BeTempered Episode 80 - The Journey From Addiction to Influence with Tim Clowers and the God Who Met Him There

A locked door at 3 a.m., a voice that asked one piercing question, and a church parking lot where a bag of drugs met a trash can. Tim Clowers’ turning points do not read like safe, polished faith stories. They read like real life. On this episode of BeTempered, hosts Dan Schmidt and Ben Spahr sit down with the Knoxville chef and creator behind Cook It With Tim to unpack an extraordinary arc, from addiction and anger after his brother’s death to Bible college, missions across 66 countries, and a calling that keeps reshaping itself through service.

Tim brings us into his years in Southeast Asia organizing large leadership conferences, including the tragic Manila hotel fire that claimed 88 attendees. What followed was a masterclass in accountable compassion, coordinating restitution, sending bodies home, and personally visiting 86 families to grieve, listen, and help. We explore how forgiveness, especially toward a father who finally showed up, can remake a man from the inside out, and why choosing presence over constant travel changed the trajectory for his own kids.

Back in Tennessee, a catering shift ended with pans of fresh food in a Corolla trunk and a simple, brave decision: drive under the bridge and feed whoever was there. That night birthed Juniper Worldwide, a nonprofit rooted in Isaiah 55:13 and focused on consistent Friday outreach. From a living room Bible study to a driveway smoker during COVID to millions of followers drawn by barbecue and everyday encouragement, Tim shares how digital ministry and community outreach can live under one roof without losing the plot. He also opens up about launching a church, the pain of closing it, and the pastoral wisdom that helped him follow what God was clearly blessing.

Along the way, you will hear about blended family lessons, being introduced as “my dad” for the first time, and a surprising moment on a country music stage when an old prophecy that he would speak to thousands came true. Food, faith, and service meet here without pretense. If you have wrestled with addiction recovery, forgiveness, burnout, or purpose, Tim’s story offers a grounded path forward: show up, serve well, and let the blessing lead.

Connect with BeTempered and the hosts:
BeTempered website: https://betempered.com

BeTempered on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/betempered

Connect with Tim and Cook It With Tim:
 Website and recipes: https://cookitwithtim.com

YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@CookItWithTim

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cookitwithtim

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cheftimothyclowers

Link hub for all platforms and resources: https://linktr.ee/cookitwithtim

Amazon storefront: https://www.amazon.com/shop/influencer-5fdccbaf

If this conversation gave you hope, follow BeTempered, share it with a friend, and leave a quick review. When you support the show and check out these links, you help more people find stories of real faith and resilient lives.

Chapters

• 0:00 Sponsor Message & Patreon Invite
• 2:09 Welcome And Guest Introduction
• 3:28 Tim’s Emotional Arrival And Intent
• 5:20 Marriage Teamwork, Ministry, And Baptism Joy
• 7:43 Childhood, Absent Father, And Brother’s Death
• 12:55 Descent Into Addiction And Alcohol
• 16:36 A Midnight Wake-Up Call From God
• 18:57 TV Seeds Of Faith And Dallas Detour
• 21:04 Surrender Night And Throwing The Drugs Away
• 22:50 Bible College, Missions Call, Philippines Move
• 26:22 Forgiving His Father And Healing A Rift
• 29:10 Surviving Divorce And Choosing Trust
• 31:25 Single Dad Reset And Moldova Trip
• 34:09 Meeting Jackie And Blending A Family
• 37:18 Choosing Presence Over Constant Travel
• 39:45 Stepdad Lessons And Being Called “Dad”
• 43:32 Rapid-Life Recap: From Addict To Missionary
• 46:40 Miracles In Kenya And A Call To Southeast Asia
• 50:05 Building Massive Conferences Abroad
• 53:08 Manila Hotel Fire Tragedy And Aftermath
• 57:52 Visiting 86 Families And Making Amends
• 1:01:06 Returning Home And Ministry Shifts
• 1:04:22 Knoxville Move, Catering, And “We Can Do It”
• 1:07:24 Juniper Worldwide Born Under A Bridge
• 1:10:08 Home Bible Studies, BBQ, And TikTok Growth
• 1:13:06 Planting A Church, Burnout, And Tough Closure
• 1:17:10 Following The Blessing: Social Media Calling
• 1:20:15 Prophecy Fulfilled: Speaking To Thousands
• 1:23:14 Country Festival MC And Quiet Gospel Moments
• 1:27:00 Park-Bench Question: Mother Teresa Or Osteen
• 1:30:02 Final Reflections, Where To Find Tim, Closing Sponsor

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

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SPEAKER_07: 0:04

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SPEAKER_00: 0:26

Patron's Class, a clear choice.

SPEAKER_05: 0:29

I want to share something that's become a big part of the Be Tempered mission. Patreon. Now, if you've never used it before, Patreon is a platform where we can build community together. It's not just about supporting the podcast, it's about having a space where we can connect on a deeper level, encourage one another, and walk this journey of faith, resilience, and perseverance side by side. Here's how it works. You can join as a free member and get access to daily posts, behind-the-scenes updates, encouragement, and some things I don't always put out on other platforms. And if you feel called to support the mission financially, there are different levels where you can do that too. That support helps us keep producing the podcasts, creating gear, hosting events, and sharing stories that we believe can truly impact lives. And here's the cool part Patreon has a free app you can download right on your phone. It works just like Facebook or Instagram, but it's built specifically for our community. You'll be able to scroll through posts, watch videos, listen to content, and interact with others who are on the same journey. At the end of the day, this isn't just about content, it's about connection. It's about building something together. Not just me and men putting out episodes, but a family of people committed to growing stronger through real stories and real faith. So whether you just want to hop on as a free member or you feel called to support in a bigger way, Patreon is the door into that community. Because at the heart of Be Tempered has always been simple.

SPEAKER_07: 2:09

Welcome to the Be Tempered Podcast, where we explore the art of finding balance in a chaotic world.

SPEAKER_03: 2:14

Join us as we delve into insightful conversations, practical tips, and inspiring stories to help you navigate life's ups and downs with grace and resilience.

SPEAKER_07: 2:22

We're your host, Dan Schmidt, and Ben Sparr. Let's embark on a journey to live our best lives.

SPEAKER_03: 2:28

This is Be Tempered.

SPEAKER_07: 2:30

What's up, everybody? Welcome to the Be Tempered Podcast, episode number 80. 80. Man, we're cruising right along. That's like three in a row I nailed. I'm so proud of myself. Got one job. Hey, today's guest is someone whose story embodies what Bee Tempered is all about resilience, redemption, and a heart for service. Chef Tim Clowers from Knoxville, Tennessee, has spent over 20 years in the restaurant and catering industry. He's traveled the world, experienced cultures through their food, and brought those flavors and lessons back home to share with others. But what truly defines Tim isn't just his talent in the kitchen, it's in his compassion and calling to serve. Alongside with his wife, Jackie, Tim founded Juniper Worldwide in 2018, a nonprofit born from a deep desire to feed both body and soul. Together they can often be found downtown under Knoxville's bridges, feeding the hungry, listening, and offering hope to those in need. Rooted in Isaiah 55, verse 13, Juniper's mission is to help transform thorn bushes into junipers, to help people grow where pain once stood, and to turn despair into purpose. Their outreach has become a movement of its own, a gathering of volunteers who have become family. Through Tim's company, Cook It with Tim, they've equipped countless people with tools, training, and confidence to build a future in the hospitality industry. And what makes Tim's story even more powerful is his journey to get here. Mark Broker, who recommended Tim for the podcast, said it best. Tim and his wife, Jackie, aren't blood relatives, but their family to Megan and me. They helped us through some of the hardest times in our life. Tim has shown me the power of faith, prayer, and truly listening to God. His story, growing up, battling addiction, finding faith, going through divorce and redemption, ministry, juniper worldwide, and traveling the globe. All of it's rooted in perseverance and growth. Everything with Tim leads back to Jesus. No matter how successful you are, he reminds you to give thanks and to praise him. So to today, we unpack that story. A story of redemption, faith, and finding purpose through service. Tim, welcome to the Beatemper Podcast.

SPEAKER_02: 5:01

Glad to be here. Those are some words that I hope to live up to. Spoken by a true, I won't even say friend, but my brother and his wife and little Annabelle. Wow. Sorry, that that made me emotional. I know some probably not the open people like, well, welcome. But when someone else says something about you, that's that's really what defines you. I would never talk about myself like that.

SPEAKER_07: 5:35

It's pretty awesome. It told me a lot about the man that you are because you know Mark uh and I's friendship is is pretty new. And uh we were walking one day in the Arboretum and he he said you need to interview Tim. He's been so impactful in my family's life and some of our most down times. And he's been such a positive presence, and he's the definition of a Christian. And if I can get him up here, which I know I can, it'll be a great interview. And here you are. So we're glad to have you, man.

SPEAKER_02: 6:10

Thanks for making the track. I am so happy to be here. I I the drive up yesterday, you know, it's about a six-hour drive from Knoxville, Tennessee. I just was quiet. I made a lot of phone calls, you know, just due to my business and the nature of it, and what I do uh in social media as an influencer. Now that's what I do full time. And I I had a lot of calls, but I had a lot of downtime as well. And I was like, Lord, just help me to be a mouthpiece for you today. And we watched a football game last night, Go Cowboys finally a win this season. We get to celebrate. Um, but you know, beyond that, it was more about the company that, you know, as soon as I walked in the door last night when I got to Mark's house, Mark and Maggins is is their daughter Annabelle. She's a a divine miracle from God. And just getting to see her, hang out with her for the night, watch a game, and I enjoy football, I enjoyed their company. My wife wasn't here, which kind of stinks, but it's okay. She's gonna travel with me more next year. And I got a great night's sleep. I slept nine and a half hours, and then the first thing that I read, uh, or first element of communication I get when I woke up was a text from my wife talking about our aunt. It's actually her aunt, but I call her my aunt because by gosh, she's not blood, but the same way that Mark what Mark and Megan said, we're not blood, but man, we're family. And when she told me that, how she was sitting in God's presence this morning, thankful that our her aunt Kim got baptized the day before that she and her ending message was when we work together, people get saved. Man, that just lit me up this morning like like no other. Because in the in the catering business, you have to function at a high level. And we did together uh for over 10 for about 10 years, we worked together in the catering business, and you have to be in sync mentally, physically, and you do, and you gotta serve a lot of people and you have to flow. And we did, man, we work great together. My wife and I are a fantastic team. But when we when we're not in uh sync together, man, it's kind of like chaos, nobody wants to be around for that. Yeah, but most of the time, 99% of the time, we are, and that's that's how we fed a lot of people. We represented Christ well, and in the when it comes to the kingdom, people get saved. It's it's true when people see the best in you or see the God in you, people want it so they get saved, and it impacts their life. And I just give all the glory to God. It it was a journey of the last 11 years of my wife and I's life, speaking into our Aunt Kim's life, never saying anything about her life or what she believes, what she thinks. We just loved her the way that Christ loves the church, regardless. And man, the video she showed us a video of her getting dunked and she came up out of that water. Wow, it was a it was a wow moment. I mean, it's it's it's just as impactful for me to see that as the birth of your first child.

SPEAKER_06: 9:49

Yeah, it's amazing.

SPEAKER_02: 9:51

Sorry, Chris, if you saw if you're hearing this podcast. I love you, son. It was still a great moment. It was. That was great, by the way. Yeah, when your the first child was born.

SPEAKER_07: 10:00

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02: 10:01

Or even your second or your third, however many kids is. It was powerful. Five. I was about to say Dan's got five. Well, we have five together, me and my wife. Okay. So we might, you know, we don't it's we're blended.

SPEAKER_07: 10:14

Well, good. Well, thank you for sharing that because we talked about that earlier, and I think that's pretty powerful. And I could tell it's impacted you this morning just just by you walking in here. So, um, but how we like to start every podcast is is this is about you. This is we we want to get to know your story. We want to get to know, you know, the things that have impacted you in your life, and uh so we like to start from childhood. So if you would start from the beginning, talk about where you grew up and what life life was like for you as a child.

SPEAKER_02: 10:42

My dad was an evangelist pastor when I was a kid, and my memories up until the age 14 was church, tent meetings. Yeah, I remember when I was like about eight years old, I was laying on the big pieces of sawdust, you know, on the floor, because that's what my dad did, is he was an evangelist and had semis with tents and bags of sawdust that they would spread around on the floor and the metal folding chairs, uh, even wooden ones back in the day. And I was about eight years old, and I remember it was my dad was up on stage preaching. I don't remember anything about my siblings at that moment, but what I do remember is I was lay literally laying on the sawdust floor, uh, or ground, actually, not floor, but a ground. Uh, and my dad was preaching, been going for a while, and my mom was sitting next to me. I remember looking up and just kind of tugging on my mom's skirt. Is he done? Is he about done? When are we going home? It's a memory that I have. And uh my dad was always traveling, he was always gone, he was always out saving the world. He was gone. And I remember like when I was 12 or 11, I started playing baseball. I wasn't any good. I wanted to be good because I I loved the game of baseball. I truly loved it passionately. I played it for, I guess, about three springs, early summers, you know. I wasn't any good. I didn't have anybody to really practice with and throw the ball with. Not that that would have made me better, but it might have if I had somebody uh to be in my corner and to throw and catch, but I didn't have anybody, and it's okay. Uh I know that probably I wasn't a star athlete to be, you know, the next uh star baseball player, but I only think I remember is my dad was gone a lot. He was always gone about saving the world, fulfilling his call. And I remember I I my brother or somebody offered me a marijuana joint. And I started smoking that at 14 or something like that. And so I started getting into that a little bit, and then my I have uh an older brother who was, I think, almost he was 15. This isn't this is we're gonna, I'm gonna fast forward to a moment in time of August of 1982. Uh I was at 14 or about to turn 14, and then I had a brother who was 15, about to turn 16 in a few months. So we're almost two years apart, and then I had another brother older than that. Uh his name is David, then another older sister who's uh uh older than him. And so I just started experimenting with marijuana, and this is the summer of 1982, and my brother, the next brother up, his name is Jeff. He started to work with my dad at the church because he wanted to save as much money possible so he could buy him a car. He's turning 16, man, he wanted a car. So he's just working, working, working, and he would go on trips with dad to uh down south or up north with him on the road. And then when he would come back, he would because my dad started a church uh several years before that in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and he was working for him, doing whatever he needed, janitorial work, setting up this, whatever needed to be, and he did it. And late August, uh I remember my brother, uh, me and my older brother David, we were up the street, top of the hill, playing with a friend John Usher, hanging out with him, you know, doing what 14. And I guess 18-year-olds do hang out with the neighbor, and then my sister comes running up to us, top of the hill. She's out of breath. She, you know, she doesn't exercise, she doesn't run, and she c runs to the top of the hill where John Usher lived and his family, and she's out of breath. Tim, David, mom and dad says, You got y'all gotta come home. Like, that's strange. She would never run to the top of the hill and tell us to come home at the instruction of her mom and dad. So we we go down to the bottom of the hill, we walk in the house, and there's all these people like everywhere in our house. And I'm like, what in the world is going on? And then we saw my mom and dad at the very end of the hallway when we walked in the house, and I forget who said it, my mom or my dad. I said Jeff's dad. And I'm just like, what? I just I'm just in shock. I'm not in tears, I'm not an emotional or anything like that. But long end of it is my brother died of electrocution. And what happened was he was crawling up under the stage in my dad's church, and there was some ductwork that wasn't ground, that there was active current moving through the ductwork under the stage. That's where a lot of storage took place in my dad's church or the church that he pastored. And so he touched it and he was electrocuted instantly. And what happened was my dad walked around the church. This is the story we found out later, is for several hours that nobody had seen him. And so he starts asking people, where's Jeff? And one of the other persons in the church, the employee, said, Well, last I remember he was going to get some stuff out from under the stage. And so my dad finds him under the stage and pulls him out dead. So that was a big catalyst of Satan being used in my life. Because I thought to myself, I'm like, why would I want to serve a God where my brother dies in your house? And so, and as we shared a little earlier, is that's when I started experimenting with marijuana. And then one thing led to another. Uh, I mean, gosh, by the time I was 18 years old, I was an addict. I was mad at God, upset. Like, why would you what's up, God, dude?

SPEAKER_07: 16:58

How did your how'd your parents handle that situation?

SPEAKER_02: 17:01

They didn't know how to. They didn't. They did the best that they could. I was still mad at my God, or my God, I was still mad at God. I was mad at my dad because he was always gone. So the only thing I knew to do was medicate with marijuana, then one thing led to another, you know, snorting cocaine, and then eventually by the time I'm 18, I'm I'm smoking crack. I'm we're boiling that stuff, you know, and then X and all kinds of stuff. And by the time I'm 18 years old, I I remember we took a trip down to Fort Lauderdale because my uh grandmother and my uh uncle they moved down there. Uh my mom's side, they're all Canadian or uh Canadians, you know, and so they moved down south like snowbirds. And I remember uh I took a separate trip by myself. I was 18 and a half years old, and I remember I was staying in one of their apartments. They had like an apartment type hotel down there, and I I needed something, and I was out of what I needed, and I remember going to the the ghetto hood, whatever you want to call it, in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, with$50. And I went and bought a little baggie with about five rocks of crack in it, and I go back to the hotel, and I'm like, oh well, I need a lighter and I need how am I gonna cook this? So I literally go get a Coca-Cola can out of the trash can, rinse it out with water, poke some holes in it, and get a lighter and start smoking rock, right? And that was like the bottom for me, I felt like. I was almost 19, but it wasn't the bottom. It wasn't the bottom. And several years go by, and I get you know, I'm in the restaurant business at this point, obviously. Uh that's what I did, that's who I became because other things didn't work out for me. I tried college, I would just fell out, I would, I would show up high or wasted, whatever in college, and so I just I kind of gave up on that. And so I just the restaurant business seemed to work for me. And you know, it was it went on for years, and then I got an opportunity to be a manager, and then they drug tested. So I'm like, okay, all right. I got this. I'm gonna stop whatever it is for 90 days. So I did. I stopped for 90 days.

SPEAKER_07: 19:28

Um how was the withdrawal?

SPEAKER_02: 19:31

Uh it wasn't as bad because I that's one thing, I guess, if you know anything about me, which obviously you're learning, is I can I've got a really strong willpower. I can quit anything I want to. Like if I don't want to eat for a day, two days, three days, and fast, I'll do it. If I don't want to do this, I won't do it. But doing drugs all those years that I did it, it was actually a total of 14 years of addiction that I suffered from. Uh, but it was really just a mass to cover up the pain that was going on internally. And so I did. I I quit uh for about 90 days to so that I could pass the drug test so that everything's out of your system. And I I became a manager and did a good job. And but I yet I left behind all the drugs and I became a you know what they call a closing manager. And, you know, it was a company called O'Charlie's. They were pretty popular down in the southeast uh for a season back in the 70s, 80s, and 90s. And I was a closing manager, that means the bar didn't close, or the the restaurant closed at 10, but the bar stayed open till one. Well, what do you think I did from 10:30 to one while waiting on the bar to close? Well, there's all this liquor and beer, so somebody needs to drink it. And so that's what I did. I self-medicated, and I just remember this is this is a moment that really impacted my life is uh I I became an alcoholic in some in some regards, but not really. Um I just started drinking a lot because that was the thing to do, and I couldn't, I couldn't have marijuana or coke, whatever the drug of choice was, because I would be at risk of getting drug tested. And so I remember I just would start drinking because all I'd get I'd get my closing duties done, I would make sure all the servers are checked out, the restaurant looks good, the uh there's like like around midnight, there's only one cook left, and most all the kitchens clean. We just do hors d'oeuvres or appetizers as you call them, and he just deep fry everything, and from one to two, you serve simple appetizers and the the bartender and one server. You know, you got three employees left and me. And so you just you got two hours to kill because the only thing is you grab that last cash till from the bartender and the one last server, and you you put that in the system, and then you're done. And I've been doing that for a year and a half, and I remember one night, uh man, we just we stayed at the bar drinking after it closed. Me and the bartender and the server, and all the customers were gone, and we just sat there and drank. And it was like 2:30, 3 o'clock in the morning. You know, I said this to my daughter recently because she's been coming home late, you know, like 2:30, 3 o'clock. Anything, if you stay out past probably 12:30, 1 o'clock, usually you're up to no good. Yeah, great things don't happen at 3 a.m. in the morning. That's right. You know, unless you're in bed and you roll over because God spoke to you. And I remember, you know, we we sat at the bar, we drank for an hour and a half, then finally we go outside. Hey, it was time to go home. And I remember driving home just obliterated. I was so drunk. And I drove home. And I think back to that moment, you know, when I was 25 years old, I was so wasted and I got on the road and I drove so drunk. And at this time I had a roommate, we his name was Glenn, and we're still best friends today, uh, all these years later. And I pulled up to our duplex that we lived in, and I remember got out of my car and fumbling for my keys. I was so drunk. And I remember pulling out my keys, trying to wedge it into the door, and I literally stood there for about five minutes trying to wedge my key into the lock to get it open, and I couldn't. I I was just that drunk. I and I'm like, how God must have spared my life and other people around me for me to get home safely. And I remember something happened at that very moment, and I felt like it was an eternity. The only way that I can explain it is God put me in a trance. He took me out of my drunkenness. I felt like it was five minutes. But obviously it was only split seconds, you know, two to three seconds. And I remember I sobered up and I heard this voice. It was almost like Moses, you know, one of those Moses experiences. Look at your life, are you happy where it's going? That's what I heard. And I'm standing there looking at my life, I'm drunk. Holding my keys, I can't get in the door. And I look up at God. And then all of a sudden I snap out of it and I'm drunk again. And eventually I get the uh the the door to my apartment unlocked. And the next day and numerous days after that, you know, I life didn't change. I was still drinking. Eventually, three or four months later, I got another job in the restaurant, uh, a restaurant next next door that I wanted to work at as a manager, got that job. And it was just the strangest thing. Whenever I turned on the TV, not every single time, but more often than not, over the course of the next nine months or a year, actually, John Osteen would be on the television. And a lot of the listeners may not even know who that man is. And that's okay. He was a pastor that was on television. Just the kindest, sweetest man. They may know who his son is, Joel Osteen. But every time I seemingly turned on the television, he was on the TV preaching the gospel. And then you fast forward, I got an offer about a year later to move to Dallas, and um I got a job uh running a laser tag company, and I did that successfully for about a year, went to a couple different stores, and then out of the blue, one day I got fired. And at this point, I'm back into drugs, left behind alcohol, really. Um, and I remember the one of the funny times about six months into moving to Dallas, running this company back on uh cocaine and smoking marijuana and doing a couple other things, is my dad, I moved in with my parents for that first um six months or so, and my car was in the driveway blocking theirs because I got home late one night. My dad asked to borrow my car. I needed to run an errand. And I remember under the floor, floor mat was drugs. There was a bag of weed and some a bag of coke. And I'm like, oh my God, don't let him find that. Don't let him find that, you know. So anyway, you um you fast forward another six months and I got fired. And so I took about a week off and didn't know what I was gonna do. And I did know my dad, you know, at that point my dad was pastoring a church in Dallas again. He had moved his family uh six years prior to that from Chattanooga to Dallas, and some different things changed in his life, and he became a pastor, started pastoring a church again. And I decided to go to church on a Friday night because I I knew that he was having some revival services from you know, a guest speaker. And I remember uh it was a Friday night, and I'm going to church, and I just got fired about a week ago, and I haven't served God since I was really my whole life. I mean, I mean I think I believed in God, I knew God, I thought, as a kid. You didn't have a relationship. No, I mean I was forced into church. I mean, you didn't have a choice.

SPEAKER_07: 27:30

What was your at this point in time with the drinking and the drugs and all that, what's your relationship like with your your dad and your your parents?

SPEAKER_02: 27:40

Uh there wasn't one. Truthfully, there wasn't one.

SPEAKER_07: 27:44

Because you were mad?

SPEAKER_02: 27:46

Yeah, I was mad at them, how they uh acted towards me. My my dad was very angry towards me. Uh and I remember in my worst state, I was about 24, 25 years old. I was actually working at this O'Charlie's job. That's right. I was 25 years old. And I mean, I was I was just living my life. And up to that point, you know, my dad always would just get on to me, get mad at me, and yell at me. Well, you know, and I just I could never be honest with him. Because if I would be honest with him, he would get mad at me. Granted, he was a good dad. He never beat me. Um he, you know, got a belt out a lot of times because I probably deserved it. But, you know, I had great parents. They were they were good parents. Are they perfect? Lord know. But I remember it was I was 25, I was working at O'Charlie's as the night manager, and I just called him out of the blue. Hey dad, what's going on? Hey son, what's up? I'm just working. And I just decided to be honest with him. Hey, yeah, you know, because he asked me a question. I'm like, yeah, I mean, I'm drinking, I'm being promiscuous, and he got mad at me. I remember he just got upset with me. Well, you know, bless God, you know. Just started going off on me. And I'm like, okay, all right, I gotta go, Dad. I love you. And you know, there's just not much of a relationship. And but when I moved to Texas, the relationship started getting a little bit better, you know, and it started improving a little. Still wasn't even close to being repaired. Uh there just wasn't much of a relationship.

SPEAKER_04: 29:25

So if you rewind back, like when your brother first died and you started getting born into drugs and stuff, did you did your family know? Like, do you think that they knew how bad you were struggling?

SPEAKER_02: 29:38

They definitely knew um what my struggles were mentally um and with uh you know addiction. But I mean they didn't know what to do. They just they just would scold you, put you in the corner, you know, take a time out, sort of speak. You know, they didn't know what to do. They didn't uh it was new to them. Now if you if you fast forward To the day, they would have done something different. Right. It's the same thing, me as a dad. You know, me and my oldest son, like I have two biological kids, my oldest son Chris. We we don't have the greatest relationship. We don't talk that often. Do I want it? Did I make mistakes? Of course I did. Um, I did some things that I shouldn't have done in terms of what I said and how I reacted or responded. Uh it's getting better. It's making an improvement.

SPEAKER_07: 30:27

So go back to that Friday night you decide to go to the church.

SPEAKER_02: 30:31

There's an evangelist preaching. And for like an hour, hour and a half, he's just preaching, just going on and on and on. I'm like, after like 90 minutes, finally I'm like, I'm about ready to walk out of here. What's up, dude? Then, you know, because he he talked about the offering forever. I'm like, I why no, dude, why? And then he starts talking. He's not really even preaching his message. And I'm ready to get up and walk out. And then all of a sudden, it's kind of like that moment that I referred to when I was really drunk and I had this uh experience and encounter with God. It's for after about 90 minutes, I almost got like arrested by the Holy Spirit in my seat and said, Listen. It's like, okay. So for the next hour and a half, this guy started really actually preaching his message, talking about the gospel, talking about a loving God. And then it came time after about two and a half hours, I guess, in the service. Uh if you want to give your life over to God, now is the time. And you know, he does what a lot of preachers do, you know, raise your hands if you want to accept Christ or, you know, come down front, whatever. And so I remember when he gave that call to have your life changed. I remember I just sat there, like, God, I'm just gonna sit here. Because that wasn't popular to do. Nobody really acknowledged that back in '97 or '96, wherever it was. And I just remember I sat there and I prayed that prayer, Lord God, come into my heart. I accept you, forgive my sins. And, you know, and that was about 45 seconds. Then I looked up and he finished the service. My dad came up, and I just was like, I don't know, I felt, I felt different physically. I physically felt different. And I remember, you know, I said bye to a few people, walked out the door, I got in my car, my little Honda cord that my dad didn't never knew the drugs were there. And I remember I put the key in the ignition and I turned it on, and I grabbed that middle console and I moved the stick back to reverse. That's the way it was back in the day. We didn't have a we had not pushed a button. And that middle, and I hit reverse, and it and all of a sudden it was like an epiphany hit me. I thought, but it was the Holy Spirit, and I just stopped. I'm like, what am I doing? Oh my gosh. I got a bag of weed and a couple grams of cocaine under the floor mat. Oh my gosh. So literally, I put it in park. I'm in the church parking lot, and I grab the bag of weed out from under the floor mat and I run, put it in the church parking lot trash can. And then I get in the car and I zoom, zoom home, and I flush the Coke. And I'm like, gosh, oh my gosh. And that was just the power of the Holy Spirit. And then, you know, my dad offered me a job about a week later, told him about my transformation. I become the outreach director uh for the church. And six months later, uh, or excuse me, eight months later, I go to Bible college. And then uh two years after I graduated from Bible college, I felt the calling of God to go live in the Philippines. And I moved to the Philippines in 1999 and I was there for three years. I got married to a Filipino woman after a year. Uh my the birth of my first son was in Manila, Philippines. Wild experience. And so, you know, during those three years that I lived in the Philippines, that's when it started some new things that we were doing. My dad and the ministry is going to foreign countries and setting up and organizing um small to large scale conferences for pastors, leaders, church workers, anyone feeling called to the ministry. So that was my job at that point. I found a new lease on life, my dad and I, and our relationship and my mom, it was getting better. Obviously, with God, all things are possible, you know. And then my dad, you know, started apologizing for what he wasn't. He was too busy focused on saving the world, but yet he couldn't save his family. And, you know, that just really impacted me uh about how he owned up to it, manned up. Um, so you know, you fast forward, and I'm I'm a missionary. I'm living in the Philippines, and you rewind four um, excuse me, uh three years, and man, I was a full-blown addict. Now I'm on the mission field serving the kingdom of God in Southeast Asia. And um, wow, that's all I could say.

SPEAKER_07: 35:44

That's all I could say. I mean, you you go from smoking dope and snorting coke, and here you are out, you know, trying to spread the word and to help others with Christianity. And at what point in time did you forgive your dad? Or have you?

SPEAKER_02: 36:08

That's a hard question to answer. Um it was in my 30s, late 30s, I think, or early 40s is when I I forgave him because even though our relationship improved, there were still things there that were hard. Um and it if he fast forward, and I know there's a lot of gaps in there of you know, like like I said on the phone yesterday, about every five or ten years, there's always a significant event in my life that catapulted me into the next phase of life. Uh, and if we go back to 2012, my marriage was just on the rocks. My wife, she didn't love me. She, you know, she said it numerous times during our 12 years of marriage. She said, I don't love you. I wish I had never married you. I regret marrying you. I regret marrying out of my culture. Numerous, numerous, numerous, at least 20 times that those words came out of her mouth during our 12 years of marriage. And I mean, I was broken at that point. Obviously, we can we can go back and touch base on some things, but I'm getting to a major point in this whole thing about the relationship with my my dad, is I remember when I was going through hell in 2011 to 2012 in that phase where my wife said, I don't finally got to the point where she says, I I want a divorce. And we were just roommates, basically. And I remember I was just devastated. You know, we moved out from from from Texas to Washington State and Seattle to fulfill a dream that was on the inside of both of us, and just something snapped in her mentally. Uh, can't explain it. That's that's a whole different story for a different day. But my dad just he knew what I was going through emotionally, and it was just hard. The psychiatric issues with my wife, me working uh 45 hours a week as a manager at Starbucks. I'm in college, I go back to college, um, you know, taking three classes, and I'm just and I'm trying to be there for my kids who are four and nine at the time, and I'm like, I I'm just surviving, you know, I'm just surviving. And I just remember my dad and my dad showed up, he flew there numerous times. He flew there just to be there for me. He he showed up, man. When I needed him. And uh that's when things change, but you know, um I'm getting all emotional thinking about it.

SPEAKER_06: 38:59

It's okay.

SPEAKER_02: 39:00

But uh he showed up when I needed him the most. Uh we would call and talk for hours, you know, when he wasn't there. Uh he he just he was there, he was present.

SPEAKER_07: 39:11

You felt that love that you didn't feel as a kid.

SPEAKER_02: 39:15

No, he he was there, he was present when I needed him the most in my life. And I was a I'm a grown man. I was I was 40-something years old. You know, there's there's worse things in life that you you experience and go through, but man, in the most critical, pivotable moment of my life, he was there.

SPEAKER_07: 39:35

Because he knew you probably could have gone back the other direction.

SPEAKER_02: 39:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07: 39:41

Self-medicating, getting back into that addictive personality. But he knew it was time for him to step up as a father to be there for his son who needed him in the most desperate time.

SPEAKER_02: 39:53

And he did. If you're listening to this dad, um I'm I'm grateful for you. Even though I wasn't the greatest son, I know I made mistakes, but that's when um I had a new love and a new respect for my dad.

SPEAKER_07: 40:10

That's amazing. Thank you for sharing that.

SPEAKER_02: 40:13

You're welcome. I've never shared that publicly.

SPEAKER_07: 40:17

It's pretty powerful because there's a lot of people out there who have had similar situations in their lives with their their parents' father, and um maybe they're maybe their relationship's not healed. You know, and all I kept hearing the whole time you're talking is ask him if he's forgiven his father. Pretty powerful. So your your dad steps in at a pivotal time, he helps you get through you know, one of the most difficult times in your life. How do you get through that?

SPEAKER_02: 40:50

Only by the grace of God. It really it's only by the grace of God. And you just have to lean into God, lean into your friends, lean into your family. And if what if you and I know people might be asking, well, what if you don't have that family to lean into? Well, you lean into God when we're lonely, when we're desperate, those are the times when we don't have somebody to turn to, and I know there's people listening right now that they feel like they don't have anybody to trust, well then trust God. And uh be on social media the the way that I am, so you know, on occasions I will make a post, whether it's a static post or a video post. I just feel compelled by the Holy Spirit sometimes to do those and I'll put them on there. And if it almost fails, almost always there's always somebody who speaks up and says that there isn't a God. And what about all those starving kids that are in Southeast Asia, Africa, that are starving, they die of starvation. Well, where is God? And then they talk about disasters or circumstantial situations that happen. Well, where is God in that? Well, half the time I don't respond to those people, but half the time I do. And I always lean in with what Adam and Eve did. You know, God gave them a will to make their own choice. Whether it's good or bad, we make decisions and do things that affect people, good or bad. Now, what about hurricanes? I'm not God. What about floods? Well, I'm not God. Those are things that we don't know that we don't understand. I I I can't explain it. But what I do know is whether phenomena are a real thing, whether people survive them or they don't survive them. But in and all and through it, there still is a God. Because you can't, if you go back to creation, science cannot dispute. It's kind of like the undisputable champion in this corner. You know, when it's a fight, it's like the undisputable evidence always points back to creation because they can't dispute what God did. He created man, he created the tree, he created humans, he created animals. When you go back to the DNA analysis, it's in undisputable who created what we are. Now, we know that the walls in this building are created by man, and the technology that we're talking on was created by man. But uh, you know, that's where you have to lean into the creator, as hard as it may be, and as difficult as it may be, man, he will be there for you. And if you ask God, he'll bring you somebody. And and I just want to give a big shout and a glory to God. And I feel so, I tell my wife this all the time that I just feel incredible. You take away all the success that I've God's enabled me to have. Uh traveling to all the countries that I've been able to travel to, uh, you know, millions of followers on social media, um, working from home, having really five good kids. I got five good kids. Are they all where I want them to be? No. But I just I go back to wow, I am so thankful and full of gratitude because I just fully trusted God. When when life was hard, I just trusted God.

SPEAKER_07: 45:04

It's an important message that I think a lot of people need to hear. So you come out of that time. Gotta pick yourself up, gotta have a little faith, have a lot of faith. What's next?

SPEAKER_02: 45:19

Well, I I moved to Dallas, and it's it's strange. It's like as a grown man in my 40s, I moved back in with my parents for a little short season because I I'm a single dad. And my mom and dad stepped up and helped when I needed to go work. Um, and they they they stepped up. They really did for I guess about a year and a half, two-year window that helped, you know, and I got an apartment near them and they would help with, you know, Chris and Caitlin, my kids, when I needed them, when I was working. Um, and then, you know, I'm still broken, I guess you could say, from divorced. Uh it it can't it breaks you in a way that you you can't really explain. And I I made a decision that when I got married, I'm not getting divorced. Because at that point, when I got married in 2000, my parents had already been married for 30 something years. And I'm like, you know, I'm I've I got a great example to follow. I'm I'm not gonna get divorced. Well, I got divorced, you know. Um, and so you know, you fast forward to say 2014, I'm two years into my divorce, uh, single dad working at Starbucks, and I'm going to church, but I'm not really engaged. Uh I don't have much of a relationship. I got a relationship, but not the way that it was. Uh I'm, you know, I'm not drinking um or doing drugs or anything like that. I'm just working. Just working. And I'm still hurting inside, just bruised from what I went through. Divorce is hard. I don't care. You know, my wife and I had this conversation several years ago. You know, when your spouse dies, that's tragic. It really is. Um, but when you go through a divorce, that that reminder's there constantly. It's like a pain that just won't go away. Like my two kids have a mom in a foreign country that is still there. But yet mentally she she can't and physically can't be a mom. And that pain is there, it's constant, you know. Um, so you know, 2014, I'm I'm in pain, still recovering from just it's hard. Divorce is hard because my two kids are affected. I was affected. I loved her. And all those years, 12 years that we went through, that she would rehearse those things. I I don't love you, I regret marrying you, you know, yada yada. And it affects you. And then reality is, you know, we get divorced, it hurts even more. So you fast forward to 2014, and my dad asked me to go on a trip with him to uh Moldova, which is Eastern Europe. I wasn't gonna organize it or anything like that, like what I did in the past and all the countries and places that I've been around the world and honored, and and I'll get to that in a minute. Um, but I go to Moldova and I'm just there, I'm just there. That's all I'm doing. I'm all I'm on a trip. And you know, they're my dad and his friend, they're preaching for three days, uh, leadership things, and uh, I don't know, a few hundred people there in a foreign country where they speak Russian. Um, so I'm engaged kind of. I'm there, I'm present. And one day after it was over, me and one of the his pastor friend that was with him, we and and another guy that was with him, we walked back to the hotel, and my mom and dad go somewhere else uh with the organizer. And on the way back, we started talking, and then something came up about the subject of selfies because that's when selfies started getting popular back in 2014, 11 years ago, if you're wondering that 11 years ago. And I I I pulled open my phone on Facebook, and somebody had done a selfie like that, and then we get to the hotel and I started talking with this gentleman, my dad's friend. Um, like, look, you know, here's the person. They took a selfie of her and her kids, and then I realized, wait, isn't she a part of your church? And he goes, Yes, she's a part of our church. And he goes, That's an interesting story, too. So he starts telling me the story of now my wife, how she lost her husband in a tragic car accident, and she's left as a single mom with three kids, and how she moved forward in her pain, in her grief. Uh, it was hard. Now, there's a lot of things I could tell you that uh how hard that is and what she went through, and a lot of moms or dads who lost their spouse of how hard that is due to an accident or a cancer or an illness. And she persevered, man. She just went to work. She started cleaning houses, uh, being faithful, telling God what she needed, and they got a job at a sorority house as a cook, you know, uh, and that was a good job. That was, you know, you work nine months and you're off for three. Then uh then in 2014, she a doctor trusted her to run an event center. And so she's like three months into this event center and building it from the ground up, basically. And then that's when I go to uh Moldova and I started talking to this gentleman, and we he told me about her. And so I'm like, okay, well, what about her? So he starts telling me the story of what I just told you briefly, and I'm like, oh. Because you know, you've moved back to Moldova and I'm holding my phone of a selfie and I'm looking at that picture, and I'm like, oh, so that means she's single. As you know, and so I started liking her photos all of a sudden out of nowhere, and me not knowing she's back in America. I'm like, why is Tim Clowers liking my photos? Uh so the conversation just continues to grow, and then the next day, the next day he brings her up, and then I bring her up. And I'm like, oh wow. So about a week later, I made contact with her. Um, so you fast forward, uh, it just it was a God thing, and we got married. So that was in June, and we got married in January. That was fast.

SPEAKER_06: 51:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 51:50

And uh I and that's when I moved to Knoxville, and that's when a whole different journey in my life started. Um, but but you know, the I I guess I go back to the Philippines when I was a missionary, traveling to the Philippines, not only the Philippines, but I would travel to Papua New Guinea, Australia, uh, Eastern Europe, Africa, setting up all these conferences, uh, you know, under the leadership of my dad. And, you know, they partnered with Joyce Meyer Ministries. And I I traveled all over the world, man. I did. I was I was so thankful because that was a that was a beautiful part of my life, but yet a hard part of my life. And I remember it was in 2008. My daughter was about to be born, excuse me, 2006. My daughter was about to be born, and I had a conversation with my dad, and I had a conversation with the Lord because I'd moved back home from the Philippines, yet I was still traveling abroad a lot, uh, setting up these conferences. And I, you know, every month from 1999 till 2008, I was every month I was in a foreign country. Uh so you know, if you add it all up, I've been to like 66 countries around the world. Had a blast. It's been a blessing, but yeah, it's a lot of hard work traveling. And in 2006, my daughter's about to be born, and I had a conversation with my dad. I said, like, dad, look, I've been gone a lot. And Chris is four and a half years old. I can't be gone much more. Because I'm I'm finding myself in the same situation of what he was. And I said, I can't do this much more. So my daughter is born, and by 2008, I'm not traveling anymore. I'm present with my kids. And I I just I can't tell you how important that is of the lesson that I learned. And how my eventually you fast forward to 2014. When I made that statement in 2006, I said, I need to come off the road. And then in 2014, I go through hell in my marriage, and he's there for me. But yet I'm there for my kids in 2006 when my daughter's born. I I I made that stance. I need to be there for my kids. And I did, I was there for him.

SPEAKER_07: 54:20

Because you knew what you how you had felt towards your father, and you saw yourself going down that same road.

SPEAKER_02: 54:26

Same road. I'm saving the world, you know. I'm I'm I'm doing what God told me to do, and things like that. But yet I think the wisdom of God spoke up in and through me so that I don't go through the same thing and my kids kids experience the same thing that I went through.

SPEAKER_06: 54:43

Yeah, that's amazing.

SPEAKER_07: 54:45

So you end up getting married to your wife. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 54:49

Moved to Knoxville, Tennessee. Yeah. Woo! Back home.

SPEAKER_07: 54:52

Talk talk about what that's like because now it's a completely different world.

SPEAKER_02: 54:56

It is. So I'm we moved uh me and my two kids, we moved to Knoxville, Tennessee in 2014, uh, around Christmas, right before Christmas. And then a month later, we get married in Knoxville to uh to my wife. And I will say this blended families are not for the faint of heart. You know, we've been married coming January will be 11 years, and our kids go from 19 to 29. Two girls, three boys. And it's all kinds of hard, man. That's all I can tell you if you if you're a blended family. But despite how hard it's been, it's also been rewarding to see how God has used me and how God has used her in the development of our children. Granted, they're all adults, they're all grown, uh, you know, but the four, the four youngest were still under the roof when I came into the picture. Uh my two kids and her two boys, because our daughter just got into college when we got married. And so I didn't really know her oldest daughter. Uh, and then you fast forward um just recently, I'll tell you about that in a moment, but of what my daughter went through, our oldest daughter went through. Uh, but you know, my son, my daughter, her two boys, they were both without. You know, my kids didn't have a mom. Her two, her three kids didn't have a dad. And I I knew that blended families were hard going into this. We both knew that. And I always told myself, internally, I was like, okay, I'm not gonna try to replace their dad or be their dad. I'm just gonna be present for them. And I feel like I did, I've done that in the last 11, almost uh in just a few weeks, it'll be 11 years. I've been in her family, her boy's life. And I've never tried, their name is Reese and Luke. I've never tried to be their dad. I've just tried to be present when their dead father couldn't be there. Uh be there for, you know, obviously kids, you know, they need money. They break stuff, they do stuff, and well, who's there? It's it's usually me or or you know, obviously us, not I won't say me. Um, and it's the same thing with my kids. Uh, like our my my daughter, who's 19 now, when we go out in public sometimes, or people that know us, they'll say, Well, who does Caitlin belong to, you or you? Because she's half Filipino, and they're thinking, okay, well, some of that she's adopted, or she's been in somebody's uh a previous relationship or a previous marriage, because they don't know. Because the reason they say that is because my wife and my youngest daughter, our youngest daughter, they get along so great. And they have an incredible relationship. And some regards I'm kind of jealous. Like, man, you're closer to her than you are to me. But I mean, I'm her dad. I'm not, I'm not, it's it's really no jealousy. Um, and so, you know, I've just I've been present for the for the boys and for their and for Darby, who's the oldest. And, you know, she recently, about a little over a year, year and three or four months ago, she went through some trauma in her marriage, and she had to separate. And so she moved back to Knoxville from where she was. Um, I'm not going to get into the details to spare her of privacy, but she went through some trauma in her life in her marriage. And so she basically moved home with us for eight months. And I got to know her better, and she got to know me, and I got to be there for her. Um, and not, I mean, I wasn't perfect, um, still not perfect. I still make mistakes, but I got to know her. She got to know me a little bit more up close because she'd never lived with me. Um, and I just tried to be Jesus as much as possible. Um, and I'm I'm very thankful for that. Yeah. So all the blended families out there, man, just show up. Even though if the kids, I remember, uh, and this is not private, uh, I'll I'll I'll happily say this openly. Um, because my wife did a lot of the Christmas shopping, you know, from the time we got married up until now, she still does all the Christmas shopping, most of it. You know, I'll buy a few things here and there. Uh dad will show up, you know. And, you know, we on Christmas Day, there's all the presents, and all the kids are there. Um uh a few of them, one of them had a spouse, one of them had a girlfriend, you know. But you you you take that time in 2015 all the way up until uh say 2020, every Christmas, you know, the kids would open their presents. Um And they would always they would open up their presence. They would look at her, thanks, Mom. Thanks, Mom. And I'm sitting there. I don't even get acknowledged. Yet I've been present. And the boys and in you know Darby, her life. I've been present. Like, well, you know, half that money for me. You know, I'm like, I okayed it, or it's my money too. I maybe, or maybe I wrapped it, or maybe she bought it, but I'm like, I'm not chopped liver over here. You know, for five years, that hurt my feelings, you know, as a as a stepdad. That really hurt. And but I I told the Lord, I'm like, I love him regardless. I love him regardless. And and then you fast forward to sometime in 2022. I was somewhere with Luke. Uh that's Jackie's oldest son or the youngest son, and the one one of the middle boys, and we were out somewhere, and he introduced me to somebody he was with. And he goes, This is my dad.

SPEAKER_01: 1:01:13

I can't tell you the emotion that went through me at that moment.

SPEAKER_02: 1:01:20

You know, you fast forward, I guess it was six, seven years later, after I got married to his mom, and all those years of him not even saying thank you during all those Christmases. I didn't even get acknowledged. It's always thanks, mom. Thanks, mom, this is so awesome. But I bit my tongue. I allowed myself to not get my feelings hurt, but he introduced me as his dad. Man, that was that was almost like the birth of a child. You know, this is my stepson, and he references me as his he introduces me as his dad. Wow. Those are those are things you can't buy. You can't fabricate those things. And how that makes you feel in that very moment, you're like, wow, God. I thank you.

SPEAKER_07: 1:02:13

Have you told him about that?

SPEAKER_02: 1:02:15

No, I haven't actually. Because it happened a couple other times since then. Um there's it let me just kind of give you a a brief scenario of our listeners, because I don't want them to be confused. Um because I my wife tells me a lot of times, you know, your brain, how it works, it's kind of like herding squirrels. And you're probably thinking the same thing in this interview. Man, he's going back and forth and here and there. And it's true. I I'm my personality and the way my brain works is I'm a very much a people person. I love to be with people. My wife is an introvert, I'm an extrovert. I love to be with people and love to hang out with them. But yet my brain bounces around because I'm a very creative person. Um, it for me to sit in an office, that would be cruelty. It's like, why would you make me sit in an office, you know, eight to nine hours a day, I get a lunch break. That would just be that would just be cruelty. You can't do that to me. And so the way my brain works, I'm very creative, I'm very visual, I'm very expressive. And I'm sure you've gathered that by now. I'm like, he's kind of all over the map. It's true. It I'm I'm it's very much like herding squirrels. And so for the listeners, you know, I just want to give them a brief synopsis to um help them understand a little bit of who and the why. Could I take five minutes for that?

SPEAKER_06: 1:03:52

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02: 1:03:52

So we talked about my childhood for a lot and what impacted me. It was the death of my brother, and then a very strained relationship with my dad that drove me into addiction from 2014 all the up until the time I was 27 years old. So you've got that window of time, and then during that 14 to 27, not really knowing who I was, you know, got into addiction. At 18 or 16, I got into the restaurant business, and I was in the restaurant business up until 27. And then obviously, uh, you know, addict, a little bit of an not really an alcoholic. I just that was a season, I just drank a lot. And, you know, 27, um, have that encounter with God. John Osteen starts appearing on the television all the time. And then, you know, when I was um 27, I moved to Texas, and I find Christ um in '97, um, my spiritual birth. Uh uh been clean ever since then. No, no drug has come in contact with my system since then. Uh not not even nothing. Obviously, you you see it, you smell it, but it it doesn't affect me at all. Uh and I see it and I pray for people. So in 20, you know, 1997, I get saved, and uh eight months later I go to Bible college, I go to Bible college, and just incredible experience. And in the middle of Bible college, about three months into Bible college, uh, I was rollerblading because I took up rollerblading and I'm in my late 20s and rollerblading on the side of the road where in Texas they have big medians, you know, big lanes. And I've I found myself at dusk rollerblading. I was at my girlfriend's apartment, you know, waiting on her, and so I decided to go rollerblading, and I get hit by a car.

unknown: 1:05:45

Oh, geez.

SPEAKER_02: 1:05:46

I'm in the like it's a turning lane, but it's a full lane, but is dusk-ish, but there's this, I guess older Chinese man hits me. Uh I vaguely remember some of it. You know, I ended up laying on my head, hits the curb, and I bounced up over the car, I break the windshield, and I I'm unconscious for three days. Me not knowing it, but uh, you know, my dad's pastor, my mom, a few lots of people from the church, people from his church, my dad's pastor, they're all coming to visit me, and I don't even know anything about it. My dad's in Canada at a series of meetings, he flies home, gets there just as I'm waking up from the coma that I'm in, or being unconscious. But one thing they told me when I was unconscious for those three days, I was speaking the word. I would say, no weapon formed against me will prosper. I am healed by the name of Jesus. I was speaking the Bible. I was speaking, I was quoting scripture. I was telling people what God was doing in my life. And I'm unconscious. I have no idea. And my mom this day tells me and her pastor, it was a phenomenon. And even people from the church would come to visit. I'm unconscious. But see, here's what happened. I got enrolled in a Bible college. It was in um uh, I guess September 2nd, third, fourth, or something like that. And the word of God was being taught to me four and a half hours a day, five days a week. And I'd never had that in my entire life. Yeah, I got saved. I was in church for, you know, I'm a Christian for six months at that point, but the word is just going in daily, daily, uh, just different topics. And so, you know, I woke up and they tell me all these stories, and I'm like, wow, that's wild, you know, to find out you're you're actually talking and quoting scripture and being full of faith and talking and speaking in tongues. I'm like, oh, okay, cool. God, thank you. So, you know, I I graduate Bible college. After the first year, I get to go to Israel. That was incredible. Oh my gosh, if if you ever get a chance to go to Israel, it's it's wow. It's you get to find your spiritual heritage. Um, it was very profound. They the the common joke back when we went to Israel with the group of uh 28 of us, they called me Shekel Boy. I was, I think I was around 29 or 30 when we met because that's what they use. Their currency is called shekels, Israeli shekels. And so there's a there's a joke behind that, but I won't get into it. But you know, uh went to Bible college, and then the second year of Bible college, you have an option to go to Africa. So we got a uh, you know, you raise the money, it was like$2,500. I felt like that was a million dollars that I was able to raise, you know, with God's help. And so you go to Kenya. Um, they are the the Bible school, it was something they did for the second year students, they always take a trip to Kenya. So I go to Kenya. Um, the the host and the the founder, you know, they're speaking at a conference for two days in Nairobi. We do lots of outreaches. Then we go to Western Kenya and spend a 13 days in rural areas, uh, going to churches, going to schools. And this was in '99. I remember going to one school, um, and it was all, you know, African kids. And it just so happened who I was paired up with. We went on outreaches every day was this black lady. Uh, I think her name was Devon. And so me and her were paired up. We always went somewhere to get with our host, obviously, our translator. We went to schools, uh, hospitals, churches. We all were paired together. We all 13 days. It was her. She and I. And I remember we walked up to our first school, and you got this. We're in this field, crossing this field, walking up to this school, and there's this herd of kids, like probably a hundred, running towards us. And I'm like, oh my gosh. So they approach me and they start clawing at my arms. I'm like, why are you not going over to her? And then it just dawns on me. They've never seen a Caucasian person. And, you know, but anyway, there's lots of stories to tell about that. But that that impacted me. And um, to see that for the first time, I got to go into a village where they've never seen a Caucasian person. And then a couple days later, I got to go to a hospital, me and Yvonne, and we got to pray for people. Um, and and there was this one lady who was literally dying on her deathbed. And when I say hospital, it was more like a clinic where you get to go die. Nothing like what we have here. I mean, I mean, you can picture it potentially. So we go in there, and I just remember full of faith, and I just prayed for this lady in the name of Jesus. I just prayed that God's power touches. I don't remember what I prayed, but we go back the next day, the same hot, same little clinic. And what happened to this lady? Where has she gone? Oh, she got better and she left. Like, wow. So uh it was about seven days in. I had this uh where we were staying, it was a it was four walls and a roof and a concrete floor where we stayed. You know, there's no heat, no air condition, no bathrooms, no shower. Uh go figure, right? But you you figured out how to stay clean and use the bathroom. So I had this little ritual. I know people are gonna think this is absolutely gross, but I had a little ritual. Uh in the mornings, I would go, I would walk up uh about 400 feet to where it was elevated, and it overlooked Lake Victoria, which is the second largest freshwater lake in the world. Stunning view. It's a little briar patch where I would go do my business, right? And I would just talk to God, and I would be gone about 15 minutes, and I would just do my business because I didn't like to go where everybody else was doing their business because it was just it was a little hole and you had to squy. So I'm like, well, it's going back to nature, it's the way I looked at it, you know. Um, so in 99, I'm doing my business, I'm talking to God, and then I'm just standing there, looking out at the lake, and I'm like, God, people got healed. I got to preach the gospel. You brought me to Africa. And then the presence of God just comes all over me. And I hear this voice. And it was like God in a cloud, kind of like Simba. It's like, Simba, I'm your father. I mean, you know that that moment in that movie, it's just profound and how impactful it is. Well, that's the way I felt because I already saw the Lion King at that point in my life, you know. And it was my it was my Simba and Mufasa moment where God spoke to me and He said, Son, I'm sending you to Southeast Asia. And I turned around and I'm like, Did somebody say that? I literally had, I, I felt that as if somebody said that to me. And so I did. I I I remember I I went, I got home and I was on a mission. Uh I got to take a preliminary trip to see where I'm gonna live and what I need to do. Um, and I, you know, I've just kind of set this figure. I'm like, hey, I need to raise$14,000. And God supernaturally provided. That's a whole different story of how God moved and did things because I didn't want to go to the Philippines and be some poor missionary and beg for money. I just I just didn't want to act like that. I said, I want all up front God for me to live for a whole year. Then I'll campaign for the other two or three. And I did got God provided all my my rent and everything because my dad, he didn't pay me. I didn't um he gave me a little bit of a um of income for uh a few things, but it was I was like, I'm going on my faith, not yours. I don't want you to pay me. And so I I was a missionary for three years in the Philippines, but I also still uh fulfilled what his dreams and desires were. I uh and that's to set up international conferences all over the world. I never stopped doing that in the midst of what God wanted me to do. He wanted me to go to remote places in the Philippines, and I did. Uh lots of cool uh stories to tell. How I got to go to a tribal chief, uh, offered iguana for the first time and turned it down, and I regret that. I'm sorry. Um and so I, you know, I'm setting up all these conferences, I'm traveling, doing personal missions that in remote places. I mean, I got stories for hours that we could sit here and talk about of going to little tribal villages, uh, still to this day that are very profound. And uh, and I even did a crusade one time uh that affected me. We're in this little little town called Dingalen Bay. I'm like, what the heck is Dingalin Bay? Well, it's off the coast of the Philippines, about six hours northeast of Manila, and I had a small team of about four people. We go to Dingalen Bay. We, you know, I sent a guy in there to put some posters up and just say, hey, you know, Reverend Tim Clowers is gonna come and do a healing crusade for for one night. And so we had this little sound system. We uh we brought it with us. It wasn't a whole lot. Two speakers, a little board, and a microphone, and we had some music with guitars and a little kick drum, and we had that. And so I get up to preach, and you know, it's a little sea town, you know, they they fish for a living and they make things. There's not really enterprise there. And at night, you know, the the nightlife would come alive. You know, I think there might have been a couple thousand people in this town, if that much. And so the the nightlife comes alive. And so you've got bars, music. And what I did not know, but I knew now is like this the speakers kept cutting in and out. The power would come and go, a little bit of lights we had would come and go. It's because back in town, well, we we were in town, but just you know, a few streets over, everybody was pulling on power to run their systems for karaoke and for music. And I didn't know that at the time, but I obviously I knew at the end of the server, well, Pastor Dim, this is what is going on, you know, the little voices. And I remember, you know, I preached my heart out for an hour and a half, and I did an altar call, and then then I start praying for people to get healed. And this, what I felt like it was an old man, but you know, at the time I'm probably you know in my 30s thinking this guy's old. But he probably wasn't that old, it's just in my mind. And he came up with this massive growth on his neck, and he goes, Well, do you want to accept the Lord? He goes, Well, if God will heal this, then I'll accept your Lord. Okay, so I started praying for him. And I just like God, I just I laid my hands on that big goiter, whatever growth, whatever they called it on his neck, and I just prayed and I like God, and I just I just would not leave that place standing right there with him until God healed that man. And over a course of about 15 minutes, that thing shrank. And you're thinking, no, it didn't. It did. So it was almost gone. There was still a small lump there on his neck. There was. Um, but it was huge. I mean, it was the size of a daggum orange.

SPEAKER_07: 1:18:02

How did he react?

SPEAKER_02: 1:18:04

Well, he uh after we got done praying, he reached over and felt it, and it was like the size of a large grape. And you know, we were working through a translator, he goes, let's let's say that prayer. And so that man accept Christ. Man, that was uh one of the powerful moments. And so, you know, for three years I was there. I still traveled to other countries and set up conferences and crusades, and I got to uh I travel a lot throughout the Philippines and different countries, and in 2002, um Joyce Meyer wanted to come. And you know, we obviously that gives us a big budget to set up a big blow-up meeting, and you know, as I told you yesterday on the phone, we got to go to the internet at the Coliseum. It's for smoking Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali, got to fight for the thriller in Manila. It was the same building, and my dad had that same dream. You know, we put billboards all over town and we did radio, we did television promotion, and I did it big, man. And we filled that place up, you know, 12,013,000, 14,000 people, however many it was. And so that day one, you know, my dad preached and his friend preached, and then Joyce Meyer preached and uh taught leadership, of course, because it was a you know all day long seminar with obviously with long breaks. And then um two days prior to that event, my son was born. Uh sorry, this was 2001, not 2002. Uh 2001, my son was born, you know, and then two days later, this is when the conference started. I go to bed. We're we're actually staying in a hotel because, you know, my where I lived, even though distance-wise, it wasn't very far, but travel-wise, it was a long, just because, you know, 16 million people in a metropolitan city, it was hard to get somewhere. And I'm staying in a hotel because it's close right next to the Coliseum. And at 4:30, I get a call. And it was we guy we called Pastor Faith. So he got me. He goes, Pastor Tim wokes me up at 4 30. I'm like, what? I'm sleeping. I hadn't slept much because my son's over here, you know, a newborn, two days old, and we're, you know, dealing with that. So you gotta come. You gotta come. There's been an accident. Like, what? There's been a fire, Pastor Tim, you gotta come. So I didn't know what to expect. So I get in a taxi and I get there, and he goes, Pastor Tim, don't get out. Don't get out. There's been a fire here at the Manor Hotel. So he goes on to explain to me that there was a fire that occurred. Like, and so what so let me quantify and explain what what the Lord enabled uh my dad's ministry to do is with the help of Joyce Meyer and other partners, is whenever we put on these conferences, they were leadership conferences, not just a chance to preach, but to teach biblical principles of how to be a better pastor, better leader, um, as well as you know, good teaching that they you would never get, and also give them materials and resources to help them. So we would either print in country or we would ship it in and we would feed them three meals a day. And for the people that lived in remote places, we would actually bust them in and we would accommodate them. And considering this is one of our bigger ones, so we uh that we've ever done, you know, that big of a crowd. So we set a budget we could house at least uh a thousand people. So we split, I think it was 16 different hotels, and we put people up a thousand, it was not quite a thousand, it was like nine. No, it was twelve hundred people that we put up in hotels and sixteen different hotels. But the one hotel out of those 16 different hotels had a fire at night. And the sad truth is that particular hotel, um, the owner paid off the fire um fire chief to let her pass on her inspection. There were bars on the windows, so there was a fire, something happened, and 88 people now there were more people that died, I think it was 112, but 88 people who were attending our conference were in that hotel, and they lost their lives that night. And that was that was wow. Because it wasn't my fault, but yet you fast forward days into this thing, the media is telling us it's our fault. You know, Don Clauers Ministries and the representative who lives here, theme clawers, is how they said it, you know, on their TV show. They were all blaming us. Then there was an investigation, and obviously it wasn't our fault. And it obviously goes back to the mayor of the city. Uh he finagled his way out of that situation, but ultimately the owner of the hotel was found liable. And so she had to pay some restitution or something like that. And so I was never angry at her, I was never upset with her because if, you know, eventually, you know, my dad left, Joyce Meyer left, everybody left like on day two, so we didn't even really finish the conference uh fully. Uh, but they did do two full days, partially on the last day. And I just remember for probably three months, everywhere I went, there was a news media person chasing me down wherever I went. Pastor Mr. Tim Clowers, what about this? What about this? And I didn't know what to do. I was at a loss. I'm like, there's 88 people's lives that were affected, and so we did not know what to do. I was I was just praying, asking God, Lord, 88 people died because they came to our event. And so I got to talking with my dad, and I was just praying. I'm like, how can we help? You know, and then we talked to some lawyers just to make sure that we're not in trouble, we're not doing anything wrong. And so at the end of the day, what I felt like we were supposed to do, because you know, we did receive a couple offerings, and then we obviously had money in the bank from the work that we were doing, a little x excess of I think um two or three hundred thousand dollars. And that was gonna help us fund the next event. And so what we decided to do was help send bodies back. Because that, you know, what do you do with the bodies and the cost? These a lot of these families are poor, they don't have the money. So we just set a budget. If you lived um outside of the main island, we're gonna give you a set amount of money to ship or fly the body back. And then I made another commitment. I said, God, I'm gonna go on a quest for the next year and three months, all of my time left here in the Philippines. I'm gonna go visit every single family that died. And we're gonna give them all a set amount of money. Depending on where they live, if they were to live far away, which uh I think there were 20 something that lived far away, we had to give them a little bit more money. So we gave them all a set amount of money just to say, we're sorry, and here's to help with your funeral arrangements and things. And it came to millions of pesos, which that seems like a lot of money, but uh you know, it's three or four hundred thousand dollars that we gave it divided among 88 families. And so I was on a quest. Um, I I bought an SUV about a year prior to that, uh, or six months prior to that, and my job with Pastor Faith and one other person, our job was to travel and visit every family and offer condolences for a year and three months. That was a lot of traveling, uh, and we did most of it by car. Um did some of it by plane, uh, and I got to 86. I didn't get to 88 and you know uh why do I tell that story? Well, because my son was, you know, he was a newborn, I had to leave him. And I told my wife what I had to do. And my son don't even really know this story, I've never told it. But I felt like I had to leave my family for that that year and three months. You know, I was married, new wife, new baby, and but I felt like it was something I had to do. But my wife, she understood. And what I learned through all that is how can you get through tragedy in such a major capac so profound? How do you how do you deal with that? I didn't know what to do, man. I didn't. But I learned a lot about life, about people, about culture, and about me. I mean that first 24 hours, man, when when it happened, I was like, I was in shock. What do I do? I've never been in charge of 88 people dying. But they're all looking at me. What does Tim Clovers do? I rose up, I figured it out, I made it happen, and um, so you you go from that moment in 2002, I go back to America with my wife and my newborn son, and from 2002 to 2006, I I continue to travel the world, uh, East Asia, Africa, Central America, South America, setting up conferences. So I go on average three to four to five times to a country, set up these conferences. That's what I did. And then in 2006, you know, I had that conversation with myself and my dad that I can't travel much anymore. And my daughter was born in 2008, and then I become more of a full-time assistant pastor at my dad's church. He's building this big building, it's stressing him out. He almost dies through it. And then, you know, we've we've talked about me taking over the church, but that never really manifested. Um, and then I'm having marriage struggles because my wife can't adapt to the culture in America as a Filipino, and she just struggled. So in 2010, uh, we built up about a year before this. So in 2009, I told my dad, it's time for I need to move. I I need to move, I need to get out of Dallas and I need to fulfill a desire. Right or wrong, I felt like it was the right move for me. So I we I talked a year in advance in 2010. We're gonna move to Seattle, Washington. We're gonna take our time, we're gonna set up a church or plan a church eventually. And so we, you know, we set planned it 2000, 2010. We get there, and within three months, my wife starts having mental health issues. And then you fast forward to 2012, she wants a divorce, I'll Hell breaks loose. I never got to plant the church. I did go to college for two years. So I moved back home in you know 2012 and back to Texas. I'm there for a couple years. Obviously in 2014, I told the story of how I met my wife and then moved to Knoxville. And we started working together. And it was an adjustment at first because she couldn't fully trust me. But then again, she decided after a few months I'm gonna give you the reins. Man, I took it and ran with it because it it was a it was still a new catering company and venue. But man, I took the reins and ran with the food. And you know, a few people we had to work with, and then I I you and I did have a gift for the hiring and the firing. That was my job. That was what I was good at. So we ended up doing a great job and working together, building that venue. And then the the thing that I point to, why I bring up that and also the the Philippines tragedy. So that was in 2001. It was so many unknowns of how do you do that? How do you deal with it? Well, I was able to do it with God's grace. And then in the catering business, you know, my wife and I got to a point in 2016, man, we can do anything. We can serve 200 Africans, a native meal that they're used to for their event, to a quincineta, to uh an Indian event. We just we pulled it off to uh serving uh ceviche to people from the uh uh Puerto Rico, Puerto Rican event. And you know, something that the reason getting back to the Philippines thing of why why did I bring that up and go to the detail is because we were approached so many times. We developed a great brand, a great word of mouth. And that venue, it may not be the nicest venue, but man, they'll serve you well, and you will taste incredible food for the price. And so my wife and I developed a really good knack of working together and accomplishing some great things together in that business. And culminating the experience that I had with the fire of 88 people, and what I went through, what I learned is you know, you fast forward to 2016, my wife and I are crushing it, we're working well together. We got approached by just different people, different organizations of the event that they wanted to do. And they said, Yeah, we can do it. My wife and I, we were like, Yeah, we can do it. You know, off camera, we were like, if if the if the audience was the camera, we're like, we have no clue how to make this. We have no clue how we're gonna put this many people together and how we're gonna pull this off. But our response was we can do it. We can do it. And we did it. We pulled it off uh on time after time after time. And it's the same thing ever since I've been married to my wife, man. She's an incredible partner. And in uh to hit on another story that just signifies the the work of the gospel is in 2017, I my job was to primarily get there really early in the day because I was the I was the chef, I was the back of the house guy, and I would get there really early, usually by six on a Saturday, and we've got a wedding or whatever the big event is, it would start by five or six or seven, depending on it. And so this one was a wedding, and so the ceremony occurred at 3:30, then you've got hors d'oeuvres for an hour, then they eat at like six, something like that. And so we got through the the feeding and it was like 7:15, 7:30. It was it was towards the end of summer, and we, you know, we fed 140 people or so, prepared for 190 or 200 and had a lot of food in the warming cabinet. And so my wife's pushed me, you've been here since six o'clock, it's 7:30, go home. I didn't get here till almost 11. That was a common occurrence. I would just, I would just work a really long time because it was just my nature, and so finally she pushed me out and said, Go, you and Caitlin go home because my daughter was very young still at that time. And so she we didn't want her to stay at home by herself, and so she always just came to work with her. And so you take Caitlin, y'all go home, y'all hang out together. And so I'm like, okay. So I look at the warming cabinet, there's all this food enough to feed 60, 70 people. And so I look at my daughter, and I'm temporarily driving my oldest daughter's 1996 Corolla with 200,000 miles. And so I'm like, Caitlin, you want to go under the bridge? Yeah, dad, I guess. So we load up that food with just aluminum pans, napkins, and plates, and a little table. So we drive down under the bridge with these aluminum pans full of leftover food that was cooked fresh, mind you, just several hours before. And so out of the trunk of a little Toyota Corolla, Juniper Worldwide was born. And me and my little uh 12-year-old daughter um fed 70 people without forks or spoons. Um, and then, you know, that's where Juniper Worldwide was born, and we started serving uh people under the bridge. And since 2017, uh we've only missed one Friday. So we made a determination to feed on Fridays because churches sometimes fill the gaps on Sunday, Mondays, but during the week they don't get food. And so we just made a determination we're gonna do Fridays. And since 2017, when we started doing that, we haven't missed but one Friday, and that was only because it was three degrees on a Friday. So you fast forward, COVID happens, and um a year before COVID, we started a Bible study in our house just because I knew something was stirring in my wife and I that maybe eventually we're gonna plant another church or plant a church or or something. So we've I feel led to start a Bible study with my my two boys and their and some of their friends, and so we had about six people show up. And so I just started cooking. You know, I just love to cook, and uh and then COVID happens, the venue shuts down, uh, our partnership with the doctor that that ends, and so we took six months off, and we're still continuing with this Bible study. Uh I buy a big smoker, I start selling um beef, pork, chicken out of my driveway. We post it on Facebook and and we're running a Bible study, and then after a year and three months, we feel led because it's grown to like 19 boys come into our house every Tuesday night and I'm feeding them. Then my wife is well, let me do something for the girls. So we we start uh a boy and a girl Bible study where we all eat together, and there's like 25, you know, got up to close to 30 people, I think. And then the boys would go downstairs, the girls would stay upstairs, I would do the men, she would do the girls. And we're a year and a half, two years into that. And then so a couple of the kids from the Bible study, my youngest son and my oldest son, they said, Dad, Mr. Clovers, why don't you get on TikTok? And I'm thinking to myself, why would I get on a social media page and shake my booty? Because I didn't know how social media had evolved. And so I like at their advice, I'm like, I get on there and start making some videos not knowing what the heck I'm doing. And then my my daughter's just filming with her iPhone, with my iPhone, and then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I figure out what I'm doing, and then it starts to take off. And by this time, you know, we're two and a half years into the Bible study, or almost three years into the Bible study, and the social media in six months, it's starting to take off and do well. And then I'm like, we started a catering company. We're doing this Bible study, I'm doing social media, my catering business is starting to blow up because word of mouth, hey Tim and Jackie are back at it again. Oh, we want their food, we want their service, you know? And so you fast forward, my social media starts taking off, just doing really well. I'm up to close to a million followers on like a couple different social pages, making these food recipes. Uh, it's fun. I love the camera. And then in 2022, I closed my catering business because my social media business is starting to blow up and do so well. And then I felt led by the Lord. My wife and I went to California, got trained of how to become pastors. We just knew. You know, I heard. And so we launched a church later that year. Um, and church didn't go the way that we thought. Uh, a lot of heartache, a lot of trials that were challenging. Um, and then you know, you fast forward to January of this year. We were at a crossroads. You know, we're almost three years into being pastors, and it's not where we thought it would be. A lot of pain, a lot of turmoil, but a lot of lives were touched. A lot of lives were changed and transformed because of that church. And I met with my pastor on a regular basis, and I just kept telling him our struggles. Um, and he goes, Well, Tim, because we would have conversations about my social media business. And he goes, Tim, I had a mentor of mine share a number of years ago with me. What's God blessing in your life? And since that time, he said that to me. This is my pastor's uh uh point of reference talking or him talking to me, and what I'm saying is, what is God blessing? And so he always said to himself, I'm gonna follow the blessing of what God's blessing in my life. And in January of this year, God was blessing my social media business. And he still is. Um and is the church is it really blessing people right now? No, it's not really blessing people right now. Um is it touching people? I'm su it it did, but currently it's it's not what it should be. I'm we are not equipped right now to to be pastors any longer. That's what we felt. So we took a trip down to Costa Rica with some missionary mentors of ours, and they basically said the same thing. And so it was kind of like confirmation. Let's just close the church. It hurt painfully, just as same as if uh a death of a child. It was that painful. But God was really blessing my social media, and I know the church, I knew this, I knew this without a shadow of a doubt. In 2024, the church needed me, but I couldn't give them me the way that they needed me. They needed, they needed Tim Clowers about 35 to 40 hours a week, but I could I just couldn't give them that. My social media, uh, I was working 50 hours a week, and then I was a pastor for 25 hours a week. And I was trying to be a husband, I was trying to be a present father still, and I was 85 hours a week, and I was mentally breaking down, I was physically breaking down. And my wife, like towards the end of 2024, she goes, You're always sick, your body's given up. Do we have to put it on a billboard? You can't keep this up, and so we closed the church in January of this year, and that was heartbreaking. And she I didn't let it out emotionally as much as her, but I hurt just as bad as she did because of the investment we made into people's lives. And six months she was in pain. But I will say this where we are today, over three million followers on my social media pages, and I give all the glory to God. And financially, this has been one of the best years that we've ever seen in our lives, and I give all glory to God for that. And here I am today in your studio, and I reflect back upon the moments in my life of the different stories that I've told. I know that we've gone way over, golly.

SPEAKER_08: 1:43:38

You're good, man. You're good.

SPEAKER_02: 1:43:40

You said 30 minutes to an hour, sometimes longer. And I'm very sorry, and I hope I've had a profound impact by some of the things that I've said to our audience. And there's been, as I told you on the phone yesterday, every five to ten years, there's always been an impactful event that has changed the course of the direction. And January was one of those moments of we had to close a church and a chapter in our life. And my social media continued to grow and it's been blessed. I've got a full-time employee. My wife recently quit her job and she's on the team. And I've got some subcontractors that do things for us as well. And, you know, I remember a prophecy that I got back in um 2015 from a pastor where we were going to church. We were friends for a long, long, long time. We were friends for 35 years, me and this pastor. But he walked away, he walked out of our lives, and that was his choice. I still love him, but uh, I'm not mad at him, but that was painful to see just because we we felt led to go plant a church. Um he felt different about that, and so it ended a relationship. Um that that was painful, that was hurtful, but he prophesied over me. Um and it was about 10 years ago, 2015. He goes, God's called you to be an orator for his word, for him. And he said, You're gonna speak to thousands. Okay, and I I I don't know if you've ever been prophesied over, but for me, I I tend to put those things in my pocket and just give them back to God. Um and so I'm like, okay, well, he said I'm gonna be an orator and I'm gonna speak to thousands.

unknown: 1:45:45

Okay.

SPEAKER_02: 1:45:46

Well, you fast forward to where we are today, God has given me a voice, you know, through social media. I don't always stand up on or or when you pull up your phone or your pad or your television, you know, there's not always gonna be millions watching me at any one moment, but there might be hundreds or thousands or hundreds of thousands or millions watching me on a video, depending if it goes mega viral. And uh it's funny. I've had videos recently go mega viral uh with millions and millions and millions and millions of views, and I didn't get to preach the gospel, but it led them to somebody who does believe in a God, and they know that about me. And um, so we'll finish with one little story, and you're gonna ask me a question, and I thought about that question. I got hired to go to a barbecue event in September in Temple, Texas, and I felt like I was kind of lost. What am I doing here at this event? You know, I got hired to come. They they paid my expenses to come and then paid me a fair, fair rate to come. And I didn't know what why am I here? You know, you got all these barbecue pit masters cooking and presenting samples, and I just did a little class the next morning, you know, and walked around and I just felt kind of like, why am I here? You know, I really didn't know why I was there. Um, so I felt like I was supposed to go. And then later that night on the day of the event, I got introduced to a gentleman who organizes events. So, like when you go to different barbecue and country music festivals, there's usually two to three organizations that come together to pull off that vent. One handles logistics, marketing, and such and such. And the other handles the organizational logistics of you know, making sure these people are here, they're doing that, the stage is coming. Um, but the other they come together. And so I met the one guy that that hired me, that got me there, then then at the event, I met the other guy who belongs to one group, and he met me. He goes, Oh, so you're Tim. Okay, yeah. And Andy was telling me all about you. Um then he learned a little bit more about me, and then he started asking questions. I'm like, What? You do what? You have what kind of a following? And I'm like, Yeah, I mean, I love it. It's great. Like, would you be interested in coming to another event in Brownwood? Brownwood, Texas? I'd like, sure, yeah. Let me know. Let's talk more. So I get hired to come three weeks later to an event in Brownwood, Texas. It's the same thing. It's a it's a country music and barbecue festival. And I'm not cooking. That's what I do, man. Isn't that amazing? They hired me to be the MC. And I'm just like, wait, I get to walk around and taste barbecue and talk to everybody and be kind of a face of this event. I get on stage and I talk about all the different vendors and you know, mention what they did. They helped their sponsors, they did this, and they did that. And then I get to go back and meet the country music stars and bands and introduce them. That's what I got to do.

SPEAKER_06: 1:49:29

It's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_02: 1:49:30

And like what I like I had a little routine, and uh so there was uh they had a stage left where they had local bands play in the interim of waiting on other main bands to come to the main stage, which you know, it's like right there, it's just stage left kind of. And those were the local bands, you know, with uh newer guys and gals. And so I remember that was the third band. It was a a young man in a band. Uh, he he was from the Temple, Texas area. This is Brownwood, Texas. And we had a sh I went over and introduced myself. Hey, my name is Tim. I'm a social media guy. I just want to introduce myself and say I'll be introducing you at this time, and then you'll take stage and do what you do, man. And for some reason, whatever, I have no idea why. I asked him a question and it led into another question. And he turns out he was raised in Eastern Europe, Europe, and his family are missionaries. Wow. It's still missionaries to this day, but he left when he was 18 to fulfill his dream, that is to be a country music star. And so he's two and a half years, three years, I think he was 21. And so I'm like, dude, let me pray for you. So I grabbed his hand and I prayed for him right there. And people are watching, and I'm praying for this dude. Because, you know, there's another artist on the other main stage, and you've got you know, several hundred people looking at you, eyeballs on you, and I'm praying with this kid. And so I go back to the main stage, the other country music star just finished, and I go, Well, is everybody enjoying? You know, we got several thousand people by this time at the event. And I'm like, man, I hope you're having a good time. But if you'll pay attention, stage left to me. I'm gonna introduce so this is who's gonna be coming up next. You know, he's been a missionary, we just got to pray together. And if you don't know me, obviously you know that I follow God. I love God. And I'm like saying this on stage. I'm like, the organizer didn't say a word to me. So I introduce him, and we throughout the whole day, I'm introducing people, I sprinkle in the gospel a little bit here and there, and then at the end of this event, I um uh not the end of it, but around 7:30, uh, there's this guy that I introduced, uh, and I got to meet him backstage beforehand. And I we took a picture, um, and he he's from Texas, born and bred. And I go out and I'm just like talking to the crowd. I mean, the place is packed. There's six, seven, eight thousand people. I don't know, there's a it's a sea of people, you know. You look way back, and like, ladies and gentlemen, I want you to stand to your feet. If y'all had a good time, if you had some good barbecue, I mean, I'm hype in the crowd. I am just rich with enthusiasm, you know. And I get everybody to stand up and I said, ladies and gentlemen, I want you to give it up and give them your best as we welcome the next artist to the stage. And I'm just building on it, you know. And I said, put your hands together, give me the loudest scream that you can, and welcome so-and-so to the stage. And they are going nuts. And I turn around, walking off the stage to my right, and there he is, you know, the country star, and he's like waving me over. He goes, dude, I've sang at a lot of venues and done this for a long time in my life, but I've never had such a great introduction. I hope I can live up to that. That's awesome. And then the reason I say that is my wife reminded me of that prophecy that that pastor gave me 10 years ago. It says, You will speak to thousands.

SPEAKER_06: 1:53:25

That's amazing.

SPEAKER_02: 1:53:26

And and if you rewind back at 12 o'clock of that day, I had introduced uh my first country music star. I think it started at 11:45. And at 12 o'clock, I FaceTimed my wife, got a further away as much as possible from the stage so that I could hear my wife and so she could see me clearly. And I I I FaceTimed her and I said, Honey, I said, I feel so humbled to be here. Like there's gonna be thousands and thousands of people here by the end of the night, by the time night gets here. I'm gonna be on that stage appointed to it. And I'm gonna be on stage, and I'm gonna be the voice of this event. Who are they gonna remember the most? Whether me, the country music star, I don't know. I don't really care if they remember me or not. But God put me on a stage in front of thousands of people, and I was just crying to her, and I said, I feel so humbled to be here that God would allow me, this little country boy, really at heart, um, to be on that stage, and I just cried like a daggone baby.

SPEAKER_07: 1:54:50

That's amazing. Amazing story. All right. Last question If you could sit on a park bench and have a conversation with someone living or deceased, who would it be and why?

SPEAKER_02: 1:55:03

I've thought about that. And there's I've thought about entrepreneurs, I've thought about different people that I know and have met over the course of my life. I've thought about powerful people who've changed the world. But I go back to two people. It was John Osteen. He was always on the television when I was an addict. He was always preaching the gospel. And I got to meet him one day. He's one of my real life heroes. And then I thought about Mother Teresa. And if you don't know about her story, uh, I would look her up. So I was I'm torn. Is it would it be, would I would I talk to Mother Teresa or would I talk to Jo John Osteen? Because that was a hard one for me. And I'm still tossing in my mind who who would I talk to.

SPEAKER_07: 1:56:07

Well, you're doing a lot of Mother Teresa's work.

SPEAKER_02: 1:56:11

And so I I think this morning it's really because I I told my wife, I was like, it would probably be Mother Teresa. And the reason why, and not one of my heroes in John Osteen, is because she was actually a well-to-do woman. I mean, she wasn't mega wealthy or anything, but she left, she lived in the Baltic States area. That's where she lived. Uh, but she didn't come out of poverty, but she left her her country to go serve humanity. And I know why she did it. That's not what I would ask her. Um, but if we sat on a park bench and we had a conversation, I would say, Mother Teresa, you left everything to serve the poor people of that nation be the less fortunate. It's like, I I know why you did it. But I would ask her. I would ask her two things. I'm like, are there any regrets that you have while you were there of things either you didn't do or things you could have done different? And then what I would I would ask her, what was your greatest achievement? Not monetarily, not like big crowds not being seen on television or being written up in an article. But what was your greatest thing that you saw happen in your lifetime while you were there? And I would love to hear her answer on that one, because it's easy to sit up here for me to tell everybody that, yeah, he got to go to a country music festival and pronounce, you know, or introduce all these country music stars and sprinkle in a little bit of the gospel to 8,000 people because that was part of a prophecy being fulfilled. Yeah, I mean, that was that was amazing. I cried, it was emotional, it was it was powerful. But I go back to what I told you this morning when I walked through those doors. What's impacted me? It's stuff that's not on camera, it's stuff that's not written in papers. It's it's it'll never be read about in the New York Times, it'll never be published on a social media page, it'll never be seen on the local news or national news about my Aunt Kim.

SPEAKER_01: 1:58:50

And that's what I'd like to know about Mother Teresa. One of the things I don't nobody'll ever know that it's inside of you.

SPEAKER_07: 1:59:02

That's powerful, man. It's a powerful story. You got anything?

SPEAKER_04: 1:59:07

No, I just love it. Ultimate story redemption, you know.

SPEAKER_07: 1:59:11

It is. You you have been through it all. And uh, and what I love is is that you you just you know, you don't give up that faith. And uh, you know, you were lost, but then you know, you you recognize that God was beside you the whole time, even when you were lost.

SPEAKER_02: 1:59:29

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_07: 1:59:30

And and then the power of forgiveness, you know, how how that played such a big part in your life. And uh, you know, I'm excited to see where you where you go with with everything that you've got going on. So for those that want to learn more about you, talk about where they can find you your social media website, all those good things.

SPEAKER_02: 1:59:48

My website is cookitwithtim.com. And you can find me on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, YouTube. Uh there's even a couple other platforms that I'm on to. It's called Lemonate. Threads. Obviously, the easiest way to find me is cookitwithim.com. That's that's really the easiest way. I publish food recipes on my website. It's a blog style of recipe uh website. Uh we send out weekly uh email newsletters. I publish three to four new videos per week, food recipe videos. Sometimes I'll I'll get on my social media pages, whether it's whether it's an Instagram story, a TikTok story, a Facebook story, and I will I will share simple gospel truths. I'll post scriptures, different things along that lines. And uh but I also admit my my weaknesses. I I'm not perfect. And I was talking to an influencer who we've become friends with. He lives in Oklahoma, and I was on the phone with him yesterday. We were getting off the phone and I said, Danny, look, dude, I know you know we've been friends on socials for a couple years, but uh, you know, in the recent months we've become friends by phone and we met last week at a at a barbecue event. I said, Look, dude, if we ever need anything, seriously, I'm an open book. If you need information, I'm here to help. I can't just seriously, if you want to vent, vent, call me and vent. But I will say, dude, I I'm not the perfect friend. I'm not the perfect creator. I say stuff I shouldn't say, I do stuff I shouldn't do. But you know what? I I said I love God. And that same guy, I met him for the first time a week ago Saturday at a big barbecue event down in Southwest Texas, and he was standing there and I gotta meet him for the first time, and we talked, like, dude, what's up, man? Then this other guy walks over who I've known and met numerous times, and we had sort of a falling out about four years ago, which I I made things right with him, and we we've been in in good standing since then. Um and then he walks over in in our conversation uh and starts talking to him. So we didn't really get to finish our conversation, me and Danny. That's why I called him. We recently finished, and so he starts telling me, you know, he and this guy, Danny, well, he's getting ready to consider moving to Texas. His daughter is, you know, is in high school. I got two in Houston, yada yada yada. They're consider to considering all the options and when and how, all these variables, his business. I'm listening for about three or four minutes, and so Mike, here, let me pray for you. Danny, put your hand on his shoulder. I didn't give him an option, I didn't ask him. I just prayed for him right there.

SPEAKER_06: 2:02:34

That's awesome. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_07: 2:02:37

All right. Cook cookitwithtim.com. All the socials. Check him out, man. Thank you for coming up.

SPEAKER_02: 2:02:47

Thank y'all for having me on the show. I really appreciate it. Really, yeah. And I I'm truly humbled to to be here. Um I I am uh I am not a perfect human. I make mistakes, I say stuff I shouldn't, do things I shouldn't do at times. Never immoral or horrible things, nothing like that. But just you know, how you stick your foot in your mouth. Why did I say that stupidly? Uh but I I just do want to express gratitude to God and and hopefully I've come across as as a humble servant of Christ today. Yeah. Absolutely. Ultimately, what I wanted to convey is I'm no better than you guys. I'm not. I'm just a I'm just a guy that's been through hell and back, and other people have been through worse than me. And I always try to remind myself, people have had a harder life than you. They have. And I'm just I'm humbled and thankful.

SPEAKER_07: 2:03:34

Well, we thank you for sharing. We wish you safe travels back home. Thank you. Excited to see uh, you know, what's next for you on your journey and your wife helping you and all those good things. And uh, so yeah. All right, everybody, be sure to like and share and do all those things. And go out and be tempered.

SPEAKER_00: 2:03:52

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SPEAKER_05: 2:04:22

I want to share something that's become a big part of the Be Tempered mission: Patreon. Now, if you've never used it before, Patreon is a platform where we can build community together. It's not just about supporting the podcast, it's about having a space where we can connect on a deeper level, encourage one another, and walk this journey of faith, resilience, and perseverance side by side. Here's how it works. You can join as a free member and get access to daily posts, behind the scenes updates, encouragement, and some things I don't always put out on other platforms. And if you feel called to support the mission financially, there are different levels where you can do that too. That support helps us keep producing the podcasts, creating gear, hosting events, and sharing stories that we believe can truly impact lives. And here's the cool part Patreon has a free app you can download right on your phone. It works just like Facebook or Instagram, but it's built specifically for our community. You'll be able to scroll through posts, watch videos, listen to content, and interact with others who are on the same journey. At the end of the day, this isn't just about content, it's about connection. It's about building something together. Not just me and Ben putting out episodes, but a family of people committed to growing stronger through real stories and real faith. So whether you just want to hop on as a free member or you feel called to support in a bigger way, Patreon is the door into that community. Because at the heart of Be Tempered has always been simple real stories, raw truth, resilient faith, so that even one person out there that hears what they need to hear, and Patreon helps make that possible.