Episode 37 - The Smoak Bros roll on!

There is a lot to listen twice to in this episode. Special thanks to Jon and Joey for joining us to share about their love for the outdoors. It was a great time invested with them and we are continuing to find common ground with folks from all over! Thanks for listening!

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Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:49

He said, man, Leo, I said, I'm not gonna lie to you. So I was honest and I said, I bet we have a hundred. And he said, boy, you lie so bad. Trapped his boat up.

SPEAKER_05 0:59

And he started driving his drone over to a kill any, uh, did you kill any birds over the weekend? And Chris said, yeah, we killed the limit that morning, and the limit that after next. Leo said, wait a minute, what? And Chris goes, wait a minute, what? So he goes, Well, I'll draw you a map. He didn't have a piece of paper. He had his pen. And he said, Let me see, palm your hand, Chris. So he grabs my wife's hand and he starts drawing. He said, go up the river, go into draw water, keep going, keep, and he gets all the way up here past her elbow. And I said, Leo, you need to get to that brim back.

SPEAKER_04 1:55

Well, it was a half-ounce jig, and he really cranked back on it, and it flew back and it hit him where no guy wants to be hit.

SPEAKER_05 2:12

Poor it's me, but it's hurt bad, though. I mean, it's it's in the throes of death.

SPEAKER_03 2:24

All right, all right, all right. It is time for another Mostly Legal Podcast episode. We're excited to be coming to you again live on location in Pinewoods, South Carolina. This week we're back with Joey and John Smoke. Of course, Scott Ding is my brother, is here from Chapin and Bubba Johnston driven down from the metropolis of Sumter, and we're out here enjoying this country life with Joey on Smoke Farms. Sitting here in his big workshop, aptly named the Smoke Shop, and uh we're excited to pick back up on some great stories that we were just getting into of your childhood and y'all, the two of you with your brother at Jim. But before I do that, I want to give a quick uh shout to a listener of the week, uh, Daniel Andrews. Daniel is a longtime friend, uh, used to be a colleague of mine in the real estate business, just a fine fellow, loves the Lord, loves his family, serves the church, great businessman. Um, and I want to uh have Daniel on here at some point to tell some stories, but I'm not in a hurry because all his funny stories are about my stupidity when we used to work together. He's got a lot of them, but I'm gonna kind of keep holding him off for a little bit longer. But Daniel is the father of Jenkins Andrews, who was one of our guests earlier with another young man that had some incredible bow hunting stories about some big bucks they killed.

SPEAKER_07 3:31

So that's really well-mannered young man.

SPEAKER_03 3:33

And uh thank the thank the Lord for Daniel, he's a great friend, but appreciate him listening, uh, putting other people on the podcast and always being an encouragement too.

SPEAKER_07 3:40

One other thing you you didn't mention in those accolades about Daniel is he's finished second place more than anybody else in the Dinksbow Classic.

SPEAKER_03 3:48

In the Dinkinsville Classic, and I think he finished third place in the charter member division this year, if I remember correctly. But uh a lot of fun, Daniel. You know you're loved, and we do look forward to having you on the podcast. All right, turning our attention back to the smoke boys. There was a couple stories about your childhood that we kind of ended that last uh episode with. We'd love to hear a few more, just uh about how you you you mentioned how you got into hunting with your dad, but how did when did you start getting some independence? So when did you start going out by yourselves after the BB gun and the cat bird? Like what were some of the other things y'all started doing as you started maturing and getting out in the woods by yourselves?

SPEAKER_04 4:25

Joey, Joey and I did um because we're closer in age than Jim, um we did a lot of things together. So it was deer hunting, duck hunting. Um course we dove hunted and actually any kind of hunting, we did it. And uh and our big thing that we really, really did a lot together was duck hunting. Um and and then after Joey acquired this property, um we hunted out here. And uh and it's just been uh and I said it earlier, you know, you I'm blessed because I get to reap the benefits of a lot of different things, and because of the success of my brother and and being here and being able to do these things and and to duck hunt, he's got some great duck ponds, and uh and it's just it's awesome, man, when you get to do that, and and it's even more important when you do it with your family as well. But but we grew up, our big thing I'd say we did duck season. I mean, that that was our thing. We duck hunted. That's that's when we had ducks on our land now. I mean, lots of them.

SPEAKER_05 5:34

Yeah, you remember, I mean, back uh what in the early eight? I started hunting duck hunting when I was 11, so that was back in uh the 70s. But I mean, all the the mounters we had, oh yeah, people we come out of state to come to Sparkway landed.

SPEAKER_03 5:49

Wow.

SPEAKER_05 5:50

Um, like we go to Arkansas now. Bobby, I don't know if you got into any of that hunting, but I mean it was just amazing. It was incredible. Um you remember that hunt we went on? That um that the water was so low you had to drag your boat out of the ditch. And um it was a Friday I got off work and I spent the whole day out there uh scouting and drug the boat out and started circling the swamp. And I circled the whole swamp through uh Otta Flats, up through broad water, all around by Mill Creek and um and and right on through. And I saw a few mallards and finally homed in on some birds, and um it was one of the best hunts we have ever had.

SPEAKER_04 6:35

Yeah, Joey called me that Friday and and a hair bit of backstory on it. Our dad had just had a heart attack, pretty serious heart attack. And um Joey called me and he goes, Man, you need to come home. And I said, This is like one o'clock Friday, and I was like, Why? And he goes, Man, you you gotta come home now. And I I said, What's wrong? You know, I'm thinking something wrong with dad. And he goes, I have found a duck. And what made it even worse was he we called Jim, and I remember this part. We called Jim and said, Hey, go with us, Joey. Really found a duck, go with us in the morning. And Jim said, Man, I'm sick, I can't. Yeah, and he must have been really sick.

SPEAKER_05 7:11

Yeah, because he doesn't miss a duck on that.

SPEAKER_04 7:12

Yeah, but when we when we went in there, I mean, again, this was back before GPS or anything like that. And we get there that morning, and Joey takes a compass reading, and we carried decoys, and that was back when we reloaded shells. I mean, because you didn't have to shoot steel shot. And um, we carried all of our shells and we started walking, and you would walk across a ridge and then go across a little flat, and the world was real low, and then walk another ridge. I mean, we walked for an hour, and I we we argued a little bit. Y'all are brothers, you know. There's a little bit of arguing going on. I'm like, where are you taking me? This is and and we get into this spot and we set up I had toilet paper in the trees at the Parkers.

SPEAKER_05 7:50

You remember that?

SPEAKER_02 7:51

Yeah, and uh before you could buy the reflector real cheap at Walmart. Yeah, that's not appreciative. You did all the scouting for him. I mean he did.

SPEAKER_04 7:59

We get in there the next morning and breaks daylight, and nothing. I mean, nothing. I know, and then finally a wood duck flies by and I I think I shot the wood duck or whatever, and it was like I was like, I can't believe you brought me all the way in here, and this is nothing. And then I mean it it was like an hour after daylight, and then it was just like game on, wasn't it? Yes, sir. I mean, and I'm not talking if you didn't know what we had back then, if you could picture Arkansas just it's it's amazing. Of course, we were in the swamp in the timber and they start just piling up. About how old we are about thousands. That's awesome. And um I was probably four Play 18.

SPEAKER_05 8:40

It was good, it was good. Um, and um you I mean you were a couple years younger than me. If you were 16, I was probably eighteen, don't you think?

SPEAKER_04 8:48

Yeah, no, no, I it was I was older than that because I I was I was out of high school, so I was I was eighteen or not.

SPEAKER_05 8:54

And I was twenty then. Yeah, yeah. Um but man, we remember the um the the uh pin tail we could.

SPEAKER_04 9:34

Yeah, so so we we would always take a box of number eights, and and I I'm a uh when we reload re reloaded our shells, we would try some stuff. We had an old single barrel Harrington enrichment that that was our test gun, and so we would try all kinds of stuff reloading. I mean we'd mix extra powder, we'd pour flour down on the shot because that's the way buckshot was, and it would hold it together, and so you'd shoot and it would blow out this big powder plume by the end of the gun. We did all kinds of stuff, not probably shouldn't have, but we had our regular duck shells, and then we would always take a box of number eights to shoot cripples with. After we ran out of the other shells, we go back to where we'd started and had our box of number eights.

SPEAKER_07 10:20

Y'all just missed a lot.

SPEAKER_04 10:21

We missed a lot. I think it's five or something. But um, so we're sitting there, and so we load up with the number eights, and here comes, I mean, no joke, 500 miles, and they're circling and circling. Joey's like, let them get down low, let them get down low because we got number eights, let them get down low. And I was like, I'm I'm ready, man. You don't have to tell me. And all of a sudden, Joey jumps up because they weren't down yet, and he jumps up and he shoots. And of course, immediately we started fighting, and I was like, I can't believe you shot, man. That's right. Yeah, he shot one time. One time. Come in, I he goes, I got him, I got him, I got him. And I'm like, You stupid, you could have waited until they got down here and we could have killed him. And and he goes, I got him, I got him, I got a pin tail. And I was like, What? And he goes, I killed a pentail. And one pin tail and 500 milers, and he shoots him pretty high up there with number eight and got him.

SPEAKER_03 11:17

Well, that was good eyes and good aim to pick him out, and no.

SPEAKER_04 11:20

He said he saw him in the water, the reflection in the water, because Jim taught us, yeah. Taught us very young age, you don't look up at the ducks, and if I catch you looking up, then you and Lincoln are one couple of things.

SPEAKER_07 11:33

Could Jim give Lincoln a few tips about how to look down and not up? Jim would give anybody any tips.

SPEAKER_05 11:39

Lincoln's got one of those pie faces, you know.

SPEAKER_01 11:43

Yeah, but in Lincoln's defense again, his face mask was rubbing in the neck. His neck was a wrong. He's not here to defend himself, but he had what do you say he had a sensitive deck? Sensitive neck.

SPEAKER_05 11:54

Hey, he and I killed some birds um out west, too. We got on some good hunts. But uh that day was incredible. It was a highlight of the biggest. Was it a rain in heaven?

SPEAKER_04 12:04

We wouldn't build an eagle that day. Uh ran out of number eights, and we always carried buckshot with us because you never know when you see a deer.

SPEAKER_03 12:12

Or a turkey.

SPEAKER_04 12:12

Yeah. He ended up killing a couple with buckshot.

SPEAKER_07 12:15

Joey had his bow though, right? He had his bow shooting and running.

SPEAKER_04 12:19

So I told Joey, I said, I got four buckshot. And he goes, Well, give me two. And I gave him two and I got two. And uh yeah, we we um got a couple.

SPEAKER_05 12:27

I remember you shooting a Drake Mallard about a hundred yards up, and it went poof. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 12:33

Um, but yeah, that was um uh that was a long time ago, and I'm I'm um it was fun. Man, it was fun.

SPEAKER_01 12:41

Isn't that amazing though to think about that that how the ducks that we used to have? I mean, and because I told people before, like my buddies, I mean, I was you asked if I hunt like in the in the early 80s. I mean, I was we were hunting at Riverside back in then. Yeah. And I'm telling you, we had days where we'd have, you know, a thousand mallards circling just like we had some of the best days we ever had in Arkansas coming in and stuff in Riverside. And it's just like, and you could you could go take that same ride around the swamp now that you did then, and I don't know that you will see a wood duck, much less a mallet or anything else. It's crazy.

SPEAKER_05 13:13

You know, I would love for the younger generation that's so hip on duck hunting right now, and we've got a great group of young people that are really hunting uh to see something like that. I mean, they drive out west, they drive for 20 hours to try to kill some ducks, and uh I wish they could have seen it uh uh be a part of it even now.

SPEAKER_04 13:32

It was amazing, and we had we had so many widgeon on our lake, and just I mean, so we would go play basketball for the church and go play basketball in the morning and then go down and put in at Pax or Elliott's and and go out and shoot widgeon. And they'd be in the coot. Oh man, we we crawled down the bank one day, you remember that?

SPEAKER_05 13:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 13:54

We crawled, we saw all these widgets up against the bank, and we pulled a boat down right down by Coca Cola Slough and crawled and crawled and crawled and got up there, and it was one of those, okay. I had a uh 870 wingmaster, Joey had his old infamous double barrel, and uh he said, All right, on three we gonna shoot, and we shot five times. And um got the limit. Yeah, we got our limit. And widgets.

SPEAKER_05 14:21

Hey, back then, you know, uh if you did happen to kill over the limit, you were a hero. Now it's different. You kill over the limit, well, you're going to jail.

SPEAKER_01 14:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 14:31

It's it it just seemed to be different back then.

SPEAKER_01 14:33

It was and it was different. And like I said, even like you think about now, but people would kill to kill a big bull widget. Now, I mean, just oh yeah. And now, I mean, they were just every they were all out there in those coots. I can remember, like I said, you know, be sitting sitting on that log and and somebody going out, you know, just to kind of check things out, and those coots get up and the ducks would get up, and we were very fortunate they would come come around to where we were at. But it just the amazing number of ducks that we had back then was crazy and not to have anything now. I mean, it's it's I'll take my son and I he's he's into duck hunting like you're talking about, and we've traveled out west and and that kind of stuff, but it is sad. I go to the lake and it's it's like torture for me sitting in the boat. I enjoy being with him, but it's just torture to set and just look at the empty sky.

SPEAKER_07 15:15

The land of the barren skies is what you call it.

SPEAKER_05 15:17

The land of the barren skies. That was back when that was Leo Morris's prime time. Oh, yeah. And man, he was a great game board and he worked hard and he took it serious. And he had this little paddle boat, and he would remember that, John?

SPEAKER_04 15:32

Sneak up on you.

SPEAKER_05 15:33

You'd hear if you were good, you could you might be able to hear him bump the boat every night and with his paddle. Um, and he never really picked on us too much. I I know it. Um matter of fact, I had a good relationship.

SPEAKER_07 15:45

When you obey the law, they don't come after you.

SPEAKER_05 15:47

That's right. One time, I mean he liked me so much every time I saw him at landing, he'd hug me. You know, he he would hug me. I'm trying to think the last time I came board and hugged me. Leo maybe he was checking for dogs.

SPEAKER_04 15:59

Leo, Leo was great, and I I see uh Leo a lot, and his wife Connie's in the real estate, and and um she's a very good customer of mine. And and um but Leo uh y'all remember when we had the white bass down in the lake, and you'd go down there and just I mean you could crush them. And that would I miss that because that was so much fun. You could take a kid down there and catch him, and it was just great. And a friend of mine and I at that time we were fishing right in the run to the river. And and I'm sure you remember there would be, I mean, if you if the white bass were there, it just wouldn't be you catching them, there would be 10 or 15 boats, and everybody would be casting all over. And so this other guy, Roger and I pulled up and we were anchored in the run to the river, and we were catching them every cast. And so I mean we kept them and we would throw them in the cooler, and half of them were missing the colour. Oh, you're clicker, right?

SPEAKER_01 16:49

Y'all were counting them up.

SPEAKER_04 16:51

Yeah, and so all of a sudden Roger looks at me and he goes, Smoke. He said, There's Leo. And I look up and so Leo's coming towards us and he's checking all these boats. And uh he goes, he looked down at the bottom of the boat and he goes, How many of you think we have? And I said, keep fishing. And he said, Man, we we gotta stop. And like so Leo pulls right up until he sees that it's us, and we both have one on, and so we take them and throw them in the bottom of the boat because I knew if I threw him back, he was coming in. Leo said, he said, Smoke, y'all catching them? And I said, Man, Leo, I said, I'm not gonna lie to you. So I was honest, and I said, I bet we have a hundred. And he said, Boy, you lie so bad. I dragged his boat up and he started driving and drove over to another boat and wrote them a ticket for not having a fishing license. Roger said, What? He said, We got to go. And I said, keep fishing. And I said, if we stop, we gonna get caught. And Leo drove off and and we waited until we couldn't hear his motor anymore. We left.

SPEAKER_05 17:49

You know, a funny story about Leo. Leo loved my wife. I mean, Chris was um, she um she's a nurse and she used to work with Dr. Perry Davis in Pinewood. Well, that was Leo, that's what we're talking about. And so he knew my wife. He'd come in there and and Chris, you know, I remember one time she came home and she goes, Yeah, I talked with Leo today. Um he came in, it was right after opening day of dove season, and uh Leo asked me, he said, because Chris liked to hunt too, you know, she'd go hunting with us and she was a cracker jacket. She could kill a dove now. She would be sometimes the first one out in the field with a limit. And uh so Leo went in and uh to see the doctor and he asked Chris, he said, Hey, did y'all kill any um did you kill any birds over the weekend? And Chris said, Yeah, we killed a limit that morning and the limit that afternoon. Leo said, wait a minute, what? And Chris goes, wait a minute, what? Um but anyway, uh he really liked her, and I remember one time going to Pax Landing, we were gonna go try catching brim. Chris and I were there, and she loves to catch brim too. So we we put in at Pax Landing, at the boat, public boat landing, and lo and behold, Leo comes up. And Leo uh comes up there and he's talking with Chris, you know, he's he's he's he's having day, and I'm over there, and I'm like, hey Leo, is anybody catching any any brim? And he goes, Man, I just I just wrote a ticket, a big ticket to some guys that were catching them in a brim bed. He said, Y'all want to know where they are, because Chris was right there. And uh I said, of course, yeah, we want to know where where that brim bed is. And so he goes, Well, I'll I'll draw you a map. And we didn't have a piece of paper, he had his pen and he said, Let me see the palm of your hand, Chris. So he grabs my wife's hand and he starts drawing. He said, Go up the river, go into broad water, keep going, keep and he gets all the way up here past our elbow. And I said, Leo, you need to get to that brim bedroom. He drew us a map, and we went and we caught the brim. And anytime we were we would dove hunt, and we were like lying. Remember we were at the Jim's dove field that time over Remini, and I mean it's loaded with birds, and uh Chris is out there, and Leo and them come out there, and they they come and uh it's me, Chris, and who on who and so they come and they check me, and then they go and they walk, they say, Hey Chris, and they walk past her, and they don't even check her. So they had they had a good relationship.

SPEAKER_01 20:23

Well, they got a good pastor. Yeah, Leo was great. You're talking about the ducks too earlier, and I can remember like one of ducks just that was my thing. I was I was just absolutely enthralled with duck hunting, and it just became like an obsession with me, and at a very, very young age, like going in Riverside with my daddy at nine and ten years old, and like I told one of the stories about getting carried into a flat at probably six or seven years old and sitting on a stump, but just duck hunting with a maiden man. I remember this was probably late 70s, maybe like 79, 80. I'm I'm nine or ten years old, and my daddy and I took a ride one easy. Come on, let's ride. And we rode down to Sparker Bay Landing, and we pulled up at Sparker Berry Landing. It was probably, you know, one o'clock in the afternoon. And Jim could have been, I don't know, Jim at the point or whatever, y'all might have been there. But when we pulled up there, Toy and John Land and Greg Richardson and all of them, they pulled up in like three John boats. Yeah. And they pulled, we sat there and daddy was talking about. And and daddy pulled, like, they pulled out the boats with him, daddy's talking to them back when they just talking about duck hunting, and I think they'd all kind of just duck hunting in the same areas, him and Will and everything. But I remember them, they they threw back the burlap on, um, nobody was at the land, they threw back the burlap, and I'm talking about the boat cover mouth. I think they all had a limit for sure, okay? And they started just throwing ducks around, like a couple of them with bands on them. I mean, they killed, they had bands on them. And I was just like, and they was like, yeah, yeah, Greg, you want this band? Or John, you want this band? And I was like, No, I don't want this band. I was looking going, I want that band on the stuff. But it's just amazing seeing like, I mean, just I was just amazed. Like, I was that thing is burnt into my brain thinking about that. Another quick story kind of ties into you. My first job out of college was doing real estate appraisals with Matt McEwan. And I had to go down to Manning and do uh an appraisal on Donald McCord's house. And I was in the garage, and every garage had a little utility room or whatever. And I walked in and I was doing appraisal, whatever, and he had like one of those cigar boxes or whatever sitting on a shelf, and that thing was stacked full of duck bands. I was a mouthful. Look at all the duck bands. But I mean, I just remember seeing that, and I was just like, look at all the duck bands. I was just absolutely amazed at how many. I mean, there's just how many ducks those guys used to kill back in. They were in Jim, and I know y'all were in there, but it was amazing to think how many ducks were killed in Sparkle Bears.

SPEAKER_05 22:45

That wasn't the SCWA bands either. No, no, these were these were federal.

SPEAKER_01 22:50

These were the real bands. I mean, it was just, it was crazy how many ducks those guys used to kill back. My daddy's got a lanure full of them, and his this is the way my daddy's math works. Y'all get a kick out of this. So he said he read something one time in one of the magazines, something like one in every whatever something, 100,000 ducks was banded. He's like, I got 50 bands right here, so that means I've killed 50 times 100,000. I've killed this many ducks. I don't know about that. I don't know the quite words that way, but it was his math is like you're spelling. Yeah. S M O A K.

SPEAKER_00 23:21

Okay. S M O A K.

SPEAKER_03 23:23

Remember, he's not even unilingual. Okay. Because he can't.

SPEAKER_00 23:27

Okay. I want to sniffle over there.

SPEAKER_03 23:31

Let's uh let's pause just for a moment from some of these outdoor stories. Um, Joey, I met you for the first time, I think probably 25 to 30 years ago when I was just back from college and in the working world. I had known of you and heard about you, but got to meet you. And you and old Tony Barwick were kind to kind of pull me along into the Rotary Club, and I got to join that with you and got to know you a little bit more uh through that. But in the years since I've I've known and and learned from you that you are a man of faith and you are really involved with the church and that's important to you, and you want to be uh serving the Lord in the right ways, all the ways that you can. And that the reason I'm bringing that up is because I know there's a crusade coming up, a temp crusade coming up in something that you're real involved with. Would you just take a minute, tell us a little bit about that, and uh because we want our listeners to know about the opportunity that's out there and uh yeah, everything they need to know, we want you to be free to share with us.

SPEAKER_05 24:23

Well, thank you. Uh yeah, that's a a passion of not only mine, but six other people on our team that God called us into that ministry back during COVID. You know, I don't know if you remember the the frustration that the church went through during COVID.

SPEAKER_02 24:39

I remember.

SPEAKER_05 24:40

Man, it was just like, God, this is gonna set the church back 20 years. You know, everybody's thinking, you know, we just it's really gonna hurt. But it didn't. It didn't end up setting it back um for 20 years. And but during that time, uh God spoke to me about doing something, and I didn't know what it was. I remember being on my way to Sumter, and that's when he really grabbed me. And uh, you know, so I taught I came back and uh talked with another gentleman, Gene Phillips from Somerton, about what I experienced that day. He said, I man, I'm gonna experience the same thing. So we ate breakfast the next day and prayed over, and through that and other people joining us, some we didn't know, some we did, we got up to a uh a team of seven uh people, um six guys and one lady that guy called together. And we didn't know what he wanted to do. Um, and he he he he wanted us to do crusades, and that's what we ended up, he ended up laying the path out for us. And um and so if Billy Graham would have been alive then, we would have called him, okay? Um that's what that's how pumped up we were. He wasn't, uh he had passed on, but Tony Evans, I don't know if you know Dr. Tony Evans, he's he's he's known worldwide. Um he's a great preacher. And uh anyway, we called him and he said, Would you come to Sumter? And he said, Yeah, I'll come to Sumter. He said, I hadn't been speaking anywhere because of COVID, I'm ready to get out. And so it was just God's timing on everything, and lined him up for Sumter, and he he went to that uh the Civic Center and we had a three-day crusade there. But before then, one of the one of our members, Mitchell Goff, said, Hey, we really ought to do this tent thing. And I'm thinking, tent? You know, you can't hardly get, I mean, I'm a I'm a Baptist or maybe a Baptist hostile or whatever you want to call it. Um you can't get people to agree on a thermostat and sit in a padded pew walking on good carpet less than go under a tent and you know have no heating and air and stuff. Well, sure enough, man, God has blessed those tent meetings. It's is a gospel endeavor that's incredible. And I'd like to encourage the listeners and and uh amongst whoever this word can get out to to come to uh Sumter uh crusade that that um that God has set forth uh and we're putting on April the 20th through May the 1st. Okay, and uh I mean it's a month away now, right? So it's coming. Uh yeah, and it's Monday through Friday of both of those weeks, and it starts at 6:30 in the evening, and and you'll probably be out there by 8.30. Um but uh we have uh evangelists coming from around the southeast, four different evangelists, one being a guy that uh is named C.T. Townsend, and C T is the one that has the tent. And y'all, that tent is as big as a football field. Wow. And and and what's so special about it is it catches people's attention and they're curious. Okay, so they go, hmm, and this tent's just so big and they'll be drawn to it, of course. The Holy Spirit's drawing draws a lot of it. And so they'll they'll be drawn out of curiosity and the Holy Spirit's drawing, and so um they'll go and and go under there and then just hear the gospel preached in a way, you know how evangelists will really they can really pour to it like a local preacher. You know, he's in his church a lot of times. He's almost restricted, some, but these evangelists they can really pour to it. And um, and so uh then we also have singing groups coming from around the nation. Um and um and so for those 10 nights, it's I think it's gonna be incredible. And it's it's gonna be um Stephen, you know where um Ashley Furniture is. Yep, right there in Brawl Street extension. Yeah, and right before you get to Shaw, uh right across from that road called Mason Road, Mason comes into 378, and Doc Dunlap has let us use that corner. Wow, it's a great site. Yeah, and um and the city, the city of Sumter, the counties behind it, um everybody's uh there's probably 60 churches from around Sumter and the surrounding communities that are coming uh that are involved in it. And so we're looking for thousands of people, and I and I just don't know what God's gonna do. We're praying for something very big.

SPEAKER_01 29:55

Yeah. So, real quick, Joe, two things. Do you you know don't need a ticket or you do need a ticket? Do not need a ticket, it's free. Is there a website or anything that y'all have, like so people can see the schedule or anything like that? And let me say this, y'all. I I was I was fortunate enough to be to help Joe and them, just not not not part of administration, but they they needed volunteers and I was able to, and it was first class when Tony Evans was here, had Hank Parker with one of the speakers and everything. It was amazing. I mean, absolutely phenomenal. So if you get a chance to go, you really you will be blessed by it. I mean, I was I was blown away every night that I was there, and I think we went all three nights when y'all were at the Exhibition Center, and it was just amazing. And and for for believers and and non-believers, it was incredible. It'll it'll it'll be something to touch both both genres to say the least. But website or whatever too.

SPEAKER_05 30:41

Yeah, uh followmecrusade.org. Okay. Um if you go there, then it'll lead you also to Facebook site, and um we have um we we have everything on there, all information. Uh we do need volunteers. Matter of fact, that the one experience that I would even invite y'all to come to um that is so special is when we fly the tent. Okay, it takes about 200 men to fly that tent. And um we're gonna do that um on the 11th of next month. Uh April 11th will start about nine o'clock. That's a Saturday morning, and by one or so, one or two, it'll be up in the air. And that is incredible to see that tent go up. I mean, it's something like what is it? They used to have circuses under that big big top or whatever it is. It's incredible. It's state-of-the-art equipment under there, too, projector screens, um all the music's first class. It is just great. But man, the uh Holy Spirit sat down on that tent. I just can't I can't describe it. If you only want if you only want to come one night, you better wait till the last night and come that night, because if not, you're gonna come more than one night. That's great.

SPEAKER_03 31:56

So at the corner of Mason Road and Broad Street Extension, right here in Sumter, South Carolina, they won't be able to miss the tent. It's gonna be huge. It's free, and uh the the it's every night, Monday through Friday, for two weeks in a row, 6 30 to 8 30, roughly. And give me those dates one more time.

SPEAKER_05 32:13

Um it's um April the 20th through the 24th, and then uh April the 27th through May the 1st. So two weeks in a row.

SPEAKER_03 32:23

Last two weeks of April is when you'll see that tent go up here in Sumter. Yeah, we'd encourage y'all to come. I'm looking forward to it. I have not been involved in any of that. I was in Africa when you guys started this stuff, uh, but I got to hear about Tony Evans and hear about that one. And uh you've told me a little bit about some of the other places y'all have pitched that tent and what God's done through that and through the speakers, and so we're excited and uh praying for that, but also excited to come and check it out and be a help wherever we can. We'll try to continue to remember it to promote it here on the podcast and our future episodes. Thank you. Uh, but we appreciate you coming on and telling us a little bit about that, and uh we'll be cheering you on and looking forward to see what God does.

SPEAKER_02 32:57

And for volunteers that want to help, they can find out about that on the website.

SPEAKER_05 33:00

Yes. Um, yes. Or or they could um they could message me um or uh you know, I'm I'm easy to get in touch with.

SPEAKER_01 33:08

And y'all, they they make it very easy to volunteer. I mean, they they will direct you, don't don't be intimidated, whether it's whether it's just pointing somebody to where they can go sit or whether it's helping park cars, whatever. They they are they are great with it. I mean, I'm telling you right, they were organized when we when we helped, and I'm telling you, it was it was a blessing to me to just to be able to be able to help because it really was incredible. So looking forward to that, Joey. That's that's great. We are really are that'll be a good thing.

SPEAKER_03 33:33

And I have noticed your marketing, I've seen a lot of your signs up on some power poles around town, a big uh blue sign with the tent on it. Yes, so looking forward.

SPEAKER_05 33:40

Yeah, and um you know next week uh or this week you'll see billboards going up. We'll have about 10 around Sumter.

SPEAKER_03 33:46

Very good. Yeah. Well, we got to, I mentioned earlier, we got to see a lot of our or run into a lot of listeners last week at the first Baptist Church Wild Game Night. Uh, we were there, had a little table, passed out a few things, and were able to give away a few door prizes, but it was great to be a part of that. Had over a thousand people show up. Wow, yes. Weather was a little tricky, but the people still came uh despite the rain and uh had a lot of good food and a powerful testimony about God's redemptive grace, uh, even through addictions and things, and it was it was really good.

SPEAKER_07 34:15

So uh thankful for that.

SPEAKER_03 34:17

Uh thankful for First Baptist letting us be a part of it, a small part. But now we're looking forward to the next event here with the crusade. All right.

SPEAKER_01 34:25

So smoke boys, let me ask y'all a question real quick. And this is this is kind of I know how old is how old is Jim? Like, what's the age difference? Jim is Jim, what's y'all's age difference?

SPEAKER_05 34:34

Jim's what, nine years older than me, and I'm two years older than you. How old are you now?

SPEAKER_04 34:38

I'm 60, so you're a little bit older than 63. Joey, yeah. So Joey, Joey and I are about three and a half years apart, and then we have a sister Julia who is a phenomenal fisherman, fisher, fisher woman, excuse me. Um her son Justin's the one that just won the CBC up on Lake Murray.$15,000. 15 grand. Yeah. He won yesterday. He's an incredible fisherman. And um, and then there's uh Jim, and then we have two other sisters, Janice and then Joyce. My sister Joyce has passed away. Joyce was 18 years older than me. Um so my mom and daddy kind of spaced us, I guess, and and uh there's a bunch of us, man. Big family, big family reunion and everything. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 35:22

So did y'all ever like it, did y'all ever like after dinner, did y'all ever get any kind of athletic competitions in the yard or anything? Playing playing football or any baseball or anything like that? Oh, we did, we did it all.

SPEAKER_04 35:32

Yeah, yeah, we did. We had a dunk goal in the yard and uh all kind of stuff. But um, you know, Jim was Jim was the one. I don't know, I don't know if anybody knew or not, but I mean, Jim, of course, real good athlete in in football and baseball and everything, and then really took baseball to the next level and played triple A for the Philadelphia Phillies. I didn't know that. I didn't know that either. He he was he was great, he played with a lot of people. I could start throwing names out because I knew him, and it was my brother, and I'm like, oh man, that's awesome. He's doing that. And uh and then he hurt his shoulder in the offseason.

SPEAKER_03 36:05

Was he a pitcher?

SPEAKER_04 36:06

No, he was a center fielder. Okay.

SPEAKER_05 36:09

Um and he and so he broke all kind of records, yeah, um, like uh stealing from first to second.

SPEAKER_04 36:17

Yeah, Jim had a lot of speed. I didn't inherit that speed, I can tell you. Um, but Jim um he had the opportunity to be a DH for the Baltimore Orioles. He said, that's the biggest mistake he ever made. He said, If I can't play in the field, I'm not I don't want to be sitting there on the bench just to hit. And he said, Man, the money I could have made to do that, he said, I it was a real big mistake. So but he he got a lot of that, and uh and then I mean we played against each other in a lot of stuff and in the yard and everything.

SPEAKER_05 36:49

And uh But when it came to hunting and fishing, Jim was a class above us. Yeah, I mean I mean yeah, that's what we always had to shoot for. Especially with fish and because um and and I mean he thinks like a largemouth ass.

SPEAKER_04 37:02

Yeah, you know, when when Clay Louder and I fished a lot of the team trail stuff together, and um and we still fish all the time together, just not as many tournaments. But our goal, I mean, we wanted to win, we wanted to win every one, but our secondary goal was we wanted to beat Jim Smoke and Mike Watson. No, I mean we wanted to beat them guys because they were they were top-notch, still are. I mean, they they get after it, man.

SPEAKER_03 37:27

Do they still fish together in these tournaments? No, they mean the local tournaments, even like the Thursday night stuff right now.

SPEAKER_04 37:32

Jim Jim has stopped fishing tournaments. He said um he as he's getting older, and and everybody knows that the older you get, you you kind of lose a little bit of your drive. Now he still fishes all the time.

SPEAKER_05 37:43

No, no, no. He couldn't afford all the taxes on his fishing spots. Yeah. Property taxes were killing him on all those places he owned. Yeah, we're gonna get you to come on and defend your.

SPEAKER_04 38:00

I fished a lot more than Joey did. Yeah, and um, and everywhere I would go, Jim would he'd say, Where'd you catch those fish? And and I'd say, Man, we went over, you know, the end of Persina Island and called him, Man, that's one of my spots. I'm gonna catch you there. This I mean, this went on and on.

SPEAKER_03 38:16

So like a guy I know.

SPEAKER_04 38:17

Lord, don't ever let me go over by I-95 anywhere because I'll sure be in trouble.

SPEAKER_05 38:22

He was real defensive, still is real defensive.

SPEAKER_04 38:25

But but he's bad about Joey's pond, and Joey's Joey's got this pond, but then Joey's got a big pond over there. And Jim now, okay, I went to Joey's the other day and I called 40, and I'm like, Donner, where'd you catch him? I can't tell y'all.

SPEAKER_08 38:37

I mean, like, he didn't get a positive mental attitude. He won't tell Joey.

SPEAKER_01 38:43

I bet he had a positive mental attitude when he was catching it, do y'all.

SPEAKER_05 38:47

That's what he told them. But in his defense, he put in a lot of time finding those spots. And so, I mean, like if Bo, if he were to take you to one of his spots, okay, and you go there and and then you know, you You could never go back. You couldn't go back. Uh, and if you did, you were in major trouble.

SPEAKER_01 39:07

Oh, absolutely. So I'm gonna tell y'all a Jim's story real quick, and like I said, we'll get him to come on because he he'd be great. And he's a little under the weather, so we wanted to come on. But so Jim and I, I I I found some stripers. Uh-huh. Um one of one of Kim and I's first dates, matter of fact. And I will we'll when Kim comes on, we'll tell the story. But anyway, I found some stripers. And we caught them, took a little boy back with us, and we let him catch them, and we catch them cranking stuff. And this went on a couple weeks, and they moved a little bit. And I went back with Jim, and we were in Jim's boat, and then this was back when we used to always, you know, all of us going in the afternoon, we're catching stripers, cranking and everything. And we pull up at this spot, and Jim, and I, as y'all said, I'm I'm not a dummy. I watched what Jim smoke's doing. And when Jim throw bait hips to water, my bait hips to water, and he winds it real fast, and he stops it. And I'm every everything he's doing, I'm doing the same thing. I'm mimicking.

SPEAKER_05 39:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:59

And every time he throws out, he catches one. And I don't catch one. And my bait comes back and he's got another one on. I'm like, what the heck? And Jim's eating this up. He's eating this up. And I'm like, I know he's good, but he ain't that good. I mean, he he's good. I mean, he's a lot better than me, but he ain't that good. I mean, sure enough, I mean, every time, throw the back there, his bait hit the water, my bait hits the water. He starts whining, I start whining. I'm watching him, and I mean, stop, he stopped, and I'm like, what in the world is going on? And he finally can't help but he just kind of busts that laugh. He said, Come up here. And literally, I walk from the back of the boat to the front of the boat and get just a little bit different angle. Different angle. And he throw that and I throw out there, and we both did like that, and we both hooked and catch one. And we stood on the front of that boat and we caught them every cast. I mean, they were they were anywhere from six to about 11 pounds. I mean, they were good knife stripers, and we caught them forever like that. I mean, it was amazing. Started to catch them to start with kind of be out of the mouth, and all of a sudden the dinner bell went went off, and all the cranks would be all the way down their throat. They were just eating at that point. But he said, there's a little piece of structure right out there. I mean, nobody would ever know this. There's one little thing, he said, there's one little thing, and all those stripers about this one little thing. So when I was throwing over here and I was coming back this way, I wasn't coming by this one little piece of structure. All these stripers were hanging on. And the difference in that back, the length of that bath boat made all the difference. And it was, but I mean, he had me scratching my head. I'm gonna tell you right now.

SPEAKER_05 41:24

How he knows all that stuff, I don't know. I mean, it was crazy.

SPEAKER_04 41:28

It's through years and years of doing it. I mean, y'all heard me say up there when we first got here about the forward-facing sonar, and I mean it's it's fabulous, and but it's it's a little bit cheating. I mean, you can go out there and all the years that he put in to find where the stump was or whatever that he was throwing to, we can go up there now and and in 30 seconds find it. And uh, and he he can't stand that.

SPEAKER_03 41:56

Old school guys don't like that forward phasing stuff.

SPEAKER_04 41:58

I I know I want to tell y'all one quick thing because I have to, because I again uh my name's been thrown out in some of the things. But uh I I've got to tell a story of my buddy Clay. I've got to. It's it's funny. I mean, it's not an illegal thing or anything like that. It's just this is a funny story because you all know him and you got to laugh at him anytime we get a chance to. But Clay and I were fishing a pretty big tournament, and um, and and we have actually have our picture in South Carolina, um, I think it's South Carolina uh one of the South Carolina magazines, we were we were in it, um, fishing game magazine. And uh so we're fishing this tournament. We were catching these fish on a jig, and you had to throw that jig. I mean, you if you landed a foot away from the tree, you were not gonna get a bite. You had to be against a tree, and so a lot of overhanging things, and so we were having to skip these jigs under this under trees. And um, so we had a really nice limit of fish and uh probably in the 20-pound range, and Clay was like, All right, we need one big one. We got to we got to have another big one, we got to cull this two-pounder out, we just got to do it. So we go, he said, pick your three favorite places, and so we go to like the second one, and we get there, and so we're throwing this jig. So Clay throws it and it skips and skips up in the branch, and he pulls it back out, and he throws it, and it skipped and skipped up in the branch again, and he pulled it back out, and he's getting frustrated and does it a third time. And this is how persistent you have to be. And he skipped it again, and when he skipped it that fourth time, he got hung, and he's pulling it and pulling it. Well, it was a half-ounce jig, and he really cranked back on it, and it flew back, and it hit him where no guy was to be hit. And it folded him up on the deck of that boat. And just like y'all are doing, I started dying laughing, and I'm laughing. And I that was not right of me. I should have been helping my buddy out, but I can't do anything, man.

SPEAKER_01 43:49

You're not holding you to help him when I'm with you.

SPEAKER_04 43:52

He's laying on the deck of the bass boat, and he picks his rod up and he goes, Oh my gosh, and he throws it and it just perfect skip and goes right on the tree. And he puts the rod down and he crawls to the back of the boat, left a bait in the water, and he gets him a diet coke, and he's sitting back there drinking it. And he reaches up and grabs his rod. Well, the line is no longer toward that tree, the line's way over here, and he sets the hook and it's like an eight and a half pounder. We won big fish and won the tournament because of the and uh that's persistence, guys. You know, the moral of that story is um take one for the team to get to eight and a half pounds. I'm like, well, sometimes you get kicked somewhere, you don't want to be kicked, you got to get back up and get after it. So he did, man. I'll give him I'll give him kudos on it.

SPEAKER_03 44:37

John, how did how did you and Clay uh first come to know each other and start doing stuff? Did y'all grow up together? We school together, what was that? How'd we get connected?

SPEAKER_04 44:43

Everybody thinks we did, I mean, because we do so much together now, but um because my wife and Clay's wife, Kelly, are best friends, and and Clay and I are best friends, and we just do so much together. But we Clay and I fished against each other in a little local club, um, Lake Marion Bassmasters, and so we kind of got to know each other, and then um Lisa was in the hospital and we were having our daughter Haley, and while I'm walking down the one of the halls in the hospital, I passed Clay and he goes, What are you doing up here? And I said, Man, we're having a baby, and he goes, We are too. And so Coker was born a day apart from Haley, but we were all in the hospital, and so Clay said, Man, let's go fishing. And so we did, and it was having babies for your point. We're talking fishing, which is, you know, hey, that's you know, sometimes, but uh we um we've just become best friends, and our our families are uh are very, very, very close. Um y'all know Clay has its foundation winners travel, and it's uh it's a great thing, and we have I say we, uh uh Clay has gotten me involved in another thing called the uh As Outdoor Dream Foundation, where they take children with uh typically terminal illnesses, and you go and do things. And I was talking to Jim about this just a couple days ago, and I said, there is nothing that will, and it would be great for you too, Joey. I mean, there is nothing that will touch you and make you understand how minuscule some little problems we have if you have hay fever or pollen or sniffles or whatever they've been picking at you about still. You don't know until you've got a kid in the boat with you that you know very likely won't be there next year.

SPEAKER_05 46:34

Yeah, Jim mentioned that yesterday. He's gonna start doing that.

SPEAKER_04 46:37

And I'm gonna tell you, I fought Clay on it when he told me he wanted me to go help him. I came up with every excuse you could think of not to go. And that thing touched my heart more than anything. I'm telling you, it's uh about to bring you to tears right now. Um those kids are special. They um they don't they don't care if you catch a fish, they want to be out, they want somebody to not look at them with an illness to go and do something, and and it's just a fabulous thing, and it's a great thing. So do whatever you have to do and volunteer for something. Go help them fly the tent, go help fix food for somebody, be a giving person, man. It's just it'll take a kid fishing. I mean, it's it's a fabulous thing.

SPEAKER_01 47:23

It'll do your heart way more good than it will to go out and not quite the same thing, but like every year we have the Dinkins Mill Classic, and I take a kid fishing because got my partner. So it's not quite the same thing, but but I'm you knew Boba was gonna give the beat again, right?

SPEAKER_02 47:38

What is the I was on the Bible spelling so you need to come back with some.

SPEAKER_05 47:42

What is what does the Bible say? If you want a blessing, be a blessing.

SPEAKER_01 47:46

The truth is the truth. So and that that is neat. You know, the things y'all are doing and and that and giving back. That is that is neat. And like I said, the the crusade, I'm I'm excited about that, Joey. That's that's gonna be amazing. I mean, because I like I said the the exhibition center was just incredible and and just seeing the response and that happened there, and I'm I'll definitely be praying for it. I mean, that's be preparing that that God preparing those that are gonna come and and getting ready to receive what's gonna be an amazing word from from your speakers. That's exciting.

SPEAKER_04 48:13

Yeah. It it's pretty cool. I'll go and do appraisals and and y'all said earlier, I have a real estate appraisal business, and I'll go to people's house and they'll go, along with your law practice. Along with my real estate on the side, only when you get caught by a game boy. Um and and I'll go there and people say, I know your brother, so he's a preacher. And I'm like, not quite, but he's about as close as you can get. So um, it's pretty cool, man.

SPEAKER_05 48:35

Do we have time for another hunting story? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 48:38

I think this might be our last one, but I'm sure it'll be a good one. It might be a good one to finish on.

SPEAKER_05 48:42

John, I think you were involved in this one. You know, we used to be avid dog hunters for deer. And um we had uh we had dogs, uh, we fed dogs, and and uh we had our group from around Pinewood that hunted. Uh and we had a lot of fun with that. Um, and and that's not part of my life anymore, uh, but it was a good season, you know. And uh you remember that time we were over over by touch berries and we were running over there. And and listen, Jim, Jim was the brother that somehow or another always got where the deer was going to be.

SPEAKER_04 49:16

Always, always always.

SPEAKER_05 49:18

And so we had this pack of dogs, we turned them loose, and sure enough, they jumped, and it was a buck, and it was like, okay, um you know, there's a buck, everybody's on the radio, it's a buck running about and so um this this dog, this dog's running this deer, and it runs, and uh Jim's down in right where the deer's gonna run again. Somehow another he's right right in the perfect place. Deer runs by bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. You know, he unloads his gun, and um, and I'm on the other side, kind of what they thought they were putting me outside of the run, you know, outside of the hunt or whatever, but sure enough, the deer pops up and it's coming towards me, and it's hurting.

SPEAKER_01 49:59

Jim's already shot this deer, but it's still running. I know.

SPEAKER_04 50:02

Oh, there we go. Okay.

SPEAKER_05 50:03

I'll tell you the way I remember it in a minute, but so so it's it's running, and it's not any giant bug, it's an average size six-point or whatever. And um, and it's coming towards me, but it's hurt bad, Bubba. I mean, it's it's in the throes of death. While it's running, it's in the throes of death. And it's it's coming towards me, and I'm just I'm in this wide open cornfield, and I get down as low as I can, and the deer's coming, and but it is still moving, right? It's still moving. It's not it's trying to run, but it's I mean, it's all broken up, and it comes right by me 20 yards, and bam! You know, you ever heard the killing shot? I mean, you know shot. You know the kill shot is a one shot, it's not a five or three, or you it's a one shot with with silence behind it, and and the deer was dead. It was on the ground. You remember what Jim did? He came out there, that Russ Crow got so mad at me. He said, Why did you shoot that deer? You know it wasn't gonna make. I said, Jim, the deer was still going. The woods are right over there. If it had gotten in that swamp, no telling what would have happened. He goes, Man, that deer was barely moving. And uh, but I got I claimed it.

SPEAKER_01 51:15

I'm dog owner, Joey, and I'm telling you right now, the last man to shoot.

SPEAKER_04 51:21

I'm telling that bumper that deer had the whole load of buckshot where Jim shot it in the side.

SPEAKER_05 51:26

They have eaten me on the house.

SPEAKER_04 51:27

And it was kicking on the ground and Joey walked over the shot. The last man to shit.

SPEAKER_05 51:35

When credit's due.

SPEAKER_01 51:37

Once again, the many years as I sat in Williams, as we closed and listened to them talk about the story, and this has been a great time recording with you because I realized that all that luck they said you had and everything, that was nothing but kill in the woods and stuff. I mean, a bandic kill, let's just think about it. You finishing books off that Jim just kind of barely went. Um, let's see. Great outwest trips and everything. And I like I used to date like the whole boat, Joey killed another big one. I said, Well, Jim, y'all went out west, what'd y'all kill? Well, and they be kicking rocks. And so they tell me about, well, Joey's got better land than us or whatever. Just, you know, that kind of stuff. And then like Abama Turkey. I mean, come on. What in the world?

SPEAKER_03 52:16

I mean, just look at when preparation meets opportunity. That's what Joey has uh. Two differs with a bow and a dog drive?

SPEAKER_01 52:24

I mean, just once again, just story after story, just saying that Joey is the man of the bottom. Uh, I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 52:32

Well, I I hope that maybe uh we can get Jim mended and get him feeling better. Yeah, and maybe we can make a return trip down here to the smoke shop and uh get make sure there's another chair for Jim, and we can we can kind of run all these stories through the gym filters, see if they're true or not.

SPEAKER_01 52:48

Oh man. We do thank y'all for coming on. It's great as as always to have legends on. I mean, we got legends of Pinewood on right here. No doubt.

SPEAKER_03 52:56

No, we didn't even talk about the fact that um that Joey really has been the mayor of Pinewood. I mean, we don't say that just because he's popular, he really was. He's he's a lawman around here.

SPEAKER_05 53:05

Yeah, yeah. You know, um boss hall. I was in for one term and I had to leave because of sickness. People got sick of me.

SPEAKER_03 53:15

I don't hardly believe that. Well, we're grateful for you guys. We we we've had a great time. We do look forward to another opportunity with Jim and you guys back on together because I know there's a lot more smoke stories than the ones we heard tonight. We're just scratching the surface. But we thank y'all for coming on. Uh, I know it's uh probably a little bit nerve-wracking because you don't know what your brother's gonna say about you, John, or what John's gonna say about you, Joey. But y'all did a great job, and I know our listeners are gonna love it. Listeners, thank you all for listening. We look forward to being with you again on another Mostly Legal Monday.

SPEAKER_07 53:42

Fantastic.

SPEAKER_06 53:50

All right, well, welcome back to this Mostly Legal Monday segment. During the Monday of Holy Week, I want to think about uh what we see happening in the Gospels on that Monday before Jesus was crucified. In Matthew chapter 21, verse 12, we read about Jesus cleansing the temple a second time. Uh we read, and Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. What we know about this area is it was in what they called the court of the Gentiles. It was the only place in the Jewish temple where those who weren't Jewish could come in and worship God and offer sacrifices. It was the court of the Gentiles, the non-Jews. And uh these merchants had set up tables to sell the different uh required sacrifices for the Gentiles to come in and buy. And they required these sacrifices to be purchased in specific currencies. And so the exchange rates were a ripoff, uh the sale prices on the actual sacrifices themselves were a ripoff, and so they were hindering the Gentiles from being able to worship God according to the law, and and this infuriated the Lord Jesus because the reason why he came, uh, John 3 16, for God so loved the world. God's plan was always about the nations, it was never just about Israel, it was never just about the Jews. And you know, he told Abraham way back in Genesis 12 and 17 your descendants are gonna be as numerous as the sand on the seashore and the stars and the sky. And um and so the plan of God was always to be a blessing to the nations. And uh and so when Jesus uh sees what's happening in the temple and how the Gentiles, these foreigners being hindered from the worship of God, he is infuriated and he goes over and he flips the tables of the money changers and he flips the tables of these uh folks who were who were ripping people off, and he says, you know, this is a house of prayer, not a den of robbery. Because God's heart uh in Christ is for the nations. And and praise God because I'm I'm not Jewish, I'm a Gentile believer, uh, and I am grafted into the promises of God uh through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And the church is a fulfillment of the promises that God has made to Abraham. And so so we see on this uh on this Monday of Holy Week that God's heart is for the nations, his heart is for the whole world. We read in Revelation 5 that every tongue and tribe and people and nation are going to be gathered around the throne, worshiping God forever and ever and ever. That was always his plan. It's still his plan. And so we need to be praying that God would do great things through his kingdom as it expands among every nation on the earth. And so uh I trust that this week would be a week where you focus on uh the teachings of the Lord Jesus in a unique way because this is the last week of his life as he heads towards the cross. We celebrate that uh on Good Friday, and then Resurrection Sunday is coming Lord's Day as we praise him for his victory over sin and death in the grave. Have a great week, have a happy Easter, enjoy your time with family, and in worship on Sunday.