Unveiling Your True Self: A Conversation with John Selby

Opening exhortation about identity and God's love

Life's not over. Your mistakes, your past, doesn't it really identify who you truly are in Christ? You may feel bad at the moment, yes. Get up and just keep moving forward. Mistakes are going to come.

No matter what we do, the love of God is still there. Well, man, I'm excited to sit down with you, John. It's been a couple of months since you came into my studio and I was just like kind of starting doing these podcasts and all my stuff was a hot mess.

Like, I had to spend hours piecing together that video because everything just broke while you were there. Yeah. It worked out. I mean, when the video went up and it was still good, man, great story, great testimony. Got some good feedback from that, but it's nice to have my life together a little bit more now and be able to sit down and talk.

So, man, how you been? Been doing good. I've just been busy with work and then getting ready to start up a youth group at church and so you know how work gets involved and kind of gets time consuming.

Naming the youth group and focus on "the next chapter"

Yeah. And it just can take up a lot of a lot of your time. And so I'm still trying to balance life, work, church and just, you know, me time too, you know. Yeah. Same time. Yeah. How's that going?

It's going. It's it's going. You probably all may know some of you may be struggling with that as well, but it's it's going, but I think it's coming together. Yeah. It's coming together. So tell me about the youth group, man, what are your dreams?

Going in life, you know, you can look up 1,000 different logos, you know, and try to figure out what the logo name is and what you want to call it instead of just calling it youth group, you know. So I found something that struck me after looking for a while and just Acts 29-1, you know, there's 28 chapters in Acts. Right. Acts 29-1, the next chapter. Yeah. Nice.

And I feel that when I was younger, you know, you're always searching for something. You know what I'm saying? The next chapter of your life, what that may look like. Are you going to go to school? Are you going to go to college? Are you going to go into the workforce? Yeah. What's that next chapter in life? I want them to focus on the next chapter of their life.

Teaching teens identity in Christ amid cultural influences

Yeah. And society, you know, I've asked my question that what or who is going to influence them? Yeah. Because something is going to influence them. Whether it's going to be a positive influence or a negative one. Something out there, whether the culture is going to influence them, something's going to influence them. You know, and that can impact their next chapter of their life, you know.

And so I figured, you know, what a little bit of time we have, because as you all know, you know, when you're doing the youth group, you only have a short timeframe. You know, other than texting back and forth and keeping, I wasn't during the week, but you only have a short timeframe with them, you know. So, so the best we can do is make up that timeframe and and just instill the word of God in them to be able to that way when they go out in life, when they go out and, you know, making their decisions on what they want to do for their next chapter in life, they have the word of God at least deep down in their heart, that way society and culture can't determine what their next thing in life is going to be.

You know, I'm saying, can't really persuade them, you know, they try to say rooted in the word of God and be able to help them make that better decision to be able to live for God the best way they can. Yeah, and imagine that's pretty important, I think, for you, right? Knowing your backstory and some of the stuff that you shared in the last episode, like your journey in life, I mean, was it that? That was the season of life, right? Were you on, were pulled in by the world, right? Yeah, yeah.

And so now it's like, so how are you maybe addressing some of that, like seeing this in the teens that you're going to be ministering to and the people that God has called you to reach, right? And this season of life and like wrapping some of your own experiences, you know, maybe some of the struggles and failures, right? Of, of, you know, not to knock any particular church, but where maybe the church was ineffective at reaching you. And I think about that a lot in my ministry experience, no, it's like, I know the people around me did the best that they could, but it didn't like, it didn't stop me from going down that road.

Personal story of rejection at church and its impact on identity

And I think tonight, if I remember, you're talking about identity and authority, your identity, right? In the Teen Challenge Chapel service. And so you want to speak to that a little bit maybe and how, you know, God's speaking to you about addressing some of those issues in the teens. You know, because I feel that it's important for them to have an identity. And we want that identity in Christ to be what God intend them to be.

And then, you know, when I was younger, when we were younger age, you know, you're kind of just searching for that, you know, what's going to fill that void, what's going to make me happy, you know, and like you said, that, you know, the churches may have done the best they can. But, you know, when you're out there searching for what am I going to do with my life, you know, then you have society trying to pull you in. And so the identity is, is I believe that as teenagers, your identity can be what you see as in yourself.

You could quickly fall into that rabbit hole was, I'm a failure, you know, fail this. Let me try again. Or, you know, I'm not pleasing my parents the way I should be. And I messed up in the past. So that identity can, can roll in the back your head and they, and if you keep believing that, then you almost can believe that. You know, I'm saying, you can believe that life for so long, and then it can almost be a negative part of you. It starts to become truth for us, right?

Because we walk that out. And those negative words and those lies that have been spoken to us, whether it's been from somebody else speaking into our lives or just a lie of the enemy that we've held on to. And then we begin to believe that about ourselves and we begin to act accordingly. And that stuff begins to affect our path, you know, so, so big. I think a lot about identity, man.

I remember during my teenage years showing up at church while I was trying to figure out who I was. And, man, the church, I mean, the church that we went to growing up, I got fond memories. I got some great memories, you know, but there was a season when I was really like running from the Lord and trying to figure out who I was. And I started to play in like the skater world and, you know, like, you know, it was into all the bands.

And, man, I remember a specific scenario where I got tossed out our Christian skate night for a band t-shirt that I was wearing. And I'll never forget, like, I understand that what the person did in that moment thought they were doing the right thing, like trying to, you know, we don't want to glorify anything ungodly. Yeah, yeah. But I don't know if in the moment they had no idea, they had no way of knowing what I was going through.

And the individual that did that never took the time to build the relationship and find out the person that was wearing the t-shirt, who they were. Oh, yeah, yeah. And I remember that experience specifically, like, I didn't go back to church much after that until I got saved later on in life. And so, I mean, a culture man is just like, there's so much influence, you know, and so how do we do that, man? How do we begin to address the needs and speak to the identity and teenagers, but move beyond, like, maybe being offended about what we see on the surface, or we don't understand it, because even now, like, I'm 37, 38, 37, somewhere in there, I don't know.

Parenting in a complex culture and preparing kids for identity challenges

But like, dude, I haven't been a teen for 20 years now, you know, and things have changed a lot, you know. And so, what are your thoughts on that? Well, like you said, you never know what they're going through. I'm saying, if they're having an identity issue, regardless, you know, I mean, if they're struggling with something, and then, they may come to church, you know, he says, come as you are, you know, they may come to church, wearing a shirt that maybe you might not think is right.

You know, I'm saying, maybe that's not that time to to approach that, but, but just in life now, you know, when we were younger, it was a whole lot different than it is now. You have all these stuff that they're trying to teach and still need to do. All these identities, all these pronouns, all of this that is going out there. And I'm thinking in myself, you know, when I was younger, if I was certain to, and I had all that coming at me at the same time, how much harder do they have it?

You know, my daughter's eight, you know, you're looking at five or six years and she should be a teenager. How worse is it going to get? You know, we call it freedom, letting people kind of figure out who they are, but it's like at the same time we're trying to tell them who they should be. And, and, and throw in all this stuff on them, like, you know, in the school systems and whatnot. And, man, I can't imagine like, I got a 14 year old and a 12 year old now, we are separated from the world, you know, we're the weird homeschoolers.

But when you look at the numbers and the states all across the country, we're not so weird anymore. We're not the minority. It's, it's, it's slowly growing. Now, I want my kids to be able to figure out who they are, but I also know that it's my responsibility to help shape that identity and breathe that identity into them. And, and there's that balance trying to speak in life, speaking the character of the Lord and them, and then letting the expression of who they are come out through that.

But there's nothing outside of the Lord that's going to shape that, you know, like, that's, that's going to be healthy for them, you know? Yeah, yeah. It's not really on who you are, but who's you are. You know what I'm saying? Ultimately, it boils down to that word, real child of God. You know what I'm saying? Our children are God's children, even though he's entrusted them in our care and it's our responsibility as godly men, godly fathers to instill that identity, you know, you are loved by God, you know, you are a child of God and this instill the love of God around them and show them who God is.

Whether it be when Addison gets a little older, I can tell her my backstory about how God has done in my life and then kind of maybe help her to throw some red flags up when she gets a little older if I go down this rabbit hole, this might happen. Yeah. You know, and then all of this culture stuff is going around her as well. She's, I mean, she goes to public school and I'm saying, all that is going around her and she's constantly absorbing that. Yeah. You know, whether we want to or not, but it's there.

You know, it's there and then, you know, when their brains are like, they're soft at this point because she's still in the learning stage of just in general life. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? So what or who is going to influence them? Yeah. You know what I'm saying? I mean, we control who she hangs out with and the friends us that, but when it boils down to, once she gets older, I want to be able to instill the word of God in her.

Do where she doesn't turn away from that. Yeah. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? And then she, she knows who her true identity is and not just her, but the teenagers of youth group, when they screw up, life's not over. Right. You know, your mistakes, your past doesn't really identify who you truly are in Christ. Yeah. You know, you may feel bad at the moment. Yes, we all say and we all screwed up. We just learn from our mistakes.

Recovery, relapse, and the fruit of a growing relationship with God

Yeah. And then get help if needed. But, you know, I want to be able to entrust that identity on who you are. So you are a child of God, you know, no matter what we do, no matter how much good we do in the world, no matter how much bad we do. The love of God is still there. Yeah. You know, he's always going to be there, you know, like the prodigal son, you know, he probably went to find his identity and try to find out, you know, what is there in life that can make me happy.

Yeah. Yeah. That's great. And then after a while, you come to your senses, like, this is not working. Yeah. So I need to run back home. And he's always going to be there. He's like, he is in the Bible story. He changes his identity once Jesus spoke to him. He wants you to just come down from that tree so I can come hang out with you and have dinner with you and eat with you.

His identity changed. You know, he no longer saw himself as what other people saw them. Yeah. If you go back to your hometown as a drug addict, you know, your identity from other people is probably still there as the way you left. It took a long time though, man. If I remember my timeline, like to be able to even though I knew I was a new creation, like I was not using anymore, but like there are moments like there were moments over those first, you know, I would say even 10 years of just like still like, man, I still feel like that old Justin on the inside, you know, and, and I know a lot of that was the lie of the enemy.

But like, man, getting to that place where we're confident as sons of God, like, you know, that I haven't done anything to blow it. And, and the thought process, like I make this mistake, like, here I am going right down the, you know, the old rabbit, the whole again, and I'm starting from square one. But that piece of identity, man, you talk about that knowing the father and the son and their relationship and the product will mean being such a good story.

But like, man, hearing that part, when we know like that we belong to the Lord, and we really can get the revelation of that, like you think about the safety, the protection, the encouragement, the life that we get from a loving father and the confidence that instills in us to run harder and run faster. Like once I, it's the thing about like watching and having faith, faith is a size of a mustard seed, very tiny, but man, like, like I was told somebody to stay on the day on the phone conversation, like I used illustration of an apple.

I said, you know, you plant the original apple seed, takes a long time for the tree to grow. But once that tree grows the fruit is more seed that goes into the ground. And like, once we can get a hold of that God wants the best for our lives, and God is crazy and passionate about us, like we find that identity and that belonging, and then it just exponentially multiplies. And we get more and more confident, you know, in our God-given gifts and who we are in him, you know.

And I want to, you know, as teenagers grew and up or even now, you know, we make mistakes. But before we were, you know, before I was saved, to make mistakes, I really messed up when I got high and all that. I really didn't, didn't really have much remorse, you know. But now that I'm clean and then I have such a strong relationship with God, you know, when you mess up, you don't feel, I guess as a Christian, when I came a Christian in 2007, Lord, 17 years ago, and then when you first mess up, oh man, I messed up, you know, you're, I was less reluctant to go to God because you almost think you're not worthy of it, right?

You know, now that, you know, the longer you have that relationship with him, we know that we're not that powerful to mess that up, right? We're not that powerful to screw up the calling that God has in our life, we're not that powerful. Yeah, that's correct. You know, we can't, we can't control the path he has for our life, we can prolong it, we can quench the Holy Spirit, but we can't, we're not that powerful.

So, you know, I just realized that, you know, it's easier to come to him, knowing, man, I messed up. Yeah. You know, here I am again. It took me a long time to realize it's just because I have one apple that goes sour and go bad, doesn't mean I have to cut down the little tree, but another apple is going to grow. Yeah. And I think that's some of the challenge, especially both of us being from a recovery background, like so much focus on counting days, and I even do it still, like, right?

Like, I mean, it's been, you know, I've been, yeah, like, you know, I celebrate that sober birthday, and it's a big accomplishment. I don't want to take away from you. Yeah. Yeah. But like, some of the struggling on, like, when people relapse, it's like, I blew it. I slipped up a fell. Now, I got to go all the way back to the beginning and start over. And it's like, brother, no, you don't have to cut down the whole tree. I get up and just keep moving forward. Mistakes are going to come.

Dangers facing teens today, ministry challenges, and planting deep roots

Now, unfortunately, this is where the things get tricky, right? It's like, I remember the "This is your brain on drugs" commercials. You know, they cracked the eggs and I still went on to drugs, like, they didn't really have an impact, but like, man, thinking about trying to raise teenagers in this world with fentanyl and overdoses, and how we, how we either get that message across, right? Because like, the fear-based tactics never works for me as a kid. So like, the answer and the antidote, obviously, is love and giving them something to live for that helps them to make those decisions to say not even once.

But, I mean, have you had any conversations with any young people or teens, man, over the years, like, you know, just in this area, like, you know, in that regard? No, not, not, I mean, as far as not as drugs and stuff, no, I mean, on force, I'd never had to had that conversation. I'd be a bummer on that one. But I mean, we've had a couple guys that want to come in the program. You know, he had one guy come in year and a half, two years ago, but he didn't stay.

We tried to help him, but we tried to do the best we can to reach out, you know, to him. Right. You know, I even explained my whole story to him, and he was living homeless, and he lasted maybe a night or two nights and then left. Yeah. You know, I was saying, but as far as that, and then thankfully, the teens we got now grew up in church. Okay. You know, they're constantly in church, and you know, but before that, we had a children's church minister running a bus ministry, and that was, that was pretty challenging.

Yeah. Because I knew God was working, and that during that season, you know, we all have a season, you know, and during that season, some of these kids, eight, nine, seven, were getting themselves up and getting themselves dressed and getting themselves out the door when they knew the bus was coming. Yeah. So we were able to, during that season, and still the love of God in them, we tried to reach out to the parents, seemed like that didn't work. Yeah. But, you know, we knew what we were doing was the right thing to do. And some of these kids, I still see the fruit today.

Yeah. You know, and then one of them's got a little girl. She started coming to church. If all that for, you know, for, for one, I guess it was worth it during those years. Yeah. And we had the bus ministry. That's awesome. You know, it was just, and it, and they'd be able to see the fruit of that, you know. Yeah. And then, you know, of course, you know, things happened, you know, I got a couple of them that were called up into, into gun charges. Got one of them on two murder charges on them now, trying to reach out to them. Yeah.

You know, 20, 22 years old. Yeah. And he was in our ministry. Yeah. And our children's ministry. And then he went to the youth group and then it kind of just fell off. So that's why I'm so big on identity and, and, and the next chapter of their life. Yeah. And, and help them, you know, not even consume the garlic perspective, but help them out when trying to make the right move in their life. Yeah. You know, I'm saying not necessarily follow their heart. That can be a feel good thing, and not a God thing.

Right. But be able to help them in the next chapter of their life when they're get, you know, maybe from middle school to high school. Yeah. You know, what that may look like. You know, I'm saying what challenges they may face, be able to be there to be able to, to, to hear their struggles to let them vent. Yeah. And to be able to just, just let it all out when they don't want to maybe say anything to their parents. Yeah. You know, you know, I'm saying, so stuff they're struggling with.

So let me ask you a personal question. If you don't mind, you can tell me no, because this is going to be on the internet. So, but on, I mean, you grew up at home with two Christian parents, right? And so did I, like, I grew up in the church as well and in the home like, so where do you think your struggles with identity, right? When you ended up eventually falling into addiction and all that? Like, where did that stem from? Have you, have you done the, like, have you unpacked that over the years? I'm sure you thought about it.

Unpacking childhood faith, church experience, and the world's labels

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I had, it, it, you know, I went to church, you know, and I had very fond memories of Sunday school and stuff like that. But during that course, I just, you know, I just thought of my Bible stories, you know, just to go to church, you know, you know, I was able to walk the church, you know, right down the street from me. I just thought of my Bible stories. I really didn't. And then we had a, some of the youth group, not really. I remember, like, just going out on outings, but no really like youth class, no really like youth Bible study.

Yeah. You know, and I guess, you know, it's just a small church in nature. It's kind of hard to do that when, you know, you have volunteers and stuff like that. But my identity is just, I didn't know at that point. I didn't know it. No one said, hey, you're a child of God. You know, you were loved, you know, just, you know, this, you know, this is a kiss and the Bible story is joining the way. Oh, right. You know, you, you, you just hear it. It's just a, hear the story and go home. You know, I'm saying, hear the story of a Sunday morning and go home. Yeah.

You know, I didn't really didn't have an identity. You know, my parents were great. I had great, great parents, you know, we didn't have any drugs or drinking or nothing in our, in our family. You know, but then they come to the point where, you know, I stopped going to church. Yeah. And then hanging out with the wrong people, I want to be cool. Right. Hey, I'm cool. We know, let's do this. And then everybody else is doing this. Let's, let's try it. So at that point, then I really didn't look at myself as just, just John, you know, you know, and when I was working in the, working in a restaurant business, John who has a job at a restaurant business, I really didn't have a strong foundation of an identity.

Okay. Until I started doing drugs, and then I labeled myself when I got too deep, then, well, now I'm a drug addict. If we don't know who we are in Jesus and we don't pick that up from the work, from the Bible and from our relationship with God, the world is eager to tell us who we are. Yeah. And there are so many labels being thrown at us constantly. And man, at the social media age, like, I am a huge fan of social, obviously, that's how this is going to be distributed. But like, there are so many influences telling us what we should and we shouldn't be.

And like, in a lot of it, more is just like making sure the heart is right. I've even adjusted my social media habits here recently. Like I'm 38 years old now. But like I figured it out in 38, I'm not 37. Yeah. Anyways, confidence. But on no man, like, even knowing that, like, this is a tool, God's giving me to minister the gospel. But like, even adjusting how much I'm personally, how much I'm consuming, you know, and I know that sounds crazy because I'm hoping people will consume this podcast.

But like, a lot of times, like, I don't think we, we really think about the impact of like, even seeing everybody else's wins. It's not even the negative stuff. Yeah. Because then it starts to put thoughts in us like, I should be at that point in my life. Why don't I have that? You know, and they've the phrase in the past, keeping up with the Joneses. Yeah. And so then our identity becomes built off of pursuing something else. And I think that's where Paul talks about godliness with contentment is great gain. And that's the never ending pursuit.

I was talking to a friend about that earlier. And he's he's doing pretty well for himself, you know, and his career and he keeps moving the ladder. And he he was on the phone with me today. And he suggested, when does it become enough? Yeah. He's like, I thought about when I I would eventually make six figures. And he's like, I've crushed that now. And he's like, I'm trying to hit the next wrong. And he's like, I and he's like, I just don't know. He's like, when does it become enough? And that constant pursuit, you know, of more, you'll never feel it. You'll never feel it. Yeah.

Influence, leadership responsibility, and focusing on depth over width

And then it comes, but you know, we didn't have Facebook when we were younger. We didn't have, you know, MySpace, right, you know, we were joking. They don't have MySpace now. They probably don't even know what MySpace is. But with Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, all these X, YouTube, all these influences, when they're because a lot of them have an influencer, they follow. I mean, I, I follow a lot of smoking channels, you know, like, you know, let's smoke and barbecue. Yeah. Yeah. But I follow a lot of YouTubers, you know, like camping and all that, you know, and then, but a lot of these big influencers, you only see the best part of their life. Right. You only see, they only show their highs. Yeah.

But what are their lows? What may, you know, what they may be struggling with? Yeah. I mean, they're not going to blast that on the media. Yeah. They're not going to blast them on Facebook or YouTube or all that because that's going to drop their followers. Even you got pro sports people. For instance, Robin Williams, he's not pro sports. Yeah. But he made people laugh. He was a great influencer. Yeah. But the whole time he was struggling with depression. Yeah, I preached on that Sunday. I talked about the challenge of the balance of pursuing fruit more than gifts because realistically, like sometimes we can get a gift, we can have a raw talent or even spiritual gifts, man, that God will give us and then not have the fruit to balance that out.

And I made a statement and I heard it from another preacher and so I borrowed it for my sermon and like all good preachers do. And I just sat from the stage and said, you know, the challenge is that I can talk a lot better than I can walk. Oh, yeah. Yeah. We can all do that. Everybody can do it. And it's like if we're not intentional pursuing fruit, which is, you know, goodness, gentleness, self-control love, all that stuff that's in the fruits of the Spirit, like our gifts will end up ruining us. And I think we've seen it in the church like so many big public failures, you know?

And it's like, man, God, keep my heart right. Even not even having a huge platform knowing that like, and if I don't put this pressure on you, but that's the call of leadership is that people watch our lives closely. And if we fall, it's easy to say, well, you should just look to Jesus. And I'm going to disappoint you. But that can almost be a cop out as well, because there is standards, right? To be a minister. Oh, you're a higher standard. Yeah. And so you're called to a higher standard. You're called to more. I'm sorry. Go ahead and come to finish. Go ahead.

You're you're you're you have more responsibility. Yeah. A pastor has more responsibility than maybe a person in the sound booth. Yeah. You know, I'm saying good because a pastor's calling is higher. Now that they're better, you know, than that person. But, but like you, for instance, you have a higher standard now that you're a pastor of a church. It's the public nature of it. I mean, we're in front of the same people every week and even you're ministering in the past like when it was youth groups or running Teen Challenge.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Man, I would see I would see a guys that would we have a staff member fall. And it would it would wreck four or five guys in the program. Here we go. Like I'm learning from you. And if you can't make it what hope do I have that I can make it like you're supposed to be the teacher. And dude, I've been really reflecting on that a lot like really pausing like looking inward over the last couple of months because I'm seeing all this stuff happen.

And I like know the human heart like the Bible talks about it being wicked and like the flesh and like really exciting against the Spirit examining that like God. What is it in my life that puts me at risk because I don't want to be the next story. And I don't I don't have millions of followers or churches in huge, you know, like we're, you know, but I know even in that and the small community God's called me to lead an influence. Dude, how I live and how I act, you know, it impacts everybody in my circle.

Oh, yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah. And I think Pastor Steven Furtick did something on this. Be careful what you copy. Yeah, you know, we're all going to copy something but be careful what you copy. You know, be careful with who you copy and what you copy. Yeah, you know, I mean, it can have a negative influence and it can have a positive influence. But we're all going to copy something. You know, you know, maybe but when you're up there worshipping, you know, when you're out here worshipping, you see your kids at a young age, they're looking around. You know, they're looking around. You know, or maybe this isn't how you should worship, but they're seeing it and you can almost be an example of worshiping God.

Knowing, you know, they may know your failures and your flaws at home. Yep. You know, my daughter knows my failures and falls at home. I'm trying to be better at it to just admit when I'm wrong, when I'm wrong. Yeah. You know, that can also help her out when she grows and when she matures and when she makes mistakes. Yeah, she can realize that she is still the same person, is not defined on who she is, but she can copy that. She can copy on how to work, you know, what it looks like to worship God.

Maybe she was not there hands up in the air, but you know, on how I worship God and in my personal life and also that church, you know, it can make a big influence. Yeah. It can be be careful what you copy. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It's just when I that's two, man, where you think about like, godliness with contentment, because even beyond just like copying in regards to the faith in what we do, like or bad influences like that carries over into what we pursue.

The scripture talks about God gave some 30, 60, 100. He didn't say the 30 or the 100 was better. Like he didn't say the 100 was better because he gave some and like, like, man, you are perfect. We are perfectly equipped to do what God's called us to do. And maybe, maybe God never called every preacher to have a huge platform and huge influence. Like because there is like small country churches and with social media we can reach millions anytime.

But man, if God's calling somebody to minister in those places and he's calling the people that he wants there to make the maximum impact and the ripple effect. And I think that's the thing sometimes I have to think about a ministry because I love growth and I can get very focused on it. And I've been doing it for years and do when the Teen Challenge program was taken off and we rode all the way up to 50 students and then even now our church is growing and it's like, but I have to constantly keep myself like depth not with, depth. Yeah.

Because width is easy. Oh yeah, yeah, depth. It takes time for the roots to grow deep. And if I'm constantly looking at somebody else's calling, if I'm looking at a guy that's been gifted with 100 fold and I'm like, not happy with my 30 fold, then I try to pursue that and ultimately it'll wear us out. Oh yeah, yeah. And I think you'll get focused more on that than on what's right in front of us. Yeah. You know, on what God has called us to do. Right. Not anybody else. What God's calling us to do. And we got to take it step by step.

You know, I mean, he started out with 12. Yeah. He started with 12. Oh yeah, David Wilkerson could have stopped and he grew. Yeah. He went on to reach millions. And so we never think about the generational impact. Sometimes we don't think about the generational impact of pouring our lives into one other person's life. Yeah. Like he could have stopped there. Now God gave him the platform, gave him the influence, and he was faithful with it. But that's not always the case. Some people get those influence and they end up, yeah, they end up falling. Oh yeah, you're proud. Yeah. You've seen that a lot.

You know, you could, you could, you could just came to him. You could plant quickly plant 50 trees in a line just throwing boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, you know what I'm saying is keep just throwing the line. Just, you know, not taking a time to help it grow, just planting them. Well, if you're just doing that and just trying to plant a whole bunch of trees, you know, when the storms of life comes, what's going to happen when the storm comes? What's going to happen with those trees? They're not going to last.

But when you wholeheartedly, you know, the few you have focused on what you have here, what you have in, in your care, what you have going to your church, what you have maybe around you in a day-to-day life. If you focus on them, you can help them get rooted in. Yeah. And then they do the same thing. That, well, you're not trying to sit there for numbers. That makes sense. Yeah, no, that's good, man. Yeah, you know, post that process like we love to plant the trees, but staking them going out, making sure they're current straight. Yeah, yeah.

And then forgetting that you planted them there and mowing over them like I have four or five times at my old house. And so, man, look at how many people we got. Yeah. You know, you don't have a connection with them. You just got people coming and leaving. They're not serving. They're not, they don't know, maybe they don't know anything about the serving capacity. They're just coming, sitting down, listening to, and then leaving. Yeah. You know, I'm saying.

When you have that small community, you're able to, to do it with, with faithful servants, you're, you're able to instill in those people and be able to pull out into those people and those people can pull out into others. Yeah. You know, I had just a ripple, like you said, ripple effect. Yeah, that's good.

Wrap-up: upcoming chapel message and where to watch

Well, John, we're getting to close to the point of wrapping up, man. But thanks for chatting and for those who are watching, John's get ready to speak at Teen Challenge Chapel. It's going to be on the internet and the interwebs. So if you want to go check out the Teen Challenge Facebook page or YouTube and watch his message from tonight, this is going to publish after this evening. So you'll be able to go back and find it a few days back.

But thanks for taking the time to chat, man. Thank you for the opportunity, appreciate it. And also if you're here watching, don't forget to hit the like button, subscribe. And you can scroll back in the channel and find John's testimony where we go a little bit more into his past. Please bear with the quality. We've gotten better, but enjoy that story, man. He's got a powerful testimony. Thank you.