Mm-hmm.

And I think that's the challenge we have is staying in lockstep with Jesus, because it...

I, what I've found is it's not the...

You know, we know the, when the bad things are going on in our life, right? There's things, these, these sins that we're like, "Oh, I shouldn't be doing that." But what I've found tends to really bog people down is a bunch of the good things adding up.

And it's like a hiker that would be like, "You know, I might need a rock to throw at a bear here."

Mm.

"I can't do this anymore." And I, I think that's where Jesus is saying, "What do you need to take out of your backpack for you to carry just what's needed at the time?" And, um, it became very real to me right after our, our daughter was born.

Um, I had been hustling.

What do you make about guys like this that are being set up as influencers or even idols to men, even within the church?

I think this is a natural result of about 50 years of messaging societally that has become feminized.

You know, God created men and women with very specific missions, but what we have had is we've had this societally, we tend to swing from one extreme to the other and maybe there needed to be a reset on some of what masculinity means, but we've had this swing to femininity and we've been told as men that that you being who you're designed to be is toxic, just in its pure form, like just you born as a man, you're toxic.

And that is obviously fundamentally flawed.

God made men to have this desire to be strong and powerful for the sake of protecting women and children.

But we've been told that that desire within us is inherently wrong.

And obviously, if you use it for the wrong reasons, which some people have used it for the wrong reasons, that's toxic but there's nothing wrong with the desire to be strong for the sake of protecting the weak and so you have a whole generations that have grown up saying as a man you're toxic so what happens you either go one of two ways you either become really kind of a worthless man or you're you're you play the stereotype of i'm not going to be what a man's made to be and we see a lot of that but we also see a bunch of guys going well who's going to tell me how to be a man and you have somebody step in and in our world whoever tells the best story wins the hearts of the people And they've been told a story that this is what you can get and you can use your power for this.

So share with me about the inspiration for this book and how perhaps it relates to what we've been talking about thus far.

So share with me about the inspiration for this book and how perhaps it relates to what we've been talking about thus far.

Yeah, I mean, it really has to do with the idea that there is history being written.

If you break that word history into two words, it's his story.

It's God's story being written.

And he's using us to accomplish his purposes on earth.

So we were born with a purpose.

His workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which the Father prepared beforehand that you should walk in him.

about here?

What was that like?

Yeah, so I always joke that I was born on the front pew of a church.

My dad was a pastor and like, I'm telling you, probably the first week I was alive on the planet, outside of my mother's womb, I was on the front pew of the church.

So I was sitting up there my whole time and about 10 years old, kind of a turning pivotal moment for us.

My family, my dad felt like we were called to move to Guatemala, Central America and become missionaries.

And that was very traumatic for me.

That's middle school right there.

What do you mean by consult your anger? You alluded to a little bit earlier, but go ahead and tell us more about that.

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm

... that, that, to guide you.

And then ultimately the character has to make a decision to go all in.

They face a series of challenges.

Those challenges pull things out of them that make them stronger than they realized they were.

They face this decisive dark cave, this battle they have to face off with.

Oftentimes it's something inside of them.

Mm.