Jeremy Stalnecker: Why Men Freeze On Their Calling | MTNPOD #159

Coming back around to the question of what actually helps people change their identity perspective?

What is actually helping there that you're seeing actually work at my deal?

Yeah.

On the show today, we have Jeremy Stallnecker.

Marine Corps combat veteran, pastor, author and co-founder and CEO of Mighty Oaks Foundation.

Jeremy served in the United States Marine Corps with infantry and combat service support units

deploying in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. After transitioning out of the military,

Jeremy stepped into ministry and began working directly with veterans and active duty service

members struggling with invisible wounds of war, trauma, moral injury, isolation and identity

loss. Through Mighty Oaks, Jeremy and his team have now served thousands of warriors

and their spouses through faith-based resiliency and recovery programs designed to restore identity,

rebuild families, and reignite purpose. Additionally, Jeremy is the author of several books on

leadership, faith, and veteran recovery. Jeremy, I am honored to have you on the show because

of many, many reasons, but I am very honored from the perspective of you with Mighty Oaks and the

work that you're doing. I know there are others, but you are on the more rare side of faith-based

programs. I actually was just ironically not knowing that we were leading up to our conversation

today. A great buddy of mine was in town last week, a 20-year special operations guy, and he

is transitioning out right now. He had been out to quite a few programs, and he has an

incredibly strong faith, and he was a little bit bummed with the landscape. He's like the

landscape out there for veteran transition. There's not many faith-based organizations that are

there, and I was like, man, have you heard of Mighty Oaks? And he's like, I haven't. I was like,

how have you not heard of Mighty Oaks? I was hammering him on that. But the conversation was interesting

because I was like, man, I thought there was more. And he's like, you know, there's really not,

there's some great organizations doing great work. But, you know, he believes, and I agree that

without Jesus Christ being at the center, all programs are going to be missing a cornerstone

component, and you guys have taken that head on. So I'm excited to impact that with you.

Yeah. Well, thank you. No, I appreciate the opportunity to have that conversation. Yeah,

super cool. I've been very excited about getting on the podcast with you. So thank you.

Yeah, I'm excited too. What would you say right now is kind of the state of the union on

the work that you're doing? The reason I asked that question is related to mountain tough in

this podcast in particular, we spend a tremendous amount of time talking about mental toughness

and resilience and mindset. And a lot of time we are talking to people about how they can

break through and really be the person that God created them to be and break through in 2026

feels different to me than it did in 2019, for example. And part of that is because of just

the sheer amount of distraction that is out there at kind of an unprecedented level with the speed

of technology and the power of technology, how does that kind of connect into the work that you're

doing? And how would you kind of describe like the state of the union on transitioning veterans

at the moment? I think it's that's a that's a broad question, but the state of the union on

transitioning veterans. I mean, that's the question in front of us is not good. I'll caveat that with

I think it's not good, just like transition from a lot of other careers and you know, life issues

and so forth are also not good. Transition is always difficult, but when you've served in the

military, particularly for any length of time, and if you've had combat experience, that that becomes

who you are, that becomes your identity. I identify myself with the uniform that I wore, the job that I

did, the rank that I had, where I fall in the hierarchy. I knew exactly what I was, exactly what I

was supposed to do. It all made sense. Even in a chaotic environment, it made sense. And that's

true. I believe in the first responder community as well, again, for a lot of the same reasons. The

job is clear. There's a lot of chaos around that and we can talk about all those things, but what I'm

supposed to do is clear, the training helps me understand what I'm supposed to do when I find myself

in situations that I may or may not have anticipated. I'm ready for that because of the training that I

have. I fall in a particular place on the hierarchy of command. I wear a uniform that identifies me

in a specific way. And so this is who I am. This is my identity. So when we talk about identity,

you could work in corporate America. Your identity can become that, but it's just different when you

wear a uniform and have a rank and a job that says that's who you are. And the rest of the world

looks at you that way. And then you transition out of that role. You hang the uniform up in the closet,

you are no longer that guy or girl anymore. And you find yourself in a world that may say,

thank you for your service, but really has no idea what you did, where you came from, what that all

means, what that looks like. And so the world around us doesn't understand it, but we don't understand

the new world that we find ourselves in either. And so transitioning is always very, very hard.

I don't know if it's harder now than it has historically been. But we have become as a society,

as a culture, unmoored, pulled away from community groups. You know, it used to be very common.

You're part of a large family unit or you're part of a church or community group. You're plugged

in somewhere outside of the military. So veterans returning from World War II or from some of these

other conflicts, they're plugging right back into a community of people that help to develop a

new identity around them. We've become really taken away or pulled apart from that. And so you

transition out of the military into this world where, as you mentioned, there are so many distractions,

there are so many different things that you can do and places that you can go and voices that are

telling you how you should act and what you should think and what you should be, that it's very

easy to get lost in that. What was once very clear is now not clear at all. I lose who I am. I

don't know how to function in this new environment. And here's the slope. If we don't know who we are,

we can't clearly identify. This is who I am. Well, if we don't know who we are, then we don't know

why we're here. So I lose after my lost identity, I now lose my purpose. I don't know why I'm here.

And if I don't have purpose, then the next step, I don't have hope. There's nothing out there

bigger than this situation. There's nothing beyond where I am right now. I don't even know

why I'm here. So there's nothing that's going to carry me forward. So without a clear identity,

I've transitioned away from what I knew. I'm in a different place. I don't know who I am.

I don't have a clear identity. I don't have a clear purpose. I lose hope. And so the next natural

decision is to do things that, I mean, a lot of veterans are taking their lives. There are steps

before that that are just very destructive. And so, yeah, I mean, the state of transition

is not a good one. And as many people are, as they're trying to help, there are a lot of good

people who are trying to help. A lot of money is being thrown at it. Without an understanding of

faith in identity, the rest of it is going to fall apart. Yeah, I would like to hear from you

a little bit more around what has actually helped the most with that at mighty oaks because

I couldn't agree more. And you can see that equation on the veteran side, the first responder side.

But I also can see that same exact thing happening regardless of someone's previous

profession. And I am a big believer that many listeners of this show because of it being

mountain tough and because of kind of pushing the limits in the back country, pushing the limits

in the gym and really trying to kind of scratch the edge of human performance.

Most of our listeners have a performance mindset. And the performance mindset can be rewarded so

greatly in a worldly lens. And it's rewarded since we were children. And so it's like

show up early, stay late, rewarded, run faster, rewarded, jump higher, rewarded, work harder,

rewarded. And so the performance mindset, regardless of profession, can quickly become a big chunk

of that identity. And then there's a point where it just doesn't work anymore. And it's like

right. It's kind of like goal post, a goal post, a goal post, a goal post with still this

giant hole in your heart. And you can't figure out why is there this giant hole when I'm achieving

some really amazing achievements. And the identity of being a son of God in a child of God is where

we have to get to, regardless of our current occupation or our previous occupation. And that

shifts our mindset. And then mindset determines our methods. So if our mindset is I always have to

perform, that's going to determine the methods I live out each day. But if my mindset is I'm

extremely loved. And I won't be any more or less loved today. If I get my to-do list done or not,

that can really change the methods that I execute on today. But

coming back around to the question of what actually helps people change their identity,

perspective, what is actually helping there that you're seeing actually work at my diodes.

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Man, great question and super important. So outside of, you know, kind of my work life and my

family life, I'm involved in two communities. So I trained Jiu Jitsu. So that's a community that I'm

involved in. And for a bunch of years, I've been part of the ultra running community. So you got

these communities of people. And the longer you're in those communities, you start to realize that

a lot of the people that are a part of very hard disciplines like Jiu Jitsu, like ultra running,

are there because they're looking for something and what they're looking for is a new identity.

And it doesn't take long to find that in those communities. I identify as a grappler. I identify as a

Jiu Jitsu person, whatever. I identify as an ultra runner. And it's, you know, that becomes who I am.

But the problem with that, just like jobs and often relationships and the other things that we find

our identities in, is that they'll change. I can't continue to perform the way that I did. Or I've

won all the things, but there's nothing left. Or I'm only, you know, I physical limits. So I can only

get this far. So I'll always fall short. So your identity is constantly shifting and constantly

changing. You're constantly asking, who am I? Because your environments are constantly changing.

And so for high performers, often you find yourself in a very physically difficult,

do hard things environment because it makes sense to you. Again, the goal posts typically are very

clear in terms of what you have to do to achieve. But then you do achieve and realize, now what?

Right? What goes, what's beyond this? Or I got hurt or something happened? And so, so now I'm lost.

When we have an actual identity rooted in a relationship with Christ, it flips all of those things

on their head. So now, instead of training Jiu Jitsu and running ultra marathons and writing books

and, you know, doing the other things that other people do, to find my identity, I'm now doing

those things to fulfill my identity. I understand who I am in Christ. And who I am in Christ helps me

to understand that my job is to leverage my purpose, is to leverage what God's given me, the

talents, the abilities, the gifts that He's given me to be a help and a blessing to others to make

the world a better place. And so, those other disciplines, those other areas of hard work that I

am capable of and enjoy are now used to get me to that purpose instead of fulfilling an identity

that shifts. And so, it changes everything. And so, the starting point is realizing that God, the

creator, exists, that He created with purpose and design, and that when I understand who He created

me to be, then I can move forward in spite of whatever is in my past. The trauma is the difficulties,

the brokenness, the hurt, whatever. I can move forward in spite of that. As my roles and relationships

and responsibilities change, I can continue to move forward because those are things that I do, those

are not who I am. But establishing that for very high performing people, and this is who we deal with,

we work with, you know, very high performing people. People have done very hard things and very

difficult environments at a very high level, both from a human performance standpoint and just

emotionally, often the things that are involved in are very spiritually difficult things. And so,

they understand that, they just don't understand it in a new environment. And they think, if I can't

be that person anymore, then who am I? So, that was a long way to get to your question. And the question

was, what works for my diodes? A couple of things. One, we acknowledge right up front, we're not a

clinical program. There are some great clinical programs. I'm in favor of them. But we're not that.

We're not a program that is going to teach you how to adjust your habits or how to apply medications

or other therapies to deal with these traumas and these brokenness and this difficulty that you're

never going to get over. But we're going to learn how to manage it. We're not trying to help you

manage anything. We are in favor of medication in the right place, in the right quantities for the

right period of time. It's overused. We have people that show up to our programs that are on

25 or 30 medications a day. There's no end in sight. Their physicians say, this is just how

it's going to be for the rest of your life. We're not for that, obviously. But medication can serve

a purpose in its right place. But that's not what we're about. So, first of all, we're very

upfront about what we're not. And then we move on to what we are. We're a faith-based organization.

What does that mean? It means we believe in God. We believe that there's a creator. And then he

created us with purpose and design and that you need to understand how to align to that purpose

and design. So, we set the table early. And then we teach classes. Our program is five days long. We

teach classes over the course of that five days. But I think the key for giving hope to high

performing people that feel like they've lost their purpose is this. All of our instructors,

every person who stands up and teaches a class or leads a breakout, every single one started as

a student in our program. They came because they needed help. They came to the program. We brought

them through about a year-long process of training and equipping them to be able to help others.

And then when they stand up and teach a class, we require them to give their testimony first.

So they will say something like this with their details. They'll say, I know where you are because

I've been there. I've been in that spot. I sat over there. I came as a student. This is what was

going on in my life. I have shared experiences, but also shared struggles. So I know where you are

because I've been there. I don't have it all figured out, but I'm moving forward. And I want to walk

this out with you. Now I'm going to teach a class. And this is how this class helped me when I was

sitting where you're sitting. And so it gives hope because now you're looking across the table or

across the room from people that are like you that have the same experiences that did the same

things that were very high-performing people and very difficult situations. And we're able to

transition through that. And then over the course of that week, as those testimonies are given,

the walls come down. An understanding of a purpose bigger than the uniform that you wore or the

job that you did, understanding God has a plan for you. God has a purpose for you. And then

breaking down, what is the gospel and why is that important? When we talk about identity,

identifying with Christ, what does that mean? It is identifying with the death, the burial,

and the resurrection of Jesus. Why is that important? Because in relationship with Christ, the Bible

tells us we are a new creation. Old things are passed away. Behold, all things are become new.

So who I was is not who I am anymore when my relationship or my identity is found in Jesus Christ.

Romans chapter 8 and verse 1 tells us that there is no condemnation. So feelings of condemnation

on the other side of trauma or what we call moral injury, that survivor's guilt. So many of the

guilt and just the emotional and spiritual challenges that are brought into a person's life,

their heart and their mind. Well, there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.

What does that mean? I am identifying with the fact that he took my sin, my brokenness, my hurt,

all of it on himself when he paid the price for me on the cross, that he was placed in a tomb.

But because he is God, he defeated sin, he defeated death, he offers, he gives new life,

and the same Holy Spirit of God that rose in from the dead in dwells, the believer.

And so I'm identifying with that completed work, the forgiveness that comes from knowing who Jesus

is and what he did. Understanding there is a new purpose, there is a new direction. That's who I am

now. And from there, the rest flows, the purpose and the hope. That's incredible, man,

because I imagine that there are quite a few that enter your program that are kind of hearing

that for the first time. Yes, yes. Yeah, most. So it's funny because we position ourselves as

a faith, you say faith-based, that means different things to different people. It just means we're

a Christian program. And so the assumption is most people that attend your program are Christians.

So it's a church program or something like that. It's absolutely not. In fact,

we don't charge anything to attend our program. We don't charge anything for travel to get to our

programs. And so for a lot of people, they're with us because they have nowhere else to go.

They've tried all the other things. It doesn't cost them anything. And so they're here because

they just have nowhere else to go. They don't care about the God thing or some of them are hostile

to God. They come from a different place. Has it relates to faith and understanding of spirituality

and Christianity? So yeah, they've either not heard it most of them or they've heard it and rejected

it. Some, you know, they blame God for the death of people that they cared about or whatever. So

yeah, it's interesting. And the way we approach that is, is relationally. We don't start with

an explanation of who Jesus is and what it is to have an identity with him on day one.

We start off by just talking about what's happened in my life. Again, all these testimonies. By the time

we would have a class that breaks down what I just said, what Jesus did and what that means and all

it. By the time we do that, that's halfway through the week. They've had, you know, our students have

had 20 hours or something of classes in small group time where they're just talking about service

and talking about breaking through that and talking about relationship issues and talking about

all the things. And so we walk there because it has to be built. That conversation has to be built

on trust and a recognition that one of the reasons I've been pushing back against faith is because

I'm a man's man or whatever. I've done very hard things. You know, I used to carry a gun for

living and so you can't mix the two. And then you realize like, no, you actually can. And there is

a reason that some people make it and some people don't. And so we have that conversation after that

trust has been built. And that's again, that's where the testimonies and those conversations and

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It makes me wonder about a comment you did make at the beginning of our episode. And

that comment was around how we are quite like alone and isolated as a society now. And

a lot of all of the individuals that come through your program and and find significant life

transformation and help. They still are going to eventually go back home and be back alone by

themselves. And that part is really interesting to me because you are so correct that you know

guys aren't playing softball much anymore. Guys aren't bowling much anymore. Guys aren't

barbecue and much in the neighborhood anymore like historically was happening. And so

the the brotherhood of just society now in America is different and difficult. And you you know

you can find it through some of the things like like you mentioned with jujitsu and ultra running.

But it is a it is a large difficult topic especially thinking about the audience that you're

working with. And you know the audience that you're working with I've through the years with

mountain tuffs leaning towards you know what can we do to scratch the limits of back country

performance. We've gone in to share some knowledge with different special operations communities.

And I always tell my wife I'm like man some of them are like Disneyland for men.

It's like the it's like your childhood dream as a boy of like well I'm going to work out with

some buddies and then I'm going to I'm going to eat some really good high protein food and then

I'm going to shoot guns like some of them are a man's dream it's Disneyland for men. But the the

camaraderie is like thick you can feel it you can breathe it it the camaraderie is so thick and

not only is it thick it is a lot of times you know it is an environment where everyone's challenging

each other to be better not only physically but mentally and leadership wise at every area of

life just the constant kind of challenge can you be a little better here can you be a little

better here can you be a little better here. And now you come out of that and you are trying

any way you can to replicate that in a civilian world for civilians it's hard to find a brotherhood

a community camaraderie especially from the lens of like to be exceptional we need to kind

of surround ourselves with exceptional people and that kind of that kind of cliche let's call it like

you are the sum of your five closest friends it is accurate in my opinion is very true but

it's not very talked about that to be spiritually exceptional you need to surround yourself with

exceptional spiritual people and whether you are a prior military member first responder or you

were never a first responder or a veteran finding that in current society is really difficult

yes yeah one of our one of our taglines we have it on our t-shirts is never fight alone and

isolation absolutely kills and you know I think most people are familiar with the number

22 but we're told that 22 veterans every single day in their lives for those of us that do this

work in other recent studies research based on accurate reporting and things like that is

probably closer to 40 veterans every single day in their lives almost five active duty service

members a day in their lives these numbers continue to increase so as much as the VA and others

have put money and attention into this the problem is getting worse and there are a lot of reasons

for that but one of the major reasons is isolation it was interesting during the COVID lockdowns

ABC News and others did kind of a report I guess on data that came out from the Department of

Defense that during the months immediately following the shutdown I think there were four

month period of time so one quarter suicides across the Department of Defense I forget the number

by break break down by service service but the total average went up 25 percent of suicides

on the active duty side of the military during that four month period of time during the lockdowns

and what happened during that period of time was those who were going to basic training were locked

down in hotel rooms waiting for basic training to start because of all the restrictions commands

that are active locked their people in the rooms isolated them to wait to see how those things

would change so I mean we all live through that we know what that was like but for the service

member dealing with the things they were already dealing with and now being forced into isolation

25 percent increase in suicides so it's not anecdotal I mean this has been researched and we

understand that this is a real thing if you isolate yourself the crazy thoughts that you have and

the emotions that are out of control they find some validity in your heart in mind because

there's no one saying hey that doesn't make sense you're not processing it with anyone you're

sitting alone in that and you begin to believe it and then you eventually may act on that and so

when we you know our program again I mentioned this five days long five days is not long enough

to really fix a problem per se we can point people to Christ and people make professions of faith

a lot of people do and that's a starting point but on the other side of that five days we're

very intentional about staying in contact with those people so for six months after a person

graduates we're in contact with them every week we provide resources we connect them to counselors

if they need that if they need a substance abuse program we'll find that for them so we're very

intentional about staying in contact you made a good decision during that five days and now we

want to provide you the tools and the resources to walk that out but before people graduate from

our program we teach a class called the four bees four bees not complicated but it makes sense in

this context right four bees in order to succeed in order to move forward in a good way in order to

keep the commitments you made during this week you need to do four things you need to be in the word

you need to be in prayer you need to be in community and you need to be in contact these we have

discovered over the time that we've been doing this with thousands of people coming through our

program if someone is consistently doing those four things they're going to be able to deal with

the relationship issues that are on emotional or traumatic issues they'll get the help that they

need they will move forward and those four things are important because being in the word is us

hearing from God every day us being in prayer is us speaking to God every day again it keeps us

grounded it keeps us focused it keeps us humble it keeps us where we need to be and then be in

community this is connecting to a local community we would say a local church where you can be around

like-minded people encouraged by people who are a little bit further down the road than you are

as you mentioned those people who are constantly calling you to be better and to do more you're in

a community of faith so you're in the word speaking or hearing from God you're in prayer speaking to

God you're in community around people that understand the values that you hold and the way that

you're the direction that you're traveling and then be in contact that last piece is important

we call that a corner man it's a mentor have someone in your life that knows they're that for you

and reach out to them regularly so you've built in now with those just four simple elements

really a defense against isolation and you're constantly pushing yourself into environments where

you can be encouraged and strengthened and helped and and and not alone so yeah if there's one key

to succeeding on the other side of making these decisions to get up and move forward it's it's

that refusing to stay isolated and intentionally putting yourself in environments with the right

people that can help you move forward yeah those are just game changing principles that

all of us need to apply regardless of where we're at in life I mean yeah those those principles need

to happen for us to be pursuing the abundant life that's right and it is really fascinating that

there is a new research study that came out that showed individuals that that eat quickly and eat

alone well trigger a lot of the food allergy problems like a gluten or celiac or lactose and they can

then have those individuals in like version two of the study eat slow surrounded by friends and

family with laughter and conversation and with slow laughter and conversation and community

there's no trigger of like the celiac or lactose and so it's just like it

and we've been you know like we've been talking about that kind of stuff for a while and a lot of

times it is talked about in terms of think about all the things that hurt our gut in America and

then you go to Europe and you can eat similar things and it does not hurt your gut so that you know

that conversation is quite common with especially now the substances in our food that actually

are illegal in Europe that are legal in America right right right but such a big component of that

is community and it is slowing down and it is conversation and laughter and there's an exercise

component with the amount of walking and walking outside creates a vitamin D component that is

all kind of happening in some societies and it it struck me you know long time ago my

wife and I worked in Uganda for a couple of years and I was I was pretty young and naive and we

flew a Uganda pastor home with us to Bozeman to preach in a couple churches and then he was

going to fly back and return home and I was thinking that this Uganda pastor was going to be

so blown away by our way of life and so impressed and he stayed in this great house with this great

family and we went over to have this great meal with him and I've been to where he is from you

know and it is a I've been to his home and it is a third world environment hands down extreme

extreme poverty at the most extreme level so now we're sitting in Bozeman and I ask him thinking

already he's going to be blown away by Bozeman right and I was like how you know how's it going

how are you how are you liking it here and you know he looked at me straight in the eye and he's

like I cannot wait to get home and I was like what and he's like he's like man the the community

the community we have at home is so strong and that always stood with me and struck me because

we are really kind of isolated and alone and in America and breaking through that is difficult

to kind of create that that true community it's not a it's not a super easy task and you know

there's a lot to that whether it's you know our personality types and the structure of our country

but it is not necessarily getting easier either with how technology has made us even more so

isolated right hey guys I did want to interrupt for a quick minute right here and let you know about

some supplements I've been taking I did shy away from supplements for a long time I was always

cautious about what they were made out of where they were from and who the team was behind the

brands but over the last couple years I've got to meet the team at mountain ops from top to bottom

and they are an amazing group of humans I've got to know the CEO Trevor Farms really well and he

is a mission focused individual that cares about humans living a better quality of life so that

they can have that abundant life so over the last couple years he has helped me add some things that

have changed the game for me one of those things that I've added is creatine from mountain ops it

helps me maintain some muscle mass but also it's a big big player in cognitive function one of the

most research supplements out there also I've added reds greens and protein all from mountain ops what

I found as a busy professional always on the run I do eat a whole foods diet for breakfast lunch

and dinner but on the go it's hard to get enough vegetables fruits and proteins so I've added that

from mountain ops and it has significantly changed the game I can feel it in my performance I haven't

got sick for a long long time and I can certainly feel it in my mental clarity as well the last thing

I've added is the mountain tough hydrate product for the back country for hunting season when I'm

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yeah you're absolutely right it it's I mean it's so important to us that people find a community

and again you're right you can be in a church and still not have a great community it's it's

difficult to build that and and particularly if you're not wired that way but it's so important to

us that when someone's with us during that five days we ask every student if they have a church

if they're regular at their church and if the answers know we will work before they even leave

to find them a church in their community and connect them I mean it's it's just that important to

us that they have that and then several years ago one of the things we started doing was developing

what we call outposts they're small groups in local churches run by graduates of our program and

so I think we have almost 70 of those across the country now and it's constantly expanding but

but to your point it's different to go into a church that you're not familiar with when you don't

know the people that are there and then you go to a church where people have a shared background

you know and they come from a similar place as you that that helps to develop that community and

so we've been working that end as well because it is and you just it's so easy to be isolated and

it's easy to be isolated and feel connected because of technology and those kind of things but

it's yeah we have a very lonely world and a lot of young people that are very lonely and we've

got to fight against that it's not how we were created to live. Yeah I think that I would be

interested to hear your perspective on this but it does kind of feel like we're bumping up

to a pivotal moment I'm hoping so that is similar to when we saw a lot of early

generation smoke and they were smoking a bunch for like status and just kind of like a fashion

statement and not realizing at all that it was extremely bad for them and then

then we discovered oh this stuff is like really really bad and then there was a generation that made

fun of the previous generation a little bit they were like can you believe like my grandma

smoked two packs a day my grandma smoked on an airplane my grandma smoked in the car there was

ash trays and cars right right and I feel like we might be on the the edge of something like that

where it's like can you believe a generation spent four hours a day on a phone can you believe

they spent five hours a day on a phone can you believe they got no vitamin D they they spent no

time outside they can you believe there's a generation that like touch the phone the second they

woke up and the second they were going to bed and there's got to be a moment where it's like oh

that stuff's really really bad for us it leaves us even more isolated and that isolation

is devastating in so many ways but are you feeling are like are you feeling any of that

yes I do believe that I mean I think more more and more people that I talk to you are are either

getting off of social media they're moving away from even having smartphones right or having

those available to them technology is shifting all the time it will be interesting to see how it

you know what happens with that but we've seen and again a lot of good data has been presented

by Pew and other other research organizations on young people returning to churches

particularly young men going back to church and a lot of that is not even a specific kind of church

it's it's the idea of having stability and community we see more and more again a lot of good

research young people moving away from kind of video game culture and going to meet ups where

they're doing you know board games and things like that and so a lot of that is happening

and I think the the need the desire for authenticity continues to grow my opinion is that

with a lot of what's being generated by AI as as helpful as a tool as that can be people are going

to really search for authenticity in person experiences being around real people people they don't

have to wonder is that real or is it AI I do think the pendulum is going to swing now you know

emerging technologies what is that going to do to all of that I don't know but yeah I think more

and more we're seeing people go I've got to do something different this is not fulfilling me the

way that I was I was told that it would and I hope that the church will fill that gap we've

seen a lot of churches lean into technology and virtual services and things like that again I think

there's a place for that but the church has to be very careful in navigating this landscape well

and understanding the importance of in-person communities and groups of people again just how

important that is and so I hope the church will lead the way on that but it'll be interesting you

know I'm I'm almost 50 I'll be 50 this year I have four kids two of them are in high school two of

them are young young adults they look at the world very different than I do and that's not a surprise

anyone but but even for them spending time with friends and spending time in in communities

becoming more and more important and it's good to see but again we'll see what happens

yeah I've heard some of that similar data which is really fascinating the data around young

individuals returning to the church and right especially there seems to be a higher rate of

young men than young women and there's a I think in some of that data it indicates that

that younger generation has kind of seen what they don't want to happen to them and decided that

like instead of going kind of like the the algorithm government route a better route is

Jesus Christ and that is so fascinating that that is starting to happen that that yes that

pendulum went too far and is kind of starting to swing back the other direction is really interesting

right yeah that's right so we we kind of started at the beginning of the episode that the

the numbers of individuals coming through mighty oaks is not decreasing it's it's continuing to

increase and increase and that is amazing to see but but it also just shows like the the massive

need that is out there what what is kind of related to why the numbers for you guys continue to climb

I think there are probably a lot of things we've been around long enough people know who we are

you know so that's a big one we're so there are other faith focus or faith-based organizations

Christian organizations that are addressing these things most of them are not addressing them

in the numbers that we are so they have you know smaller groups and smaller opportunities and

there's nothing wrong with that but it's just it's very limited in scope and in what they can do

so there are a lot of people doing good things we're unique in how we do it and the scale to which

we do it so that's a big part of a part of the growth we just provide more opportunity there's more

opportunities to attend our programs but I think I mentioned this to you 84% of people who

attend our programs say they came because someone they know recommended them and this has been

crazy to watch over the years I think you know Chad Rochow who found my diodes and you know in the

early days when we were talking about what my diodes would look like and who it would serve

there was always this pushback on us with the faith piece people would say if you keep talking

about Jesus then you're never going to have access to the active duty community maybe veterans

will attend if they care about faith but but you'll never be able to really have a big impact on

people who aren't already Christians and you know that was not negotiable that was something we

were committed to but what's happened over the years is the opposite of that it's the other thing

when someone gets help someone who's broken someone who's hurt someone who has no one else to go

someone that's tried everything else they come to a place with others who are similar to them in

background and experience we're not a church program we're not held in a church it's not pastors

who are leading the programs it's not any of that it's it's men and women who've experienced the

same things and so now I'm in this environment with people that are just like me but now they're

talking about faith and they're talking about a relationship with Jesus and all that means and

all that has meant to them and they found hope and healing and then I'm going to give this a shot

I'm going to try this I'm going to lean into this and then that person finds hope and healing

in direction and they go back and tell others in their community and it continues to you know grow

exponentially that way and so it's people finding hope and help and turning around and helping

and offering hope to those that they know who are also struggling and so I think again a lot of

reasons that we've seen the growth that we have but the biggest one is probably just enough people

have been helped through what we do not because of us we point others to Jesus but through what we do

they've been helped that now that exponential growth is really getting momentum

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it is encouraging to me and I'm sure many other listeners to hear a little bit about

I would guess how kind of intimidated a little bit scared you were to start into this

and how far it I'm just guessing has exceeded your wildest expectations at this point because

so many listeners I believe have kind of been nudged by the Lord to do something cool and have

been nudged by the Lord to take a little risk and have been they've heard the Holy Spirit ask

them to be obedient to different things and they've been in a state of fear or state of delayed

obedience and so like with with your story I would imagine you were a little bit scared a little

bit intimidated you probably started in an incredibly small scale compared to what the organization

is now and you probably could have never in your wildest dreams imagined what it looks like today

and then in your wildest dreams you couldn't imagine of not doing what you did is that accurate?

oh yeah I mean I was well said so I met Chad through a mutual friend and he had come to

Christ through a mentor through someone at his church in Houston and said I need to share this with

other veterans and so my deox was started I was introduced to him through another marine and marine

that I had served with and and I was a past I was pastoring a church at the time so Chad said hey

I want to do this thing I have an idea we're we're putting the pieces together I'm just not

exactly sure how it all works out like I'm I'm not in ministry I've never done this would you help

me and so initially when we were talking about it it was having a program that we could work with

donors to fund for the people that we knew for people who who we knew who we had served with

who were in kind of our community of veterans and service members so these were people we could

call directly and say hey come to this place and we'll be able to do this and so that's what it was

about I was working a full-time job you know leading a church I was doing that and then a few times

a year the plan was a few times a year we'll get together for a week and I have these have these

sessions and if we can have you know a hundred people a year come through one of these that would be

amazing I mean the day we get to a hundred people a year we're gonna have to hire like staff and

stuff and so when we started it was I think four of us that taught all the classes it was just us

doing the best that we could and then again people would reach out to their friends and say I

went to this thing it's different than anything I've experienced different than anything you've

experienced you need to try it out and it grew to the point where now you know we're a large

national organization but to your point at the time I just thought if I can be used in any way to

help people that I've known I was helped by people in the church I struggled when I came home

and I had people in my community come alongside and help me get back on my feet help me move forward

if I can do that for a few other people then I want to do that but God's plan envisioned for

that was so much bigger we've had over seven thousand people come through one of those programs

we have now this year we crossed a thousand a year that will put through the program so again

exponential growth we're receiving about 200 applications a month right now so we're trying to

figure out what's the best way to scale and we're working through a lot of that and a lot of

questions have to be answered but yeah I'd never put a limitation in my mind on what

God could do I just never thought it would be more than just a few times a year we do this and that'll

be great and I'll be happy about that but it's become yes something much different than that

that's incredible it's just incredible the way God does that just like over and over and over again

and yeah yeah he only seems to show us like just the next step not all the steps and I think

it'd be overwhelming to show to all of them it with you know with mountain tough it's always

funny because we I started with three guys behind the park behind my house in the park

yeah like you know no gym no money no equipment but I loved every minute of it and

he if he would have showed me like where we were headed over the next 10 years it would have

been hard to believe and then if he would have showed me some of the because it's not easy either so

no if he would have showed me some of the pain that you have to go through it's it's a lot easier

to walk through that pain when you don't know it's coming versus if you wouldn't know it's coming

that's right man that's right the way it orchestrates that is really cool yeah yeah in order to see

you know I think good things happen you have to be committed to the the reason you know your why

the mission the the thing that God's put in front of you but you also have to be willing to

endure a lot of pain I tell people all the time I'm not good at much really anything but the one

kind of skill I have is I just don't quit you know I was I was introduced to the speaking thing

the other day and they went through my whole bio and and the guy at the end was a mince event so

at the end of it he's like and he's an accomplished ultra runner I got to have a password I'm like

I'm not an accomplished ultra runner I just know how to keep going and I go slow so I'm not even

getting anywhere fast I mean it's not that it's just you have to be willing to go

God's put this in front of me and so I'm just going to keep going I'm going to keep

to take the next step and I think you know I I've said before that persistence is a super power

because so many people are unwilling to be persistent but yeah you start where you are

you let God guide you one step but a time the way that he says he will you trust him for the next

step and you just remain committed to taking the steps that he sets in front of you and as long

you're that there will be hard times there will be difficult times for sure but yeah man will we

ever regret doing what God let us into I just I just don't think so no I think the the scary regret

is the other side of like at judgment day where we're all gonna pass some point in time it's

coming for all of us Jesus kind of asking us why we squandered a lot of authority and power

yeah I mean that is a much scarier regret I agree yeah that's right that's right well man we are

at a time and I want to stay stay punctual with you but it has been awesome to learn more about

what you guys are up to and learn more about your story and just the work that you're doing

with mighty oaks from the way that you know the gospel and the message of switching your identity

into an identity of being a child of God a child of Jesus is powerful and it's been it's been

awesome to get to know that story a little more cool man thank you so much for yeah I just

for having the conversation I really appreciate it appreciate what you guys are doing awesome thank you

appreciate you