Fearless Faith 10 Year Anniversary! #152

On this special edition of Finish Strong, we are celebrating 10 incredible years of Fearless Faith ministry. Join Brian, Terry, and Dan as they take a heartfelt look back at the early days of the ministry and reflect on the many milestones God has allowed us to experience along the journey. From humble beginnings to reaching countless lives with encouragement and hope, this episode is a celebration of God’s faithfulness every step of the way.

You’ll also relive some of the funniest, most touching, and most powerful moments from our Finish Strong podcasts and our daily Morning Cups of Inspiration. Plus, we’ll shine a spotlight on Fearless Faith Radio for those who may not have discovered it yet. Whether you’ve been with us from the beginning or are just joining the journey, this promises to be one of our most memorable Finish Strong episodes ever. Be sure to tune in and celebrate with us!

Transcript

Dan Wheeler: 0:02

Thanks for joining us for a very special edition of Finish Strong, as we are celebrating 10 years of Fearless Faith Ministry. Guys, I know, yeah. Oh, that's good. Raise the roof, you know. So we started when we were like, what, 37 guys, we're gonna take a trip down memory lane over the last 10 years, because we had no idea in the beginning what God was gonna do, and it all started when my wife, Beth, passed away of cancer during that journey, that three year journey, the Lord was really working on me, and I felt like, you know, I'd give two QVC two years notice after that, and then move into ministry, and I didn't know what kind of ministry it would be, but apparently, guys, the Lord was working on you also during that time to maybe want something more, am I correct

Brian Roland: 1:06

in my case? Definitely, because I was retired and I was looking for the next step when I was going to go on every job I applied for, I was overqualified, you know. So, okay, well, here we go. So, there's always younger guys, and so I was even looking back into Christian television, and that what was around nothing in my area, where I was at there, but I was looking that way, and knowing that I wanted to do something, I always felt comfortable in that, in that arena, and of course, we talked, Dan, about too, about once you retired and going on, so I was leaning in that direction, I was just looking,

Dan Wheeler: 1:39

now Terry, you were working and in a form of ministry, but what was going on with you during that time, that year or so?

Terry Steen: 1:47

Really, my whole career was in ministry. I've been a, you know, an ordained minister for years, and all my work has been in the church field or the ministry field, so it was in ministry, but yet at the same time, when you brought that up, there was something that just said, you know, what, this is just another open door that I feel strongly about stepping through. It's something you and I also talked about, how much fun it would be to do something together later in life. So, with the idea of the three of us doing it, it was like, man, who knows what God wants to do, but let's walk through this door and see what happens,

Dan Wheeler: 2:27

right? Yeah, right. And people should realize that the three of us met in 1973 in Springfield, Missouri, at Evangel College, now Evangel University, and boy, that was a long time ago, we all have more hair, and Terry, don't, don't lean down.

Terry Steen: 2:45

No, I will,

Dan Wheeler: 2:47

but no, we did. But you know, during that three year journey with my wife, I remember sitting in the hospitals the last few months, and I'd be exhausted, and I remember falling into the chair and saying, Lord, I've got nothing left, and I felt him saying good, now I can take over, because when you're weak I'm strong. And then he just kept working on me, that you know, when this is through, I've got something for you. And all of this is for a reason. And Beth passed into heaven, October 5, October 30, 2015 and I wrote about it in my book, Hurricane of Love, which is still available on Amazon. It's gotten great reviews, but you know it all goes back to after the funeral, when everybody left. You two stayed, and I took you out on a Friday to the Outback Steakhouse, and I think we've got a photo of that, the three of us outside there, and over a bloomin' onion, God started doing something.

Terry Steen: 3:46

Yeah, we were a lot better looking back then, too. That's true. That's true. Yeah, we were excited. I remember being excited, just talking about the possibilities of the future, even though we had no idea what it would look like, no idea, the camaraderie of

Dan Wheeler: 4:06

it. Yeah, right. I remember saying, what could we do? I don't know. We know what we're gonna do, and we're gonna figure what we're gonna call ourselves, but we had no idea. It's like this, the beginning of a band, you know? Yeah, okay. It was kind of like, what? Yeah, I remember thinking I'd just be speaking in churches and everything, and, and then with Covid and everything, it was like, I think I well, when I asked

Terry Steen: 4:31

you both,

Dan Wheeler: 4:32

well, I actually just told you guys both what I was thinking, that's thinking of going to ministry, and you both said, Can I help you? Can we be involved, and you guys have been terrific partners. God, it's all three of us that God laid it on our hearts. And you know what? What I love, guys, if we don't all agree on something, we don't do it right. We all agree, we feel like the Lord has opened a door, we walk through

Terry Steen: 4:59

it. Yeah, right. Yeah, and we each have different, to some degree, different skill levels that help us kind of none of us are incredible at any one thing, but we all have enough of a skill set that we can keep this thing running.

Dan Wheeler: 5:14

Yeah, Brian will pretend that, yeah,

Terry Steen: 5:18

come on, I can hear you.

Dan Wheeler: 5:20

Oh, I'm

Terry Steen: 5:21

sorry,

Dan Wheeler: 5:23

Terry's pretty good at a thing

Terry Steen: 5:25

or two.

Dan Wheeler: 5:27

Well, that was a great time, and you know, we go all the way back to college, and I think we should share with our viewers a picture of what we looked like back then. Yet, take a look, look at the hair beards. beards, we were something a few

Terry Steen: 5:45

pounds lighter. Also,

Dan Wheeler: 5:47

that's right, yeah. And then we started, and I remember saying to you guys, you know, QVC is using video a lot, and we connect with our customers, video, and maybe we should start doing video, and we looked at other Christian Facebook pages and websites, and it seemed like nobody was doing

Brian Roland: 6:04

it, right? Yeah, that's true. I remember you saying that, Dan, because we started out just doing some written inspirationals, and we, yeah, not very long. We created a Facebook page right away and started doing that, and then you, you came on one day, we had a conference call, and you were talking about the girl that worked with you in your, your media, and that told you that you should be doing video, or this is the video's way to go, and you brought that to us, so then we started looking at nobody's doing it, so in a sense we were pioneers in that area, so we really did start off and kick it off the video on our podcast, that's

Dan Wheeler: 6:39

amazing, with our phones we're reaching the world now.

Brian Roland: 6:44

Yeah,

Dan Wheeler: 6:45

so that was kind of the beginnings. We started doing those morning cups, and in our next segment, we're going to talk a little bit about what that has all evolved into, I right. Well, we're moving into the next phase in the development of fearless faith, guys. I think it was February of 2016 We thought, well, we're doing this, we should really become an official ministry, and we formed a 501 c3 nonprofit organization. We became official, I guess it wasn't until December of 2016 and at by that time we were doing some morning cups, and and we're going to share with you a few of our early morning cups of inspiration here.

Terry Steen: 7:43

Hi, I'm Dan. With your morning cup of inspiration. Welcome to your morning cup of inspiration.

Brian Roland: 7:48

Morning cup of inspiration. Hello, and thank you so much for joining me today.

Terry Steen: 7:51

Let's talk about

Dan Wheeler: 7:52

it in your morning

Brian Roland: 7:53

cup of inspiration.

Terry Steen: 7:54

Good morning. Welcome to your morning cup of inspiration. I'm talking quietly now, because we are actually at the West Wall in the old city of Jerusalem,

Brian Roland: 8:04

here yesterday, Dan and I were walking my dogs here in my complex, the neighborhood I live in. And yes, he is here, he's running camera. Hi, Dan.

Dan Wheeler: 8:11

Hi, everybody. Let's talk about it in your morning cup of inspiration. Look at the right side of the bug, you know, guys, when you look back at those early morning cups, you know, our lighting wasn't that great. Sometimes our cameras, I don't think back then were as good, but it was a start, and we just kept taking the next step, don't we?

Terry Steen: 8:32

Yeah, and I didn't know that much about it. I didn't know where my head was supposed to be, whether they were supposed to be up or across, and it took a lot, and remember, we had those initial mugs, those first mugs that we used, official mug, and we used that for a while.

Dan Wheeler: 8:53

Here's the current

Brian Roland: 8:54

one, that's the official one. You can

Dan Wheeler: 8:56

still get it on our website,

Terry Steen: 9:00

but it is funny to see our appearance change, the different glasses over the years, and sometimes glasses, sometimes not, different backgrounds, different houses that we were in, and different yards, we've all moved,

Dan Wheeler: 9:15

we've all moved since we

Terry Steen: 9:16

started, yeah, yeah, that's right,

Brian Roland: 9:18

and different dogs,

Dan Wheeler: 9:21

yes, true, very true. And we do, we do use our dogs in our videos, you know. And I guess in that first year, at some point, Brian, I think we decided we needed a website, and you kind of went to work on one, did

Brian Roland: 9:40

you? Yeah, yeah, we talked about a website that we could lead people to, so we can do more than just a Facebook page, and so, yeah, got together, I got on, I think it was, I think was something I found that online, I think it was, there was

Unknown: 9:55

Wix

Brian Roland: 9:55

when I started playing with, but then I went to Wix, yeah, and created and created a website. And it, you know, it was received pretty well, and I remember a couple people looking at going, "Hey, this has everything you need on it, because it had our contact information, our introductions, and, and forgiving people wanted to donate to the ministry, they could, and it took us, it was a good start, it was a good start, because we had all of our morning cups on there too, so we could do just so much, and we were, we were using everything we can do on her, but yeah, it was that first one that came out, and, and that gave us a little more exposure, and that we can give people. Here's an official website, not just a Facebook page, so we were official. Yeah,

Dan Wheeler: 10:33

good memories. And I remember we traveled, we did some traveling, we hit the road, we were making contacts, we went down to Liberty University. Terry tried to sell his movie script. Well, you didn't come to terms, did you? Because

Terry Steen: 10:46

it didn't go as well as I hoped it would. The reality is, I got - I did it for cinematography class, and I only got a C. So, what would you expect, really?

Brian Roland: 11:01

Rewrite the movie.

Dan Wheeler: 11:02

The movie was called The Old Ball Game, so you know what kind of a

Terry Steen: 11:07

creativity.

Dan Wheeler: 11:10

Terry was always more of a ministry and a business guy, and now we've got him into the video on the creative.

Terry Steen: 11:15

That's right. I

Dan Wheeler: 11:16

don't know, Brian, what do you think he's doing? Pretty good.

Brian Roland: 11:18

He's doing really good. I'll tell you something that really, that really got me, guys, is when we were together. I, we were in Florida, I think, going someplace, and we stopped at a McDonald's, and we got outside, and then we got it. It's either a text or somebody wrote that. I just saw you guys, yeah, they recognized

Dan Wheeler: 11:37

our Facebook, they wrote us on the Facebook page,

Brian Roland: 11:40

and that shocked me. I go, oh, I gotta be careful what I do.

Terry Steen: 11:44

Virginia,

Brian Roland: 11:46

well, that's right. Yes, because in

Terry Steen: 11:47

Virginia, back from Liberty University. Yeah, yeah,

Dan Wheeler: 11:51

surprised they don't recognize us, because honestly, I think we look better in person than on camera.

Terry Steen: 11:57

Let's stick with that. That's our story,

Dan Wheeler: 12:02

so the end of 2016 and that was really our first year of operation. We had a Facebook page, and we had the beginnings of a website. Stay tuned, because in our next segment we're going to tell you our next step in the growth of Fearless Faith Ministries. We're so glad you've joined us for our 10th anniversary podcast. It's amazing to look back over the last 10 years and see what God has done, but we can't do this ministry without you. We have many expenses, and this would be a great time to give if you never have. Simply go to our website@www.ffaith.org that's two Fs, www.ffaith.org Click on the orange giving tab up in the upper right hand corner, and then that will take you to our support page. And if you just scroll down a little bit, you'll see the three ways to give. We so appreciate each and every gift. And now back to our podcast. So, after a while, guys, we decided maybe we should get a YouTube channel, because everyone was telling us, you know, YouTube's great for videos, and you could put your videos on there. Again, we didn't have a clue how to start a YouTube page, yeah. YouTube, what are you in a tube or something? I mean, we're old guys, but wow, I

Brian Roland: 13:31

remember it was longer format too. If we wanted to do longer format, that gave us the availability, so that was a selling factor for us to do that

Dan Wheeler: 13:38

right. And so, as we started putting our videos in there, I guess we realized we could actually categorize them,

Terry Steen: 13:46

yeah,

Dan Wheeler: 13:47

and, and, and today we have, what, like 3300 videos on there, something like that,

Terry Steen: 13:54

yeah, multiple categories that you can just go to our playlist tab and see all the categories, if there's something, if you'd like to listen to or be inspired by, whether it's depression, whether it's victory, whether it's faith, whether it's hope, all those things are in there. Over the years, it's been pretty cool, hasn't it? Yeah,

Dan Wheeler: 14:18

and then somewhere around maybe it was 2018 We thought we were going to go into TV, and we had a TV pilot. I know we've got some pictures from that. It was a lot of fun. It was difficult to work in that studio.

Terry Steen: 14:31

Yeah,

Dan Wheeler: 14:32

but then when we looked at the finances and everything, we thought, TV, man, we don't have enough money because we don't take a salary and we depend on public support, and but because people have always given us enough to do what we've the projects that God has put on our heart, which is pretty amazing to me. We don't have a lot, we never seem to have way too much, but we get it

Brian Roland: 14:55

done, you know. Then we always, we get these ideas, or Lord, we put some. In our mind, and we always said, if the doors open, we'll go through it. If not, we won't. Every door really was has been opening for us. That one shut, that one shut, and we looked at it and said, you know, where's going? Walk away, and being that we all came from TV, it's like, okay, this is a natural, we should be here. Yeah, and to know that Lord's going, no, I'm shutting that door. And so we said, okay, we'll just follow where you want us to go, and that's not it. So, that was a learning lesson for us too,

Dan Wheeler: 15:25

but we haven't been able to appear on some Christian television programs and talk

Terry Steen: 15:29

about

Dan Wheeler: 15:29

our ministry and what God's doing. Sorry, Terry. Yeah,

Terry Steen: 15:32

no, that's okay. I was just gonna say that's to me, that's pretty cool and encouraging that we are wide open to walk through whatever door the Lord opens, and we have had that mindset, we have had that attitude that Lord, we're your vessel, whatever you want to do with us, it doesn't matter how old we are, we're willing to do it, and we have not been afraid of that, and the Lord's honored that in such a beautiful way,

Dan Wheeler: 16:02

yeah,

Brian Roland: 16:03

man, it's not us, it's Him, we always say it,

Terry Steen: 16:05

yeah, and

Dan Wheeler: 16:06

then we decided another form of social media, because we realized quickly social media is today's marketplace, I mean, even TV networks aren't keeping up with the numbers that some people are doing on social media, and again, we're a worldwide ministry. We reach the world with our phones and with the things our podcasts we produce. We've got, I don't know how many countries now, but back then, after YouTube, so we had Facebook and YouTube, and then we decided that Instagram might not be a bad thing to foray into, and I don't know exactly what year that was, maybe 2017 we started an Instagram page, and today Karen, your wife, Terry, runs our Instagram page, employee,

Terry Steen: 16:51

yeah, the number of people that she gets viewing her posts, and tell us a little bit about her process and how she works at it, so well, if if she's never around, if I, if I don't know where she's at, and it's quiet in the house, I know what's going on. Put so much time into these posts that she does, and she posts multiple times a week, but she'll, she's always, no matter where we are, out taking pictures, photos with the idea of how can I make that photo work and have room to put my, my verse in, or my saying in, and those kind of things, and she works tirelessly at that, really considers it her ministry, loves it, God's given her creativity, she's an English major and an art minor, so that kind of works perfect for the eye to do these kind of things, so it has been really neat to see the growth of the viewership, for sure. Yeah,

Dan Wheeler: 17:50

guys, I think we remember 2019 we decided maybe we should do our morning cups of inspirational in a devotional form. What are your, what are your memories of that? I remember us hustling and, and brainstorming, and Karen typing and

Terry Steen: 18:08

talking about stepping out of the box. Yeah, that was a real challenge for us, but at the same time it was pretty cool. We kind of divided the devotional into thirds, and we went to find our morning cups that we thought were more popular that did well, and then we had to take that from the morning cup, put it in written form, and get it in that book, and it was a lot of work, but man, the return on investment has been wonderful. I still have friends that every morning sit with their wife, use that as part of their daily devotional life, and it's, it's really cool.

Dan Wheeler: 18:49

Our last guest in our last podcast, Russ Hedge, said he reads it every day. I have so many people, and they'll contact me and say, "Man, I love this devotional, and I think it's different. I think we come from the unique perspective of all of us are more lay people. I mean, Terry, you're an ordained minister, Brian and I are with the Harvest Church, which not really, but you know it's it's a unique perspective. We're not talking down to people, just like with our morning cups, that was always our idea. You just want to have a morning, a cup of coffee with you, and we've gone from three minutes now to two minutes, because people's attention span is short. But and then we took those and put them in written form, but we tell stories, and it's usually a one pager. We give a verse, some recommended scripture that goes along with it, and it really has been well received.

Terry Steen: 19:45

And then, at the very end, we give them something to ponder for the day,

Brian Roland: 19:50

right?

Terry Steen: 19:50

So that was really a nice concept, and, and just so everybody knows, we have those available. We still have a strong inventory of those that you can go to. Our website, and get one for a donation. We encourage you to do that to ffe.org and get your devotional.

Dan Wheeler: 20:09

And our website now, Brian has everything they can find, everything we're doing, because we're doing much more than just Facebook and Instagram, and even YouTube. And now, then we had the devotional. So, what were you to say, Brian?

Brian Roland: 20:22

The one thing I remember about the devotional was when we decided to do that, and going back, and I remember listening to them, and I was transcribing them, and I'm going, "this doesn't sound right now, and I'm rewriting stuff, and then when we finished all of that, we sent it to Karen, and she redlined it. Remember, she was reading them, I was like,"bad grammar here, good grammar there.

Terry Steen: 20:43

She rewrote half of them

Dan Wheeler: 20:47

in English class again. The other two books I wrote, I had an editor, but every time she would finish and send it back to me, I would redo

Brian Roland: 20:59

it again.

Dan Wheeler: 20:59

Remember, let's go

Brian Roland: 21:00

West Motel, and you saying this is good. I mean, they didn't have to go through all the process, they really go, this is boom, that's already done. So Karen did it,

Dan Wheeler: 21:09

man. And by the way, you can find Hurricane of Love and your morning cup of inspiration on Amazon. You can read some of the comments there, and what people are saying, five stars, and, and also, you can order it through, through QVC, through QVC. Where do I work? Through Fearless Faith on our website. Well, guys, I was with QVC almost 30 years.

Terry Steen: 21:32

It's hard to get that out of your system. First thing

Brian Roland: 21:36

that goes, Dan, first thing that goes.

Dan Wheeler: 21:39

So then somewhere along the line, I guess, in 2021 Well, I guess in 2020 we were talking about doing a podcast, because with our two minute devotionals, you know, you can't go real deep on a subject, and with the podcast, you can go much deeper. So we did our first podcast, and we talked about that meeting at the Bloomin' Onion, and we're gonna play a little bit of that for you right now. What a day it is, and it was, and I'm here with Brian Rowland and Terry Steen, my two partners in Fearless Faith Ministries. Guys, that was a special day. I felt like we had an appointment from the Lord. You better believe it, and if I were a bet man, I'd say we probably had the bloomin onion. Yeah, I think I might have paid for that lunch

Brian Roland: 22:28

too. I think so. Just when you brought that up, it was like, this is it. I didn't even have to ask my wife, she already knew that I was gonna, I was gonna get involved with this.

Terry Steen: 22:35

How could you possibly say no? That was something that God just dropped in my lap, that you know, sometimes you have to go, hey, let me pray about it, and I'll get back with you. This one was a spiritual no-brainer.

Dan Wheeler: 22:50

So that was our very first podcast, guys, and back then we were only doing audio, and at some point our producer talked to Cinda going to video, and since I mentioned our producer, why don't we bring him on to see if we've come, how far we've come from episode one to episode 150

Terry Steen: 23:10

it's all

Brian Roland: 23:12

his fault,

Dan Wheeler: 23:14

Matarazzo. We wouldn't be doing this podcast without you.

Terry Steen: 23:18

That's right. Oh,

John Matarazzo: 23:18

I'm honored to be a part of it, guys. It's been a great, what, six years now since we started this, and I was just looking at the notes. We started this, like our first recording, I guess, was on my birthday, january 2.

Terry Steen: 23:32

Oh, that's right. Yeah,

John Matarazzo: 23:35

I forgot about that then. Yeah,

Terry Steen: 23:37

me too.

Dan Wheeler: 23:37

Celebrated your birthday that night.

Terry Steen: 23:39

You were a young whippersnapper back then, but now you're old and mature yourself. So,

John Matarazzo: 23:44

yeah, pretty much. Yeah,

Dan Wheeler: 23:51

we're old, but he's old and mature.

Terry Steen: 23:55

We can't,

Dan Wheeler: 23:58

John. Our philosophy is we may grow older, we refuse to grow up.

Brian Roland: 24:03

That's right,

Dan Wheeler: 24:05

but John, what we've had some really memorable podcasts, and you've helped us secure some of our some really good guests. What stands out in your mind over the years of what we've been trying to accomplish with this podcast?

John Matarazzo: 24:20

Well, some of the ones that that I've really appreciated was the fact that you guys would talk about the end times, those always got a lot of interest, and the conversations about that was was fascinating, and I believe it was Terry's brother-in-law,

Terry Steen: 24:38

yeah, John Hope, John Hope,

John Matarazzo: 24:41

who was a.. we had him on many times because he was somebody that everybody loved to hear him talk about the end times, because he.. he was studied and he knew it, and he was able to communicate it in a way that it wasn't.. it wasn't like scary, it was more accessible, and so I appreciated that,

Terry Steen: 24:59

and I'm interested.

Dan Wheeler: 25:00

You said that John, because we were always, we would just sit in amazement at his mind, how he could just quote scripture left and right, whatever he needed,

Terry Steen: 25:09

and I might add,

Dan Wheeler: 25:10

we knew that he was related to Karen and not Terry at that point.

Terry Steen: 25:14

Well, there's a lot to that, there's a lot, but I wanted to mention, in memory of him, as a matter of fact, he passed away four months ago due to a heart attack, so he's no longer with us, but he had a phenomenal mind, and he loved the scripture, and he loved prophecy, and he loved end times, and it was such a blessing that he was willing to come on and share his knowledge with us, so you're right, we had some great podcasts with him, yeah,

Brian Roland: 25:45

yeah,

John Matarazzo: 25:46

and I love that I was able to make some other connections for you guys, like Dr. Mark Rutland and Lee Strobel, yeah, John Burke, and just from some of the connections that God's blessed me with, I've been able to bring them here, because I know that, hey, they were going to have a great time with you guys, and Lee Strobel was like he ended up pitching himself foot to come back, and so that was a great, a great way to do that.

Dan Wheeler: 26:11

Well, I'm glad you mentioned Lee Strobel, because we're going to throw here to a clip or two. We had some real funny moments, one was about when Jesus was conceived. Check out this conversation,

Unknown: 26:26

very interesting. I found a reference by a guy named Sexist Julius Africanus, who was a very early Christian historian, at about the year 220 and he says that Jesus was conceived on March the 25th Well, how would he know? Because they're truly calculated. Oh, he died on that day, therefore he must have been conceived on that day as well. The

Terry Steen: 26:54

reality is Joseph didn't even know.

Dan Wheeler: 27:01

Very true, very true. Here, I thought they didn't celebrate birthdays because they didn't have kegs big enough for those big torches. They had Terry quick-witted, Joseph didn't even know. Yeah, there was a there was another one I'd love to throw to where he was saying that he had some guy that figured out all the prophecies about Jesus, and that for all the prophecies to come true and point to one man was like one in a trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion,

Unknown: 27:49

that the odds of any human being fulfilling 48 of these ancient prophecies would be one chance in 100 billion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion.

Brian Roland: 28:05

Wow, did

Terry Steen: 28:06

he write any round up or round down

Unknown: 28:14

big, you can confidently say ain't gonna happen.

Brian Roland: 28:18

I thought my computer was stuttering. Records,

Dan Wheeler: 28:31

did we find out? Did he round up or down? Did we

Terry Steen: 28:34

think he clarified? It's still.. I was just gonna say another thing that's dear to me is that I was able to have some of my family members to be a part of our podcast, my daughter Ashley was on a couple episodes, and we also had my nephew Derek, and he had an incredible story of being a prodigal son, and I think we had another clip about from Derek's. I think it's just audio, but another funny little experience that we, we had during his podcast. Check this out.

Dan Wheeler: 29:15

So, tell us, how did you wind up coming back to the Lord? Walk us through that whole process. How did it happen?

Derek Steen: 29:20

So, my mom would give me $20 to go to church, so I would buy a bag of weed and smoke it and go to church.

Brian Roland: 29:27

You were going to church, so

Derek Steen: 29:28

that.. hey,

Dan Wheeler: 29:29

yeah. Did the church have a smoking section? Boy, that was good stuff. And I'd like to get one more clip, and we'll have to find it of John Burke, because you know his book meant so much to me after Beth passed, and I was in a bookstore, I saw this Imagine Heaven, and that book is fascinating, the near death experiences, and John, you helped us get him on as a guest, I think. That was one of our best, well, two, we did two puns, yeah, those were two of our very best. Do you remember those?

John Matarazzo: 30:07

Oh, yeah, I can't forget them. I mean, I became friends with John Burke through doing interviews with him for my work, and then being able to connect him with you guys was great, and just seeing how much that book impacted you, Dan, and then you being able to talk to the author who had done that study, it just kind of made that moment so much more rich, and I just felt the Holy Spirit's presence in that, because you got to really connect on the heart level with him about why this was so important, and how your life was was changed by this, and he was blessed.

Dan Wheeler: 30:43

It really, it was a blessing for me to come full circle, remembering I must have read that book three times, and never, and always thought, man, it'd be great to meet this guy, and then having the chance, and he's, he's such a humble guy, it's great, but very, very, you know, he's whip smart, and you know he's got so much proof that there is a heaven and there is a hell with all of these near death experiences, just, just amazing. Yeah, so let's, let's throw to a clip right now,

Unknown: 31:17

because just because I started down the path of faith, I still had a lot of questions about these near-death experiences. It really did take me 35 years and studying 1000 of them before I was ready to write a book about

Terry Steen: 31:30

it. Yeah,

Unknown: 31:31

yeah. So, but but Vicky was blind from birth, so she had never seen anything, and she had no visual perception. No, you know, people blind from birth don't imagine something visual at all.

Terry Steen: 31:47

Yeah,

Unknown: 31:48

and yet at age 22 she was in a car accident. She finds herself up above it and trying to adjust to this new thing called sight, and that's common. So, I have, I've interviewed about six blind people, and they can always see, and they see and report the same things as sighted near-death experiencers, and that's a powerful strand of evidence.

Dan Wheeler: 32:17

Sure, now

Unknown: 32:17

the other thing is, Vicki, she ended up following him to the hospital in the ER room. She's up above her body, and it's chaos, but she, she notes the ring. She doesn't even really know what's going on, and she's like, "Am I dead? And then she notices the ring on the body of this person they're working on and long hair, and she puts it together that well, I have long hair, and the ring has her wedding ring had an orange blossom on it, and she saw that. Wow, and one of the, one of the other things that really convinced me of near death experiences being grounded in our reality is how many people, when they come back, can can describe things that they saw happening in the emergency room during the resuscitation that turn out in studies to be 92% accurate, completely accurate.

Dan Wheeler: 33:16

Well, those were just some of the great guests we've had, and you know, John, you've helped us a lot, I think, from the early.. if we look at episode one, which we didn't do video, we did several that were just audio, but now I think you talked us into doing video, because with YouTube it's a perfect outlet for video.

John Matarazzo: 33:35

Yeah, the video podcast has definitely grown a lot because YouTube likes that long form content, and then it just provides more opportunities. I mean, more opportunities for clips and other ways to go viral, but you have such a great rapport, the three of you guys, and I always love that I get to be, you know, kind of brought on on the side, and you guys are such good friends for so long, and I consider you very good friends myself as well, and so it's great to be able to see you and to be able to interact with people in that way when it comes to the podcast stuff on YouTube, because actually YouTube is trying to get to the podcast space, and they're like, here, let's let's put this together and hopefully grow the audience and more people can be impacted by my fearless faith,

Dan Wheeler: 34:25

and you know it's here's an example of how God works. We don't know what's around the corner, we don't know what the future holds, but after my book came out, I was on a TV station in Pittsburgh, a Christian TV station, and I went there, and I met this young producer. I thought, man, this guy is really sharp, and it wasn't John Matarazzo. And we just did some good TV there. And then years later, when we were thinking about a podcast, I called Dave Tucker, who you worked with for there at the station. I said, Gosh, do you know. Anybody that's into podcasting says, as a matter of fact, John, the producer you worked with, has gone into that field. I mean, he's still here, but he's doing that too. And I contacted you, and you were the perfect fit for us, because we're three old guys, and we love having a young man's perspective. And congratulations, by the way, your first child on the way, boy, a lot has happened. Fearless Faith Ministry, he was

Brian Roland: 35:26

single when we first met

Dan Wheeler: 35:28

him. You know what, he should be paying us. No, but John, you have been such a blessing to us, and we really appreciate your work and creativity, and you've made Finish Strong the very best it can be. So, thanks for joining us for this celebration. This segment, and we've got two more segments to go. So, thank you, John, and you stay tuned, because there's more that happened.

Terry Steen: 36:02

Thank

Dan Wheeler: 36:07

So guys, we come around to October of 2024 Well, let's go back maybe July, no, June of 2024 No, it was even earlier. We were at an NRB, and Terry, you had to leave early in the afternoon. Yeah, and so Brian and I were going through the hall one more time, and we kept walking by this one booth that just caught my attention, caught Brian's attention. We're like, internet radio, what is this? We went back, had a wonderful conversation with these guys. We thought we've got plenty of material to do a 24 hour a day, seven day a week internet radio station, and guys, you know, we really worked hard that summer, the summer of 2024 loading in videos, loading in music, we, we used all of, yeah, video and music, because we had, yeah, we didn't load videos, guys. See, we're getting old now. Thank you, Brian. You, what you know, all the videos, all the audios we loaded in, all, and we took from our music collection, because through this live 365 they have the music rights, and then Brian had a great connection with the voiceover guy, Jim, who's done an amazing job. He's got a very professional sounding radio station. In fact, we're gonna show you the app right here. You can see our logo there, Fearless Faith Radio, reimagining Christian radio, has kind of become our tagline. And Brian, boy, that connection you had with Jim, when did you work with Jim in your past?

Brian Roland: 37:53

Jim and I worked together at TBN Trinity Broadcasting back in the early 80s. Yeah, early 80s, we met, and Jim was always.. he's very, very creative. He was.. he was great. He used to do a show called Real Videos, too. He did all video.. he was a video major, a TV.. I'm sorry, a movie major, but he had that great voice, and he's done work for all the networks in that now. And so, when I called him and said, 'Jim, this is what we're doing. Of course, he wanted to help out. He knew we had a ministry going, and Jim's all about the ministry too. And he just made.. he gives us just the best work. It's just.. it said it's just all.. it's a professional announcer, and we have him on our radio station, and he's been able to blend in perfect with the professional jingles we've had made, too.

Dan Wheeler: 38:37

Yeah, I told you, I heard him the other day on Sirius XM, because his voice is so distinctive. In fact, let's give you a little bit of his work right here. Listen in.

Unknown: 38:46

You are listening to Fearless Faith Radio, Christian Radio Reimagined. Three wise men, they're not, but Dan, Terry, and Brian wish you a very merry Christmas,

Dan Wheeler: 39:16

and I love some of the jingles you created, Brian, and, and, and he came up with some of his own that were pretty funny, but yeah, you got to check out our radio station. Really,

Terry Steen: 39:28

about it, guys, what I love is that we've been able to blend our overall ministry into that. We've had more exposure to other countries that people have listened to the radio station. Yes, and we filtered in our morning cups of inspiration every hour. We have a couple of those twice a day. We have one of our podcasts on, so it's a combination of the music plus ministry, so if people are enjoying the music. They can still be hit with some great minute, great ministry and inspirational thoughts that can really impact their lives.

Dan Wheeler: 40:07

Yeah, because we have our morning cups of inspiration on there, the audio, we have our podcast,

Terry Steen: 40:13

finish

Dan Wheeler: 40:13

strong. This one will be on there eventually. We've got all kinds of things and great music, and I'm inspired. I'll put it on during the day. Do one of you guys have your phones? Could you show the app? If you don't, I could grab mine real quick, because it's an app that you download in the app store, and it's called Fearless Faith Radio. And there it is, Terry. You had the logo up there, now it's

Terry Steen: 40:38

just went on to the..

Dan Wheeler: 40:40

there it is. Brian's got it. Brian's got it. There's a fearless face,

Terry Steen: 40:44

VB whining right now.

Dan Wheeler: 40:46

Yeah, and you know

Brian Roland: 40:49

that's why a variety of

Dan Wheeler: 40:50

music. Yeah,

Brian Roland: 40:51

just gonna talk about that. We have this is a lot of this is older Christian music that people don't hear anymore, and we put it on there, and it's like I get more people complimenting, but I love this music. You just don't get it anywhere.

Dan Wheeler: 41:04

We've got some of the Jesus music, some, you know, Phil Kegy, Chuck Gerard, the early days acapella. We've got some country, you know, I've got Alabama on there, and Barbara Mandrell, Barbara Mandrell, jazz, you know, some acapella with Take Six and people like that

Terry Steen: 41:23

instrument, yeah, everything, yep,

Dan Wheeler: 41:27

yeah. So tune into Fearless Faith Radio, and we launched october 1 of 2024 so you can see the progression through the years. So now we've got our Facebook page, Fearless Faith Ministries. Go there, follow us. Where you can get morning cups of inspiration. We got Karen doing still posts. We've got an Instagram page. We've, we've, we're incorporated. We've got Fearless Faith, FF faith.org our website that has everything on it. We do a podcast called Finish Strong. We've got the devotional, we've got a 24/7 radio station

Brian Roland: 42:10

YouTube

John Matarazzo: 42:10

channel,

Dan Wheeler: 42:11

yeah, a YouTube channel. Thank you. And now I'm just going to roll into segment six, because now we have a Bible study. Terry, this was a project that was really on your heart. Tell us what you enjoy about that.

Terry Steen: 42:25

Well, I just felt like, you know, we have these little morning inspirations, we have our podcast, but there's something about getting into God's word at a deeper level, and it's something that I always have done at my church, I'm sure you have many of us have Bible study, small groups that are so impacting in getting into the real meat of God's word, and so I approached you guys, going,"Hey, we've tried a lot of stuff, why don't give, why don't we give this a try and see if our followers would enjoy it, and we jumped into the book of John, which we always tell people, if you're just starting to read the Bible, that's a great book to start with. And, as you guys know, we had some incredible response, didn't we? We

Dan Wheeler: 43:17

did. I mean, one of the largest Bible studies, probably going today, we have hundreds and sometimes 1000s, and we did John, Mark, and we just finished Romans.

Terry Steen: 43:29

Welcome everybody. Hope you're having a great evening. You are joining us for the first Fearless Faith Bible Study, and we are so excited. Hey guys, ready to do this thing.

Dan Wheeler: 43:42

Gary, I'm excited. Our viewers have been asking about this for a while. I think it's a great idea. How about you? Be

Brian Roland: 43:48

when you first talked, started talking about it. I was a little apprehensive, but I'm into it now. I love doing the study.

Dan Wheeler: 43:54

We're all learning together,

Brian Roland: 43:55

definitely.

Dan Wheeler: 43:56

Hi everybody, and welcome to a brand new study. We had so much feedback on the Gospel of John. Today we are starting the Gospel of Mark. Whether you've read the Bible before or you never have, this Bible study is important for you. Well, welcome everyone to another Bible study. We're excited to start a study on the book of Romans. Guys, this is going to be great. There's a lot in this book.

Terry Steen: 44:20

Yes, I always look forward to it. It's a new, fresh one for us, so it's going to be great,

Dan Wheeler: 44:26

right? And Brian, you know, I like it because we're doing research, we're learning things, and the three of us are coming up with things. You guys will say something, I'll think, "Wow, I didn't know that" or "I never thought of that. And so we're learning along with the audience, but God wants us to study His word, doesn't He

Brian Roland: 44:44

got all these Bibles and commentaries, and going through it, of course, uses a computer now too, and asking questions, and seeing if the, if Grok knows what's going on. Most of the time they don't, but, but really like to get into the commentaries of it, but you know, I was thinking the other day. We used to listen when we were kids to revival time, you remember that, and CM Ward was, he was the speaker, but they always opened it with from across the nation and around the world, and I'm thinking, well, that's really what we have going right now, don't we? Because we are a Christian media outlet, really, and it's across the nation, around the world, we have so many people that are listening to all of our different segments that we have on our different genres, and it's just been amazing, just amazing to me. Where the Lord has taken it, and every time I think He's done with us, something else opens up. I'm going, I'm going to be here for.. I told my wife, I'm going to be here for a while. God's not taking you

Dan Wheeler: 45:36

home yet. Yeah, well, guys, it has been incredible to think that three college friends, I don't know what 45 years later started a ministry, or 40 or 50 years later, fifth, now 50, yeah, yeah, yeah, I guess closer to 50. After 10 years, we're still here doing what God calls us to do, and like you said, Brian, we're going to be here until God says it's time, and but we are planning for the future, so stay tuned. We're going to tell you about it in our final segment, guys. 10 years, we've had a lot of fun. Our friendships have deepened, they've grown. I think we've grown in the Lord, and so many great experiences. And to think that God just took a simple idea, like we wanted to go into ministry, we didn't know what, and now we got Karen doing the stills. Pam shoots my videos. We've got a Facebook page, an Instagram page, a YouTube channel, a podcast. We've got a written devotional, and we might have some writing projects coming where we've been talking about that,

Terry Steen: 46:56

right? Maybe

Dan Wheeler: 46:57

a Finish Strong theme, hint, hint, yeah, and you know, we've traveled, we've been to a couple national religious broadcasters conventions, we've been to Pod Fest, Brian, you've been to a couple of them, we've traveled to different ministries, we've spoken live, we've been on TV shows, and it's pretty amazing this journey, and we've been talking about the future, and you know, you know, we're all in our 70s now, and we don't know how long we're going to go, but we want the ministry to continue.

Terry Steen: 47:36

Yeah, and Terry, people have met your daughter Ashley on a few podcasts, and now her husband, Paul Irwood, who's a minister, pastor out in California, he's been doing our Sunday morning cups of inspiration, well received, and they've kind of expressed interest in maybe being the next generation to come and carry this work on, yeah, they've observed, they've watched since day one because of what we were doing, and I've kept them informed, and they've seen what we've been doing, they've seen the growth, and one day I was sitting there talking to Paul, and we just began a discussion, and he just showed some real interest in the ministry, and what was happening, and showed a real openness to be involved with it, and Ashley the same way. So, of course, I talked with you guys, and we thought, well, what better transition, whenever that might happen is to bring some younger blood in, and they're both ordained ministers. They both minister or pastors at their church. Ashley is a social media director of the church, so their skill set is perfect for a ministry like this, and so it just seemed like a nice fit, a nice mix. How could we possibly? We talk about leaving legacies. Part of our goal in finishing strong is to find our purpose and to leave a legacy. What better legacy could we leave than to pass a ministry down to the next generation as we move forward, like I say, we don't know when that's going to happen, as long as the Lord keeps us active and going, but it's nice to have a plan in place, and so hopefully people will start to see Ashley and Paul a little bit more as we bring them into the mix. Ashley has a podcast, she's just started with a friend. We're going to bring that into the mix. Paul's talking about one, so there's some neat things ahead as we continue to further God's kingdom as best we can.

Dan Wheeler: 49:57

Yeah, that's, you know, Brian, as long as God. Keeps us healthy,

Brian Roland: 50:01

yeah.

Dan Wheeler: 50:01

We'll keep going. I know there's times when we feel like, man, we're kind of too busy because we are retired from our jobs and we don't make money doing this, but, but then, then the Lord drops another project on us.

Brian Roland: 50:15

And I told, I told them the other day, I said, you know, I'm on the other side of the 70s now, just a couple months now I'm going on, I got middle point, and I'm just gonna start going down turns towards the next stage. All right,

Terry Steen: 50:28

right.

Brian Roland: 50:29

Wow, this is that's why I'm glad I got a good report from my, my cardiologist. But you know, Brian's the

Dan Wheeler: 50:35

70s are the new 50s,

Terry Steen: 50:37

that's it.

Brian Roland: 50:39

You're as young as you feel,

Dan Wheeler: 50:40

exactly.

Brian Roland: 50:41

That's what I think. Well, we're never gonna grow up, you know that.

Dan Wheeler: 50:45

Yeah, we're gonna keep following the Lord, and we just.. it's been great, guys, going down memory lane. I, when you, when you look back and you think of everything, it really is amazing. Because we didn't have a clue, this is leading us. We didn't know. I mean, I think of what we've learned technically, and about the computers, and working with video and audio. It's pretty been.. it's been pretty amazing that we've been able to do it. Yeah,

Unknown: 51:11

it has been.

Terry Steen: 51:12

Yeah,

Brian Roland: 51:12

it has been.

Terry Steen: 51:13

And you know, a neat thing is, we're doing this to further the kingdom, and to minister and inspire others, but the way God works is so incredible. He has turned that around, and we've used it for our benefit. We've had the challenge, we've had the purpose in our life, we've had the desire to finish strong, and these last 10 years have been incredible. How He's used us, how he's drawn us closer together, how he's continued to build the kingdom, and even though we've been trying to invest in other people, God always turns it around and blesses us even more, doesn't he?

Brian Roland: 51:53

He does, he does, and he blesses the people that are supporting us, because without them, this wasn't going to happen. We would always go and say this is what the Lord's putting on our heart, and they would fulfill what we needed to get it going, and so we never had to worry about that. We knew the Lord was blessing us and had us in the right direction. But you folks, you folks at home, you're a vital part of this ministry.

Dan Wheeler: 52:15

We want to thank you for supporting us, and if you haven't been able to make a gift. We understand we're here for you. If you can help us out, you know, no gift is unappreciated or not. And we'll always spend it wisely. No gifts too small, and no gifts too large either, quite frankly. But we want to do our best. We want to keep following Jesus, and we really appreciate you guys tuning in. Any any final thoughts? Here's, here's to another 10 years.

Brian Roland: 52:47

Just gonna say exactly, it's

Terry Steen: 52:49

exciting. What a great time! What a great journey, guys!

Dan Wheeler: 52:53

Yeah, and we've been talking about doing some live events. We'd like to hear from you. If you'd like to see us, meet us, maybe we could do a section of the country. We've talked about, maybe doing a fearless faith cruise. I don't know, we're just throwing these out there, that would be fun. Yeah, take a nice three day cruise and meet some of you in person.

Terry Steen: 53:12

Let

Brian Roland: 53:12

us know what you

Unknown: 53:13

think.

Dan Wheeler: 53:14

Yeah, some of you are so faithful, you're there every morning, commenting on our morning cups, you comment on our podcasts, and so we thank you. Those of you who have given, we thank you for your gifts. Those of you who are always there, thank you for watching. And here's to the next 10 years, because Fearless Faith is going strong, and we want to finish strong. God bless. Thanks for taking the journey.

John Matarazzo: 53:41

Thank you for listening to Finish Strong. For more information about Finish Strong and Fearless Faith, check out their website, f faith.org Make sure that you rate and review this podcast to help more people accomplish their God-given purpose, so that together we can finish strong.

Unknown: 54:00

You.