I started expressing love. We're, we're descending. And I'm, I finally got Wi-Fi, you know, I'm texting Natalie about the, and she's like, do not, do not give him your number. She's Googling him. You know, she's like, do not, we land. And he's like, Natalie knows what's up. Oh, she, yeah, she knows what she was, yeah. Yeah, Natalie knows what I thought. That's been my life. And so, so I said, I said, okay, Bay, we land. And he's like, hey, man, can I get your number? You know, and I'm like, definitely dude, for sure. You know, and, but right when we were landing, he was telling so many stories. And he was saying, man, we're on this private jet. And man, you know, me and Mike, and this crew, we're on this jet. And he's like, dude, you know, we had the orders and, you know, all the food and all the women and blah, blah, blah. And he said, he said, Mike looked at me and I looked at Mike and said, Mike, we're, you know, we're living now, man, we're living now. And, and, and I said, man, that sounds like, I mean, that sounds like some fun times, you know, and I said, you know, the way I see life is and what I've learned is that true living comes from giving. Not stuff, not jets, not money, not, that's great. Money's, it's a tool. Money's not good or bad. It's a tool. It's indifferent. It's, it's what you do with it. And it's okay to have stuff as long as stuff doesn't have you. But how do you know stuff has you? Well, it's in, it's in your generosity, right? It's in what you give in life. So you hit that one on the head, man. Like life is about true living and fulfillment is about giving what you have away and, and helping people. So with you and, and the podcast and all the people you're helping, that it's making them a better them. And you're getting paid. Yeah, great. I mean, that's kind of what we all do in life, but you got, but that's the thing like it's easy to do when you're getting paid. It's hard to do it when you're feeling like shit on the back of a Southwest flight with no reclines, but that's, but that's the moment you got to do it. And that's real. Yeah, that's real. I mean, you know, I'm a human being and, and I have feelings or I have emotions and sometimes life's really freaking heavy. And the call of a pastor, you're always giving out, you know, and you can't stop giving out. I mean, I know what I found though, just because you, when you said that, it just, it hit me like, so, you know, I speak at conferences and stuff like that and, and definitely not talking religion, but talking business. And the second you step on, say, yeah, so my, my better half, Gina, show his last because he's like, I actually have to, I should like pull you away. So like, people ask too many questions and spend like, you're on sage for whatever 30, 45 minutes, second, you get off, people are pounding you. I'm sure it happens to you with other life questions or whatever. So I go, well, I should pull you away more and, and it's so easy to say, yes, you should pull me away. I should, you know, I, I spent my time on stage as it's going to be another hour and a half. If you just hang out there and talk to people, it looks like tiring and draining. And when you go into it, before you talk to that first person, you see people like kind of lining up to ask you some like, sometimes really hard questions about, let's talk about marketing and sales and they're like, I have this exact problem and this is exactly what I have to figure out. And how do you do it? And like, I'm already tired from just doing the talk and I have to think about how to fix your business in under 30 seconds. And you go into it thinking like, but then, but then the second you start to do it, it actually gives you a lot of energy. And it, and very, actually, I would say never after after, because you have to be super grateful that people are even giving you the time to help them. First of all, you have to sort of completely reframe what, how you look at the situation because it is a blessing. And after you do it, you, you actually always feel like it's just like this energy that just like, that you get out of it and it's just like a very positive experience. But it's very easy to, to close off and say, listen, I need to protect my own energy and I have to protect like, and I think that when you lean into those situations, it just goes to sort of prove that thesis that when you do help out other people, if people give you opportunity to help them out, like it's, it's what humans are wired to do. I truly believe that. And what a blessing that people see you as somebody that can offer them, it's incredible. I don't know, it's incredible. And, and the selflessness that goes with that, like for me, in Scottsdale, in Arizona, and because of, you know, the people that I'm associated with with athletes and stuff, say, say we're at lunch, and it's a well-known athlete, you know, one time there was a certain athlete and he was like, he's like, more people coming up to you than me, right? Well, that's my city. That's my city. That's my area. I said, we talked about the difference. I said, what's the difference is, they want an autograph and a picture from you. For me, they want to tell me their life story. You know what I'm saying? And, and that, yeah, that can get tiring, you know? And you can get to where like, dude, I'm drained. The, the people part of it is fun. It's rewarding. It's what it's about, but it's, it's tough, man. It's like, dude, I'm going through this. I'm going through that. I'm going, it's like, okay, you know what? Trying, trying to be available. And, and I think, you know, one of the things I'm reminded of, I don't know, you know, some of your, some of your listeners would know this and probably most wouldn't, but this is, this is a cool thought from the Bible that applies today is Jesus finds out his cousin was beheaded. So John the Baptist was beheaded. So the, it talks about how Jesus went to like withdrawal to like a, oh, just a quiet place. Man, he's probably just wanting to get away a little bit. And as he is, is walking, people start going, there's Jesus. There's Jesus. There's Jesus. And then all of a sudden, there's, you know, about 15,000 people that show up. And, and this is the story where Jesus feeds, you know, the 5,000. And the Bible, they only counted men, but there was women and children. So there's a supernatural feeding number 5. So, so, so, then it goes all the way into the night, you know, and Jesus goes to his disciples, because you guys go ahead and leave all this, Mr. Krauts. Dude, what? Imagine that at the arena, right? Imagine the star athlete going, hey, I sure appreciate you guys all go me and my teammates. We're going to take care of this. Like that, that was Jesus, like flipping everything upside down, right? So, so then eventually the crowds just miss. And this is the story where Jesus he finally goes up to get some alone time. And then he comes down off the mountain and he walks on water, right? So, a lot of times we know little bits and pieces, but when you put that in context, so what am I saying? What am I saying? What I'm saying is he put aside his own pain to meet the needs of people. Man, I just need to give away for a minute. Like my, my cousin was with murder for me because of me. And all of a sudden, these people are showing up. It's like, okay, you know what? I'll get some time. I'll get some love. We'll make sure everybody's fed. Now he put the needs of others before his own. And I think when I think of you doing that, dude, that's what you're doing. It's not that you would never want to help somebody figure out their stuff. You're tired. Like, you came, you do a keynote or whatever and you're prepping fuel in. Yeah. And then people go, man, Scott's got some great stuff. If I could just get 20 seconds with them times 3,000 or whatever you know, and not 3,000, but it could be, but it might be, hey, don't be a you of little faith. Come on. 3,000's coming. And so, you know, but that's those things. I'm not, I'm not Jesus, but those encourage and challenge me because there are times I'm just like, dude, the plane. And then I'm like, man, he, he, he has somebody to sit by. I mean, they just needed some love. But I think that that that's what differentiates like somebody who's in for the right reasons versus not because the one thing that I never wanted to have happened, it's a big deal for me. I never want somebody to like meet me after listening to the podcast and be like, oh, that's why you never meet your heroes in person. Yeah. I never want that. Yes. And I like, listen, if I can, if I can, you know, figure out my shit in my business and it's worked. And if that helps you, like, even like a fraction of a little bit, amazing, glad, glad I was, you know, gifted the time to tell you that. Absolutely. But would be one thing that I should have asked you that I didn't ask you that you think you want to leave the audience with. I think for for anybody that would would want the keys to the kingdom, man, to help them through whatever fire they're in right now, whatever, whatever that fire looks like, whatever that fire is, no matter how hot that fire is burning, this book, the fire is for you. I am telling you, it is going to help you. It is going to help you. It is going to give you tools to not only stay in the fire while you need to stay in it. But as you walk out of the fire, it's going to give you the tools in life and that that can be purchased on Amazon or Barnes and Oprah or any platform. Use type in the fire is for or you can go to a landing page that's just my name, Travis Herndt.com. That landing page, you can actually pre-order and get on the pre-order for the book, even right now. But but that is that is the that is the simplest, quickest way and dude, refer it to everybody you know. It's almost like if I had the answer to cancer, would I keep it or give it? I'm giving it. Well, I got I got the answer to something far worse than cancer and and and and that is the hell on life that we all live through. I have the answer. So I want I want to give it away man, give the answer to the world. So Amazon Barnes and Oprah, Travis Herndt.com, any of those, where when's it coming out with the day? The official date where the actual book is going to be shipped out and is available for a purchase is is is in the middle of January right after the inauguration, but you can pre-order it officially on Amazon and all platforms on November 17. So it's out now. Yeah, it's out now. You know, Travis Herndt. Yep.com, you can go to Amazon, you can Barnes and Oprah, anywhere you can buy a book. It's out now. Okay, cool. Where should people, I mean, outside of Travis Herndt.com, what are your socials? Same at Travis Herndt on on on Instagram and that's my main one that I use. And and yeah, I love to I love to connect but at Travis Herndt. Amazing. Very soon on they can stop by after in their Arizona impact church and pull up back. Yeah, I just found out. So there's a guy named Mason Plumly that plays for the sons. He's 7 foot dude. He's 7 feet tall. He's big dude. Well, I know Mason and stuff before he came to the sons, but I just found out that he was at church, but he didn't want to you don't want to let me know and be like a new sense. So he just came like everybody comes. Well, you know, he's got a park and over over oversized over size. Overflow park. He's going to take one of this. He's got to take one of the sprinters. But he got to jump in a golf car. The guy, you know, he's like a celebrity. And what we try to do is because like we have we have big names to go to our church. I mean, one that I would be okay sharing would be like OBJ. OBJ goes to our church and he is a friend and his family goes to our church and he's like, bro, I'm just thankful that I can go to a church because I haven't been a he's like, I go to Germany and a thousand people line up and they're like, OBJ, OBJ is like, I can't go anywhere on the planet, right? He goes, but you've created a place where I can go and like a normal human being and just just sit and not have to worry about pictures and autographs. So we're very intentional about what, especially if people have big celebrity, like you want them to feel like a human man. Like I should be able to go to church without you asking for a picture for me. It's church. Like it's church. So, but that was funny about Mason. I'm like, I just found that out last night. Like you went to church and they hang in there. Yeah, the big old seven putter and a golf cart like well, he probably does stand out a little bit. He's definitely death is the time of it. The last thing I like to ask, I mean, you've gone through some of the different seasons of your life. You go back and and this question has I think extra meaning to you in particular because you've gone on records saying that you wouldn't change anything that's happened to you. But if you could go back and tell your whatever 18, 19, 20 year old self one thing, not to change it, but just to give him some wisdom. What would that thing be? Man, I would say if I were to give myself some form of wisdom, it would be to stay true to who you are forever because life has a funny way of hurting you. And then those hurts can change you for the worst. I can go through a relationship problem and now I become resentful. And then if the resent is not dealt with, I become bitter. And if I become, you know, bitter, you're in this ultimate state of brokenness. I think it's hard to stay true to you because half the time we don't even know who we are, you know, but get good people around you, surround yourself with good people, man, that you can ride with, that you can die with, that you believe in, that believe in you. And you know, maybe chart, like, you know, put a vision board for your life at 18, 19, 15, 14, what, what's the, it's going to change because we all know as adults, it changes. But like, man, this is the vision for my life. This is the dream, right? And then keep going back to that board and cut that dream up into bite-sized pieces. Man, I want to be a motivational speaker. Okay. Well, how are you going to get there? You're going to go to some, some, some, some training stuff, educational stuff, maybe go to school for I want to go into real estate. Okay. If I'm going into real estate, which I'm not, I'm a pastor, but I'm telling you right now, I'd be an instant gazillionaire because of my network, like life is about who you know, not what you know. I like what I can't remember. I think it was Mark Cuban. He said, I think it was Mark Cuban. He was interviewed. If you could go back to college again, what would you do differently? And he goes, I'd meet everybody on the college campus, every one of them. I'd meet as many people as I can meet and get to know as many people as I could know because life is about who you know, not what you know, you know? And so the power of connectivity, the power of network relationship, like who you're around, who you're around. Man, you're around knuckleheads. Dude, you're going to be a knucklehead. And we've all been around knuckleheads and we've all been a knucklehead. You know, but like find some, find some people that aren't and I think the biggest thing for me that changed me, yes, God, but was the new people I surrounded in my house. I was raised with my best friends are all elite athletes, right? And good people, good hearts, but still party and still at that time. Well, I had to get away from that. And so I started hanging around these church nerds. When I mean nerds, they're the nerds of all nerds. Like they don't play sports. I don't even know if they know how to sport is. They were just stupid nerds, but like they were good people. Yeah. And you know, they weren't doing it when I write people for you. They're the right people, right people for me. Yeah. Yeah. And I think just be intentional about that man networking surrounding yourself with good people. You know, so I have vision. Get yourself some people that can support you with division, but also who who and it just be a friend and because life is tough. You know, we're always looking around like is this what's this person doing? What's he want? What's the angle? What's her angle? So surround yourself with good people.