Lasting Impact
Welcome to "Lasting Impact," the podcast that dives deep into the stories and insights of extraordinary individuals who are leaving an indelible mark on the world. Here, we'll explore the transformative power of their actions and innovations in the realms of business, ministry, and community. Our guests are the change-makers, the visionaries, and the unsung heroes whose unwavering dedication and passion have not only made an impact but a lasting one. Prepare to be inspired, informed, and empowered as we explore the stories behind the lasting impact these remarkable individuals are creating.
Lasting Impact
What Happens When Men Climb Mountains Together?
Lee Martin, co-founder of Mountain Men, reveals how personal crisis led to creating a transformative ministry. Combining physical challenge, spiritual formation, and brotherhood, Mountain Men addresses modern men's passivity by fostering authenticity and growth. With a focus on culture rather than curriculum, the ministry has grown organically, impacting hundreds of men annually through wilderness experiences. Lee's insights on fatherhood and unconditional love further emphasize the power of connection and lasting impact across generations.
We as men can get head down and just work hard, and those are good things. But sometimes there is a cost to that, and that is our relationship with other men.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Lasting Impact Podcast. I'm your host, mark Marquand. Join me as I sit down with remarkable individuals making a meaningful difference in business and ministry. We'll explore their stories, challenges and successes, all with the goal of encouraging you to go out and make a lasting impact. If you love what you hear, don't forget to rate, review and share. Welcome to Lasting Impact Lee Martin Mark.
Speaker 1:Hey dude.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the podcast, man.
Speaker 1:Thank you, I appreciate it. We've been talking about doing this and I'm glad we're finally getting to do it. I love your setup here. You've had some good guests on too. Man, I'm feeling a little pressure. I hope I can hold my own with some of these guys you've had on.
Speaker 2:Well, I'm excited, man. I just kind of leading up to this I was like this one's special, this one's special. Yeah it's special, and I think you and I could probably talk forever, so I'm going to try to do good about narrowing it down and not lingering. Um.
Speaker 1:So, man, though for if there's anyone listening that may not know, you tell us a little bit about yourself. Well, my name's Lee you probably saw that on the thumbnail or whatever but um, yeah, I'm a pastor at church on the move in Tulsa. I'm the campus pastor of one of our locations and, yeah, I'm married to Shannon. We've been married, for it'll be 25 years in May, so it's a milestone year for us, and I got two adult sons now, and I'm just barely getting used to that. Ethan is our oldest, he's 21. And Isaac's a freshman in college. He is 19. And Isaac's a freshman in college, he is 19. And so I'm learning a whole new way of fathering. That's different when you've got adult sons, and it's been great, though.
Speaker 1:And so that's kind of what I do. That's my family. But I also am the co-founder of a thing called Mountain Men, which you know a lot about because you're a big part of it, and so I love being a pastor at the church, but, man, I really do. I don't want to say that like a throw off, it's a calling and I love it. But I even got this role at Church on the Move because of Mountain Men.
Speaker 1:There's something very, very special about Mountain Men and how it started. We'll probably talk a little bit about that. But taking guys to the mountains every summer in order to have an encounter with God, the way that came about really, really special. So my work with that it's a nonprofit parachurch ministry, but that's where, kind of my heart beats, and so, between church and men's ministry stuff, my family, that's kind of what I focus all my time on. Yeah, pickleball Well, a little bit. A little bit Not as much as I used to, but it's still. If somebody says, hey, let's get together and play pickleball and I've got the time, I like to do it.
Speaker 2:Well, that's one thing I like about you All the serious stuff you can be involved in. You're a guy that likes to have a lot of fun I do like that a lot, but well, just to how you and I met yeah um, we're.
Speaker 2:If we're not at 10 years, we're, we're coming on. It's got to be close to that. Yeah to um, a friendship, yeah and um. So gosh, I'm in a. Let's take us back a decade ago. I'm in a couple's small group and one evening we're at small group and one of the guys is gone. So I asked his wife like hey, where's, where's Greg tonight? Yeah, and she says he's, he's on a trip. And I mean I, you know, I don't remember word for word, and obviously it would have been summertime, so it wasn't. She was like Colorado and she and I, and I think she tossed out some names like Steven and Brian and Gary or something like that, and I'm let's see, where do I want to go with this? I'm grateful that those guys are my really close friends today.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Take me back a a decade. I'm really daydreaming of having some good christian friends, probably, and like they're. They're they're known names and faces in the church and so like the vanity in me is like, oh, yeah, I want to be?
Speaker 2:what's this about? Where are they going? Are they like is this a cool trip? Is this one of the cool guy trips? Yeah, really, I'm just really probably thinking that is this where the cool dudes in the church are going, the who's who and um. And so when greg gets back, I was just like hey man, so where were you? And uh, he was like I took this trip and like well man, how do I, how do I get the invite? And I think I alluded to like this sounds like a blast and all the fun stuff. And you know he's pretty stoic, like it's not really like that, okay, and uh, it just dropped real quick, yeah. And so I was like all right, I let it, I let it go, and and I think I probably forgot about it. And then, and then some point later, I got a text like hey, mark that trip you were asking about, there's an interest meeting this sund night.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Would you like to go? I was like, yeah, absolutely, and then I'm ahead of my interest meeting or whatever he said you know, Right and so yeah, so him and I we go to the meeting together.
Speaker 2:We happen to live in the same neighborhood. I think we might've drove together or something, because I remember walking in with him and I'm saying all that to say we walked in and I meet you, I see you At the time. You're not a church on the mover. No, I'm not, and I am, and probably a majority of the guys that I'm seeing in that room are familiar faces and you're not.
Speaker 2:And so, like you, I just remember this dude. You're like playing ping pong. You drop everything, beeline to me, introduce yourself, and I think you already knew who I was. I had no idea that you would already know who I was. And, um man, it's just real cool. You were really friendly. And then like yeah, Mark, and just like instantly, like I think I'll call you Marquis.
Speaker 1:And I still do to this day. I was like oh okay, and so, man, I never got your permission or anything.
Speaker 2:That's what I'm going to tell you. I think I was a little overwhelmed of the, of the Lee you know, and I, who I didn't know at that point, but I was like man it's so To describe that meeting real quick that was. I was so impressed and you're looking back probably like, well, that's not really an impressive meeting. We just got together in a back room at the church and but we, you set us up in a in a in a back room at the church and you had a screen up and we all circled up and you talked a little bit, and Brian talked a little bit and whoever else, and then you just start describing a trip that you're on and then you throw up some PDFs on the screen and I'm like starting like man, this thing is serious, get blown away.
Speaker 2:Anyway, I say yes to this trip. I say yes to this trip. I'm thinking, I'm saying at the time and I'm being dead serious, I'm getting excited about who's in that circle of guys. There's like 20 of us in there and I don't I know of them. They're like the celebrities of our mega church, right, they're on staff that we see them on stage. I know they're. They're cool guys and I'm like this is this is going to be an opportunity for me to meet those guys.
Speaker 1:Yeah, guys.
Speaker 2:And I'm like this is this is going to be an opportunity for me to meet those guys, yeah, and so I'm probably over trying trying to say the right thing. Um, I, I, I get accepted. I'm on a team. You split us up into two teams and I'm not on any of those guys teams. The Lord knew just what you needed. You're here for one reason I got another plan for you and I wouldn't have been able to peak that other trip either.
Speaker 2:Right. So, and that was probably man more than I could have asked for describe. It's hard to describe these trips and how impactful and meaningful and all that comes with it. So I said all that to say this is how I was introduced to you and what you were as mountain man guy and it wasn't labeled that yet. You're probably in a few seasons of just like hey, we're kind of rolling, we got something, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Anyway. So that's how I introduced you. And then I oh, you're, you take me on this trip along with 20 other guys. And then from there, 10 years later, this thing is massive, it's mega, it's a nonprofit, it is legit. As they come and you're, I'm, let you take it from there.
Speaker 1:Like what do you want to start from, how this happened? Well, there's a couple of things that you said that I want to back up on and go first of all. You just kind of said it in passing, but you said back when that happened 10 years ago, you didn't necessarily have a lot of really close guy friends in your world, maybe at least not in the church that you were attending. You knew people, you had acquaintances. I think that's the way most men are. I think most men, especially men that are building something, they're entrepreneurial, or maybe they're building their career, even if they're building their family, which all those are good things. We as men can get head down and just work hard, and those are good things. But sometimes there is a cost to that and that is our relationship with other men gets put on the back burner. It just kind of. I was talking to a group of guys not long ago and we were asking that question Okay, if something went wrong at 1.30 in the morning, do you have guys that you could call? That'd be like, yeah, man, I'll be right over. And most of the guys that I asked that question to said something like you know, I used to. I used to back in high school or in college, but not so much anymore, and I think that just happens. And so mountain men is not a response only to that, but I think that need for men to be around other men that make them better. We've all been around other men that bring out the worst in us. The other men in our lives that maybe our wives or our girlfriends go. Are you going to hang out with them? I don't like who you are when you hang out with them. We know what that's like. But to have men in our lives that push us, challenge us, make us better, either directly or just by the way they live, you go, man, I need to step my game up. We don't have a lot of that as men often, and so I think that's part of the reason that Mountain Men has grown. But just to back up, if you want me to tell a little bit about that story, because it's an incredible story, I was a pastor's kid here in Tulsa.
Speaker 1:I was in the sixth grade man. I think it was the summer between my sixth and seventh grade year. I was part of the youth group. I was a pretty good kid. I wasn't maybe that typical stereotypical preacher's kid. That's really rebellious or whatever. And I mean at the time I was in middle school. So one weekend this guy comes to our church first time. He's a sixth grader and we just hit it off. Just, both athletic, both like to have fun. We just you could instantly tell there was going to be a chemistry there. His name was Brian, yeah, and he's still my best friend to this day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and we've been through ups and downs and all throughout our lives. Growing up we had this sense that God wanted us to do something for the kingdom. It wasn't delusions of grandeur, I don't think it was just God's given us some gifts and what are we going to do with them. And for a long time we led in our youth group. He went on to have this really, really successful career in oil and gas. I graduated high school, went to Bible college, following in my dad's footsteps, became a pastor and just ups and downs of life.
Speaker 1:But about 15 years ago, a little over 15 years ago, my life blew up. I was a pastor of a decent-sized church in Omaha, nebraska, and I ended up having an affair with a woman on my staff. That story in itself could be a whole podcast. But the truth of the matter is I had a moral failing and, yeah, just shipwrecked my life. And the person who was there, that had always been there for me, was Brian. I had been there for him through some really tough seasons and he was there.
Speaker 1:And so I felt like my whole world had fallen apart. My marriage was hanging on by a thread. I had two little boys at the time that were six and four and lost my job, lost everything. I mean I could handle losing my job, I can handle losing my money, but to lose my reputation, my calling, what I thought I was created to do, and now I disqualified myself from it, it just seemed like everything was lost and I moved back to Tulsa from Omaha and I just went into this season of just desert Depression, maybe would be safe to say. My wife decided that she would try to work it out and so we started going to counseling.
Speaker 1:But it was just hard. I mean, you're unfaithful like that in your marriage, especially as a pastor, where people have put you up on a pedestal and you've wanted to represent Christ in a good way, and now you've completely done the opposite. And I was just at the very bottom. I was just working a job for an event planning company and just felt like, well, my life's pretty much done. I'm going to try to keep my marriage together for the sake of my kids and because it's the right thing to do. I was the one that was wrong, but it just.
Speaker 1:It was about three and a half years of just desert wilderness. Well, it just so happens that when Brian and I were teenagers, our youth pastor took us to start climbing mountains in Colorado. It was like a youth event, like a trip, like a leadership trip, you know, kind of like outward bound or whatever, and so we fell in love with the mountains and we had kind of continued to go as a hobby in the summers, that kind of thing. But in 2012, about three and a half years into this just broken season of my life, we went and climbed this mountain. It was the hardest mountain we had ever climbed. It's called Crestone Peak. To this day, crestone is my favorite mountain of all the mountains that I've climbed.
Speaker 1:For this reason, I was so broken and so empty and I went to the top of this mountain and I had told my wife before I left. I was like, if I don't have some kind of a breakthrough here, because I'm just a shell of a person. You deserve better, our boys deserve better. I don't know what to do. I said I'm going to have a breakthrough with God. I've got to have a breakthrough with God and we had been doing the right things, mark, I mean, you know this story. We had been going to counseling, we were in church every weekend, we were serving, we were trying to find reconciliation and resurrection, but it just hadn't come yet. And I know now that there was a purpose in that.
Speaker 1:For me as a man, there was some emptying out that God had to do of all the kingdom that I had built for myself, all the mixed motives that I'd had, my ego and all those things that had driven me to a place where I could be leading in a church and kind of feel entitled or just foolish enough to allow myself to get into the relationship that I did with this other woman. And so God was emptying out some things in me over that course of time. But I was more desperate than I had ever been, just for God to. I needed his help, I needed to rescue it. So I have this encounter with God on the top of this mountain.
Speaker 1:Brian and I are together. We climbed to the top of this mountain. There were a couple other guys that came with us, but Brian was like we're going to give you some time up here. And to this day Brian will say like I was a little nervous if you were going to jump off and kill yourself. You know what I mean. He knew that I was in a pretty bad place, but I wasn't there exactly. But he stepped off and it was only about 15 minutes of this experience I had with God on the top of this mountain where basically several things happened in that moment. Nothing like lightning bolts or doves descending and lighting on my shoulder or anything.
Speaker 1:But I definitely knew that God was speaking to me and I won't go into all the things that I felt there, but at the very least God said you know, no one else is following you anymore, no one else is listening to you. I mean, my whole life had been ministry and leadership and speaking from a stage, and that had been my whole life up to that point. And now he's just like all that's gone. You don't even have the respect of your family, like everything's gone. It's just me and you.
Speaker 1:And he said essentially, if I don't fix everything in your life because he knew that's why I was there I need rescue, I need you to fix things. I'm broken, everything, life. Because he knew that's why I was there. I need rescue, I need you to fix things. I'm broken, everything's broken, I'm broken, my marriage is broken, my family's broken. And he was like what if I don't fix anything but you still have me, would that be enough for you? And this was the defining moment of my life, without question, and somehow, because of my parents and others that have been in my life, there was a foundation there where I was able to go okay, god, yeah, I believe that you are enough for me, even if you don't fix my life. And I just felt, like God said okay, now we can start rebuilding.
Speaker 1:And I turned and I took I remember just taking steps right off the top of that peak and I knew that something had shifted. I knew that something had shifted. I knew that something had changed. There had been a breakthrough within me and with God. And when I got back it wasn't like Shannon was like everything's great now. You know, we still had a few years of kind of, but we were, but we began the process of walking out of it. So you kind of have to know that part of the story to know that when we got back there was another guy at Church on the Move that you know we're both friends with, who had just been fired for an inappropriate relationship with a volunteer at the church Similar thing and I got connected to him and we just said hey look, we love going to the mountains. It's an amazing way to connect with God. Last year I really experienced a breakthrough. You're at the bottom, you're hurting. Why don't you go with us? Maybe it'll be there for you? He came and he had a breakthrough and it wasn't exactly like mine. It had to do with some conversations coming down from the mountain and then a conversation in the tent that night. But for him it was a total rescue and a breakthrough. His family is still together. He's pastoring a church in Santa Barbara, california, right now. It's beautiful.
Speaker 1:But the next year, a couple more guys wanted to go, and they weren't necessarily guys like me and he had been like that, were in crisis and our whole world had fallen apart. It was just guys who were like, hey, if you can go and have an encounter with God that makes things better and changes things, I want to go. And that was 11 years ago-ish yeah, and that was 11 years ago, ish, yeah, 12 years ago. I mean my, my year was 2012. So in those next three or four years, just a few more guys started coming. I mean, you were very much on the front end of that. You were like three, maybe four years into that and, um, it was just guys going hey, let's go pursue god in the mountains and let's not just go have a dude's trip, yeah, where we're just like, hey, let's hang out in the mountains.
Speaker 1:There was like, let's talk about it before we go. Let's figure out what we're trying to accomplish. What are we needing in our life and our marriage and our career with our children, whatever, even in our just our relationship with Jesus, and every year it was like almost to a man guys were having some real progress in their life. They were. They were having some real progress in their life. They were seeing some real breakthroughs, trajectories of their lives were changing a little bit, they were finding freedom, they were getting some healing. And it was just like whoa, we didn't feel like we were creating any of that, we were just creating the conditions. And then the more guys were impacted, the more there was like man, my best friend, can he come with us next year? My brother-in-law would love this man. He needs this right now. And so that's kind of how it started and you know all this because you were a part of it from the beginning.
Speaker 1:But it just grew and grew and grew until we were like we can't keep doing this, like we've got jobs, you know, and so we had to, like, start training leaders to take guys on trips that we weren't on, and we had to. We became a 501 C three and we're like all we were trying to do is say yes to what we felt like God was saying like make more room, make more room for more guys, take more trips, because they need men, need this, they need an encounter with God, and the other thing that goes back to what I started about your story is they also need brothers around them that can hold them accountable, encourage them, believe in them. You know guys that can look at each other and say I want that for you, and they can look at that guy and say I want that for you. Like, I will pray and I will help you get to the mountain to meet with God. If you'll pray for me and help me to get to the mountain, because I need need this in my marriage or I've got this issue going on with my kids, and so just having other brothers where you're not doing it alone that's the double-edged sword of mountain men is that you're getting to grow in your relationship with your heavenly father, your creator, but you're also building real relationships, not that are just built on fantasy, football or golf, like you're like talking about real things. You're sharing your life with somebody else that can be like a I mean, I don't like to use too many military illustrations because I'm not a veteran, so I don't know but from my outside looking in, it's like brothers that you'd go to war with, brothers that you'd in the foxhole with you.
Speaker 1:It's that kind of feel because there's a level of trust. And so you put those two things together guys growing in their relationship with the Lord, guys finding real friendships and the fact that it's making a difference in their real lives. When they come back it's no wonder, and I think if we did some things differently it would grow a lot faster. But you know this We've tried to keep it pure. We don't want it to turn into some just happy meal kind of a thing. We just reproduce it everywhere. It's still invite only. Even though we're going to take 275 guys on like 30 different trips this year, it's still invite only. And so anyway, you know the story. So you can ask me whatever you want to draw out of that.
Speaker 1:But that's how we got here and it is the burning hot passion of my calling. In my life now it's like the center of the bullseye because I see God working so much in Mountain Men and I know how little I'm really making it happen. And that's a really cool place to be, having been in ministry my whole life to to look at something that, like, I'm not really doing that much. I'm having a lot of conversations, we're making sure guys have the right gear, but in terms of, like, the spiritual fruit that's being produced, we're just getting guys there asking good questions and God's just showing up and just speaking to guys and healing guys. And we're not manufacturing any of that, it's just happening organically and so that has made it like one of the most satisfying things that I've ever done in my life, because I just get to be this small part of something that really does produce meaningful fruit. So, anyway, that's kind of the mountain story.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's so good. There's so much to just to talk about the trip a little bit. And I know we don't want to talk only about a trip, but here's so we'll go into the brother thing real quick. It's like you know, I don't want to cry but I had just never been around. I just think, well, like I just was so prime for someone to really care about me.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And uh like, just that alone can carry a man. Yeah, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it can.
Speaker 2:And just the intentionality of circling up with some guys. And you know, on paper I know how it can sound. You're going to be vulnerable, you know you're going to share your feelings and all this stuff. But you know, when you get around, really cool guys, awesome dudes, you know this is for well, here's what I was taught. This is for the man who wants more of God. This is where we start with the invitation Yep, who wants more of God? Yep, so we're not like looking for cool guys, right, but that question, who wants more of God? It's really impressive on who it does attract, because all walks of life and from like, hey, you know, vocationally, all walks of life, uh, financially, all walks of life, right, I mean, that could be the same thing, just family life. Anyway, I, I, we have some really strong men in in in this, in this ministry, that are really cool, that can make impacts in impactful, uh, make an impact in a man's life. Here's where I'm going with this. It was like you really get yourself in a cool situation too.
Speaker 2:Like it's not just all feelings and let's, who's going, let's, let's, let's crack this open, let's break. Like you, get around some cool guys. Man, like this is going to be. You're, you're laughing, you're having a good time, people want it, men want to be there, they're intentional about the guys on their team and I know you've kind of just said that, but, like how you said before, it's not normal. And so when I've walked into that, when I'm thinking back of, like walking into that and um, you know I'm a man who deals with a lot of insecurities, self-worth, um, trying to over-impress so I can be included and be welcomed. Well, like that is almost make would make someone want to throw up and mountain man, they're like whoa, like this is not. You need to come as you are. You're going to be loved and well.
Speaker 1:Can I say this about that? I think we purposefully have never had a curriculum and we don't even have like a really outlined process. Now we're intentional. So if you have led our trips before, so we tell our leaders this is very intentional, start to finish. We know what we're trying to do.
Speaker 1:But it's not a system, it's a culture, and I think that has been the key. And I mean maybe for people that are listening to this, because I know you have people that listen to this from all different walks of life, maybe even in your business or the team that you lead you're going to do more with culture than you are with processes and systems. Got to have processes and systems we do too, because when you're trying to get 30 teams of guys up and down a mountain with food and gear, I mean we got lots of systems. But I just mean the thing that changes people's hearts, maybe draws them in, the way loyalty is built, the way trust is built it's around a culture. And so from the beginning and what I really want to be clear about on this is I don't think this came out of mine and Brian's brilliance, I think it was just we were just saying, okay, we've been friends for a long time, we kind of know how to be friends and brothers. He had two sisters, I had one sister. We didn't have a biological brother. So we just kind of grew up like this was what a brother should be like. We loved each other like that Meaning that sometimes we fought. Even today we get irritated at each other at times because we're very different, but we just kind of said come and be a part of this kind of from a brother culture, because that's what we knew. It wasn't like, oh, here's a super strategic way to build Mountman. There was none of that.
Speaker 1:But God showed us some things along the way and that was that if guys don't feel like there's an agenda, like if they don't walk in and go okay, this is what they want me to think, it'd be like having a curriculum with fill in the blanks. Okay, this is the right answer to that question. We were like let's not do that, let's just have real conversations. And I don't mean let's pretend to have real conversations. I mean what you're describing is let's just be dudes who are kind of in agreement, at least around the part of do you want more God in your life? Because that could mean a lot of different things. It could mean a guy that's brand new to the faith or he's just exploring God. But he's like I'm interested, I want to know more about God.
Speaker 1:And it can be pastors who are just like man, I'm working hard, I'm a little dry, I just need a little time just me and the Lord, where I'm not serving other people. It can be anything in between there younger men, older men. But if we're all kind of going, I'd like to finish this process and it's about a five or six-month process. We kick off in February, we climb in July and August. It's like, if I finish this process a little better husband, father, follower of Jesus that'd be good for me and for everybody.
Speaker 1:So I'll lean in, I'll go in and if you've got leaders who we always do co-leaders we don't have one guy. This is a guy that knows everything. No, no, no, it's two guys, usually with a different perspective. They can kind of care for the group and really they're not guides, they're not there to give advice, they're there to just go. Hey, we're wanting to pursue Jesus. It's just last year.
Speaker 1:This was really helpful for us and so we'll facilitate for you to go. I mean, that's a lot the way our leaders operate, and so it's just creating the conditions more than a process or a curriculum that allows guys to experience what you're talking about and what we discovered we didn't know this before we started is, man, that's needed. That that ended up being super contagious and, and every year guys are like can I bring two guys? Can I, can I bring somebody? This was awesome, this helped me. And we weren't going. Yeah, sure it did, we knew it would. We were going oh great, I didn't know if you'd like it or not and you've heard us say this before, but those first five years we were probably going. We hope you like it. We really think it's great. And now we just go look if you'll lean in and go all in with this. We are 99.9% sure this is going to be a good experience for you.
Speaker 1:And typically it is. I can count on one hand Over the last 10 years. Guys are just like that sucked, I don't, I don't, you know. Yeah, every guy is either saying, man, that was good for me or this was the most life-changing experience I've ever had, and I don't say that with any ego. It's like this is god doing something we just get to. We're just trying not to mess it up. Yeah, you know, and so anyway, I think it's it's culture more than it is well, I love you said that.
Speaker 2:I'm glad, yeah, it's culture and I think that's culture more than it is curriculum. Well, I love that you said that.
Speaker 2:Yeah it's culture and I think that can fast forward to everything. I was probably trying to spit out that the culture was really cool, that I walk in and I will say this, like you and Brian's leadership is just phenomenal. God really blessed me to be kind of in that first layer or so of men that were going, because it allowed me to be friends with you Before you were a pastor at Church on the Move same with Brian, become friends with him and I was on your team, you know, and then did Bible studies with you and stuff. So we really had access back then to like, wow, we're doing this together. So we really had access back then to like, wow, we're doing this together. And I said all I have to say is I've really got to watch really great leaders ask facilitate well, facilitate well.
Speaker 2:Like I remember being in awe, kind of like, wow, how did you just draw that out of a guy and I'm not trying to lift someone up on a pedestal, I know he had the Holy Spirit inside of him and Holy Spirit was involved but meaning that like it's fun, it's cool, you start talking and you really just watch God work through great leaders facilitating some conversation and letting men. You create a safe, you recreate a safe place for a man. We're all somewhat like on the same page. This is what this is about. And, going back to the all walks of life, you kind of see we're all say some of the same things, maybe a different way, and it's very powerful.
Speaker 2:And so this thing is the small group part, which is you're going to build a brotherhood, you're going to have some guys like you're assigned some leaders that are going to care for you, and that's going to be natural, like it'll work, but like it was so cool. On the intentionality of and I've talked with other guys who go on their trip like man, the servanthood on these trips, when you're like nope, we got that, we got that, you just, you just relax, we're going to take care of this for you and you're you're the guy who's usually like let me get this, Let me get that Like nope, we just want to.
Speaker 2:We just want to bless you, man, Just serve you. We're going to cook the food for you.
Speaker 2:We're going to do this Like it was hard for me, right, you know, because I'm, I'm kind of like that's my way in is to help you and to be like no, no, we're going to make you back, we're gonna make you breakfast, we're going to this and anyway, this, the culture, is the servanthood. It's just helping guys, just to like, like, you build this culture, you create this atmosphere, you set up the opportunities and let god go to work. You're getting guys in shape like you're. There's so much to this thing because there's this physical aspect to it. There is that scare the living daylights out of you because you're like man, I don't want to be the guy who can't like who. It's like it's serious, dude, it's serious. These, this mountains will break you and I've been out there. The most people in shape, the altitude got them yep, like, oh, you're strong.
Speaker 2:But today, for apparently, yeah your, your lungs on handling this thing. Um, and so it is serious business, does the mountain? Doesn't care who you are, it will break you down. So you have to prepare that way. You have to prepare, you get to prepare spiritually because, like, what are we doing here? We're asking, seeking, knocking, so we need to start preparing. Yeah, um, there's just like it's hard. That's why it's hard to put on paper, because as you go through this journey and it's usually for a man, it starts off on kickoff night, if you're really dialed in, or not even halfway dialed in, of like, because the practical stuff will start kicking in. I got someone who's checking on me. Hey, hope you guys are doing well. Don't forget to start your nutrition. Don't forget, we're going to go to the training.
Speaker 2:Hey, why don't you read this chapter in the book of so-and-so? I mean it just kind of like starts, you know it just kind of starts, and so all of this surrounding you for half a year. That's why it's hard to put it on a piece of paper. It's the culture. It becomes a part of your life. It's the culture it's become. It becomes your lot a part of your life. It's an under brewing part of your life, yes, which is awesome. Yes, like like I remember just being a part of this and I am a part of it, but just being introduced to it. Of like having this brotherhood, yeah, just underlying, under it's brewing, it's's there, it's you know to to to joke about it. Of like the secret society, I mean, cause there was kind of this like what are they doing? Like how do you even get on this thing?
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:So anyway, we'll, we'll keep moving on but like it's, it's hard to describe, especially in a podcast or just on paper, talking to someone off the cuff. I think that's why you know I've invited a lot of guys throughout the years and you're just very specific on like who you're going to give your time to, on talking about this, because it's not a lot of times it's not real. They got, they got to be ready. You know God's going to lead you to who needs to be invited to, because someone could easily be like and you know it's more than that.
Speaker 1:Right, and that's such a key part of it, Mark, because in order for mountain men to have the impact that I know it can have, the participant has to want something. Yeah, they have to be hungry for something. And if a guy just wants to go climb a mountain because that sounds cool or hang out with some guys, I'm pretty confident he's going to miss the best part of Mountain Men. And so we actually actively try to discourage guys from that. You've heard us say it a hundred times, but we believe Mountain Men is for every man, but that doesn't mean that this is his year, because he's got to want something deeply to really get there. And this is a principle that we kind of know like you're going to get out of something what you put into it. And Mountain man just says right up front there's a high commitment here, Don't do this if you're not going to go all in.
Speaker 1:And some guys get offended by that. They're like you know who are you to tell me I can't be a part of this? But we've been okay, balancing that tension, kind of the secret society thing. You have guys come and say, well, I'm not in the cool group so I can't get in. It's like no, no, no. It's just like the guys that ask around a lot, they end up on mountain trips, yeah, Because they're demonstrating. Man, I want something of this.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I don't think we have enough things in our life in the modern world like they did in ancient times, like these milestones, these rites of passage. Specifically for men I mean because that's what we're talking about and I know you have female listeners too, but I just for men there were these rites of passage that were pretty important and we don't really have much of that anymore Graduation from high school or college or something. But to be able to, for a man to feel we use this word a lot to feel a little bit initiated, both in the company of other men that he respects, but also in the accomplishment of a very difficult task, to fulfill it and go, I was able to do that really, really hard thing. I put my effort toward it, I gave myself to it and I did it, and there were all these other great things that came from it.
Speaker 1:We have this phrase, it's like built into our logo. It's so central to us and that is the mountain is just the excuse and we really want guys to understand that. Is it really really cool to climb a mountain? Absolutely, it's my number one favorite hobby. But we're not going just to mark off. We climbed X amount of 14,000 foot, feet. That's not what this is about to just say.
Speaker 1:I'm a mountain climber. The mountain is this excuse for us to go on an adventure, which I think most men are hungry for? Adventure, especially when you get deep into career life and family life, you just feel like all you do is responsibility, it's just duty responsibility, or you're selfish, you're just doing duty responsibility, or you're escaping. To go on that golf trip to Myrtle Beach and I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that, go play golf with your boys. But I just mean we're kind of medicating with adventure. And this is more like hey, go on an adventure and it's so key you said it, mark that you might fail at, you might be the weak link on this team, and that's devastating for most men, especially builders and alphas.
Speaker 1:They're like I'm not going to be the weak link and so putting yourself in a spot where you're like, man, if I don't train, if I don't take this seriously, I might not make it. I mean, I don't mean you won't come back, you might not make it to the top and others on your team might.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 1:I don't want to be that guy, and so it draws something out of men to say give yourself to this, devote your time, be disciplined. It's building muscles within us, both physical and emotional and mental, that say it's worth it for me to discipline myself for something better in the future.
Speaker 1:It's like I'm not just thinking about my present self, I'm thinking about my future self, and my future self wants to stand on the summit with my boys, with my brothers from this team. And then you can apply that to a lot of other areas in your life, your spiritual life, your family life. You can say, okay, I've proven to myself that I can take on a big challenge, and so I'm going to apply that in other parts of my life. And you have other men around you that are like you did it. You did it, you were right there with us. You were not the weak link, you know. And so there's so many things.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a lot of places bring out the worst in men. That's where toxic masculinity and these things came from, and I hate that phrase, but it does have some truth in it. There have been some men that have used power and position to get what they want, and this is a challenge to men and obviously it's for men of God. But I think these principles apply. They're going to produce good results. Whether you follow Jesus or not, I would say follow Jesus. That's where real life comes from. But even if you don't, even if it's in your business or whatever, maybe you're still asking those questions. I think most men still want to be the best version of themselves.
Speaker 1:Absolutely and so that's partly what I mean, and you've grown from it and I've grown from it Just because I'm the co-founder doesn't mean that every year I'm not growing and I'm not seeking the Lord and I'm not being blessed by a brotherhood, because I need a brotherhood too. I'm not an island. I get discouraged, and so it's kind of everybody wins and not just the men. Sorry, I'm going off, mark.
Speaker 1:No, it's great, not just the men, but when men are getting better as husbands, fathers and followers of Jesus, marriages are better, wives are cared for and loved and children have good dads that are present and tell them they love them and that they're proud of them. And for most of us as men, some of the missing piece of that. This is no shot at our dads, but our dads did the best they could with what they had, and so what we're trying to do is build upon that and do an even better job with our kids than our dads did with us, and we all know how important that is. We all know that your relationship with your dad, good or bad, impacts a lot, and so Mountain Men is not just a blessing to the men that go.
Speaker 1:I mean, that's my dream and my heart and what I've seen, but it's that families and churches are better because they have mature or maturing men in them that serve and give, and communities are better, that neighborhoods are better and workplaces are better because men are exercising character and they're ethical, because they're just becoming better men. So there's this downstream effect that if we can do this well and not screw it up, that it becomes this flourishing benefit to kind of the world, and I don't mean the whole world, but the world that we live in, the worlds that we occupy and man, for me that's like there's nothing better I could spend my time on than something like that.
Speaker 2:Well, there's a lot of adventures out there and you talk about this a lot. There's a lot of things you can go do to get an excursion and to have a great. You know, you can hire a guide, you can do this and um, but but you and you're going to grow, you're right. I mean, someone challenged some.
Speaker 1:Some corporate guy challenges themselves and puts it on the calendar. And every day is that work? Do the triathlon.
Speaker 2:Yeah, triathlon, that's right, I'm gonna go on a mountain, I'm gonna go climb everest or whatever it is like it's gonna change you, of course, and and there could be some deep spiritual thing to it. But adding in the, the brotherhood aspect to it, adding in serving others, um it, the adventure is obviously amazing, the you get, you get to the kickoff meeting and you're showing just slide shows of, like this, the summit photos are just, they're unbelievable and yeah, we're here in oklahoma. So yeah, you're. You're this not the normal for us?
Speaker 2:right, we can't zip over to some trails. No, and just like yeah, we're gonna spend all day climbing a mountain and just go home tonight yeah no, it's not gonna happen.
Speaker 2:I mean, this is a big, big, big, big deal and you've created you and brian have created something where someone could say yes to this thing and be taken care of for the next six months really taken care of, like, honestly, my trips were, someone was taking care of me. I'm just hopping in a car and I'm there and back and I just follow the direction of others. It's, it's unheard of. I want to start going faster, cause I want to get into some other questions. But yeah, the adventure stuff it's. I mean, we'll just kind of keep. We'll come back again and talk some more about it, but it's, it's pretty late.
Speaker 2:You're, you're doing some great stuff and I want to say this to it you kind of get someone on their first trip and you're just solely thinking about that trip. And then you do the trip and it's like anything else. It's like more than likely, that was just your first step. Yeah, because the next year God has something for you.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like this is you like a lot of people, like how God works? How God works, there are some instant miracles, totally delivered on the spot 180. There are those stories. Those are stories that we have at church. There's stories that we have at Mountain Men. There's also and Pastor George has talked about it just like this last week of like it didn't instantly happen. There's a journey you're going to go through, there is a process that God wants to take you through, and so, man, some of these trips, guys come back and the wives aren't ready to forgive yet.
Speaker 1:Right right.
Speaker 2:And they're like it didn't completely turn around Right, it was just step one. You were supposed to be on this trip. We've scratched the surface. You need to keep going, and that's what's really cool, too, is that you've stayed faithful to this ministry and made an opportunity for men to continue to come back and serve and just grow. And so let me ask you this what would you say a top couple of challenges that you see the most Like? Is there some the themes that you see in men that are that we, as men, like this is our main attack. This is what a majority we're facing and that we're dealing with. What are you seeing out there?
Speaker 1:There's a couple things that come to my mind. The first thing that comes to my mind is and this is not original to me, I can't remember who said this, but they said the number one challenge that men are facing in this day and age. Most of us would go it's got to be porn, it's got to be sexual stuff. Yeah, that's pretty bad and it has to be addressed. But this guy said it's not porn, it's not greed, it's not pride though pride is a part of every kind of sin but he said maybe the most dangerous thing that men are dealing with is passivity. But it said maybe the most dangerous thing that men are dealing with is passivity.
Speaker 1:That and this was the sin of the of the garden of Eden. For those that are familiar with the Genesis story of Adam and Eve, adam's first sin, if Eve took the apple from the tree that they were told not to eat of, adam had an opportunity to say let's not do that, but instead he let her eat the apple and when she said, hey, you try it too, he's like, oh, okay, and he took it. A lot of passivity there. And I, and we're living in a culture now that is constantly saying to men you had your chance, you blew it, you're toxic, everything masculine is wrong. You sit down and shut up and let women you know that they're smarter. I mean, look at every male figure in television in the last 20 years. He's a, he's an oaf, he's an idiot. If it's not for his wife, you know, he can't even dress himself Like. And that's the yeah, that's this imagery of men are pretty stupid. Now, those of us are men know that. That's that's. That's true. On some level We've all done stupid things, but it's created in us this passivity where, especially when it comes to, like, spiritual things or even parenting, we would just prefer to just kind of defer to our wife. She's probably better at it anyway, she's, you know, she probably knows better than we do. And in that passivity, um, powerlessness emerges. And so I think one of the saddest things for me as a pastor because not only do I do mountain men, but I'm the pastor one of the pastors, at a very large church here in Tulsa, and so I counsel with couples all the time and the recurring theme that I see when I sit in front of couples that are going through really hard things is that there's just an unbelievable lack of maturity, usually on both parts, but especially on the part of men. It's just an unwillingness to grow up, and we live in a culture where we're not really encouraged to grow up. I mean even and I've got adult sons. But I noticed even from the time I was a kid and there's some amazing research out there a guy named Jonathan Haidt has written a couple of books just about the next generation, what social media has done to our kids, what just the internet, the iPhone, these things have kind of changed us as a culture. But what you're seeing is kind of where you and I, mark, were at 18, kids today are about that same spot at 21 or 22. It's just that there's just a delayed. Let's grow up, take a lot of responsibility.
Speaker 1:I'm a big fan of Jordan Peterson. I don't know if your listeners would know who he is, but his whole message. He has a lot of spiritual things to say, but really the message that made him popular was he was speaking not only but primarily to young men, saying do hard things, clean your room, pick up something heavy and carry it, sacrifice. And guess what? There was a whole generation, including some from our generation, that were going. Yeah, that sounds like it's a lot more meaningful than this easy, comfort-pursuing life lazy video game.
Speaker 1:Netflix do what I want to do, like I'm still a kid. He calls it the Peter Pan syndrome. There's the unwillingness to grow up and if you've ever heard him talk about that, he's like what happens when you're supposed to grow up and you don't grow up. He's like Peter Pan is this picture of. He's the king of Neverland. Like these are things I never thought about before. He's the leader of the lost boys. He, peterson, calls Tinkerbell the fairy of porn. Like she demands nothing from you, but you get something from her. She adores you, but she demands that. Like a wife expects you to be a husband, and so I think that's the biggest challenge that I see is and what I'm seeing is a turn of the tide a little bit.
Speaker 1:I see that both in the world outside the church and in the world inside the church, men are starting to go. I do think I want to take more responsibility. I do think that's a path to a better life, which is what Jesus taught he's like. If you lay yourself down for others, you're going to find your life in it. If you only focus on yourself and what you want, you're going to lose yourself. In that you won't find the satisfaction that you're looking for, and so I think that would be the primary thing that I see is men just needing men in particular.
Speaker 1:But I think it's true culturally stepping up in the area of self-sacrifice, laying yourself down for others that was the model of Jesus to us, and I think that's a key element in finding the life, whether it's in your business, in your marriage, whatever. Finding the life you want is going to be counterintuitive. It's going to be countercultural, because so much of our world in the last I don't know 50, 60 years has been technology says make it easier, make it easier, make it easier, and I'm glad. I'm glad we have dishwashers, I'm glad that my phone is a handy tool, but there's a there's a other side to that coin that has stripped a lot of life away from us, and even watching it with my adult kids, that kind of their high school age was the age of social media and just what that's done in terms of the way they interact and relate to people.
Speaker 1:I heard this girl and we'll go on to your next question, but I heard this girl. She's a Gen Z girl. I think her name was India Fry. She was on a podcast and she was kind of diagnosing what she sees among Gen Z and she said something fascinating to me. She said that they interviewed a bunch of Gen Z young people and that they found that like 60 to 75% of those that they interviewed said that they Snapchat, tiktok, like the thing, instagram, the things that they were on so much they were on them all the time but they kind of wished that they weren't. And she was saying when in history have we gotten these technological advancements that we all use and we wish we didn't? She's talking about the hair dryer, the washing machine. These technological advancements came and we were so glad. Some of these in more recent years have been technological advancements that we all are participating in, but we're not really sure if we should be. That's a weird place to be. Anyway, I went off on a tangent.
Speaker 2:No, I love it. We'll have you back to continue to talk about a lot of this stuff. This is cool. I think that I'm not a man's man yeah to you know, just I tease myself about it. I mean, that's, that's probably a little too harsh. You know what I mean?
Speaker 2:it's just like you mean by that yeah, um the outdoorsman the fixer-upper, the um, and yeah, I want to be careful there because I do tease about myself a lot and and and my it's a. It's a joke in my household, you know, and and with between me and my wife and it's all friendly, you know. Um, but yeah, every now and then we're in a rush or whatever. Sure, I can get the power drill, but I know I'm not the good at it and I'm going to mess something up.
Speaker 2:So I'm like I'd rather just hire someone you know like we have the tiniest yard in the world, we've got someone at a great price.
Speaker 2:Zip in and zip out of there like yeah, you know I don't take pride and like I move my own lawn right you know, um, you know I'm getting to the I like I don't take pride in that I put on, I put up the shelves in my garage, just like, and I so there's this, that joke that I have amongst like my family or whatever like, and just, yeah, I think I work really hard and it's not my what we call up arrow at my church, at our church or whatever, and so could I maybe. Yes, anyway, here's where I'm going, here's where I'm going, like all the teasing that I can make about myself myself. I have done hard things. I do hard things and I think every now and then I have to show that and um, and that's okay, you know what I mean. Like, I just I'm, I'm about to be 46, so I'm, I'm a long ways from when I did a lot of hard stuff as a kid, yeah, and as a young adult, and really hard work.
Speaker 2:You know I'm, I was up on the roof as a kid and I didn't have the power, like, like we, I was, we did some older houses and I had to do with the hammer. I mean there's, I can name them off. So I, I keep that stuff in my back pocket.
Speaker 1:You bet.
Speaker 2:Cause I just didn't evolve to like anyway, here's where I'm going. Thing about mountain men is that, like you, were forced to get out there in the dirt, you know, and to set up a base camp and to go to the bathroom outside. Yeah, you're, you're, you're getting water from a stream, like you're learning to like. Well, how do we get this water clean? Like the stuff that you don't think about? Right, like you're? You force us out in nature. Yes, you force us to get out in nature to, and we bring food and stuff. So, like you know, we're not trying to kill something out there and eat it because it's cool to have luxury. But this is this trip too. To come back to mountain man, it's like there is this, like you're gonna put whatever you need for the next few days in a pack. That's what you have for the next few days. So this is importance of your organization having the list. Now, that's like, man, I didn't know I would need a knife out here. Like I didn't know. Like things that you just learn and and become neat. And some guys are like, yeah, I do this all the time, but what's really cool about this trip is you don't have to be that guy that does this all the time. You can be that guy.
Speaker 2:That was like me and then, like I think I went camping one time as a kid and now I'm like in the wilderness for a few days straight. But it makes it like should be anyway. With technology today you couldn't get a signal in a lot of places, but you can really get disconnected. And that brings this spirituality to where, like, you're intentionally getting away, and I'm just thinking about doing hard things. I'm thinking about, uh, like when you start going down the road of like there's I was watching this real one time like this guy talking about dirt. You know it's just like man, my kids there's a lot of kids will never really feel dirt through their fingers and smell it and know it, and it does kind of like put some energy inside you to like maybe I should start a garden or something. Like I just whoa, taking something natural, and like all that is intertwined in what you're providing to men too, and maybe it's there is it's like, yeah, mountains, but a lot of what we don't think about is you're trekking to a base camp.
Speaker 2:You're going through something. On a lot of our peaks you're working hard. Before you start the hard work. Right right, you got to work as a team and you got to use your brain out there and you got to be thinking. Your senses are all active at certain times and you're against elements Not to scare anybody from the weather. But we can't, we can't help the weather. Right right, it's gonna rain and wind and it's like sucks, so bad sometimes. The thing about this trip there's a lot of times like why am I on this trip? Right right, and then you find out why you're on this trip yeah, dude, it's hard yeah it's hard, so I don't want to ramble on that either.
Speaker 2:But I know we were going down like there's this there. There is no one extreme is dumb too. It's just like yeah, I mean, it would be nice to drive a luxury car and the Bluetooth happens instantly and I can conduct a business for a car ride.
Speaker 1:Sure, that is very nice yeah.
Speaker 2:That that, like I'm not using dial up internet anymore, we can really get some stuff done.
Speaker 1:I'm not anti-technology, no, I know, you're not 100% Just know it's got pros and cons and the way that John Eldredge, the writer, we're at a live.
Speaker 2:I'm going to let you talk, but we are in a place in life we could go without ever doing hard things if we wanted to, and a lot of people do. That's right. So the joke with myself is like I'm choosing that yes, you bet, because I want to spend my time another way.
Speaker 1:I think we almost have to choose it. Well, at least people that live roughly the same way you and I do. I'm sure there are people in places of the world, or there are people in places here in the United States, that have no choice but to do really, really hard things. But there's also a lot of us. I mean, compared to other countries, we're very wealthy in this country. We have a lot that's at our fingertips. And so what John Eldredge says, one of my favorite authors he says this and it stuck with me so much. He said 90 plus percent of everything we do every day in the modern world is touching, seeing, smelling, interacting with things that are man-made.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's good.
Speaker 1:When we go out with only our backpack and those little thin nylon tents and we're up there hours away from retail emergency services, we're away from everything, and nothing's getting there quick, even in a helicopter it's not getting there immediate and you're immersed, with the exception of just what you brought on your backpack into this massive wilderness. 90-plus percent of everything you touch, see, interact with smell, is God-made yeah, and that there's. I mean we were created by God and put into a world that was designed for us. Again, I'm not anti-technology, I'm not saying we should all sleep under the stars. I'm just saying there's something I think in that comes from the reality that I didn't make this. This was here before me, this will be here after me. And look at its beauty, look at its wildness, look at its beauty and like you feel very small. I know you have. When you look, you're like, wow, I'm small. But one of the beautiful things about Mountman is we can go up there and I you're like wow.
Speaker 1:I'm small, but one of the beautiful things about mountain men is we can go up there and I get to say this to every group I'm with and say do you not feel really, really small? Like this is dangerous too? Like one big rock shifts and I'm squashed, you know, like like this is a dangerous place. And yet in all of this wet, vast wilderness, the thing that God cares most about on this mountain right now is us.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're his children.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this is his creation, but we're his sons, yeah, and you know, and so like there's something about that. That, that way of describing the, the 90% is steering wheel, keyboard, cell phone, TV, kitchen sink. It's all manmade and that's okay.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but getting yourself out there, where everything? Where do I get my water when I'm out there? Like you said, out of a stream, and then I pump it through a filter so it doesn't make me sick. But it's interacting with things that man did not make and there's something about that. That's just really beneficial.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's just something great about and I want to shift off the trip. Something great about and I want to shift off the trip, but like, like that's where they're again to the. So much about it that you're not thinking about until you're out there like, wow, this is very dangerous. Yeah, if you let your mind get there, then you're really scared. Yeah, um, it's supposed to be dangerous it's supposed to be hard, it's supposed to be adventurous and, um, it's really cool.
Speaker 2:So I want to, as we're really we're running low on time here. I want to let me pick a couple of last questions. You're a father of two sons. You have led and you're currently leading a lot of men but, like just over the years, man, you just have spent a lot of precious time, serious time, with a lot of men, a lot of sons that aren't your sons. Would you do anything different? You're here for a reason. God's put you on this certain journey and he's plucked you out and, like, this is going to be, this is your journey. You have choices to make through these years where it's like man, my call, my passion, my attention is going to be on serving a lot of other families. All the time Now I've been around your boys, man. They're stellar and you could tell them how well they love you. Yeah, they love being around you and your wife Shannon. You have a great family and they're serving God right now. So obviously you did a lot of good things and the right things. Looking back, would you tweak anything or adjust anything?
Speaker 1:Yes, I'll tell you what was such a terrible part of being a dad. That ended up being a blessing because of God. The terrible part is I had an affair which I talked about a minute ago and I had to deal with when my boys were young, like, are they ever going to forgive me? Not that I mean they were so little, it wasn't like they were making me feel bad about it, but it was like they were old enough to know what happened. They were making me feel bad about it, but it was like they. They were old enough to know what happened. And as they got older, we we told them more not gory details, but we told them more about what had happened and I always lived with this. Will they ever respect me? Will they always be a little bit upset with me that I did that to their mom? I always lived with that. But as hard as that was as a dad to feel like I had really let them down and failed as a dad, let Shannon down, failed as a husband, them being close to us as God put us back together has ended up being one of the best contributions I think that Shannon and I have made into their lives, because they got to see that you will fail. We're all going to fail on some level. It's a matter of what will you do after you fail, and so even though I wish I wouldn't have failed they are very acquainted with the reality that when you fail, you can repent, you can turn back to God, you can attempt to seek forgiveness and change your ways, and there's a path back to real life. And I think nobody has seen that more clearly than they have, because they've had a front row seat. They hear us share our testimony all the time. They're well aware of what happened and they're well aware that we have a very, very strong family, that Shannon and I have a very deep love for each other. So they got to see how you come back from failure in a vivid way, and so what I thought was my greatest failure as a dad and it was God has. This way of turning it to it strengthens those two boys. They're not glad that that happened, but they know how to recover from disaster because they saw it. So that's an interesting thing.
Speaker 1:I think I've been chewing on this that there's two times in the Gospels where God speaks to Jesus or speaks out loud for people to hear about Jesus. It's when he's baptized and when he comes up out of the water it says a voice was audibly heard that said this is my beloved son, in whom I'm well pleased. That was God's pronouncement over him. And then Jesus goes into the desert for temptation before he starts his ministry. But the other time is like it it's at the Mount of Transfiguration and Jesus is on the top of this mountain and he's got a couple of his disciples with him and God speaks again in that moment. He says the same thing. He says this is my beloved son, in whom I'm well pleased. Listen to him is what he says that time, and I've been thinking about that a lot.
Speaker 1:So for dads and this is where I wish I would have done a little bit better what does a son need more than anything else? A son needs more than because sons need discipline. We all know that my sons need a swift kick in the butt most of the time because they're being lazy or they're being knuckleheads. And I don't believe in parenting like do whatever you want. I don't believe in that we are to discipline our kids. But what they need more than anything else is what the Heavenly Father did for His Son, which is to say I love you and I'm proud of you. And what's interesting about both, when he goes into the temptation and then what he says in the second part is I love you and I'm proud of you, before you do anything. Before God was saying at the Mount of Transfiguration, I think he was saying this is my son, I love him and I'm pleased with him, and he does have work to do. He has a message to share. You should listen to it. But it's not based on his message that I love him and I'm proud of him. And Jesus' ministry hadn't even started when he was baptized and God was just saying, declaring before you do anything and this is really good, dads, listen to this Before your kids do anything, do they know that they are your son or your daughter, who loves them and is proud of them, just because of who they are? Because most of us grow up. Most of the men, even some of the women listening to this podcast, are going.
Speaker 1:Yeah, if I'm honest, I always felt like I needed to do certain things to earn my mom and dad's love. If I did the right stuff, they loved me. If I did the right stuff, they accepted me. But God flipped that on its head and I wish I would have done a little bit more of that, because I was especially hard on Ethan, my oldest not quite as bad on Isaac, but I was always pushing him. Pushing him, pushing him to reach his potential, to live fully who I knew he could be. But sometimes it felt to him like he had to do certain things to make me happy and he would even say that I mean, we have that kind of relationship. He would say when will I ever do enough? I'm like man. That's not the message I wanted to send. I really do love him, but he got the message from me I'll love you more if you work hard. I'll love you more if you'll always have integrity and never tell a lie. That was the message, and I think we've got to tell our kids to work hard. We've got to tell our kids to have integrity. We've got to guide them that way. But you are mine, my son, my daughter, who I love and who I'm proud of before you do anything. That's what I wish.
Speaker 1:I would have understood a little bit better when they were younger, and I'm understanding it better now, and I'm trying to help dads understand it more now, that trying to help dads understand it more now that even if your kid deserves discipline, they need to be grounded, they need to be corrected. They can't associate that with your love and acceptance and that they are yours, because there's something about. I tell them this is true, we all know this. No one else will ever take the place of your mom and dad. It's just the way it is. And so that means dad's moms.
Speaker 1:Take it really seriously, be really intentional, because can you be an adopted parent and just love, like absolutely? And orphans need people that will adopt them as their own, 100%. But what happens when orphans get older? They're curious about where they came from. So if that's your child, if that's your son or your daughter, know that no one else will have the voice that you have as a dad. So whether you use that for good and it's a benefit for them, or whether you're careless with it and you hurt them or you frustrate them or you discourage them, they will carry that with them. So the intentionality of making sure those two things are in place before anything else, and then discipline, sure. Accountability, sure. But I love you because you're my son, my daughter, and I'm proud of you because of who you are, before you do anything. I think that's the best bit of advice I would give to dads in particular.
Speaker 2:I almost wish we would have started with that. This opens up so much. That's really good. Well, I'll ask you one last question. Okay, podcast is lasting impact.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So my question to you is what does lasting impact mean to you?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've been thinking about that and obviously I'm a man of faith, I'm a follower of Jesus, so I believe there is life after this life. I believe in an eternity, and so I'm. I'm always thinking when I think lasting impact, I think what is going to matter in 100 years from now, what am I putting my hand to that will make a difference 100 years from now? And really, for me, that boils down to our people coming to know Christ in such a way that their life after this life is with him, is in the new earth and the new heaven. It is in the new earth and the new heaven. It is in the family of God. And there's a second layer to that, which is are people coming to know Christ in a saving way? But also, are those people making an impact in their world? That is also eternal.
Speaker 1:So when I was talking before about what's a better use of my life and my time than helping men become better husbands and fathers and followers of Jesus, because all those things have generational impact. They don't just make a difference today, but that may be something that I'm doing. Let's take mountain men, for example. But even in the church this happens a lot in the church too. But we'll just take mountain men, since we've talked about that quite a bit.
Speaker 1:If a dad goes on a few mountain men trips and he breaks the cycle that he got from his dad, which was maybe it was alcoholism, maybe it was not treating women very well, maybe it was just being angry and letting that come out on his children, if that's been happening because one dad handed it to another dad, if something of what we're doing causes that cycle to break and a man that would otherwise have been angry and had fits of rage and made his family afraid of him, whether he physically hurt them or not I don't even mean that, I just mean like an environment that was scary for children or that they were afraid of their father. If something we do can break that and then he teaches his children or his sons a different way and then that son can build upon that and make it even better. Like that to me feels like lasting impact upon that and make it even better.
Speaker 1:That to me, feels like lasting impact. That to me, feels like it's changing generations. And again, I don't want to think too highly of what we're doing. I mean, we're just trying to say yes to what God is doing. But to me that's where I think about lasting impact is what I'm putting my efforts toward making a difference for eternity, and is it making a difference in people's lives. That can, that can translate generationally, and so that's that's, that's that's what drives me for lasting impact.
Speaker 2:Dude that's awesome. I know I feel like we're scratching the surface.
Speaker 1:We'll have to circle back.
Speaker 2:So thank you for being here, man. It means a lot to me. Of course, you mean a lot to me yeah dude, you're really one of the most impactful people in my life and I love you and I appreciate you. This is Lee Martin, and he is making a lasting impact. Thank you, brother. If you liked today's conversation and want to hear more, hit that subscribe button. Don't forget. Thank you, brother.