A Dad’s Rite Of Passage

A kid doesn’t need a perfect dad, but they do need a present one, and the window to shape a heart doesn’t stay soft forever. Father’s Day sets the tone with a simple poem, “The Sculptor,” and it lands like a warning and a gift: the impressions we leave on our sons and daughters tend to last. If you’ve ever looked at middle school years and thought, I don’t have the tools for this, you’re not alone.

We sit down with Matt Hanson, president of the National Rite of Passage Council, to talk about Aion Path, a three-year Christian rite of passage built for 12 to 14 year olds and the fathers who walk beside them. We get into why male discipleship is struggling, why outsourcing faith formation has not worked, and why the solution is often simpler than we think: warm conversations, shared time, and a clear structure that makes leadership doable. Matt explains how Aion Path starts with “30 conversations” (five to ten minutes a day), how kids choose “30 skills” they want to learn, and why an overnight adventure can become a turning point when your child gets real ownership.

We also unpack the power of tangible milestones like challenge coins, the role of a pastor as a “shepherd,” and how three trusted “guides” (financial, vocational, spiritual) create the intergenerational relationships that help faith stick. If you want a practical framework for raising resilient teenage boys and teenage girls, strengthening father-child connection, and building lifelong Christian faith at home, this conversation gives you a clear next step. 

Subscribe, share this with a dad who needs a playbook, and leave a review with the one rite of passage you wish you’d had growing up.

Go to www.aionpath.com to learn more

Chapter Markers

• 0:00
• Welcome And The Inner Fight
• 0:33
• The Sculptor And A Father's Weight
• 3:16
• The Hunger For Rites Of Passage
• 6:31
• Year One Building Real Connection
• 18:14
• Coins Skills And Trusted Guides
• 27:30
• Letting Your Kid Lead The Journey
• 32:00
• Year Two Faith Foundations And Year Three
• 35:41
• How To Find Aion Path And Closing Prayer

Visit www.thesavagepath.com for more on David, his book The Savage Path: A Memoir of Modern Masculinity, and the Savage Path Ministries Corp.

Transcript

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Welcome And The Inner Fight

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Welcome to Wrestling with the Inner Man. Because the first fight we face each and every day is a fight with our own flesh. Do we listen to our selfish, sinful nature or to our divine nature guided by the Holy Spirit? Your host, David Stavage, is a product of the West Texas Desert and energy industry. His desire is to inspire and help other men win spiritual warfare. We hope you're ready to rumble because wrestling with the inner man begins now.

The Sculptor And A Father's Weight

SPEAKER_01 0:33

Happy Father's Day to every dad out there. I'd like to open this show with a poem as my gift to you all, which reflects your extreme importance in your children's lives. And it's called The Sculptor. Now this poem has no uh no author who would take credit for, but I think it's wonderful. So listen to this. I took a piece of plastic clay and idly fashioned it one day, and as my fingers pressed it still, it bent and yielded to my will. I came again when days were past, but that bit of clay was hard at last. The form I gave it still it bore, but I could change that form no more. Then I took a piece of living clay and gently formed it day by day, and molded with my power and art, a young child's soft and yielding heart. I came again when years were gone, it was a man I looked upon. He still that early impress bore, and I could change it nevermore. So, Dads, you are extremely important to your sons and daughters out there. And of course, this show is called Wrestling with the Inner Man, and the wrestling match is what if you feel terribly equipped to mold these children? And that is not an uncommon problem. But I have good news. My guest today is Matt Hansen, he's the president of the National Rite of Passage Council, and I I like that name, but we need rites of passage, and this organization has answered your prayers with an incredible program called the Ion Path. And I just want to welcome Matt to the show. How are you doing, Matt?

SPEAKER_00 2:19

I'm doing well. Thank you, David. What what a uh important poem, and and uh isn't that just a lament in there? Something we all carry as well.

SPEAKER_01 2:28

It's true. I think there's just so many people out there. Uh, you know, I had sent to you this little white paper that the Man in the Mirror organization had put together, and it was talking about, you know, the summary of the state of young men in America today, and in this 2026 report on spiritual formation, cultural trends, and the future of male discipleship. And it says for decades, and this is true, you and I know this, the dominant narrative has been one of male disaffiliation from church, from purpose, from responsibility, and from the sacred. So that means a lot of young men grew up ill-equipped, they weren't getting what they need, and I think we're beginning to recognize that hunger, but what do you do when uh you don't feel like you've got the tools?

The Hunger For Rites Of Passage

SPEAKER_01 3:16

So tell us how you came up with this Ion Path and the genesis of it, and kind of give our audience a little bit of a primer on uh the evolution of it.

SPEAKER_00 3:26

Sure. Well, so the National Rite of Passage Council that you mentioned is a coalition of faith leaders that goes across denominational lines in the Christian church that believes that we're moving towards a time within the next 10 years where it will be normal for pastors to invite the parents of their 12, 13, 14-year-olds into a Christian rite of passage journey. I always say, think think of it like an Eagle Scout marries the bot mitzvah. And uh and so that coalition created the framework and launched the um the pilots of the Ion Path a little over a year ago in five states. And the Ion Path is that three-to-year rite of passage journey designed for a dad to walk alongside their apprentice, which would be the term we'd use for a 12, 13, 14-year-old son or daughter on this journey towards spiritual, physical, and emotional adulthood.

SPEAKER_01 4:22

Yeah, super, super. Well, three years now, um, you said that that that's how long it took Jesus to take uneducated, common men and turn them into unstoppable, world-changing men. Uh, much like Christ's method, you know, the three-year approach. So how is that how you came up with the three years?

SPEAKER_00 4:39

Yeah, and honestly, I I wish it was I wish it was so noble, right? Yeah, uh, because you know the the some of the early feedback was, hey, if it's not eight weeks, you can't do it in the church. But the reality is, as a dad, we're going on this journey anyways with our kids. And so wouldn't it be great if we were handled in a tool and were equipped to do it really, really well. And so what we did is we just brought out a lot of the traditions when you study the things that matter most, both in the passing of our faith to the next generation and from a sociological, anthropological perspective, rites of passage, we laid that out over a three-year period so that it could be done in kind of bite-sized increments, so the average American dad in the average American church could say, Yes, I'm willing to spend an hour a week on the formation of my child and the preparation for them to be launched well as a successful adult, and that seems like a bite-sized component. And so that's really how the three years came out.

SPEAKER_01 5:41

Uh well, you know, those are those are significant years, you know. There was there was that uh movie Mean Girls, you know, that's talking about the junior high years, and and of course we know, you know, seventh, eighth year, those are tough years, you know, for kids. Uh puberty, your body's changing, you know, you're growing hair in places you never had before, things like that. So um I think you know, today we hear so much about attention deficit disorder, you know, three years. That's that's a big deal. But what uh we just had a meeting that you allowed me to sit in on, you know, with your leadership team, and we heard from one of the fathers who was going through it with a daughter, and he he said, Look, as a pilot dad, I'm just telling you it's so important for the child to take the lead and say, I'm gonna choose these uh these 30 conversations.

Year One Building Real Connection

SPEAKER_01 6:31

That right so why why don't you start there? Tell us a little bit about like year one, uh which is called you know equipping and and again highlight that you know you're not just given the tools today, you're you're doing this really through the local church, right?

SPEAKER_00 6:46

Yes, now this is definitely designed to be in partnership with the local church, although we have many dads that are doing it on their own, but through the journey, it will connect them to uh their local church. So it certainly can be done on their own, it can be done in groups, uh, which is ideally because we all know we go go further when we go together. Um and uh and then we have dads all over the country, literally all over the world now, that are doing this individually. Um you would ask kind of what was your question like what does that first year look like? What are what are some of the components? And uh and it's really tapping into that understanding that as dads, like generally, certainly a church-going dad, we kind of know that we're supposed to be the spiritual leaders in our house, but we really don't know what to do with that. And so even an intentional dad like me, like I just wasn't I didn't feel equipped, I didn't feel comfortable, um, and if I didn't if we don't think we can win the game, we're just we're not gonna play the game. And the church has made it easy for us to outsource to our youth pastors or uh to our wives, and the reality is that today, after 40 years of doing that, roughly eight to ten percent of our kids raised in our churches follow Jesus for a lifetime. And I I still almost can't say those numbers without having my stomach churn. It's one of the things that empowered uh the assembly of this coalition. It's like that's not really what many parents thought. We thought if we raised our kids in church, they would raise their kids in church, and now they don't. And it's it's for my generation, it's probably one of their biggest laments. And so the eye on path in that framework uh came along, and it's a it's a collective contribution from literally more than dozens and dozens of leaders from men's ministry, youth ministry, discipleship ministry, senior leadership ministry that have contributed to this idea. And if if I was describing the first year to you, or what would happen if a dad says, okay, I'm curious, I'm interested, what happens? Um, when they sign up, they'll receive a launch kit. That launch kit will have uh five envelopes in it, and we always say, don't go to envelope number two until you finish envelope number one. But that launch kit represents the first of three phases, which are heavily built and weighted towards activities that will connect the father and their apprentices' kind of heart relationally. Because we know the 800-pound gorilla in discipleship and the passing on of our faith to the next generation is if you have a warm conversational relationship with your earthly father, it exponentially impacts your ability to have a warm conversation with your heavenly father.

SPEAKER_01 9:48

For sure.

SPEAKER_00 9:49

And and and for some dads that feels like heavy. Like we're always like, well, what does that mean? What are we supposed to do? Because I always thought I was supposed to, you know, get the get the discipleship book, and Sunday night I'm gonna inflict discipleship on my kids because that's my job. And I had a number of really bad runs at that. But I I guess the first thing I would say to dads is like really what it means is you need just to have an authentic relationship yourself with God, an honest, authentic relationship, and an open, warm, conversational relationship with your kid. That that and prioritizing going to church on Sunday, as a good friend of mine says, that'll get you in the playoffs. And it's really, it's really true. Those fairly, fairly simple things, and so we're wanting to make it help make it easier for dads to connect. Um I had a I had a great relationship with my dad. Uh I had a good relationship with my dad, kind of a business relationship, but we never we never were really able to connect, like our hearts were never able to connect to the last seventy-two hours of his life. And um and then everything cleared up. And I know that we spent most of the forty-five years before that time trying to find a way to connect, but we just didn't have the tools. And so hopefully the Ion Path in that first phase with the 30 conversations that it has, planning an overnight adventure with your dad, connecting with three guides uh and a shepherd, some of these elements, planning uh what are 30 skills that my apprentice would want to have uh getting inside of their mind of what things that they want to learn to do are all helping to build those intersections in that first phase.

SPEAKER_01 11:33

And they're and they're choosing them, right? You know, so I saw that list, you know, it could be, you know, I'm gonna learn how to shoot a gun, or I'm gonna, you know, things that you want to do with your dad, and if you're if your dad has agreed, signed up to do this, and and the child gets to choose. That's power, man. That's and who doesn't want to spend time with their dad and dictate the recreational, you know, adventure. It's funny because uh, you know, I'll tell you just a story of my own. You know, I unfortunately I I went through a divorce and uh I remarried in 2002 and I I picked up two stepsons that were already mostly formed, 13 and 15, and so the 15-year-old, you know, I mean, you know, he was almost out, and so he's uh graduating from high school, and we've had some real headbutting, you know, because here he had been kind of the man of the house. You know, my wife had been a single mom for seven years, and he's getting displaced, and uh so it was difficult. And I I said, Hey, Jeffrey, how would you like to go to Grand Teton National Park and Yellowstone National Park? Because wow, that sounds that sounds pretty cool. How would you like to whitewater raft, you know, the the Snake River? Man, that sounds real cool. How would you like to hang glide off this peak? And he's like, Man, I'm gonna do it. Well, there's just two conditions, you know. One, you gotta do it with me. Second, it's called Christ and the Tetons, and it's biblically based. And I didn't know if he would uh agree to go, but he goes, Man, I I'm in, I'm down. And it was incredible. It was I can't even describe it. And then what made it even more potent, at least for me, is while we were on that adventure, Christ and the Tetons, my own father passed away. And uh so I had all these other men around me that were, you know, helping support me through that, and of course I wasn't there, but but what a tremendous uh experience that was. And and Robert Lewis, you know, I gotta tip my hat to him, that was in 2006. But you know, he began something like this, and he was you know saying, Hey, what what are the things that uh that every son needs to have? He needs he needs to have dad's character and his heart, he needs to have a manhood vision, he needs to have a manhood moment, and that's the significance of these ceremonies are, and a transcendent cause. And you know, we had these uh situations well, they didn't let us uh know ahead of time that we were gonna have to deliver this father's blessing at breakfast, because they knew people like me who had been in Toastmasters and everything, I would be writing like the best possible speech and you know trying to outdo somebody, but they just give you a short period of time to prepare, and then then you just stand up with your son at that breakfast in front of them, and there were like 40 men, you know, 20 fathers, 20 sons, and you say, I love you because I'm proud of you because, and I think you have what it takes to be a man because, and people are weeping, and and you were seeing sons just inflated, you know, uh before your eyes. It was unbelievable the transformation. There were some where uh one father had been a uh philanderer and left you know the the home with you know for his secretary, and the son and him had been, you know, really estranged for some time. The son was like 32, 33 years old, the dad's almost like 60, and the restoration of that relationship that we got to see was incredible. So the the power of this is is truly unbelievable. So so you have go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 15:06

I just want to I just want to like pause on that for a couple of things. So one is Robert Lewis's book, Raising a Modern Day Night, which I think is might be re-released for its twenty-fifth anniversary, probably was one of the most influential foundational things in the beginning of this journey for me that really started more than 15 years ago. But what you just said and that moment you just described, and what were the three questions, because they are I've you and I have been fortunate to be in situations like that, and and I just think what a gift for you and for your son, your stepson, your son. And so that I just want to hear the three questions again because I think they're worth ingraining in our heads.

SPEAKER_01 15:45

Well, many men that are like our dad's age, you know, just didn't say I love you. It just wasn't manly, you know. So you you need to hear your dad say, uh, look you in the eye, you know, with your hands on each other's shoulders and like, I love you, you know, and I mean really mean it and feel it. And you know, in a quivering voice, and uh you know, with a trembling lip and a tear rolling down your cheek. You know, and and then I'm proud of you, you know. All right, so hey, yeah, we've all made mistakes and everything. I'm proud of you. I'm really proud. And then you know, you have to think of some things that they're really good at and say, and you're good at something, you know, you're good at these things, how you your compassion for other people, things that aren't necessarily what I'm good at, but things that I have noticed in you, that I've observed in you, and I want to honor you by acknowledging this, you know, because maybe I've never done that before. You know, there's there's things that you know, you're different than me, obviously in a stepson's case. I also took my biological son in 2009, but yeah, those those three things were incredible, and then they do other things. So this was a uh you know, a one-week compression of the three-year program, you know, that that you're talking about doing.

SPEAKER_00 16:57

Well, and I mean our hope is by normalizing rites of passage in the Christian church and by creating this framework that you know Christ and the Tetons is this amazing experience that hundreds, maybe thousands of dads have been through. But it's there's 4.2 million dads today of middle schoolers that go to church at least once a month. How do how do we get it so that not a fraction of one percent of them get that experience? How do we normalize it so that they can connect with their earthly kids in a way for the sake of both dad and their son and daughter connecting with their heavenly father in a way that's transformational for their life?

SPEAKER_01 17:39

Yeah, that accessibility is extremely important. And I know in those early years when I was going through, you know, that that was pretty costly. And uh and you need it, you know, in these ceremonies, you do need to have something that's costly. So it demonstrates, you know, the importance, you know, you're placing on it, and then you have these uh ceremonies, you know, we had this big sword and we you know knight them and stuff, and and uh, you know, in the in the call that we just had, uh you know, you you showed this box and then these these coins. Uh why don't you describe a little bit about how that works because it's it's that significance and it looked really nice.

Coins Skills And Trusted Guides

SPEAKER_00 18:14

Yeah, thank you. I mean the so the box that comes is it's a super nice, high quality box. It's intended to be a something to keep the treasures. Maybe it's pictures from the three-year journey, maybe it's things you collect, rocks along the path you were hiking, whatever it is in that box, but it also has places for challenge coins. And if you're familiar with the tradition of challenge coins, have the uh kind of historical emphasis in the military where a general might give it to you know the lieutenant or the commander, you know, celebrating the success that he had, so they're memorializing the sacrifice and the success, and that commander may give it to its men. Um, but it's the same type of thing. So the first exercise that a dad does is this thing called 30 conversations, parents and teens, and we help them have a conversation a day. It's only about five or ten minutes over 30 days. We we literally give the prompts, we make it super, super easy for dad and apprentice to do it, and literally thousands of parents have gone through this with their kids with just tremendous stories that come out of it. But at the end of it, that's a big accomplishment. So then to give the dad a coin that they can present to their apprentice that memorializes that accomplishment and what has transpired in that relationship helps market, just like in scripture. We're told to place stones. And so it's drawing, it's a dropping of a stone, and that happens throughout this journey. And while you mentioned yours being a one-week experience, this is, as they say, it's a three-year experience, kind of like an Eagle Scout, it's a way of making it affordable from a financial standpoint, but costly from a commitment standpoint. So when you get to the end of the road and you're standing in front of your church next to your pastor, being introduced not as a boy or a girl, but as a man or a woman who's demonstrated that they can lead others well, lead themselves well, and follow Jesus well, that's a significant accomplishment that has some rigor and meaning, and it'll matter. So if your son and my son end up in the same dorm room in college, and they've both been through this process, like if they both had had a bar mitzvah or both had been an Eagle Scout, they immediately know something about each other, about the commitment that they've accomplished, what they've followed through on, and their families and what their values are.

SPEAKER_01 20:38

Yeah, that's true. And I, you know, because I am an Eagle Scout, I earned I got it on my 15th birthday. So it's right in this age range, you know, where you're exploring. And in fact, the last merit badge that I earned, because I got all three of my palms, was the engineering merit badge. And then I became an engineer. So it kind of launched me into selecting, you know, what my vocation would be, but it also exposed me to many other things, you know, that I broadened my depth of experience, whether you know it was cooking or wilderness survival or horsemanship or nature, all of those other merit badges that I earned that really give you that that confidence, you know, like, hey, I didn't know anything about that when I started either. You know, so you're ready to be launched out into the world saying, All right, I might not know even what I'm about to get into, but you know what? Uh I I've I've done these other things and I've been successful in these small things, and so I'm I'm ready for a bigger challenge.

SPEAKER_00 21:31

Yeah. No, I think I think that's true. It's like it you you have some sense that you can you can handle the world, you you know something about it, you've accomplished something. I have um I'll pull it out from behind me here. You you mentioned the the 30 skills. So this is this is one of those written on a piece of wood, and uh, you know, I want to learn how to give a toast, I want to learn to barbecue a steak, do laundry and fold, uh I want to open a bank account, I want to trade a Whatever it is, I love there's that we have the we have the kids post these in a community section, and there's uh Ashton. I love his, I'll never forget his because I'm just kind of reading through these. And the number 16 is I want to have a six pack, and number seventeen is I want to learn how to talk to girls. And I'm like, what a gift for a dad. Like, I know right where my kid's hit is, and I don't know which six pack he was talking about. Either one will probably help him. I'm pretty sure it was the the one that comes with ab crunches. But, anyways, it's uh uh it's a chance then for not just to create these connections between the dad and their apprentice, but for us to hear what our kids want to learn, and then to your point, you know, the the kid that has this on his wall with 30 things that they've learned and accomplished probably is gonna have less prone to anxiety and concern about their ability to accomplish things in the world as an adult.

SPEAKER_01 22:55

That's that's it. That is the the ballast, the weight, the gravitas, you know, that that's needed uh for for leadership. And so you have these 30 conversations. I think one of the other things I see here is uh, you know, your team, and this is really important. So choose individuals that you would like to speak into your child's life along the journey. You know, I probably lectured to my children too much, you know, and they just you know, they knew not to argue with me, so they would just, you know, look down and like endure it. And then, you know, now that they're adults, though, they're like, man, you know, you wasted a lot of words, but you know, if somebody else who was like my friend, you know, said, Hey, I knew your dad, you know, when he was young and he made these foolish mistakes, well, that first they love to hear that. And then and then they go, but I got some advice for you. And man, they're so open to that advice from another adult. A lot of kids don't know how to interact with adults at all anymore. Part of that is the screen issues, you know, that we're dealing with, but just to have these other adults that they can go to maybe something a little more sensitive to talk about, and because they they trust them, it's a safe place. So I think choosing that team. So you're you've launched the pilot in five states, right? And you're kind of closing year one of the pilot. Is that is that what you were?

SPEAKER_00 24:14

We're past year one now of the pilot, and I don't I don't know how many states we're in now. Those focus was a five, but once something something gets out, you can't control where it goes. Right, right. So we're really launching that. I do want to hit just quickly on your comment about the the guides and the shepherds, because it really is a key point. And um as dads, we we can only impart so much to our kids that they can hear. Uh but they can hear it from other people. So, in the structure is identifying three guides a financial guide, a vocational guide, a spiritual guide, that they're gonna have two conversations with over the course of the year. And we equip the apprentice with the agenda, how to have a conversation. We equip the guide with what to say, and we always say it's a guide, not a mentor, because people get a little nervous about mentorship, like it's a connect, you know, who am I to be a mentor? It's a lifelong commitment. A guide's a little bit like being a fishing guide. You jump in the boat, you spend the day, you don't, you know, you like him, you hire him again, you don't, you get another guide. Right. But it's a little bit lower, lowers the bar, but it gives that opportunity, just as you said, for my son to sit across from another man and hear uh maybe a little bit that they'll teach him if it's their financial guide about you know the dangers of debt or com the power of compound interest or something like that. But eventually their faith story, and so my child's world experience that's been our sweet little Hanson family Christian faith journey is going to start expanding, and then they're building a relationship that might end up being a letter of recommendation, it might be a uh a job opportunity, it might be something else, and so it's uh it's really it's really important. And we know that those intergenerational connections are one of the most important things in uh having our kids retain their faith and want to be uh engaged in their church over an extended period of time.

SPEAKER_01 26:12

For sure, for sure. And you know, we both know Chris Harper and the Better Man program, and it's like that is what today's church and why we've had this disconnection or whatever is is we've kind of segregated by age and stage to where the intergenerational relationships aren't available to be formed, you know, because oh, well, you know, you're 30 years old, you got kids here, and you're in your community group and you r you really don't have any church-wide events where you know those intergenerational relationships can happen. And so I think that's unless you're in a small rural church where they just can't afford to do that, well, they're the ones who actually thrive. Like these cowboy churches in Texas actually did fantastic during the pandemic, and the megachurches uh uh treated like crazy, you know, because people were just watching it on TV.

SPEAKER_00 27:04

Yeah. No, in hindsight, I I am grateful for the small church that I grew up in, and I always say the reason was because if they were gonna have a men's event, they had to invite the boys, otherwise there wouldn't be enough people there. Right. And as a consequence, I got to interact and travel in an intergenerational experience because it was a small church, and it's one of the many gifts of a small church.

SPEAKER_01 27:27

Yeah. So then uh you have these adventures

Letting Your Kid Lead The Journey

SPEAKER_01 27:30

too. So, you know, and I talked about the ones we did in Christ the so they get to choose the adventure, and that's pretty cool, and go do I I think uh, you know, I had four kids with you know, two stepsons and my daughter and my son, and I intentionally, because I went through divorce, you know, I wasn't my wasn't living, you know, full-time with my biological children, so I was like super strategic, you know, and I wanted to do one-on-one trips with them. And uh that was super valuable. And you know, I wanted so I took my my my biological son and my oldest stepson, Jeffrey, to Christ of the Tetons, and then my other stepson, Sean, is a real musical guy. He's a sound engineer now as an adult, but their father passed away of uh cirrhosis, and uh, you know, it was just a horrible you know situation. We got this letter, and it was just stamped red legal indigent, you know, and he had like a county pauper's cremation, and so they kind of went spinning out of control and experimenting with substance abuse issues, and so I had to go through this three-year program with Sean called Air, which was Adolescence and Recovery. And I was like, I had a goal that I was gonna take my three sons, you know, this Christ in the Tetons. And Sean just didn't want to have he didn't want it, he just did not want to do it. And I was like, I'm gonna convince him somehow, and then the counselor was telling me, look, you know, he's been through this whole program and he's sponsoring people, he's doing all this great stuff, and now he's finishing, and this is the time for his rite of passage, and you need to let him choose. And I relented uh to the counselor, which was very, very difficult for me. And you know what I did with Sean? I took him to the Coachella Music Festival. And yeah, I know you're from Southern California, so in 2010, I stretched myself way out there, you know, with all this indie music and everything, and I I'm I'm like, saw a lot of Cali skin and ink. And uh well, actually, I just gotta interject this little story because you know he had this drinking problem, and so he wanted to go to LA Inc. there on Santa Monica Beach, and he wanted to get a tattoo. He had other tattoos. I said, I'm not getting a tattoo. Come on, come on, David, you gotta get a tattoo with me. And I'm like, What would we get? And he goes, I think we should both get a tattoo of a camel on our butt. You know, and I was like, What? You know, why?

SPEAKER_02 29:49

I was gonna ask him, but now I'm going to go.

SPEAKER_01 29:53

I I didn't do it, I didn't do it. But he said, look, because a camel starts every day on his knees, ends every day on his knees, and tries to go all day without a drink, you know, and I was like, oh, wow man. I I was close. You know, I think we got in line, and then I bet. I I didn't see that. Yeah, so but but then I chickened out. But but we did do the whole Coachella Music Festival, which was incredible, and uh, you know, I made him do a little bit of hiking, you know, out there too and stuff. But uh having them choose, you know, that it w was just so memorable, and that was you know back in 2010.

SPEAKER_00 30:30

So Yeah, well done, David. I mean, and what an it that's such an important story for us as dads to hear because i I mean, obviously your stepson didn't come directly from you, so it's more obvious. But even the kids that come from us aren't exactly like us, right? And it's our job to get to know and understand them and help them be all that God created them to be, not all that we wish God had created us to be, right, or we wish God had created them to be. And it's it's hard for dads. I I do think this next generation of dads is uh a little less weighed down by that than you and I were, right, right. And and more willing to acknowledge that they don't have it figured out. And so the hope is that this is one of those things that helps them uh be successful in sorting out the things that matter most.

SPEAKER_01 31:19

Yeah, because you know, you think also about the uh like the cheerleading mom, you know, you you don't want to be living your dreams through your children, you know, like, oh, I wasn't the quarterback, so my son's gonna be the quarterback, or I wasn't the cheerleader, or the stage moms and things, which those still uh are around. If you've ever coached a team, 100% they are.

SPEAKER_00 31:40

100%. It's by no means cured.

SPEAKER_01 31:44

So then so you do your 30 conversations, you plan your adventures, you have your your shepherds, is what you call the guides.

SPEAKER_00 31:50

Uh three guides and a shepherd. Yeah, a shepherd would be a pastor in your church, and then three guides are just spiritually mature adults in your orbit.

SPEAKER_01 31:57

Okay, so so year one sounds sounds great.

Year Two Faith Foundations And Year Three

SPEAKER_01 32:00

Uh then you go to year two, connecting the hearts of fathers and children. Uh just give us a little thumbnail for year two.

SPEAKER_00 32:08

Yeah, well, I mean, so uh the in in each year, we kind of have talked mostly about the first phase. The second phase is a uh a video-based curriculum on the foundations of their of our faith. And um uh it builds on it in the second year. And I think what's important about that curriculum is when when this group came together, they never intended to build any curriculum because there's tons of curriculum in the Christian universe. If we needed an animated, you know, something about the Bible, we would go to the Bible Project, right? There's just world-class stuff out there. Uh and the Bible Project has been a great, great supporter of allowing us to use their stuff in places, but there was literally nothing for a dad to walk alongside their apprentice as a co-learner of the faith, where they could be equally asked the questions that they're all wondering about. Because I think there's a lot of pressure on us, dads, if if our kid asks us, like, why is the Bible any better than any book written by a whole bunch of guys a long time ago? And dad's answer might be it's like God's word, and uh believe it, so should you, right? And that might be as deep as it goes, but then to get some great teaching together on why is the Bible different than any other book in written in human history, and then be able to articulate that back in kind of a Socratic uh way and go through that journey together where dad doesn't have to be the expert, but he can be a co-learner alongside his kid, is one of the amazing things about this journey and gives freedom to both of them to experience God uh as as uh as equals along the journey. So that builds in the second year to your point, many of those same things where channel where there's 30 more conversations, there's uh an over another overnight adventure, we're always encouraging them. And for you, being a guy that would love to climb those mountains behind you with your kids and you wouldn't know what to do if it if it got dark and cold, lots of dads, like the thought of being overnight alone with their kids is is uh is a formidable challenge. And so, you know, maybe they do it with a group of other dads in their church, whatever it is, but the idea is how do we create this time to connect? And so we just build on that in each of uh of the subsequent years along the way. And when they get into that third year, that's when it it uh you know they'll do a service project, kind of like you did as an Eagle Scout. Correct. What is something that you can do and contribute to the big C church, the larger community uh, and uh a number of other things, and then you know, get to the point where you've earned a celebration, an incredible accomplishment. Um you've gone from attending church uh as a uh as as as somebody who is, you know, just taking or receiving uh to somebody who's contributing to church. Maybe in middle school you were just uh uh attending the life group, and in high school you're actually leading a middle school life group, whatever those evolutions are to help kind of deepen your own personal faith in Germany.

SPEAKER_01 35:18

Yeah. And those those are are yet to be because we haven't gotten to year three yet of ion. So uh it's still still evolving, but I think there's been enough of a of a little taste here for you guys listening that this is something you should be extremely excited about, especially if in the introduction I said you felt ill-equipped. So I would just encourage you to investigate.

How To Find IonPath And Closing Prayer

SPEAKER_01 35:41

So, where can people uh learn more about Ion Path?

SPEAKER_00 35:45

Yeah, I'm IonPath.com, Ion, A-I-O-N Path.com. Ion is a Greek word that means a moment in time that impacts all time. And uh yes, it's been incredibly encouraging uh and valuable for dads to be able to have a tool to walk alongside their kids and help equip them to be successful adults.

SPEAKER_01 36:09

And you've got some terrific uh technology tools too, folks. I mean, I was just on his leadership meeting, and they've got uh a frictionless. That's uh that's kind of the noob word, you know, out there. It's like, yeah, the frictionless, so that you can you know login required, you can go and get this. It's it's very uh chopped up into bits and and uh very uh tech savvy. So the tools are there, they're building it's everything with excellence. And I want you to try to imagine, you know, ten or twenty years from now, and you're looking through your your daughter's house or your son's house, and you see this blue box. It's like a little treasure chest with these challenge coins on it, and they're proudly displaying it in their most visible niche, and going, Man, that's in three years with my dad that we're the best of my life. And uh you will be glad you did it.

SPEAKER_00 37:01

So I think that there's not of all of the surveys, there's not been a single dad that hasn't said their relationship with their child hasn't improved in this journey, and uh that's that's worth worth all of it.

SPEAKER_01 37:18

All right, well let's close it there. We already so the Aeon path is uh is it dot and org or dot is Aeon Path? Either one should work, but dot, I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_00 37:30

Yeah, yeah, that's all right. Like keep your eye on the path is how we always say and uh yeah, that will that will do it.

SPEAKER_01 37:37

Okay. Well, let me close in prayer. Dear Heavenly Father, we just thank you for Matt, for his team that he's assembled, for the people that are supporting it, and uh for the people that are embracing it, and we just uh ask you to use this podcast to reach as many people as we can and to access these tools and to return the hearts of uh sons to their fathers, as it says in Malachi and Scripture, and we just ask all this in Christ's name. Amen.

SPEAKER_00 38:04

Amen. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 38:09

Thanks for listening to Wrestling with the Inner Man with David Savage. We believe the winners in this ring courageously follow God's word, loves and protects God's women, excels at God's work, and betters God's world with his children. For information, reach out to David at David at thesavagepath.com. That's David at the Savagepath.com or visit his website, thesavagepath.com. Tune in next time as Wrestling with the Interman tackles more tough topics to train up a generation of better men.