Ep 1009 | The Military Knows Exactly What's Going On with the Mystery Drones
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I am unashamed. What about you? Welcome back to Unashamed. We're back in the lair, Jace. You're back in the duck blind. Does life seem normal again to you? Does everything seem... You know, yesterday, there's a phrase that is used in the religious world that I do not like. And as much as I've talked about it, it's not working. I'm thinking maybe a bumper sticker. But the phrase is, I'm going to church.

Do you know why I don't like that phrase? Your dad's been trying to nix that phrase for years. Yeah. What's wrong with that? Because you can't go to the church. Well, you can't go because we are the church. We are the church. How does the church go to the church? Wherever I'm going is where the church is going, especially if there's two or three people with me.

So you never did the, here's the church, here's the steeple. I've done that. I've done that, but that didn't work either. It phased out. So yesterday when I was headed to meet with the brothers and sisters in the Lord at a central location. That's a fill line. Where a building is of which God does not live in buildings. I have multiple scripture references to that. You agree with that, Zach?

God does not live in buildings made by men's hands. You know, I've heard a couple people say that. The first person that I heard ever say that

was a man by the name of Stephen. Thank you. He got killed for it. But the man who gave the approval to kill him for saying that ended up saying the same exact thing. And wrote several books in the New Testament. And wrote several books about it. So I'd have to agree with you on that, Jason. So here's what happened. So I'm a little grumpy because we have some guests here. We do. I'm super excited about our guests. Something happened this morning that caused a slight bit of grumpiness. Yeah.

I will reveal that when our guests get here because they were a part of what triggered Grumpy Jace. So we'll wait and share. There's your cliffhanger. So yesterday, my wife and I, we drive to this building and we get out. To meet with some of your brothers and sisters. To meet with the brothers and sisters. And they have what they call a service. That's another thing that I've never figured out.

Because I would call it a sitting session with a little standing. But service is actually doing something where you're serving. I wonder why they do call it service. I've never really thought about that. Look, I'll just make a list and check it twice. So we get there, and I'm trying to have a good attitude about when we meet. What do they call it, Al? Corporately? Yeah, corporate worship. Where's that verse at? Nowhere. Okay.

So, but I said, you know what? We're going to come to serve today. So we're down at the nursery. We're dropping off a little one. And we literally bumped into a couple that they were also going to the nursery. And this woman saw Missy and she just, she just got teared up. And she said, can I hug you? Which was a little awkward. Missy's like, sure.

Hugs are welcome. Who doesn't want a good hug? She said, we followed y'all on your podcast. We're from Washington. So I started talking to the husband and I was like, what are y'all doing here? He's like, well, they're going to a funeral in the area. And I think he meant the state of Louisiana.

And so we wanted to run by because we heard this is where y'all meet. We were hoping to meet some of you, the duck people. Okay. And I'm not sure they knew which one I was, you know, because we all. Pretty much just throw a rock at any of us. So I said, before you guess, let me just introduce myself. I'm Jace because I didn't want them to call me Si. Or like our good friend that went to school that called you Willie. Yeah. This is a tough crowd today. Oh.

So anyway, we met them. Missy had to hug. And they had a 16-year-old son there. And they had a toddler, obviously, because they were dropping off. So we set our peace. And now we're going to attend. We're going to go sit. Which, by the way, AI says, it says AI, a church service is called a service because it is a gathering of Christians to worship God and receive the Word of God.

Yeah, where's the serving coming in? I don't know. That's a terrible definition. So... That's what AI said. I have a speech on that, but I'm trying to tell a story. So then all of a sudden, somebody tapped me on the shoulder. Well, it's the same guy. And he said, I got a question. Will you baptize me? So at that point, I thought, oh, we have Phil's little class that he's not teaching because he's... Jersey is the sub. He's stepped in. And so...

I said, oh, you were at the class. And he said, what class? I was like, oh, you weren't at the class. I said, well, I looked at Missy. She looked at me. And I said, well, you know, who baptizes you means nothing. And he said, well, yeah, I know. But I just I've been following y'all. And I thought, you know, about time. I said, well, I think you might need to hear why we should do this.

And he said, well, I'm open to that. So we went and found, you know where you walk out when you preach, that little, there's some stairs. Yeah, a little cubby home. Because I didn't know where to go. And so I just went to the staircase. Yep. So it was Missy and I. So you did your little staircase sermon.

Yeah, that's what this story is funny because I went to attend a church service, in quotations, and I never attended anything. It turned into a proclamation of Jesus on the staircase. I love it. So they asked questions. Missy and I kind of doubled team. Which, by the way, is why you go. You never know. We spent 40 minutes talking about Jesus and five talking about baptism.

Because I was like. That's a good ratio, by the way. Yeah, I was like, you know, let's talk about Jesus. And are you ready to surrender your life to Jesus? We heard their personal stories. And so the father and the son, after they said, we're ready. Well, the wife said, well, you know. And she kind of told her religious history. And she said, I was baptized as a baby, but I have no idea why, because I was a baby.

But based on what I just heard, I don't want to steal their thunder. I said, there's no stealing any thunder. This is about who Jesus is. And she said, well, I just think I'd like to do this too. So I said, well, perfect timing. Because they're fixing to sing an invitation song. And we're not going to walk down the aisle because we're at the end of the aisle. Yeah, you're there. It's going to take a right to change clothes. Right there. And so we walked out.

Three minutes later, they're singing the invitation song. We take a right. I motioned to one of the elders there. I was like, we're fixed. I gave the baptism signal book. Somebody else had responded, a 14-year-old young buck who looked like he was 25. And so he was back there with us. And so we went out there and I told them, because basically we had a real raw, I didn't go into the details. I mean, we went through the book of John. We went who Jesus was.

And I said, I'm going to ask y'all in your own words. I've been doing this here lately. I said to tell people what your confession is. And so the mom said, well, there's a lot of people out there. And I said, yep. And I quoted Romans 10, 9 and 10. I said that if you confess with your mouth, Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised from the dead, you'll be saved. I said, you're making a vow to God here.

And I said, it's supposed to be a little uncomfortable. I said, but based on everything you've heard about Jesus, you know, I think this is a moment. You're declaring Jesus is the Lord of my life. I said, now, however you want to say that is up to you. So I got them all three out there.

And there was a mic there, and I just went right down the list. And look, it was as beautiful, a heartfelt, three different versions of I'm surrendering to Jesus. That's good. Tearfully and very powerfully. And I thought, we need to make this a thing moving forward. And so I baptized the dad, and then the son, and then the mom. And they just...

So they were all standing there together, and they all just huddled up and just began to cry, which I got a little bit, or clamped myself. A little misty? Well, it was just like, what has happened here? I came to sit, and now I'm moved by the power of Jesus. You know, it sounded like service to me, Jase, because you were of service to these people. And so then it was kind of an awkward silence. I looked at the crowd. The service, in quotations, is over.

And I just raised my hand to the crowd and went, yeah! Everybody started clapping, you know, and hollering. And so then we went in the car and left. That was it. And we took Phil lunch. I told him the story. So that made his day. And so the story with Phil, he was physically not in as much pain as he's been, which is good. But he seems to have another back problem.

surgery. Now the other side of it with his Alzheimer's, it, you know, it wasn't the best of days yesterday, but that's the way this is. There's good days and bad days, but, uh, I told him the story and, uh, we were going to cook for him, but he called me the night before and said, look, uh, there's this chicken place and I want two crispy legs.

So I said, you want me to go buy two chicken legs at the chicken place? So it was kind of funny and bizarre because my dad doesn't really eat fast food. But, you know, there I was in line at the chicken place. He's grown to like some cabs. So all of a sudden he wanted a couple of chicken legs. Yeah.

But he's hanging in there, and we appreciate your prayers. And just to let you know, we're going to bring our guest on here. We're continuing our Unashamed Bible Study because a lot of you come every week. And so Joe's going to continue to lead that. Obviously, Dad can't do that. And then once a month, the first Sunday of every month, we're going to try to have a little celebration for you guys. Whoever of us is in town, I'm going to be here on January 5th.

The first one. And so, you know, we just encourage you guys, you want to come check us out, check WFRI, just like this family obviously did. All right. And my point of making fun of our little –

taglines that doesn't make any sense is what i learned in the process is is i need to wake up and be willing to serve yeah because that kind of happened what we would say by accident but at some point it was a divine appointment for these folks that's what i was going to say now do you think it was just a coincidence that we bumped into them in the nursery section and then ended with them

Being assured that there is. And even them blessing you with their confession. All right, so we're going to take a break. When we come back, we've got two very special guests, and we'll introduce them. Zach, I'm sure at your church that you help lead, you guys will be talking about the true meaning of Christmas, and that is the coming of Jesus into the world. Emmanuel, God with us.

Yeah, which is a great blessing, right? And the idea that God in his infinite wisdom decided to send his son through the womb of a young woman in an unplanned pregnancy shows us a lot about what we should be doing while we're here on this earth. And that's helping women that find themselves in similar situations. And that's where our good friends at Preborn Ministries come in.

They've got many amazing stories of women who have chosen life for their babies. Here's one of them. Kelsey found herself in an unplanned pregnancy. Like most women in this situation, she was scared and she was unsure of what to do. Kelsey had already had one abortion and she promised God she would never have another one. But life happens.

By the grace of God, Kelsey and her partner found a pre-born network clinic. And from the moment they walked in, they were overwhelmed by love. And then she was introduced to her baby on sonogram. Once they heard that heartbeat, they cried and they chose life. She's so thankful for a beautiful son who brings her great joy.

There are babies in their mother's womb who need our help right now. As the year comes to a close, please consider a leadership gift to save babies in a big way. Your tax-deductible donation of $15,000 will place a machine in a needy women's center, saving countless lives for years to come. And now, through a match, your gift is doubled. Or you can sponsor one ultrasound with a donation of just $28.

Let's join together. Let's help mothers choose life to donate securely. Dial pound 250 and say the keyword baby. That's pound 250 keyword baby, or go to preborn.com slash unashamed. Welcome back to unashamed. We are joined by Chad squared, um, Chad Robichaux, who has been on the podcast. Welcome back. I think it's your third time to be a couple of times. Yeah.

Get your applause. And Chad Wright is joining us. And Chad has two Ds. Chad, you're the only Chad I've ever known that has two Ds. Is there a reason why you're a Chad with two Ds? My mama's just a little crazy. You are from North Georgia, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. How is it? Chad-da.

Yeah, you have to draw it out a little bit. I'm going to tell you, I'll come to whatever you call me. I'm not too picky. I found out he'll come to a nice big steak. I found that out. Yeah, or Chick-fil-A biscuit. Chick-fil-A biscuit, which is good. Here's what's crazy about it. We went duck hunting this morning.

And I told y'all last night, because we got together at old Jay's Stones. He's a griller. He grilled us some steaks. Had a nice little time. Amazing. Pretty good. And you ate all the leftovers this morning at four, right? Yeah, it was just as good the second time. Yeah.

And so. Chad's a runner, by the way, so we'll talk about that. So we went to the Elm Hole, but I told y'all to lower your expectations because it was, what was it, 70 degrees? Yeah, it was the warmest that I've ever ducked on it. Yeah. Cloudy. And muggy, just like very, very muggy. No wind. But I said, look, I've got a knack for this, and there's these wood ducks.

They're getting up and they're coming over in waves and they're hitting this particular spot in the woods. And that's where we're going to hunt because they're coming. So we go duck hunting this morning and what few we saw were,

Did not come in. Now, we shot, how many did we shoot? Four. We got four, so we got some appetizers. Good. And they had some kind of gun specialist that had some kind of prototype, something that hasn't even been released to the public, so I won't go into it. The Vortex Red Dot. Oh, we can say that. All right, so there was a red dot on my gun, and they want me to shoot it, but I didn't want to shoot it just into the air.

So I thought if any duck comes over, because we weren't seeing many ducks, you know, I'm fixed to take a shot just to see what this feels like. You know, you call those a hope shot. So four came by, a little out of range. I picked the back duck, and I threw up with this thing. And I was kind of doing a sigh. I was like, all right, he's a little too far, but I got this red dot I'm looking. I'm going to try about a seven-foot lead. And I went, boom.

And it was like 1001, and that duck, rubber duck, dead fold, just poof. And I said, how much does this cost? We got to believe her, folks. And actually, after the hunt, we went and retrieved the duck because it fell so far. So I went to look for it on the way back to pick them up because we had parked the boat.

And I looked out across the water. I knew he was dead, but I didn't see the duck. But I saw feathers, so I started tracking the feathers. And I looked to the left. No duck. Looked to the right. No duck. Looked straight ahead. No duck. So there was a lot of feathers. I thought he had to hit hard. The duck looked dead. And then I was thinking a hawk. I was thinking birds of prey. And then, you know, a little voice in the back of my head, because I've done this many times, I thought,

I don't recall hearing the splash.

on the water and so i looked up and there he was the tree hanging up in the tree as dry as he was when he flew over but he was it was such a thicket that we i went back and got them and i was like let me see if they can find this duck and uh of course nobody spotted him until i said look up he was just yeah so it was pretty cool now you say well why are you grumpy you got four ducks you're hunting with these you know our war heroes here

Speaking of service, and we appreciate y'all's service, I was grumpy because as soon as we had to leave at 9 o'clock and come here to the podcast, here they come. We're out in the decoys, picking the decoy. We look up. The woody wave. Wave after wave. Look, locking up on us. Yeah, we're everywhere. Oh, just the sky was filled with ducks.

We could have waited an hour. Here's why the grumpiness is. I thought you never want to end to quote my dad. You never want to be duck hunting on a schedule because that's what happens. Yeah. So it's pure sacrifice that we're here. And, uh, did y'all see any, uh, did y'all see any groups of drones come in? No. Zach is infatuated with these drones. That would be in New Jersey. I mean,

So here's the question. You two guys are military veterans. How long would it take to correct this problem? I'm serious. Oh, I think hours. If our military wanted those things out of the sky, they would be down in hours. Well, that's the question. Do you think they belong to us? I mean, that's what everybody's surmising. Because the government's just acting like nobody. Well, they're flying in sensitive areas. And I thought, well, don't we have a military?

And everybody's like, oh, no, it's attack of the drones. I 100% think. I mean, I watched John Kirby speak about them, and he says, they don't know what they are, but they're not a threat to public safety, and they're not a national security threat. Well, that means they know what they are. That's what I thought. The Pentagon spokeswoman said it's a local law enforcement matter. They're not reacting because they know what they are. We can relax.

I think so. I think we know exactly. Have you guys seen drones that are as big as they're describing? Because they're talking about them being as big as a vehicle. Like an SUV. An SUV. Have you all ever seen them that big? I've never seen one that big before. No, I haven't either. Drones wasn't a big thing when I... It was kind of a newer thing. It was kind of coming about after I had done Got Out, but...

Yeah. You know, people can't people look, I don't think, I don't like that the government has secrets either, but here's the thing. Uh, some things have to remain secret that the government is doing. Cause you got enemies, right? Well, you have enemies and you have a population who's going to respond in a way that is detrimental to society. If you was to actually tell them what's going on, you know, you tell me, are you something bad is about to happen? Well, we down here on the river, we don't give two rips. Uh,

We're not going to go crazy and panic about it, right? We can take care of ourselves. But these people in these cities, man, if you was to tell them that there's some imminent threat and maybe that's the reason these drones are flying around, maybe it's because...

It's for your own safety. Well, you want to tell them that, what are they going to do? They're going to lose their mind. Yeah, right. You know? I'm glad y'all cleared that up for us. Well, I always side with Chad. This joker right here is sharp. It's a full circle moment for me. The first time I ever heard Chad was on the Unashamed podcast. Really? It really is. I was going to ask them. One of my questions was, how did you meet and how did you become friends? Because

Obviously, we've known Chad for a bit. We didn't know you. But once I looked into your story, amazing. You were Navy SEAL. I guess you're always a Navy SEAL, right? Because that's something you're not like you were. You are. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know the answer to that question. I just, I kind of, I kind of just more, I try to identify most with

uh, with my faith and, and with Christ and, and the older I get, the longer I go into life, the less I identify with my military service or my running or, or anything as the, the Holy spirit just continues that process of sanctification. I less and less really identify with even any, anything else in my past. So we were talking before we came on chat about your running, just so I can bring this up. And you, um,

You said, well, my favorite race is 100 miles in the mountains. And I was like, 100 miles in the mountains? So tell us what kind of racing we're talking about. Well, my favorite race is actually what's called a last man standing race. And it's where a bunch of runners show up. There's a film on Amazon Prime, if you guys want to watch it, called Just One Mile.

It's me doing this. Him winning it, by the way. No, nobody can really beat me at it, but I don't mean to sound prideful or anything. It's just a fact. Yeah.

about a hundred runners show up from all over the country and you run this one mile loop over and over again and you got 20 minutes to complete the loop but there's about 350 feet of climbing and descending in the loop so it's super steep and you know you come in if you come in in 15 minutes well then you got five minutes to refill your water bottle get you a little food in your belly and then you got to be back on the line toeing the line to go again and

And so I love these last man standing races. I think that one that the documentary was done on, I think I ran for 33, 34 hours straight, something like that. And I just like that because it's a I can really mess with people's mind. Right. I mean, you know, you're my mind is blown. You're running with these these same people loop after loop. And, you know, you get down to the core group and and, you know, you look over at a guy and you say, hey, man.

You look like you're limping a little bit. Is your leg doing all right? Well, his leg might be fine, but when you tell him he's limping and that his leg looks like it's a little off, he starts thinking, dang, my leg is kind of bothering me. And man, you just pick them off and you just really get to get in people's heads. So that's my favorite format. The longest I've ever ran is 250 miles. That was through the mountains of Arizona.

But yeah, I love to run. It's been a wonderful avenue for me to challenge myself.

since I left the Navy. And, uh, and also it's, it's been a thing that's given me, uh, this platform that I have. It's really the foundation of the platform that I have to where now, um, uh, you know, we're able to share the gospel. We're able to travel around and speak and our faith is, is, is, uh, the foundational element of our business now and everything that we do. And, um, yeah, man. So just for clarifications,

Full transparency, my favorite race is 30 feet. Because, did you know, you may know this, a man who's above average in speed, which I always was, can outrun most vehicles for 30 feet. And so when you put a little money on it, it's a pretty good way to make a buck. But now that I've told everybody...

Well, it was on the movie too, Dad. Yeah, we all did. I remember seeing that. My dad passed that on to us because at high school, you know, I made a lot of money running 30 feet. And even my own brother, Willie, who didn't believe it, we actually did a little duck episode about it because he had one of them souped up. He's got all these tricky trucks. He went through that stage.

And he said, you ain't go out running this. And we did it three times. They only ran one take. But all three times, he lost and slipped a $100 bill in my hand that I still have. Because I'm saving for the right moment to spend that.

Our good friends at Angel Studios have a new movie, and I have to say, they have had some, they got an amazing run going, Jason, on some of these different movies. They're on a roll. They had a little film called Sound of Freedom that blew up. Very good. So Zach, tell us about their newest movie. Basically what happens is there's a nuclear blast that devastates all of Los Angeles. It's kind of like a

apocalyptic end of the world type movie. Um, it's got Neil McDonough in it, which you, you love him out. Oh, he's been in so many good things. He's usually a bad guy.

in most of the things I've seen him in, but he's a fantastic actor and a believer. Yeah, but in this one, you have all the dilemmas of what would happen in some type of apocalyptic event. There's a lot of moral dilemmas in it that you've got to work through, but I love those kind of films anyways. I mean, I think I've said it on a previous promotion that I love anything that's apocalyptic or dystopian, so this is kind of in

In that vein, it's a very, very good movie. I highly recommend it. Yeah, it becomes about humanity. This film is coming to theaters December the 20th, so we don't want you to miss it. Don't miss Homestead in theaters December 20th. Get your tickets now at angel.com slash unashamed. That's angel.com slash unashamed. Check it out.

Dad said the only thing that it won't work against is a horse. A horse or a motorcycle. A motorcycle. My only loss was a motorcycle, so I found that out. I mean, it beat me. And so I guess. A little quicker takeoff. But if they ever, most people get in there and floor it and their tires spin, I'm gone. It's over. You lost.

So that motorcycle took off without spinning that tire. And, you know, it was a controversial loss. Yeah. But. So Rob and Sho, you have obviously did your MMA fighter, jujitsu now. Did you ever do any running like just for conditioning? Well, I ran a lot in service because of, you know, just being in special operations. Right.

all those fields you run a lot and uh but uh i i probably ran from like 13 years old to about three years ago i kind of backed off from running because i felt like it was uh it was starting to impede my jiu-jitsu uh competing in jiu-jitsu you know i want to say something about chad real quick but you know everybody focuses on chad's military background on all the awesome stuff he's done and is doing but yes why are we friends well we met and this man right here

He loves, his life is dedicated to loving people. He loves and cares about people more on a higher level and on just a more, just a whole nother degree.

Than any other person I have, I've met in my life. And I don't think people talk about that part of him near as much. And that's one of the things that I'm worst at is loving and caring for people.

Not that I don't love people. I just want to be left alone, right? Right, right, right. That's kind of the background I came from. Yeah. We're loners. And so he inspires me just when I see how much he genuinely cares for people. I mean, he'll just send me a random text and...

Tell me he loves me and hope I'm done. I'm like, what? This guy's busier than I am. Yeah. Well, it reminds me when Jesus summed up, you know, when he brought. Thanks for that, Chad. Yeah, man. Appreciate that. He brought the new way of thinking from a rule oriented system. And he summed it up by saying, you know, you want some commandments? I'll give you two. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love people. Love your neighbor as yourself.

which is really a glimpse into the character of God. I mean, God is love. And so when you see love transpiring, and I mean real love, not a definition of physical sex or whatever. Love, you know, 1 Corinthians 13, kindness and patience and trusting and perseverance and not delighting in evil, that whole list.

When you see that, you're seeing the evidence of God on the planet, even from people that don't believe in God. Because that's where it originally came from.

So I wanted to ask you about, uh, when you came to Christ, how long was that? Oh, in, in 2012, the Navy sent me on a deployment. Uh, I spent a month or two in North Africa and we had left North Africa and we were rejockeying our gear in Germany and they stuck us in this, uh, old, like run down dingy barracks because we were just going to be there for a few weeks. And, um,

A barracks is a building that people stay in. That's what we call it in the military, a barracks. And it was empty. It was just me and a couple other guys staying in there. And just to make a long story short, this place was inhabited by some sort of evil spirit.

And we began experiencing some pretty scary things to me and the three guys that I was with were in there. And to the point that eventually we were all sleeping in the same room together because we were so freaked out about what we were experiencing. You could feel it. You could feel it.

The first so that the initial thing I was laying in my bed one night, something slammed, hit my door and it jolted me awake out of sleep. And then I could hear voices echoing up and down the hallway of this of this building, big, long hallways. I'd heard it was used to house Holocaust victims. It dated all the way back to World War Two.

And I woke up. My roommate was asleep, looked in the hallway. Nobody was there. Went to the guys across the hallway. They were dead asleep. And I thought, OK, that's strange. So it was it was a lot of of of strangeness.

Bumps in the nights, the oven turned on one time. But even more so, it was a feeling. It was a presence that was so oppressive that when I would walk into this place, there was a stairwell. I'd walk up the stairwell and then it turned back up to a landing. We were staying on the second deck and I could feel something staring at me. You know, we have that instinct just like an animal. Yeah.

And and I would fully expect to turn around and look up at that landing and see something up there. Anyways, we got to our wits end on this thing. And I call my little brother. I wasn't a Christian man. I didn't I didn't I didn't I didn't want God.

Would not have ever chose God, I don't believe. I actually believe that since I was a good guy, I was a Navy SEAL, right? I was serving my country. I was doing a hard job. If I was a good guy, that if there was a God, if I got killed, he's going to send me to the good place, of course.

You know what I mean? What a lie that was. You know what I mean? And so I called my little brother because I knew my little brother was a Christian. I said, look, man, we have encountered something here that is outside of our

Our knowledge of warfare. I don't know how to combat this thing. You couldn't just shoot it. You couldn't. I mean, the things you would do in normal warfare won't work. Exactly. Exactly. And I said, Blake, you know, can you help me with this? And he said, let me let me put you in touch with my pastor. That pastor called me the same day.

on a little flip phone I had, and I told the pastor what was going on. And that pastor said, oh, it ain't no big deal. I said, what are you talking about, man? No, this is a big deal. We got four Navy SEALs sleeping in the same room together. Something's going on here, man. And he said, no, don't worry about it. He said, put me on speakerphone. And he said, I want you to just walk up and down the hallways of this place. And he said, I'm going to pray.

So I said, all right, this is foolish, but I'm at my wit's end here. And I walk around this place. He prays. He's praying in the name of Jesus. He says, go now to the room you're staying in there. He said, you got some olive oil? I said, yeah. He said, take a little, just a dab of that olive oil. He said, just dab it right there above the doorway, you know, of your room and

I said, okay, man, that's it. Nothing happened. No spirits descended or doves started. Nothing. He said, yeah, that's it, man. So we wound down that night, laid in bed. Total peace had just returned to this place. Whatever that thing was,

Left, I don't even know what it was why it was there how it got there. I'm not here to think about God I'm not here to explain that yeah, but whatever that thing was was gone, and so I am no fool So I said there's some power here and so I I got my hands on a Bible and I started reading in the book of Matthew and the first thing that I realized when I started reading God's Word for the first time

Our first thing I realized was what a wretched human I was. That old thing about how I was a good person, right? I was doing a good job, a hard thing. If I die, surely I'll go to the good place. If there is a good place, I realized, no, man, when you get to the Sermon on the Mount and you get there right quick and you get to the Beatitudes and you get to the Sermon on the Mount, you say,

I'm screwed. If this is true, I am screwed. Right. And and as I went, the Holy Spirit revealed to me the truth of the gospel and showed me why I needed Christ.

And I received a gift of salvation just maybe a week or so after. Was it at those barracks? Yeah, at the same barracks. Received a gift of salvation. Which is, look at the blessing of that from the power of the Holy Spirit. It's interesting because I was going to ask you guys about Ephesians 6 because we just studied Ephesians last time on the podcast last year. And, you know, you have that section about armor. Obviously, it's a military thing.

and it's connected to Roman soldiers, and you've got all these different comparisons to spiritual things, to physical things, but it closes with three verses on prayer. Way more Paul talks about prayer in that context than he does any of the other sort of defensive weapons that you're talking about, a helmet of salvation, sword of truth. So it is interesting that you brought that up, that that really is our first and greatest thing

weapon in spiritual warfare is prayer. And it's the one, I think it's the one that we leverage the least. That's right. It's like, I don't know about you guys, but I love reading my Bible. I mean, I could read my Bible for hours a day, but it's hard to pray a lot of times. You talk about, well, I want to read my Bible. Well, I don't. It takes a long time to get to the point

And the Lord leads you there to where you

can sit down and pray for hours. I mean, how often do you do that? And it's the most powerful tool that God, and what a gift. We have access to God through Jesus Christ. And we don't leverage that. We leverage that gift, what, three minutes a day in the morning and five seconds at a little prayer around dinner? I've got to the point

You know, my family, we got stuck in the hole. We sit down to eat dinner and it's a, thank you, Lord, for this food. Amen. I'm done with that. If we have time to pray, by gosh, we are going to pray. And we're going to take it seriously because it's the most powerful tool that the Lord has gifted us with.

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It's the only time, in my opinion, that you engage all the deity, the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit at the same time. And I think about that Romans 8, you know, where the Spirit interprets what we can't even say because we're human beings that is so much bigger than us. So that idea of having all the whole Godhead...

in a conversation at one time is powerful. Because, you know, we cry out for help. We thank Jesus for saving us. But when you're in a conversation with a Godhead, I mean, there's nothing better. We've talked a little bit about your story in the past, but when you came to Christ, was it something similar? Was it, you know... When I came to Christ, it was after all the...

all my deployments to Afghanistan, I came home and just fell on my face. And I, and I was at that just complete rock bottom moment. Uh, I was, you know, in, in a complete state of panic, panic attacks, anxiety, depression, and, uh, and just real hopelessness. And, uh, and, and I spent about three years in just this dark downward spiral. And at the end of that three years, uh, ended in a suicide attempt. And, uh, and that's when my wife came in and,

And some amazing people from my community came in and got around me. And I was really confronted with the truth that everything had tried to repair

The damage that I'd done to myself, to people around me, that I was trying to fix myself, that I was not capable. Everything I tried had failed. Medication, counseling, professional success, the MMA stuff. Rebuilding my ego and trying to rebuild what I thought I lost from my persona and bravado. All those things. Some of those things were good. Some of those things were bad. But none of those things had helped heal me and restore me. And the only thing I had yet to try...

was it was a relationship with Jesus. And so for me, it was kind of like I made it into my rope. I've tried everything else. What do I have to lose? And I, and I made a, a very, I'd say uninformed decision. Cause I didn't even really understand what I was doing, but it was just like, I'm going to give God a chance.

But that decision came with about a year of discipleship that radically changed me. Because I realized that all the things that happened to me, the anxiety, depression, those all came from some moments that happened in my life and some bad things happened. But those things didn't leave me to be in a closet with my pistol in my hand. What would have taken my life? What would have led me there were the choices that I made in response to those things. And so I realized through this year of discipleship that the problem I had was a –

a problem with my own wretchedness, with the choices that I was making and all these bad things that happened to me, you know,

Those things were not what had caused me to be in that situation I was in. It was a choice I was making. So the Bible gave me a new blueprint to make better choices. And so did I still get anxiety, depression, all those things? Of course I did. I've been through some hard things. But when I did, I went to the Bible for how to respond in accordance to what I was dealing with. And I became very intentional about it. And through that, I found a restoration. I found hope. And ultimately, I found a new purpose. And that purpose manifested in me, just this deep desire to pay it forward and

shared that story with others and that I knew how many other people were struggling with the same thing I was struggling with. And, you know, my whole life has been just committed to that, that, that sense. Yeah. You remind me a lot, Chad, of dad. And I love what you said, Chad, right about his heart for people. That's what we saw in dad. Once he figured it out and once he saw that and that life change, then he decided the rest of his life was going to be helping people find what I found. Yeah.

yeah for me like um it's funny when i hear people say that about me and a lot of people i hear a lot of people say that about me now uh not as eloquent and beautiful as i chad said it really really meant a lot you said that but uh my wife gets to see both she's a contrast she's like you did not like people i didn't want to talk to anybody i didn't want friends i had the guys i worked with and that was it i didn't want like don't invite anybody on over for dinner like i don't like that my

My wife was like, she used to hate that, that she couldn't invite her friend over. New people, yeah. I didn't want to meet new people. Yeah. So the fact now that I had this heart for people and I really had this really just compassionate heart for people is still surprising to me. You've been made a new creature. Yeah, it's a brand new creation. Well, that's what I started off this podcast for y'all, Joe, and just talking about this family. Because when you're in the public eye...

There's a certain amount of weirdos that show up, you know. You mean weirder than the people at this table? Oh, yeah, way weirder. But what happens is. We're not weird. That's the thing. So it's like, you know, the first time I kind of gave an altar call at a speech I was given, the first person, and I was standing at the front, the first person when they came down, and I thought, now we're talking. All these people are giving their lives to Jesus. So the first person.

that I came up to because I thought he was going to say, I'm ready to give my life for Jesus. And they said, will you take a picture with me? And it was when that happened, you know, it's just my old man just thought, what am I doing? What are we doing here? And it gets to the point, it's hard to love people.

And so now, which, by the way, I made an adjustment. I'll let somebody else do the altar call. I'll do the same thing. Because I just take that distraction out of the equation. I share Jesus. Because if they get hooked on Jesus, they're not going anywhere. But what I was going to say is you can, even in that my first thought was when the woman started crying in front of my wife, I thought, oh, boy. I mean, because that's not a normal occurrence. Hey.

Are you messy? And then bust out into tears. And so my first thought was, okay, this person might be a little weird or mentally unstable. But you know what I realized, what's helped us deal with people, and we talked about this in the duck blind, because me and you are kind of lone woofers.

is I realized that they're not attracted to us. They're attracted to the Spirit of God living in us. And so that's why when this guy was talking about being baptized, he was just thinking, oh, this will be cool. This famous guy baptized me, and I was like, hold the phone, time out.

And it became a beautiful thing. God teaches you to love people where they're at because that's what he did for us on a cross. And so you're seeing more that God has given us this treasure, this answer to life and to clue into his existence.

And that needs to be the way we're thinking when we see people. And I want to tell you another person who's really good at this, and I think you'll agree, is our dad. I mean, just when we were young, I remember just seeing what we would call just the trash of society come in. I was just always surprised at how he would ask them questions about different things. He treated them with respect.

human beings but I realized that he realized they were God created creatures who had lost their way and through the power of the gospel you would see these people that you would just think had fallen through the crack of society

And so we had that foundation. But even though, you know, our default setting, it's a difficult place to have that kind of love that God has had for all of us. When it's even birthed our church into being a place where it's like, you know, the people that other churches say, we don't know what to do with this person. Someone will say, we'll send them down there to WFR. They'll take anybody.

I want to be the place that will take anybody. You know, I mean, that seems like a Jesus kind of place to me to be there. So I want to ask you guys something because we don't have a lot of time left on this podcast, but.

We've been studying Colossians 3, which talks about the new life, the old life you walk away from, the elements. And he has a whole long list of all the stuff you do in that old life. We're all sitting here realizing what that is. Then he talks about this new life that you both described. And then it's interesting because he goes right into family, goes right into wives and husbands, children.

children, how you parent, how they respond to you and even your career and work situation. So I want to ask you guys, I mean, you obviously both spend a lot of time deployed as young men in service to our country. And so I know that had to have been hard. You're away from your family and yet, you know, you're coming back and then all of a sudden you find Christ. How has that changed you in terms of being a husband, being a father, being

just being a man of God in your own family. I mean, what's been the biggest change there for you? I let Chad go first because I know he's got a good one. I do too, but I don't want to steal time from him. I mean, I'd say the most logical answer to that question is how has it not changed me? My wife won't mind me telling this, but my wife's a recovering addict and she's

Uh, we, we've had, we had a lot of rough, rough times in, uh, in Jason. I were talking about this at dinner last night. You know, it's, it's the power of the Holy, Holy spirit that enabled me to forgive her for that period of her life. Um, and how has it changed me? Uh, you know, in my opinion, the, the best way that we, uh,

can attempt to represent or emulate Christ in our lives is by way of selflessness. You know, you ask any special operations guy, what's the number one characteristic you want to see in a teammate? It's selflessness. Yeah. It's not proficiency. It's not shooting. It's not physical fitness. It's selflessness. And that's how we...

get to image Christ is through selflessness. And so it's changed me in that way in terms of my marriage. I look at the, you know, the foundational mission of my life in terms of actionable steps is leading God's daughter home, leading my wife home and being selfless to her and imaging Christ to her

along that journey. And so that obviously bleeds into every aspect of that relationship. And it's changed everything for me. And let me go ahead and tell you right now, I'm not perfect at it. And I still make a lot of mistakes and I still struggle with certain sins and things like this and even sometimes succumb to them. So don't think that I'm sitting here saying I'm a perfect husband, but that's the number one thing that I want to do is I want to lead people

daughter home. And I'm so thankful that God has gifted me with his daughter and put her in

in in you know under my care yeah i mean what a responsibility that he entrusts us with and and my job is to die yeah that is my job and it i'll i'll never completely do it yeah because because my old self boy it rears its ugly head so many times man all the time but man

I know my job is to die. Thanks be to Christ, right? Yes. That'd be the same for me. I mean, look, before I surrendered my life to Jesus, everything was about me. I always worked hard. I always felt like I'm a provider for my wife. I'm going to make sure that I'm working hard. I'm going to put a roof over their head. They're going to be safe. All the things that I'm supposed to do. So I felt like that was my responsibility. That was my duty and I did it well.

But what I realized looking backwards now is that I was the center of my own universe. Like the whole world revolved around me, me, my wife, I was in a marriage from a wife to provide what I wanted out of a relationship. My kids were, I was their, their father for them to be there to serve me. Everything was me focused. And I was, you know, very selfish and, uh, and, and,

And so that surrender to Christ, I think changed something in my heart that make me from selfish to, and I would never admit it to being selfish before. I'm like, what do you mean I'm selfish? Like everything I do is for like, I'm serving the military. I'm serving, like working hard. I'm providing. Like I would have never even saw it, much less admitted it. But the truth is, you know, I was, I was selfish. And it's a shift happened in my heart to go from selfish to selfless and realize that my life's really not about me.

my life is about service. And that's why I think I'm, I thought it was service driven before, but now even more so I'm, I'm service oriented, service driven. My life is about others, but it starts in my home. It starts with my wife. It starts with my children. And because, you know, I can't serve well in ministry if I can't do that at home first. So it starts there. I love that. And you both, what sounds like wound up landing in the same spot, which by the way, is exactly what Ephesians five and Colossians three says.

Give us the example for it.

because we serve our wives as Christ loves us and serves us. I mean, he gave his life for us. I mean, what ultimate, the ultimate sacrifice and the ultimate selfless move. He did it. He says, he not only gave his life for us because, uh, you know, we can wrap our mind around that as warriors. We understand a man. It's not that big of a deal for us to think that a man would give his life for another man or for somebody that they loved or cared about.

No, he didn't just give his life for us. What Christ did is he took the sin of all of humanity upon himself and literally bore that on the cross. In one moment. In one moment. And that separated him in some way, shape, or form from the Father. And that was like the...

biggest moment of we can't understand what that felt like. Like we can understand a man giving his life for a man. That ain't no big deal. But we can't understand what the weight of

of the sin of all humanity feels like. How that crushes you. Yeah. I mean, it's just incomprehensible. Yeah. And to do it in love because he loved us. Even enemies, which is powerful. So look, as we wrap up here, man, what a conversation. This went super fast.

um we could we could spend hours we could we could so so you've got uh we've talked about your books you got a new fiction series coming out i do i got a new fiction series come out called silent horizons it's actually available on amazon right now for pre-order and i can't wait to get into it because i love you know fictional stuff especially i'm assuming it's like military yeah it's very much jack carr style uh that style like jack carr brad thor i read him ryan stack is a

Yeah, Ryan's awesome. Ryan's a great guy, so I read him as well. In fact, Jack wrote the forward cover, like the cover endorsement on it. Jack Cardin. I'm so excited to see you get into this because I just think you'll have a perspective that will make some really good reading.

podcast what are you doing a podcast yeah so the resilient show is my podcast and in fact as we're recording today and it'll already be out once this drops but is the episode with Chad Wright so I mean we just this was short we didn't get really into Chad's story if you want to hear Chad's full like story he just he man he unburned and bore his life story which is

super powerful. Like challenge me, encourage me. He inspired me to do that. I respect this dude. So what's the name of the podcast? The Resilient Show. And what's your podcast? The Three of Seven Podcast. Three of Seven. Ooh, see Zach, there's a name. There's a name. Three of Seven. The only one I've known close to that is Seven of Nine. She was on Star Trek, but that's another story. Three stands for body, soul, spirit. Seven is a biblical number for completion.

Everything we talk about is developing our body, our soul, and our spirit in order to achieve the most complete version of ourselves that we can. You know what I mean? So that's what it's all about. I like that. I like it. It's great having you guys on. Always welcome here. It's a great honor. Yeah. In the Duck Commander land.

We love being here. Mainly for Jay's food. Yeah. So I will say this. I'll leave with this because there was a little back and forth back with Jay and Jace, and I don't know where all this started, but there were a lot of our fans wanting them to get into a physical battle with each other. I don't know where – Jace, were you aware of this? No. It was going with the back and forth with the duck call room. So, Chad, you know both. You know Jay and jujitsu and all that. Does Jace need to get into a physical altercation with Jace Stone?

I don't know if they need to, but look, if it happened with shotguns,

I'm going to give Jace to him. J. May and I like him. I'm going to give Jace to him. All I'm going to say is this. Here's all I'm going to say. I'm with two of the finest warriors that we can produce. We're talking about J. They work out. I work out the natural way. You know, cut firewood, stuff like that. I've never seen the indoor of a gym. I will just say this. If you shoot at me, you better not miss. Oh, yeah. That's what I'm saying. I got you a shotgun. On the hand-to-hand side, you're going to miss.

I love you, but the jiu-jitsu's bad. Well, that's why I'm fast. There's a time to run. That's why Chad Wright is at Mandy Lynch. He's just running the hills for 100 miles. Time to shoot. Nobody's catching you. Jay's getting good at jiu-jitsu.

He's getting good. I had to work that in. I had to work that in for Stone because I know his name before. We're out of time. We'll see you next time on Unashamed. Thank y'all for being here. Oh, yeah. Thanks for listening to the Unashamed podcast. Help us out by rating us on iTunes. And don't miss an episode by subscribing on YouTube. And be sure to click that little bell to get notified about new episodes.

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