Hello, and welcome to Walk the Walk. This is a podcast that provides spiritual wellness. All listeners and readers of this podcast will be able to relate to some of the journeys shared with us from our guests. The messages are powerful, thought provoking, and some are even heart wrenching. And they all display the power of God, and how he can change the heart. I welcome you our listening audience and reading audience as well. Today I have invited Chris Gargus. Chris, welcome. (Chris) Thank you, Tina. (Tina) Well, it's good to have you. Now let me tell you a little bit about Chris. Chris is the founder and director of the Licking County Champions Network and The Refuge. Both of these organizations are organizations that will help people with addictions. And Chris is going to let us know how God has taken him from one step to the next step to be able to establish these organizations and to help those people who are addicted. Chris, I would love for you to take us back to when kind of give us a little bit of background about yourself.
Chris:Oh, great. Yeah, absolutely. Real quick, before we get started, I am not the founder of Refuge. I'm actually the founder of Vesper Hills Daybreak. And it's okay. We're part of the Refuge. Okay, good. Thank
Tina:Thank you for the clarification.
Chris:We're fine. Yeah, no problem at all. So anyway, going back in my early salvation days, which was way back in 1992, I still remember the day it's July 18, 1992 if you can believe that, I was saved in the Southern Baptist Church. And it was like, it was very ceremonial. And we had about the food afterwards. And it really didn't mean a whole lot to me, it was just something to do. But its when my military career ended very suddenly, in 1993, I started realize that I was probably not doing things the right way. I still didn't know God yet. I mean, I did. I said, I said yes to salvation, but not just not just really(inaudible). So I had to move out for North Carolina, moved up here to Ohio and with my mom and dad for a while. And my neighbor had a friend who was going to this church called Family of Faith Community Church. That's where I go now. And they put me in that church for the first time in late 1993. And pretty much the things haven't been the same since I started seeing that the relationship that we're supposed to have with him was a lot more real to then it was first meant to be. And so this walk is not been easy. By any stretch, I'm pretty sure that Jesus told us that it's not going to be easy. But it's been unbelievably cool to see all the different places he's put me and taken me to, in my 20 plus years, 25 plus years of being saved.
Tina:You know, I think sometimes people believe that, once you accept Christ into your life, that it's easy street. And it's is really just the opposite of that. Wouldn't you agree?
Chris:Oh, absolutely. I think I think the God told us over and over and over again, that there will be perils in this world, we're going to go through some stuff. And I think some stuff, you know, since I've been saying worse, way worse than when before I was saved. But the great to get through it. And to be able to take the opportunity and turn it into what we call in
Champions, the Romans 8:28 moment is exactly what he always says if you just stay faithful. And it does say that in scripture for those who are faithful. And so we always make sure that we stay faithful and we do we follow him because he's in it. Once you say yes to Jesus, he's with you all the time. We need to learn to walk in his peace.
Tina:Exactly. So did you grow up being a believer? Or was it not until you became an adult?
Chris:it was way later. My mom and dad took me to church as a kid. But it wasn't it wasn't a very deep church. It was a it was a mess. No, it was a Presbyterian Church, I believe it was and I was was a little kid, like five years old. I don't even remember my church life. And then all through high school, none of that. And I started drinking really bad in high school and then got one the military drink even worse, and am I drinking just got really out of control, which is what God ended up changing that and taking my alcohol away from me. And then to His glory. He turned that into the ministries that we're doing today, to be able to have the empathy for people that are addicted. So it was his plan all along. I just didn't see it until he finally had to
Tina:Tell me what it sounds like to hear God's voice for you?
Chris:It's pretty unique for me at times. And I'm sure it's unique for everybody because I'm sure he talks to everybody differently. Because every all of us communicate differently. And it's amazing that we serve a God that is able to do that. And that omnipresence is always there and his voice being. He almost did it more like an action. He was almost like closed doors on purpose. He says, Okay, you're done here. Like I didn't use it for like 20 years or so. And he's like, Okay, you're done with that. And I want to show you another. I want to show you another battlefield that's becoming worse and that was in 2015. And I started seeing the addiction issue with some of our old church people used to going to church there and like what's going on. And then the founder of the Refuge, which is a guy named Tom Thompson, came to town and I was on a media team. I was helped record him. And I got to see what addiction was doing to not just our community, but the United States and the world in general. And start realize how bad that was and God said this is your this is your new mission field.
Tina:Yeah, and the addiction is has increasingly worsened.
Chris:Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Since we got started, I did statistics a few nights ago. In 2014, we lost two people to fetanoyl. This give you a little bit of a correlation. Last year, we lost over 50 people total and 37 of them to fentanyl. Wow. So that's 75% of them died. And that's only happened since 2014.
Tina:Wow. That's tragic. It's terrible.
Chris:Yeah. And the devil is stealing our people. And we got to stop it. That's why That's why there's a remnant of us that are like, okay, we're tired of it. We're gonna raise up and so God show me Champions. I went and met with the founder from Refuge in November 2015. Shortly after that time, he came to town. And I asked like, Okay, can I bring what you're doing in Columbus, Ohio, to Newark, and on the east side of Ohio, because we have nothing. And he says, I'd love for you to do that. I want you to do Champions. First, if you wouldn't mind, because champions will help you to build rapport.
Tina:What is Champions? Can you tell us what that's all about?
Chris:Sure. Sure. What Champions is is it's called the Champions Network. And we have a website. We also have Facebook, and Instagram, all that good stuff. And I can, I can share that with you later as well. But what we started, what we do is we meet once a week, and we do roundtable, basically like the old days back in the old Hebrew days, when when scripture first being wrote, they would do roundtable, it's a Greek, the Greek kind of took it to a different level with the pulpit ministry, but it all works together. But we do a roundtable at six o'clock on every Wednesday night, we have a nice home cooked meal, sometimes we'll have pizza but most of times, we have volunteers that do home cooked meals, it's just amazing food. And we break bread together. And we talk about our day together just like it was a family dinner thing. And what that what that what that does is it gives people encouragement that if they don't have their own family and their own family is really crazy, right now they can see what it really looks like. And that's what that's what's been sort of our mantra since day one. And we've seen a great success rate. Just meeting once a week, 50% of the guys are now successful. They've been there within the last five years, over 65% of the women that have gone there are now successful. And they a lot of them still go, you know, a lot of them don't. But a lot of them still go there. So we're getting about 20 -25 a week and it's just a real ball. But what this is becoming is like a funnel, because we had some guys that came in that once a week wasn't enough. So we had we also are now now we're building a residential facility, which you're very familiar with, called Vesper Hills Daybreak.
Tina:Okay. Let me ask you one more question about champions. Did I hear you say both women and men?
Chris:Yeah. Yeah, that's the unique to Refuge doesn't even really say they had a women's ministry for a while. That didn't work out. It wasn't focused on men. But remember, they're residential. So we're, we're once a week, so we're able to bold that. So we have men and women together. And now we do break up into groups. Periodically, we'll break up, we'll do like half of the session will be together, and then we'll break up into men and women, because all of us have different issues.
Tina:Absolutely. And that's just awesome that they have both men and women, it always seems like a lot of times, the focus is just on men, and I think women sometimes are forgotten about. And so that's really, I'm glad to hear that that does include both
Chris:I think it was in the neighborhood of 40% of the deaths last year were women. So 60/40 that's not much difference. Wow. They are suffering too.
Tina:What are what are the reasons do you do have any documentation or any, anything that kind of attributes to the reason of the increase within the within the United States?
Chris:I think a lot of it is the the real health, the root, the root of what we know is just disobedience. And basically it just says, you're just not looking into what God wants you to do. You're living your own life. And when we when people become painfully aware that they're just weak people, we're all weak together, and you get them together and in other weak people, they see their weaknesses and they're, they power through that. For the Lord's in the Holy Spirit. The faith one part that we're building Vespers Hills is that part where they come off the street. While we're still detoxing, a lot of them are still, you know, going through some some pretty bad withdrawals. And they go through it together like they're like a band of brothers and we're starting off with a male one the one that the one at Vespers Hill Daybreak is male but will eventually, we want to add a female facility in Newark as well. So we're heading for that direction. But yeah, yeah, I think the identity stolen and people just don't even know it until they are clean for like 20 or 30 days. They're like what? This is who I am supposed to be.
Tina:Like a fog lifted off.
Chris:Yeah, like their eyes are jaded.
Tina:So we, you we talked about Champions and then there's Vesper Hills daybreak. Correct? Yeah.
Chris:Yeah, that was a that was a, that was a we call that the miracle on the hill. Because it's literally on a hill. It's a beautiful cross on the hill, you know it, you know, you've seen it. And your husband had a whole lot to do with that. I praise God for him every day that me and Jeff met at a warming center back in 2018. Both of us wanted to do something about the addiction in this area, we get tired of seeing it. And we both got together and he goes well, there may be some property. We go before the church or the church says and sure enough, 20 Acres is now ours to use on the lease. And we have completely reconstructed it and completely transformed that from my church camp. To now a residential men's facility with a full industrial kitchen. Big dining room area, worship center area, place study, we got booths, like restaurant booths, like a subway, like Subway would have something like that. We're gonna is gonna do homework and all that. That's just a beautiful facility.
Tina:You know, isn't it amazing how God works? Because we were doing that warming station back in what? What year? I don't remember.
Chris:I think it was 2018. Yeah, it wasn't that long ago. And yeah, we had that. We had that polar vortex it got very cold.
Tina:Yes. Very cold. Right. And so we opened up the church. And it was amazing. As to the numbers of organizations and people that came together. We had so much food that I don't even know if we could use all of it. That was it was just just kept coming in. But remember that part of that is is that whole interaction between you and Pastor Jeff, about possibly setting up this Vespers, Vesper hills. And, and then of course, now look at it now, look, God is so awesome how he brings us, you know, you just think I'm just doing this to get these people off the street to feed them, give them a warm, two or three nights, however many nights we needed to do that. And then they all go back. And God says, Well, no, that's that's not the end of this.
Chris:No, no, that was just the beginning. It was just the beginning.
Tina:So are there already men at the facility has not started yet? What what's going on? Where's the progress on this.
Chris:The progress right now is the the campaign for capital is just about done. We have a driveway to pour a couple more heating needs out there. We were doing a cold air return in the hallway now. So we have some better eating in the big building and also in the barracks. And then once that's done here, probably this month, then we're going to shift over to a day to day operation thing. And the cool thing is one of our champions who actually she says while I was on vacation, she was actually imprisoned for a while, while she was in, our counselors when after that, they went in visit with her and continue to pray with her and she came out she knew it was family. Before she went in, she just had all kinds of problems. But she came out. And she was humbled by the fact that she had to go serve in some jail time. And she just came out as just a totally different person. Just because we reached out and continue to reach out, we did not judge her for what she was going through. We helped her get through it. And so now this girl is becoming, she's getting ready to get her CDCA which is a chemical dependency license and still be working at labs here in Newark. And part of that is she has to do an internship for 140 hours. So we hired her as our administrator for the next four months. And she's going to lay the groundwork for the day to day operation. Help us write the bylaws, do the scheduling, do marketing, all the stuff we need to do to make this thing start moving by spring time so we can start advertising it.
Tina:Wow. So in her lowest God has brought her to her highest wouldn't you said
Chris:It's another story. Another another Champion's story. It just blows me away. She's also serving in our church. She's a she's a children's director there now. I'm like, Oh my God. Lord, can you get any more awesome?
Tina:Absolutely. So let me ask you, let's say somebody is listening, and they know of a family member or friend. They're like, man, they really could use this service, but we just don't have the money to afford to send them there. What how much does it cost?
Chris:The good thing about this ministry is it set up to be free. There's no insurance needs at the beginning. Basically they'll go to phase one here. It's totally free the first 30- 45 days, there'll be kind of detox things to the last, finding their identity through to the Lord. And then once that's done, they will graduate to phase 2 which there'll be moving on to Lancaster, Ohio, which is the actual Refuge. So we're actually Refuge phase one, but we're on the east side of Ohio, when there's nothing. And then from there, they'll go to phase two, three and four at the Refuge in Columbus. And to phase two, they actually will employ them for one week. So they'd be employed with an employer, I'd known that they have like four or five of employers set up already that takes these guys in. So they'll go in, they'll do the work one week is in the next week, they'll be back in the work of getting their driver's license that work again, ID, birth certificate and all work on all the stuff. And that's for another 30 to 45 days. And then from there, they graduate to a phase three, which is a fulltime job, they'll be working that job that they were only working once every other week, fulltime they're getting up every morning, they'll be on a schedule. And this is where you really start to see the transition, they start going, this is what I'm supposed to be doing all along it just to watch that happen. We've had those guys come out to the facility, and there's pictures on a website, if you guys ever get a chance, or I'm sorry, on our Facebook, if you want to go look it up, you can see pictures of the Vesper Hills project, and how beautiful was this, the Refuge guys would come out there and just serve, I mean, with gratitude and gratefulness. And they're out there in the middle of a hot sun just sweat like crazy. But man, they don't care. You know, we give them a big nice lunch on the grill. And it was just splendid to watch how it goes. And these are phase three guys. These guys are getting ready to move into the final phase, which is the fulltime job site, they'll be living in a regular home phase. So Refuge takes a person from ground one, ground level one on the street, probably homeless, most of them more. And when they graduate, they have a fulltime job. They most of them have their families back. Most of their families are going to church with them again, they've reestablished communications with their their their parents, everybody, and their fulltime employee that most of them already have a vehicle lined up. This all happens within(inaudible)
Tina:They become productive citizens. Yeah, again. Yeah, I mean, WOW
Chris:Not not just the phase part, which is the most important part. But when they just did a survey of three year alumni survey, and they found out that 66% of the guys that go through Refuge never relapse, which is an incredible number. But the even more incredible numbers are stuff like 90% of them are still employed, after three years 88% of them and their family goes to church. This is the kind of numbers that are turning out there at you know, 80 to 90% of stuff. So you can only imagine, you know how this is going to work in broader scale. So Tom Thompson, the founder of Refuge started what they call a Refuge replication. And that's what I'm part of, I'm a replication of the Refuge that we're in Newark on the east side of Ohio, where there's not a whole lot. And we're going to be targeting Cambridge and Zanesville and all those other places that no one goes out because you're just too far away from, we're gonna go after this.
Tina:So this is a serious program. I mean, this is not like somebody could just come and go and be whatever. This is serious. Jeff and I have known of a couple men who have gone through the program, and remarkable change. I mean, I remember the one gentleman that we know, that went through the program. When we went up there, I was like, this is a different person, because I'm going to I'm going to be honest with you, I gave them no hope when we first I mean, they were constantly coming to the church, asking for money asking for this and swearing that you know, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that. And the story was just over and over and over to the point where it's like, I can't I can't listen to this anymore. You're not You're not being honest. You're lying. You're just downright lying. Just Yeah, anything to get what they need it no money, or fix or whatever. But when they go throught this program, oh my gosh.
Chris:Isn't it awesome? Oh, that's amazing.
Tina:And then we will go there for family day.
Chris:Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. Talk about that. That's really cool. That's really, really cool. The family day is when I think it's in phase two, I believe it is. or later phase one, I think we may actually have a family day out there. We're going to be at after I think three weeks, maybe four weeks. They have the they open a facility up for all the families who have people that are in there, it comes to see them, and just within 30 to 45 days that the difference is just fascinating. And they really haven't even started the big journey yet. So stick with it. But the most of most of relatives are like, what's the world happened here? What you know, that's how God works. So you can go there the second places all day long. You can get suboxone fixes. You can get patches and fixes wherever there's lots of those laying around here. Newark is full of enabling patches. There's a lot of programs that are enabling people and I don't you know find whatever dude you're going to do, but we're not in the business. We're in solution business. We're in the solution. Yeah, we want. We want people we don't want to pass. Right? We don't want to we don't want to, we want we want we want to fix and the fix (inaudible)
Tina:Exactly. So that faith component is critical or important to their success. And I get do people come in and like, look, I don't want to hear anything about your God. I you know, do you get that?
Chris:Oh, yeah. Oh, our first board president for Champions back in a while when we first had a board back in 2016. Went to refuge as a non believer. And he was sitting in just the orientation. And he felt this presence on him. He didn't know what it was, he's never heard of it. And it fell in love with it. He's like, Wow, I've never had this kind of peace in my life. And then he went out to at that time, it was Benton County, it was his way out of the way, like two hours away from here. And after two or three weeks there, he was a whole different person. You know, he gave his life to Christ. He's now serving the Lord got a really good job, got a family's married to the woman he was living with at the time. He's now married, they have their own child, the youth from each other. They both had nice cars. I mean, just to watch that whole process, you know.
Tina:That'a amazing isn't it? Isn't it it is so cool to watch.
Chris:Yeah. And this is the kind of stuff we need to get out more. This is why I'm going to start talking more about this in a promotional attitude, where people were like, you know, what are you doing here? No, we're not, we don't need the money. I mean, yeah, we need the money. But look, I'm telling you, this thing is real, it's happening, and people's lives are being changed, whether you know it or not, it's happening. And I'm gonna start, I'm gonna start having these guys. I'm gonna start putting stuff online go, Yeah, this is what's really happening. They see it.
Tina:And you know, these people have probably already, by the time they come to a program such as this, they have alienated everyone, family, their work, they have no one to turn to the only other person they turn to as the person that's selling them drugs or sharing needles or whatever, they have no one to turn to at that time. And because they've just alienated everyone.
Chris:That's what happened. Yeah. But you know what, that transition just like that facility, we're gonna do a video probably next couple days about the facility. And we're going to show the before and after. This is what transition looks like physically. Now, join us join us. And I'll show you what the transition was like, with the human lives. And how God can transform people.
Tina:And he does all the time. And a lot of, you know, most of the time. Um, no, I'll just say all the time. transformation has to happen, because the person who is being transformed what has to want it. You know, we we would have people come in and, and talk the talk, but they weren't walking the walk, you know?
Chris:Yeah, yeah, we do orientation, right at that same church you guys are talking about. We do orientation every Thursday, we have guys come in there. And I think we sent a total of 30 people last year, about two month go, which is pretty good, for starters. And maybe only five stay. Because it's the same thing. They get in there, they talk, they talk and really good at the beginning, but then that temptation comes back and it's just overwhelming. They can't stop doing it. They have to go back. But the good thing is some of the guys go back and then they come back again for a second round. They're like, Okay, I'm gonna say this time and they get it.
Tina:Yeah, because, I mean, like I said, You guys hold their feet, you know, to the fire. It's like, you come in here, you are going to do what we ask you to do. And if you're not serious, there are other people that want your spot.
Chris:Your exactly right, you better believe it. It's a spiritual, it's like a spiritual bootcamp today. So it feels like it's actually like, very strict, but for a reason. We're not trying bully them. . We're trying to say what it's really supposed to look like out here. This is what real world looks like. You've been in such a jaded, clouded attitude for so long. You don't even know what it looks like, well, we're going to show you what it looks like.
Tina:And they've been so used to conning. I mean, they they could I heard such stories over and over. And at first I was like, wow, and then after a while, guess what? I was hearing the same story from several people. It's like, oh, you all are telling me the same story. Yeah, yeah, that makes it really challenging.
Chris:You're right in the thick of it. You and Jeff were right there the thick of it, man, you know, you know, and that's why I'm so my hat's off to you two what you did. To get this started. I remember when we first started last June, June 2020. The first day we went out there and we started to cut some wood and Jeff was framing and just loved how the master had really good conversations and that building was in such bad shape. But you know what, we didn't care. We just we knew how was coming, we know God would provide, he has more than done it. So
Tina:From what I have seen, it looks absolutely beautiful. And you know, we would be there and I would be like there's more for this. For those who are listening. This is just a, they called it a farm. But I didn't see it as a farm, it was just this beautiful piece of property that has this huge cross up on the hill, and has this bunker and kitchen and just not even used just sitting there. It was like, I would always break my heart because I thought there's something else that this place needs to be used for. And now there is and it's like, again, God intervened.
Chris:Always does. He knows he knows what needs to be done.
Tina:And you know what? He not only does he know what needs to be done, he knows who will do it. And that's what I'm so thankful to you for is answering God's call and all of these people together. The founder of the Refuge, all of those people, Pastor Jeff, all the people along the way, answered God's call. They sure did. As as everybody answers the call, things happen. It's when people start saying, "well let somebody else do it. No, I don't think you're calling me". God, we'll find somebody. (Chris) Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Every time. And that's I knew
Chris:I didn't, I didn't want to get passed over. I wanted to be part of it. Because I saw I saw the need one. And I saw it when I when I saw the Refuge, I saw how God could really make it happen. So the revelation of transformed lives was put right in front of my face. And I'm like, I want this. I want this really, really bad. And I'm going to keep going until we get it.
Tina:What do you need?
Chris:Well, there's always the basic basic needs are on a day to day basis. We have a contract or we will have a contract with a food bank. So we're going to have pretty good amount of food coming out which is great. Most of furniture has been provided already we still need a few mattresses. We need a driveway poured, which is coming probably in the next week or two Hopefully, we've got to get get the heating fix up we needed a lot of little bit more touches on the building itself. But it says day to day things. The utilities that need to be paid, the insurance obviously we have pretty expensive insurance to be able to run this, which we've had for over a year now. We have a bus. I don't know if I do that or not. But we have the "Look up Center" donated a 14 passenger bus to us to use to transport the guys back and forth. The city events so yeah, donated. Beautiful, stunningly beautiful. So you know, so that's really maintenance upkeep on that. So we have a lot of people that are helping. Finances are always obviously, I mean, that's the number one thing usually with anything that's going to be free. You know, how are you going to pull that off? Well, we're only doing phase one to start with. So we're gonna see how the businesses and the churches help us out in that position right there at first and if we can go to a phase two and three and four, then we're going to go ahead right on the march with it. And that's a whole different protocol. And obviously I mean anytime you think about the addicted you're you see him on the street or see someone's homeless you know they're going through addiction. Just reach out to him and tell him you know about us here. Are we have a website is called if I could spell it out for you, LLCCNVHD.COM If you go to that website, you get an idea of the numbers, whether there's a part right on the front page that talks about the homeless people. And then right underneath all that all the statistics of all the bad stuff is the solution. And that' us.
Tina:I will make sure I include that on the actual podcast for those who are interested. And I know I think I heard you say Champions budget looks like about what $10,000 per year am I correct?
Chris:Yeah. Champions budget is a little bit different because they basically it's once a week. So we provide meals for them. Sometimes one of our Champions family if they're in the family, they need some financial assistance. We've even bought cars for them periodically when we get when we can do it that kind of thing. So yeah, $10,000 a year on that was easy. However, the Vesper Hills Daybreak one's going to be probably in the neighborhood of$75,000 to $100,000.
Tina:Okay, and God you know what that's like a drop in the bucket.
Chris:Believe me, it sounds like it's not. It's not at all and I know that. Yeah, absolutely. I've seen him do so much. I don't even doubt anymore. Like yeah, because every time every time something needed done out there So I was sitting here, here's $5,000, here's 2000, just popped in there. And I wasn't even I wasn't even advertising I was, well, we need to have that oh ok.. Okay, here's the money for thing, and it just happened. So he's gonna, he's got this. So we just got to believe that he's got it, and let him do it. And if he anoints you to give and you are in a position to give, now we can use all we can get, I'm not going to say no to none of it, we're going to use it. And it'll be used a second, because eventually, we're going to have to staff this thing. But I have to have some paid staff on tonight. I think we can do it on a volunteer basis to start with, but to take advantage of grant to pay the administrator and to pay a financial officer, and maybe even pay a couple coordinators down the road. So that can get a little bit more, because that's why I tell you, it might be more of a $75 to$100,000 more budget as we get into it. But to start off with where we just need that to happen as soon as possible moving in that direction.
Tina:Do you plan to open? Excuse me? Do you plan to have an open house? At any point?
Chris:Yeah, yes, we're going to do open houses probably starting in spring. So we're going to look at the facility get an idea of going on. We'll have we'll have video sets up up there so you can kind of see what what it was with looks like and what we need to have done. I'm going to publicly do several presentations. I even got a although if you've ever heard of the of the concert called Winter Jam, it happens every year. Have you ever heard of that? It's a big rock concert.
Tina:Winter. What is it? Yeah, Winter Jam
Chris:It's big rock concert, big Christian rock concert thing. They go around the whole country, and just like 10 bands that that hook up but they do it for like 10 bucks for kids to come in and watch it. Is this an amazing event. Well, one of those Winter bands one of those winter jam bands offered to come out and play for our open. If we wanted to have that. Wow. So yeah, that was nothing. I'm good friends with a guy goes, Hey, when you open it up, you know, we'll come to a concert like guys will do it. So it's awesome. Yeah, he's got it, man. Got it. I just got this all gonna fall into place. I just got to watch him do it. We did we just get out of his way and let him run.
Tina:We hear the excitement in your voice. And I just love that. You know, that's yeah, gosh, God is just awesome. And so, so amazing. Exactly. So, Chris, we are gonna wind down here. Is there anything you would like to say before we close?
Chris:Um, yeah, that's all pretty well, I really appreciate the time. And the ability to be able to get this word out. So this is kind of like the beginning for us. We're going to take this, this, this recording and get that out there still, but hear it and see really what we're really after and kind of get an idea. And then from there, we're just going to launch with this and go for it. And this really the Lord move. And, you know, what did they say put feet to our face? So, yeah, it's just been glorious. And like, again, I just really, really do appreciate the opportunity Tina thank you so much.
Tina:Thank you, and to our listening audience. You know, a lot of times people like, I can't I all I have is a prayer. Well, that's awesome. We want your prayers, if you can financially help. That's God, if you know of somebody that can donate a service, let us know, all of these things. And you know, people think all you know, God's gonna bless Chris, because he's doing this, God's going to bless everybody who's involved, if it's your prayers, if it's your money that God God has given you, because he's given you a job or whatever, if if God has blessed you, with all of those things to help, believe me, he will really bless us because we as a team are working on this together. Yeah. So
Chris:You know, and you know that the whole the whole thing with the transition of the life, your return on investment, is you get to be part of a transformed life. And it's so beautiful to watch that happen.
Tina:It sure is. It sure is. And God is you know, I know he rejoices when and with that. Yeah, he sees the sees what's going on. And just, I'm sure it breaks his heart to see all that's going on. But I'm sure he rejoices in the fact that people are doing what he wants us to do to show up. Chris, thank you so much. I really appreciate you taking the time to do this. And to our listening audience. I will include this information so that you can contact Chris or somebody there so that you can see "what can I do? What can I do"? I'm sure Chris will find something for you. So thank you so much for listening. And I just pray that you're all blessed. Thank you so much.