Podcast

Today’s episode is a special one—it’s a heartfelt look at the power of vulnerability, the journey of healing, and the courage it takes to truly cry out to Jesus. This week has been full of travel and connection as I visited multiple cities, witnessing firsthand how God is moving through men’s ministries and drawing us all toward healing and restoration.

We dive into the story of Blind Bartimaeus in the Gospel of Mark—one man’s encounter with Jesus that reminds us all of the importance of being vulnerable and bold in asking for the help we need. In today’s world, we’re often told to ‘suck it up’ and carry on alone, but Bartimaeus’ story calls us to something deeper. When everyone else tried to silence him, he cried out even louder. In that moment, Bartimaeus showed us the true meaning of courage and faith: daring to believe that Jesus wants to meet us in our brokenness and bring us wholeness.

___________________________________________________________________________

---

Become a Partner in the Pew! Donate to the ministry today!

START A MEN’S GROUP IN YOUR PARISH!

www.justaguyinthepew.com

---

 

Hello. Welcome back to the Pew everybody. I’m your host, John. Edwards and I’m excited to be in the studio again this week, bringing you another episode of just to get on the pew. Thank you for always coming back. Thank you for choosing to listen to us and thank you for just being here every week alongside of us as we journey through our own faith and through life and looking to grow as disciples of Jesus Christ.

So. I am a little bit delirious this morning over the last week. I’ve been from Memphis to Atlanta, to Tallahassee, to Chicago, to Indianapolis, to Muncie, to Newark, New Jersey, where I returned from late last night at about one in the morning, the Lord had us go to Muncie for another men’s conference for, for their men’s conference.

We’ve been there a month ago, launching a group and doing a Pierce mission. And they invited us back to the group. They were able to. To add to that group number through the conference. So now they have the sons of St. Joseph that they started, excuse me, the men of St. Joseph that they started and they’ve already had their first successful meeting.

So they’re off to the races there. All praise be Jesus Christ for his work there. And through this ministry to help get something for men there where there was nothing, then I went and, uh, I came back a week ago, Saturday night. Left Sunday morning for the JP two, uh, healing centers, team retreat. Dr. Bob put together a treat for all the team members, everybody that’s involved.

It was a wonderful time of, of just, uh, rest and relaxation, but also growth as a team and, uh, especially there on the, on the feast day of the patron saint of St. John Paul the second. So I got back from that on Wednesday. I was here Thursday taking care of some stuff in the ministry and being with my family.

And then I left Friday. to go and do our third diocesan deanery leadership summit in partnership with my good friend Adam Carlisle in the diocese of Metuchen. This time it was in the Round Valley, Round Valley Deanery. We had over 60 men from multiple parishes there with deacons and everybody alongside them.

And we spent a day, uh, just training and teaching them to go back and, and equipping them with our methodology to go back and build life changing, vibrant ministry to men. Folks, the Lord is using our ministry to in an amazing way. Not only are we partnering with other ministries like, uh, the JP2 Healing Center, and we worked alongside of the Knights of Columbus and Metuchen this past weekend, but we’re also utilizing what God has given us in this methodology to go and help men implement ministry to men that’s going to be life changing and help pull men out of darkness and into the light, help them find restoration and healing.

The Lord is using it to do all of that. And folks, we are in more demand than we ever have been. That’s why I wanted to take a minute here to just tell you that giving tuesday is coming up It’s on december the 3rd this year and actually early giving starts on november the 18th. And so I would like all of you to consider Uh giving to us on giving tuesday.

You can start early on november the 18th It’s kind of like early voting I guess but Uh, you can go to the show notes in this episode and find our link to be able to go there and on november the 18th And afterwards, uh, you can start giving to our ministry At least one time monthly whatever you want to do, but every bit of it helps you can see in just the last week Everywhere we’ve been multiple cities doing multiple things to help people to help ourselves to be better Evangelists and and better ministers for what the lord wants us to do So we are in more demand than ever we’re going to bring on some evangelists, but that costs money Therefore that is our goal this year is to raise over fifty thousand dollars to bring on a fellow evangelist that I already have in mind and have spoken to so we can go out and reach more parishes, work in more diocese.

And, uh, we could do the things that the Lord has called us to do and help men find that healing and restoration and authentic friendship with Christ and each other so that they can become the men they’re called to be. So folks check that out. Of course, you can become a monthly partner in the pew at any time for our ministry by going to, uh, www dot.

Donorbox. org slash pew are going directly to just to get on the pew. com and uh, clicking the donate button at the top of the website. Folks, if you’d like us to help you in your parish or in your diocese or archdiocese, get something going for men. That’s what we love to do. That’s what we’re called to do and that’s how we spend our time.

So you can do that and get with us and sign up for a call with me. Find out more information by going to just a guy in the pew. com. So folks, thank you for being with me again. As I said in the beginning of the episode, thank you for listening to that. I just couldn’t let a week go by, even though, like I said, I’m delirious.

So if I make mistakes or, or say something or have a lot of us today, it’s cause, uh, I haven’t had a lot of sleep in the last week, but the Lord moved my heart through the gospel reading. Um, Yesterday when I was in Metuchen, I went to a vigil mass because I knew that I’d be flying and coming in late last night and I wanted to rest a little bit this morning before I got up to do this podcast.

So I went and there was a wonderful priest that gave a wonderful homily on this. But the reading itself and also just some of the things he said stirred in me a way to look at this gospel reading from this past Sunday, uh, in a different light. So as you know, the reading was on the blonde, uh, Bartimaeus.

It was there in Mark chapter 10 verses 46 through 52. And it’s something that a lot of us have read before we’ve heard before. And there’s. Two versions of this actually in matthew matthew uses it in the beginning of the gospel and then comes back Before jesus enters into jerusalem, and he talks about two blind men there But it’s believed that uh, he he found those stories from mark and expounded on those now He was there with jesus where mark wasn’t but he utilized the the uh, the version that mark had of it Uh and placed it in different places in his gospel If you read the notes and and most of the bibles that have notes out there, it’ll it’ll talk and confirm about that but Really what, what struck me is just, you know, the thing about, I talk to people all the time about reading the Bible and it being the living word of God is you may read something a hundred times, but each time, if you’re praying about it and asking the Lord to speak at your heart, you’re in a different place in your life.

And so the Lord meets you in a different way in that verse, right? And so you may hear something completely different six months ago than you do now, if you read it. That’s why as Catholics, we need to be in the Bible each and every day because the Lord has a message for us, right? And it’s not just in the gospel readings.

But any time of taking prayerful time to read through scripture The lord always wants to tell us something and that’s how we get to know him I always talk about relationship with christ and people say well, how do I do that? And you know i’m quick to say what you know Pope benedict the 16th said through through prayer through the liturgical life of the church and through scripture Uh, and oftentimes scripture is the last thing that we we’re in we kind of have that magnificent life where we just read the that myth the readings of the day or You Or whatever, but if we’re not going to mass every day, then we’re missing a lot of the story.

So it’s awesome to get in the, in the gospels and to just, even if you’re just playing Russian roulette with the Bible, flipping the Bible open and saying, Lord, what do you want to say to me in this today? And reading until he stirs and moves your heart. So that’s what I was doing. I went and started reading through the gospel and it moved me and you know This is one where i’m going to read through it very quickly And then I want to get into some points that the lord spoke to me and hopefully it will you’ll find it as a help to you So it starts in uh, mark 10 verses 48 It says they came to Jericho and as he was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a sizable crowd Bartimaeus a blind man the son of Timaeus Sat by the roadside begging on hearing that it was Jesus of Nazareth He began to cry out and say Jesus son of David have pity on me and many rebuked him Many rebuked him telling him to be silent, but he kept calling out all the more son of David have pity on me Jesus stopped and said, Call him.

So they called the blind man, saying to him, Take courage, get up, he is calling you. He threw aside his cloak, sprang up, and came to Jesus. Jesus said to him in reply, What do you want me to do for you? The blind man replied to a master, I want to see. Jesus told him go on your way your faith has saved you Immediately, he received a sight and followed him on the way.

So there’s a couple things I want to say here First of all, we’re always talking about healing in this ministry It’s a big part of my of my journey, right? All of you know of my struggles of drugs and addiction and alcohol and porn and if you don’t Then you’re finding out about it now, I guess but I’ve always and I always talk about healing and vulnerability in those things Because that is what sets us on a path to changing our lives to getting past our wounds to healing from our wounds Uh, but so often we’re afraid to ask jesus for help right for so so often like when we talk about things and we say Man, I’m really struggling or I’m having a hard time.

A lot of people in this world and, and even in our family and in relationships can say, Oh, you’ll be all right. You’re fine. Just suck it up. Right? Just, just go on about your business. Just put your head down and work and, and move forward. And that’s all you need. You’ll get over it. Right? We all have trouble.

We all have problems. And so what do we do as men? Like for most of our life, we’ve been told to shove all that stuff down and it never gets any better. In fact, it festers and it affects the rest of our body. Right? And so. I love this passage because here you see a man who’s sitting on the side of the road and he’s afflicted and he’s been that way for we don’t know how long.

And he’s begging. He’s doing the best he can to survive. And sometimes that can feel like our own lives where we’re just doing what we can to make it through this life. Right. But there’s parts of us that are broken. There’s parts of us that aren’t healed and we’ve gotten so used to it that we just have that way of life.

And then one day. A miracle happens jesus walks out of this town and right past where he’s going And this man finds out that it’s jesus and he sees he knows that he has a chance He has a faith to believe in this man that he’s heard about because everyone’s heard about jesus And all the miraculous thing that’s going on that jesus is doing with the the healing of folks And so this man starts to call out and he starts to cry out And what does Jesus do?

What, well, first of all, what do people do be quiet? Like, stop it. Just sit there and shake your, your can of change. Like you always do stop yelling and calling out for people. And instead this blind man’s like, you know what? This may be my only chance. So he starts to scream, son of David, have pity on me, Jesus, son of David have pity on me.

So. While people are telling to be quiet, this man has this courageousness, this courage, right? To, to simply say, no, I’m not like, I’m tired of being this way. I’m tired of the things in my life. I can’t fix them on my own. I need help. And here’s help. This is, this, this is the, the epitome of help right in front of me.

And I will not be quiet, right? I’m sick of this. I want to be healed and I’m going to do everything in my power to do that. So people tell him to be quiet. And people tell him to continue to be quiet and he calls out louder and louder and they’re rebuking him But he calls out all the more right he refuses to be stopped He has this courageousness about him.

He has this courage and finally in his life He just wants to be honest and he wants to be vulnerable And he’s pouring himself out to Jesus, but how often, as I said, again, do we, as men, we, we feel that urge, but then we listen to the devil. We listen to other people in our lives and we say, you know what?

No, this is just the way it is. And there’s no possibilities for me to be better, to be healed. I just need to be quiet and get in line and just deal with a lot in life that I’ve been given. And sometimes, folks, we can even feel guilty asking Jesus for anything. Like, no, it’s not right of me to go to the Lord and say, Lord, I want this, I need this.

Because we’ve been told to be a gift and when we ask for something, it can make us feel guilty for asking Christ for something. But Jesus says in other places, ask and it shall be given to you, knock and the door shall be opened, seek and you shall find. Jesus knows full well what we need. And he’s not withholding anything from us But for us to think that asking him for what we really need and especially in situations where we need healing And we’re hurting and we’re acting out of wounds and and all we want is for him to come into those Situations and to do what we cannot to do something for us that we cannot do for ourselves It is not bad to ask jesus for what we need Now i’m not saying jesus.

I really really really want a ferrari. Please bring me one That’s not what we’re talking about here. But lord i’ve been dealing i’ve been struggling like please come into this and do what I cannot What I cannot do do for me what I cannot do for myself That is a beautiful prayer that the lord waits and longs to hear and so this man like He finally gets this point and he realizes.

Oh, here is jesus physically in front of me This son of David, this miracle worker, this, this man that could do anything and has brought healing to so many people. And he finally has the vulnerability to go, you know what? I can’t fix myself. I can’t fix my lot in life So i’m going to do everything I can to call out to jesus and tell him of my great need He has this call to honesty and it spurs him into into courage to call out and to cry out And so what happens?

People tell him no, no, no be quiet. Be quiet. Just like the world tells us you don’t need jesus figure it out on your own Just just you know, here’s these methods of the world that make you feel better Here’s comfort and all these things right just just live in this stuff. You don’t need jesus You

But all the more when we try to figure out on our own and we fail and fail again Then the world tells us we’re failures and we’re not good enough It’s a never ending vicious cycle But we need healing and jesus is the great healer. That’s what he says in isaiah 61 Right. The spirit of the lord god is upon me He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted to free those in prison to unloose the bound Right, this is who jesus is and so we have to realize this in our life and this man shows us How exactly to go about this?

right, it’s Is so amazing because he continues no matter what people are saying and in the face of adversity He still says no I need to be healed and I know jesus wants to heal me and i’m going to bring this to him and no matter what Nobody or anything is going to stop me And so finally jesus hears him and jesus stops and he said he says call him So he tells his disciples and who knows maybe even some of them are like hey, man, we’re busy Right because all of us could get like that in our own spiritual life We have the ability to help people but we can just be like, you know what i’m busy You And sometimes for me, it’s like I’m busy doing ministry stuff.

I’m too busy to help somebody because I’m doing ministry stuff, right? It’s just we can get in that mindset in that mode. And so the disciples, Jesus tells them to call him and he does. They do. And so the man comes to them. It says they go to the man and they call the blind man saying to him, take courage, get up.

He is calling you. Well, I would already say the man had courage because he’s screaming and yelling for Jesus and then what happens When this man knows that Jesus is there for his to help him and he doesn’t even know that Jesus will but he knows That Jesus is there and he knows that Jesus is merciful.

And then what does he do? It says he threw aside his cloak sprang up and came to Jesus So as soon as he thought there was even a possibility Of going to Jesus for healing he sprang up as a blind man jumped up from where he was and threw off his cloak Right? What does that signify to me? What did that speak to me?

How many times are we wrapping ourselves in things and this comfort and these things that are just temporary? Things that might make us feel better for a moment There’s safety blankets of things that we return to and maybe that’s your alcohol. Maybe that’s your drugs Maybe that’s your porn and you’ve wrapped yourself because you’re just trying to feel better.

You’re just trying to numb the pain You’re just trying to to hide things to to convince yourself that you’re fine You You’re just trying to feel better than you do. And so we wrap ourselves in this stuff, but this man knew after so long that nothing was helping him. Those blankets and the things that he had wrapped around him, his garments, his cloak, they weren’t doing anything but hiding the pain.

And so in this moment when he realizes Jesus is there and that Jesus wants to heal him more than anything, or at least that he’s healed others and there’s a chance that he would do the same for him, he throws off the things that have bound him, right? He throws off the things that he’s used for comfort and he springs up and says, all I need is Jesus, right?

That’s what this action says. It’s this heroic call for all of us is this courageous honesty and vulnerability to say like nothing I’ve been doing is going to work and I can’t help myself. And all I’m doing is sitting here in this when Jesus is there and he has a desire to heal me. He has a desire to bring me into wholeness.

And folks, this is who Jesus is. And this is what he wants to do for each and every one of you. This is what I found in my own journey. This is what he continues to do in my own life. I witnessed it time and time again, when I go to help these men in men’s groups and launch these groups where they can find healing and restoration.

I see it in the work that we do with Dr. Bob and especially in the work that Dr. Bob and his team do through healing the whole person and through the books and all the other things that they do. But this man says, I’m no longer going to wrap myself in this falseness that doesn’t do anything to actually heal me.

And so he throws it off. And this is a call in all of our lives to just recklessly say, you know what, no more. No more self medication, no more crutches in my life. I’m going straight to Jesus and I’m going to pour myself out in love of him to say, please, please heal me because I know you could do it and I know you desire to write.

This is this man believing that Jesus is who he claims to be and that’s the same thing we need to do in our life. It’s believed that Jesus is, it’s not just some story and a good idea. Jesus Christ is healing personified. He is truth personified. He is love personified. I am the way I am the truth. I am the life This is what he says to us and this is what he means and so we have to have the courage To look those wounds in the face those places that are hard for us those places that bring pain to us Look them in the eye and then bring jesus into it with them Because he’s the one that’s going to walk into that with you and bring you out the other side folks This is what this man shows us.

And so he throws aside his cloak. He gives up on everything says i’m done with all this He springs up You Because he’s excited at the possibility of finally being healed and then he runs to jesus and jesus says What do you want me to do for you? And this is the question that Jesus asked all of us. And I can just imagine his piercing eyes, right?

These eyes of our merciful and loving Lord, who already knows what this man wants, but takes the time in his abundant mercy to just ask the man, what do you want from me? Tell me. Let me hear it from your mouth and have the faith and the courage to present it to me. Jesus waits for us to ask him for the things that we need.

And again, I’m not talking about some prosperity gospel, Jesus give me a million dollars. I’m talking about the things in our life, the very things that are holding us back from keeping us from being the people that he created us to be, for our family, for those around us, but most importantly, for keeping us from being the disciples that he needs us to be.

Because that’s the thing, when we receive healing, it’s not like we just run off into the distance and go, thanks, I’m healed, Jesus. Thank you, see you later. No, it’s a gift and it’s a call to then go out and share that gift with others, right? So this man is excited and he jumps up and Jesus says what do you want me to do for you?

And he replies to a master. I want to see I want to see and there’s so many metaphors here right like he wants to be open to the to the kingdom to the to the vision of Christ and the vision for the for the for the kingdom of God But it is utmost, sorry I can’t even speak, I told you I was delirious, at the utmost truth he wants to just physically be able to see.

And how many of us want to say, Jesus, like, I want to see the world like you, but I also, I want to stop being angry. I want to quit hating people. I want to quit judging people. I want to forgive the people that hurt me in the way that they have. I want to quit hurting people, Lord. Please, I want to see, I want to see the way that you do, and I want to be healed.

Please make me whole, right? Make me whole. That’s what this man is saying to him. This man is saying to him. And so Jesus, he says, he says to Jesus, master, I want to see. So he’s calling him Lord and saying, basically, I know you have the ability to do this, this faith that this man has. And how many times has Jesus healed people?

And he goes, your faith has healed you. He says it again here. Jesus told him, go your way. Your faith has saved you. And I find that interesting too. That really spoke to me because it says, go your way. Jesus doesn’t say, follow me. He says, go your way. So basically Jesus does this great work for me heals him and he doesn’t hold his feet to fire and say now you owe me Right now you owe me because that’s not who Jesus is.

Our love is always a choice. God doesn’t force us to love him because if you’re forced to love, it’s not true love. It’s not really love if you’re made to do something. That’s servitude, right? You’re forced to do something. You’re forced to like me, to be around me. Jesus doesn’t do that. He heals him. He looks at him and says, Go your way.

What is he saying there? The choice is yours. You’ve been healed. You’ve been helped. Go your way. The choice is yours on what you wanna do with that gift. And so what does this man do? It says immediately he received his sight and followed him on the way. You see, that’s the way this is supposed to happen.

We’re honest and we’re courageous, and we’re vulnerable about the things that we need Jesus to come to in our life. And when Jesus works through those things, and it’s not always miraculous, like, right? You may have something wrong with you that is never righted, right? Well, I love that scene in The Chosen with little James where he’s begging Jesus to heal him.

And he’s saying like, no, your particular, you know, uh, impediment. Is going to be a witness to other people sometimes that’s the way it is But there’s wounds in our lives that jesus heals every single day if we ask him to Those places of anger those places of unforgiveness those places of judgment those places of shame and disgust with ourselves Jesus will come into those and so he gives the man a choice go your way And what does the man do?

Because he’s received this healing and this great faith and his gratitude in that His way becomes jesus’s way You He doesn’t run off and go, woo, that was awesome, thank you, see you never, I’ll go back to my life. He chose to follow Jesus when Jesus gave him the freedom to do whatever he wanted to do with the gift that he had received.

Folks, this is the call in our lives. When we meet Jesus, It’s not just for us. Yes, we could revel in the in the meeting and in the friendship and the relationship and the growth That we’re going to continue to have with jesus But it’s not just meant for us. The relationship with christ is not a me and jesus running off in the tulips It’s not just me and him as some of our uh, protestant brothers and sisters can sometimes believe it is It’s a call to return to the body of christ to follow the way Right.

Jesus gives him a choice But because of the great gratitude of what had been done for him This man said what else can I do but give my life back And folks people ask me why I do this with my life Why I was on in so many different cities this week and on multiple planes getting home late at night at one point this week There were multiple days five six days where I’d had three hours of sleep and i’m not saying poor pity on me This is the life I chose and I love every minute of it, but jesus did something for me that I could not do for myself And I could not walk away and say thank you for the gift lord.

See you never So, the response when we receive the gift and the healing that we’re called to is then to want to go out and tell other people and bring them into the same opportunity that Jesus so gracefully, graciously, and mercifully gave us. Folks, that’s what I love about this. That’s what I love about this reading.

Because, you know what? It’s just amazing like sometimes we think that we’re going to be able to fix our own problems And this man sat there was able to do anything and he wrapped himself in that cloak and he was just sitting there in it Knowing he couldn’t do anything. But then jesus comes along and he has that faith.

He has that hope he has that courage He He has that call to vulnerability and honesty. He cries out. He won’t be stopped by anybody. The world or anybody. He doesn’t listen to You’ll be okay anymore. You’re fine. Just deal with it. That’s your lot in life. Just deal with it. Suck it up. Put your head down. Be a man.

Crap. He doesn’t deal with any of that. He says no. The hell with that. Throws off his cloak. Everything that had been keeping him bound. Everything that he’d been looking to for comfort. Like I said the things you may be self medicating with and he goes to jesus As profoundly as he can as courageously as he can and pope benedict the 16th has something to say about this I was reading a gospel reflection from regnum christi.

If you don’t have that app, you should download it It’s the legionaries of christ and my spiritual director is a legionary father. Jacob demont. Shout out to him He’s been on the show before but even the spiritual director at the john paul The second healing retreat I went to this week for the team. He was a legionary and he was amazing father brian in And it was just an invitation, uh, again today to sit with that, that beautiful community of priests.

And so in one of the, in the reflection, they quoted Pope Benedict, the 16th year, and he’s talking about this very thing about how we often think that we just need to, um, we need to. Reflect and not ask Jesus for his help. So maybe we can get out of our mess ourselves. But folks, if you’re like me, you find out you keep trying to do that and you’re digging a deeper and deeper hole.

You stay in the same rut. You spin your tires and you never get anywhere. Pope Benedict XVI says this, in our difficulties, problems, and temptations, we must not simply engage in a theoretical reflection from whence do they come But must react positively, invoking the Lord, maintaining a living contact with the Lord.

Beyond that, we must cry out the name of Jesus. Jesus, help me! And we may be sure that he listens to us, as he is near to those who seek him. Let us not be discouraged. Rather, let us run with ardor, and we too will reach life. Jesus, the Lord. Folks, this is what he’s saying. In our difficulties, in our problems, in our temptations, we’re not meant to just sit there and just introspect and be by ourselves and try to figure it out by ourselves.

We’re never going to be successful in that way. We’re always supposed to call out to the Lord in everything, in gratitude for the blessings, but also in cries of mercy for the times that we need him and in healing. That’s what he’s saying here. We’re not supposed to simply engage in theoretical, theoretical reflection.

Right? But we must react positively. What is positively? By invoking the Lord, maintaining a living contact with the Lord, a living relationship that we grow each and every day through prayer, through the liturgical life, through scriptures, just like we’re doing right now. There would not be an episode if I hadn’t taken time out of my life to go to Mass, to read the readings, and to go back and sit and reflect on them.

But he says beyond that we have to cry out to Jesus, Jesus help me. We have to throw away this notion that asking Jesus to help us is wrong, that it’s selfish, that it’s greedy. If we’re asking for the true things that we need, things that we struggle with that we cannot heal ourselves, then you are well within your right and you’re invited by Jesus Christ to seek and find.

To ask and it’ll be given you to knock and watch the door open That’s what he wants of us But we only understand that if we have a relationship with christ, we’re not only as he is lord He is friend Which of us wouldn’t go to a friend and ask for something if we were in need if it was a true friend that we knew Truly loved us and cared about us.

Well, we should have no greater friend in our lives than jesus christ I hope that If you’ve gotten anything out of this show and out of your knowledge of me and the times that we’ve had together on this Through this 301st episode And all the other ones that came before the missions or the talks or the the interviews or any of that stuff You know that I the one of the most important things to me is a real relationship with Jesus Christ If we don’t know him We don’t know that he wants to come in and he’s waiting for us to invite him into the problems in our life We cannot fix ourselves.

There is one person and like blind bar made his came Brian bar made his came to know I got to throw off the things that bind me. I got to throw off the ropes I’ve tied myself with i’ve got to be done with these things I’m self medicating with and i’ve got to go out there. I’ve got to step on a Off a ledge i’ve got to go out on a limb and just reach out and cry for jesus and pray with my faith Be courageous be honest and vulnerable and know that he’s going to answer that call Brothers and sisters, if you’re sick of spinning your wheels, if you want to know how to start all the healing that you’ve heard me talk about, or Dr.

Bob talk about, or all the other people I’ve had on here that talk about healing, how to start that, you do it just like Bartimaeus. You don’t listen to anybody tell you that you don’t have a right to ask for healing. You don’t listen to people tell you you’re going to be fine. You don’t listen to people tell you to suck it up and to just deal with it.

You go to jesus because he waits for you there in the confessional in the eucharist And communities of your brothers and sisters in the scriptures in prayer in the liturgical life of the church He longs to meet you. He sits there waiting for you. So the question is are you going to sit there and be silenced?

Are you going to continue to cover yourself in that cloak? Are you going to continue to self medicate? Are you going to finally give jesus a chance to do what he wants to do in your life? And have the courage to ask him for it Jesus, have mercy on me. Master, I just want to see. I just want to be healed.

That’s the challenge today. That’s the challenge today. Do I believe in the fact that Jesus can do these things and he wishes to do them for me? And if you don’t believe it in your soul, then have faith and let him show you that’s what he wants. My brothers and sisters, thank you for being with me for another episode of Just a Guy on the Pew.

If you find these things healing, if you find great help in this, please help us by becoming a monthly partner in the Pew. Help us do this so we can continue to help more and more people. We can continue to bring people on to help people. This is a great work of the church, right? Theology and all that stuff is great, but until we have healed, until we know that Jesus Christ wants to be our Lord and our friend, our brother, and he wants to come in and do the things that we can’t, we’re going to spin our wheels.

So help us help other people come to that realization. Thank you for your time. And let’s end this in prayer in the name of the father and the son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Lord Jesus. So often we feel like we have to sit in the mess of our lives, whether we’ve hurt ourselves or others have hurt us. We feel guilt.

We feel shame. We feel like we’re not good enough and we don’t deserve to be healed and that you don’t want to do for us what you have done for so many people. Oftentimes when we try, the world, the flesh, and the devil, they beat us back and they tell us you don’t deserve it and you don’t need to do that and you need to shove it down and you need to, to just, to be a man and to not need anybody or anything and Lord that is garbage.

You know that, and we know that. Lord, when we find ourselves in those places where we need healing, and we, we feel like we have to do it ourselves, remind us that you always wait for us. And the only thing that is a roadblock to that healing is ourselves. Lord, please help us to have great hope in you and great faith.

And even if we don’t feel it fully in our hearts, let us have the courage. The fortitude, the strength and the desire to be honest and vulnerable with you, to go and to pour our lives out to you and receive the healing that you so want to give us. Lord Jesus, be with us always and continue to show our yourself to us each and every day.

In the name of the Father and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Hey everyone, welcome to a very special milestone—our 300th episode of Just a Guy in the Pew! 🎉

In this episode, Victor and I take a moment to reflect on five incredible years of sharing our hearts, our struggles, and our faith with you all. From the very first episode to now, this journey has been full of raw conversations about vulnerability, faith, and the real challenges we face as men. We’ve laughed, we’ve learned, and we’ve seen how God has worked through this ministry to touch the lives of so many.

If you’re new here, this podcast isn’t about perfect people or perfect answers. It’s about real guys, talking about real life, in front of the one person who can truly make a difference—Jesus Christ. Our hope is that by sharing our stories, we can help you find hope in yours.

Thank you to everyone who has been a part of this journey so far. If this message resonates with you, I encourage you to hit that subscribe button and join us as we continue to grow this ministry. Together, we can reach even more men who need to know they’re not alone in their walk of faith.

___________________________________________________________________________

---

Become a Partner in the Pew! Donate to the ministry today!

START A MEN’S GROUP IN YOUR PARISH!

www.justaguyinthepew.com

---

. . . . some stuff around the house there and you said, Hey man. Dude, we gotta do, we gotta do a show, because I gotta leave. I gotta be out, this weekend, I gotta go to all these places. I said, okay. And he said, by the way, it’s 300. I’m like, I thought to myself, I was like, has it been 300 shows? And we operate like one show a week, pretty much.

If you think that’s 300 weeks almost of actually putting out product, but also formulating the show and a topic that kind of like would resonate with people who listen rather than us talking about, like me talking about how to pull weeds correctly in a garden, which is like what I love doing.

I, it’s the same thing, right? I’m a guard, I like garden and stuff, and hopefully one day have my own greenhouse. So if anyone would donate something for Christmas present for Vic, a garden spade or something. But yeah, so I was excited to come because you said, Hey man, just, let’s just vibe on this, let’s just see, let’s just celebrate, be present, but also, let everybody else that listens to us over time to know what it’s like sitting here on the side of the mic and how excited we are, but how happy we are that they listen.

And also just really what we’ve learned over time. Yeah, sure. And that’s the thing, man, like you’re right. 300 episodes is a lot. We usually spend an hour and a half, In here, whether the shows aren’t always that long, but the time we’re sharing and Discussing what we’re going to do and stuff like that and it’s just been such a joy man It’s 300 episodes.

Like I keep getting the image of that 300 movie with the greek You know, it just keeps coming. I don’t know i’m the guy that gets killed the first shot. Yeah, hopefully somebody survives But no it’s been a great journey and, I was sitting here when it came up, Derek who works with us in the ministry, he does all the marketing and the backend stuff.

And, he does the thumbnails and one of the last ones he was showing me, it just caught my eye. I was like, man, it’s 298. We just did the episode with Dr. Bob that came out last week about the Restored Men’s Conferences that I hope everybody will check out. But I was like, dude, we can’t, I can’t have, I An episode 300 without with anybody, but you, we’ve had guests on and plenty of guests and all that stuff and been so blessed.

But yeah, looking back, like I just, I knew this episode had to be with you in this episode today is not Anything other than us just reflecting on The last number of years. This started in I think we uploaded our first episode in 2017, you know late 2017 early 2018 and back then that started with Deacon Jeff, basically me being in a Cursillo group with him.

I was a recent convert too. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And Deacon Jeff and I were in the same Cursillo group and cause I’d gone to Cursillo before you did, a bunch of us did at the time you weren’t able to make that week. Yeah. And so I was meeting with him and Tom Dorian and Mike Bishop and a bunch of other people and walking out of the bowling alley one night, Deacon Jeff was like, okay, man.

Cause every week I was just sharing about what we were doing in the men’s group. We had started Holy Rosary and all the men’s lives were being transformed and how just all this amazing stuff was happening out of nothing right out of our brokenness and just God calling us to do something.

And Jeff was like, Deacon Jeff was like, I think, I want to build you a podcast and I remember laughing in the parking lot and going dude, get out of here. Yeah, I’ll see you next week. You’ve had a beer or something like, you’re not thinking straight. And he was like, no, every time you come in here and all these amazing things are happening and I think what you are doing could help a lot of other people besides the ones in the room.

And so he was like, what are you going to call it? And I just spewed just a guy in the pew. And that came from, when father Martel took me under his wing and I was going to mass every day when I was in my time off from work after I’d been arrested and all my drug rehab and stuff. And people would come up to me every day and just say, are you in the deaconate or are you in the seminary?

And I’d say, no, I’m just a guy in the pew. So when he asked me that, that’s where the name came from. And he just said you need a cohost. And so I went and prayed about it. And I thought, man, Victor has this background of faith. You’d been to seminary in the Protestant world and you had a great understanding of the Bible and a love for knowledge and even the desert fathers and things like that, even when you weren’t even Catholic yet.

And. Man, I just, I never thought like in that parking lot when we said yes to that. And when we were meeting at St. Louis church and Deacon Jeff’s Catholic cafe studio, that we would ever be sitting here in a studio now in my home with a YouTube channel and traveling the world and doing all these things.

And it’s just, man, I want to thank you personally to start off with, because you’ve been such a big part of this ministry. And I couldn’t do this every week without nor would I want to. And there’s so many people that come up to me when we’re out places. And when I’m out. Speaking or doing events and you’re like, man, how’s Vic?

And what’s Vic like? And tell Vic, we said, hi, go Florida state and all that stuff. You were in the Memphis hat today, but they love you, man. And I do too. And I just, this episode is just, I just want us to talk, man. And just to share memories and let people into some of the backside of this and.

Maybe go through some of our favorite, look back on some of our favorite episodes or jokes or things that happened and go from there. But I had to be doing this with you for the 300th time. Yeah. Same here. And you’re talking about flashbacks with Dick and Jeff Drozimski, cause he has Catholic cafe and so he was doing that for a long time.

So when we walked onto set, it was almost like, cause he’s, he goes EWTN and he had yeah. I don’t know, a million listeners, followers. And so for me, I was like, he asked me, I’m like, man, John, this is going to, after the first episode, he’s gonna realize, yeah, Vic, thanks for showing up, buddy, but we’ll reevaluate this, but because, I, it was always like a thing let’s just talk about where we are in our group.

And I think a lot of. Our basis topics for the early shows is we found out what men were struggling with in the group. And some people have been from the beginning. Those are the first couple of 12 podcasts where there’s a thing called a bag where, we had 20 guys and whatnot.

And we write a piece of paper, what is something that is, that you’re struggling with the most? And it could be from anything, from anger, from too much time at work, not enough drinking, pornography, or not spending enough time with family. These things where I love work and And I want to be in my family, but for some reason I just can’t, I can’t be present, and those are all like really down to life, like gritty questions of I’ve done all these things. I’ve went to church. I grew up did the whole go to, go to college, get married, get a, get a house, had a family. And now where’s the rest of this instruction booklet?

Like how to get through, the thirties, the forties, and for me coming up the fifties and so it’s one of the things where like the spirituality of self is ongoing development of where you are in life, like when when you’re older, you have older kids, you more worried about who they’re going to meet.

Sure. Are they going to be peers that are good for them, or as stressed out as Hey, my spouse and I, are we still on the same page? We spent our whole life, around the kids schedule and we adapted to that. Then now when we’re together and it’s empty nest, are we still the way we are?

Yeah. Do we know each other? Do we know each other? And that was questions because we had guys from all ages, from single to retirees And to widowers, you know who were there and they gave the advice or wisdom that they’ve gathered and is like This is a great platform to share, you know the group and then this is accelerated it to where you know The things we talked about in group also mimicked what we talked about this podcast was really an extension of the group, right?

It was always just man, let’s talk about this. I remember I would bring that bag of sins home and, we had 50, 55 guys come in a lot of those weeks. And so we had we kept adding a whole bag. Yeah. There was a lot of people, especially there in the beginning. And so what we found was I started looking around and some guys were sharing, some guys weren’t.

And a lot of the guys that weren’t were never sharing. And I figured, the Lord just shared with me, like they’re probably got something they’re struggling with. They’re embarrassed about, you just get put that thought in my mind one day. So we took those pieces of paper and took somebody’s ball cap and said, here, like, why these up dome in that hat?

And then we’re just going to draw them out. And I remember when I got home after the first or second night, like I opened them all up and laid them all out. And the thing that killed me that I remember laughing at was like, it’s all the same things. Even though we had 50 pieces of paper, there was like 20 that struggled with confession.

There was like 15 that struggled with alcohol. A bunch that struggled with pornography, work stress pride anger, unforgiveness. It was all the same thing. And it really helped to open my eyes of man, we are all living in different places and different ages and different types of life and all those things.

But we all struggle with the same stuff, right? We all start with the same stuff. And so what we, what the Lord allowed us to fall onto is this, like, where’s God in my mess kind of stuff is what people wanted to know. And these were men that were, some of them were going to church regularly. Some were not, some were addicted to things, some were not.

But what we found was we all had these commonalities, right? And that, This is where we wanted and needed to meet the Lord was to know that we weren’t alone and to know that other guys struggled too. And then we could figure and let our guard down, right? That vulnerability that was so impactful and still is today in this ministry and in that group that’s made it so different and really helped us launch what we’re doing now in parishes over the country.

But yeah, that was so neat because I was so excited every week to pull one of those things and go, all right, Victor, I pulled, confession, so let’s start digging into confession and what does the church say about it and how are we going to talk about it and why, what have we heard the men say, and guys would say I don’t want to admit what I’ve done or I’m tired of saying the same thing again and again.

And so when you, like you said, when you go back to the very beginning. One word episodes and that’s because it was one word. I told people don’t write a dissertation. There’s one word on the paper, just write what you’re struggling with in one or two words. And so that was the simplicity of the episodes in the beginning was just like confession.

Pride, anger, unforgiveness. So people could look and go, I struggle with that. Let me listen to that one. And it wouldn’t be some obscure title. We’re like, what does that mean? Now I’ve probably gotten into some of that now as we’ve gone along. But but yeah, it just, it’s something magical happened, man.

Like I know that you and I, we’re being honest with everybody. I don’t remember ever going dude, we’re going to do this and it’s going to take off and we’re going to be listening to all these countries. We were just prayerfully saying, Lord, We don’t know what we’re doing and you’re calling us to do it.

I still know what I’m doing either, but that’s the thing. If you go back to listen to the first, like three or four episodes, if there’s a hundred words in them, like 98 of them are probably I think I said, I think, and actually a lot, I probably, it was, I felt Oscar from the office where I come and say, actually, or someone, yeah, I would, I had a, I said, and write a lot so I would, I had to be very conscious of not being a parent and trying to like ease into a conversation, and, it takes a while cause I know when when you have guests come in from the group, like David and all them who did real good, and it’s, it’s different when you’re here on the table and people, people are going to listen to it.

Yeah. And you’re showing up every week. It’s hard to come in here every week and talk about something different, but That’s the thing. I remember worrying about that too, like going, man, we got 50 episodes. What else are we going to have to talk about? Cause we don’t always dive into the Summa and all these high theological things, which, the church is so full of that stuff that you could talk about something every week for the rest of your life and you’d be dead for, you got a halfway through the catechism.

That’s not our specialty. What we do is focus on where’s God in my life right now. And so we always, I remember thinking like, dude, what are we going to do where 38 episodes. Like I, I’m, I don’t have anything else. We’re running out of the bag and the Lord just invited us into trust.

And then we started looking at our own lives and going, you know what? This bag was full of struggles from everyday men’s lives and we’re everyday guys and we don’t get stuff right. We spend a lot of our time sharing before we ever get on the air about, man, Christie’s upset with me for this, or Angela’s upset for me to this, or I’m struggling to find a balance between work and home life, or I’m stressed out and handling it the wrong ways or whatever it is.

But that was the beauty of just letting go and letting God and even today we’re doing that. There’s a lot of times when we show up and we’re like, I don’t know, I think this is what the Lord wants us to talk about, especially you, because a lot of times I’ll prepare and then you just show up and you’re like, what are we talking about?

Yeah. So for those of you out there, whatever Victor’s contributing on every episode, which is always a lot. He’s doing on the fly. Like he doesn’t really, a lot of times have a, a two day ahead of time email saying, here’s all the points we’re going to use to request that. And, I remember going, Hey John, what are you gonna talk about?

And then I prepare something. I get back is now we’re doing something different. Yeah. And it wasn’t on purpose. No. So then I realized like, You know what? I’m just gonna I’m just gonna trust that, cause we always pray before we do this for the Holy Spirit to be present because it’s not about us.

We’re not driving this, this is something that we can just like, glory be to God that you want me here, and I’ve always told you, day one, I said, I will not be ever offended if this platform needs to go higher and further and you need somebody else in the chair.

Because I believe in you, and I believe in your ministry. And so it’s been a, it’s been great time for me to be here. But as you said I’ve learned a lot about my own I guess say, inadequacy wounds, from leaving the Presbyterian Church and be in that wilderness for a while and finding myself within the Catholic Church.

And so this has been a great landing pad for me to still be active in faith but also in some form of ministry. Because, when I left the Presbyterian Church going, what am I doing? What am I going to do? Because I was always like mission work or chaplaincy work or, pulpit supply in a small church in Marion, Arkansas.

And I love that. But like I said, I just felt like me being ordained in the Presbyterian Church USA was not where I needed to be. And I was like, I remember saying to the Presbyterian Church and my home Presbyterian area, I said, look, obviously we’re buddy heads and you want me to be.

Something that I can’t, fit myself to be. Yeah. And that’s okay. That’s okay. You there’s someone else I’ll probably take feel that need in that presbytery for those churches there and I was probably around 2000 I think I would say 2010 Where I just said, I not that I gave it up, but I said, I’m done with it.

And so for that period of time, and I became Catholic in 2017. So almost that six, seven years, I was Christian, I would go back and forth from Evergreen Presbyterian Church, across the street from Rhodes College. Sure. And then to like Holy Rosary or OLPH cause where her family’s from.

And I really enjoyed the Catholic faith. I really enjoyed The ambiance, the ceremony, the rituals and the traditions, and that’s what like really pulled me in to go, I want to know more about this. And of course, me being, a little bit of a theology nut, I knew that there was like the, the Summa Theological. Yeah. And I knew all these other, the Saints, but I didn’t know that There’s so much more Yeah. Information out there. So when I started like really diving deep within the Catholic tradition and the Catholic writings the writings of the Saints St. John the Cross Theresa Avila.

Just go on and on. Sure. There’s so many like beautiful like life stories that Saints have gone through to say, Hey, this was my struggle. Yeah. The lessons in their suffering. Lessons of suffering. And so that’s where I think we all come from a point of suffering in life that we all realize that, faith’s important.

Having a spiritual grip of what life’s all about is very important and essential because if you don’t have that, then you just wander like a tumbleweed. And like I said, for me, I think, getting up with you and the group and got to get into the Catholic faith was definitely like my anchor that I needed.

And I hope that, for our show is like for people listening that needed anchor in faith. This is something that pulls you back into the faith. Like if it’s a Catholic church, great. If it’s just going back to, your Baptist church or your Methodist church or, your Presbyterian home.

Great for you. We don’t, like I said we are open for everybody in the sense of brothers and sisters in the domination of faith. Just that where we found ourselves at the Catholic church is where it enriched us. Yeah. And it’s funny that you’re saying all that because I’m looking at a sheet here and it’s basically our most listened to episodes and like one of the very first ones is where do I even start?

That’s, and so you’re talking about that. You’re needing an anchor and trying to find a place. And we’ve tried to just, fall into that place and just receive that as our niche and the area that we work in, because the thing is we all struggle with the same stuff all the time. And you’re going to struggle your whole life.

Like you may be back this vice, but then another one pops up or things resurface and these wounds that. You might heal one wound, but then there’s four more waiting behind it. Like you don’t ever graduate from the simple things like healing and virtue and growing and knowledge of your faith and needing authentic friendship.

And that’s what the show has always tried to be about. And those were some of my favorite episodes when we did stuff like series on, okay, like where do I start and how do I become a disciple and here are these four or five steps that you got to start working and those things didn’t come out of a book.

Those came down to our learned experiences, right? Of Okay, this is what has to happen. You have to be vulnerable. What’s going on in your life? You have to then take it and repent and then you’ve got to replace bad habits with good habits and then you’ve got to persevere through those things and you’ve got to fully surrender and all of that stuff.

And even though it’s easy to say, it’s something that we all have to keep doing in our life each and every day. And you deal with uncertainty, you have needs for temperance you wonder why it’s so hard to live the faith. It’s easy to become complacent, right? You have to face your wounds.

These are all titles on this first page of stuff. What does your yes look like? What are you willing to do? The struggle with hope? What’s the process? All of those things are some of the most listed two episodes we ever had. And we’ve tried to stay in that vein. Because obviously there’s an audience and there’s a need for it.

And we’ve had so much fun along the way. Like I remember being in the studio and just laughing because Deacon Jeff would be like, all right, only have so much time. We got to get, that’s right. Yeah. I remember at the end, before he had the pre recorded intro and outro and I would always, yeah, and I would always write the The prayers, there I’d spontaneously just write a prayer that I thought had something to do with what we talked about.

And so sometimes that music would come on and I wasn’t able to get it all in before his voice started on the end. And he’s like, all right, hurry up, hurry. We’d have to do it 40 times. And we all laughed about that a bunch. I remember One episode when you it was in the very beginning and you’re like, I don’t know.

I’ve got to get in my mind palace yeah, right and that became a running joke for a year on the episodes of right and that’s the rooms in your mind Palace. That’s the thing being in my palace also gets me in trouble at Christy too because as I’m speaking right now You’re in the wrong room.

I apologize Christy because I thought I told her yesterday. I’ll be recording and and she’s a busy woman. So she had to go to Ella’s volleyball orientation. And I said, yeah, I’m here, I’m here, I told her that. And then I’m like, I thought I said, in my mind palace, I’m sure I, let me go back and rewind.

Did I tell her this or not? And more than most likely I did not. So this is my my, yes, that I know I probably, I know I didn’t. So I’d already texted her. So she’s fine. But like I said that’s the grace that comes in marriage too. Yeah. What are your, some of your favorite memories and stuff of doing this?

We’ve got, gosh, it just seems like I said, I never thought we’d be sitting here and listen to an over a hundred. 20 countries around the world and downloaded close to 600, 000 times or whatever it’s been. And man, I just never thought that. What are some of your favorite memories or things that we’ve done?

Yeah, I just like just the, five years thinking about it, here you lost your hair. I lost my vision five years, I didn’t have much to start with. And a lot has happened in a sense of that too, with, you go in full time. And then me having three jobs between then and know, and knowing the struggle where it’s work stress and life stress really could compound each other when you’re in a certain job.

And it’s okay to look for a job that doesn’t that allows you to have that. Comfortability because I finally found one right now. Sure. Yeah. Of course, watch next, next quarter. You never know. But like I said, it’s I’m blessed where I am right now and I’m still going to do behavioral health work for those in addiction work that need it.

And, some days when I go in to talk to therapists, I’m like, I feel like I’m wasting their time. But then when I get a call from a desperate parent or a person or a doctor Hey, I have a patient here right now needs help. And so that’s again, that is like an offset of kind of what we’re doing because, the form of ministry comes in many forms.

It’s by sitting and talking to someone, pick it up the phone and say, Hey, I’m just checking in. How you doing? All of us perform ministry, forms of ministries every day. We may not know it. And we may not say that’s not ministry, I’m just, I’m being a good friend or I’m being a good listener.

Or I’m just randomly helping someone open the door, help them get their stuff in and out. But what I like about the shows is that we’ve done is that it keeps me in check, to where I’m like, like I see a situation go, I remember this, from something we talked about or a life lesson that I learned that I’m able to like share with other people, like my trips.

to South Africa and Northern Ireland formed me so much, to where, me being pompous as a young kid, going I’m going in, I’m going to save the world, I’m going to change the world. And, and really what is that they, the culture changed me. Yeah. It shaped me to see what was really like, what poverty was really like.

What anger was really like, what the dilemma in humankind is that we don’t stop to listen to each other. And we were immediately angry with each other before we talked to each other. With, South Africa being apartheid, very racist over there, between the Afrikaans and then, and the the the, I guess you’d say native blacks over there.

And then in Northern Ireland with the Protestant Catholics, it’s so weird, like I said, those two places, the majority of people love each other, there’s a lot of people trying to change the world, like we’re trying to change the world as Christians. We’re reformatting the world and what Jesus taught us to do is love our neighbor.

Yeah. And our neighbors don’t always look the exact like ourselves. Yeah. Our neighbor may not believe the same way we believe. Our neighbor may not act the same way we believe. And we have to realize that, even in this country where, I hate to say it, the politics is so divisive that it’s hurting families.

My message to everybody is the story is already written. God has already written the story. Yeah. All we can do is do the best we can in there and live virtually in the everyday we have. Let’s not get so tied up and frustrated with what happens. Whatever happens, and let’s just take a step back and know we’re all Americans trying to work out this strange thing called democracy, it’s experiment.

And and that’s the thing about, Our faith is if you believe Christ is a son of God, you believe Christ will come back again. Just do the best you can while you’re here. Yeah. You have to live the way he’s called you to live. And then once you change behavior, yes. Yeah.

I’m saying, but like I said, it’s just it’s already written. And I just, ’cause I have a lot of people, I love my family that I disagree with some things, but I know that’s their perspective, that’s their opinions. Yeah. And I can’t change that. And that’s what, you’re talking about just growing and Yeah.

And learning from these episodes of things like that. And that’s, that’s really what it’s been for me a lot is just therapy, man. Like working through my own issues and going, you know what, if I struggle with this, other people probably do too. Yeah. And the one thing that we’ve never been afraid of.

Is to be honest about things. Y’all spent so much of my life lying, man. Like I never want to lie again. And when I catch myself doing that, even a small exaggeration, like I get so disgusted with myself because I spent so much time in my life lying. And so like people ask, like, how do you, man, y’all get on there and you just talk about stuff that like, I don’t hear anybody else like talking about I don’t hear speakers getting up there and saying I had to go to confession last week because I felt a pornography.

You’re not going to hear a lot of Catholic personalities admitting that. And it’s dude, I spent so much of my life lying. Wow, I’m not going to lie anymore. And you know what? I’m not perfect. And I don’t have everything figured out. And that’s the beauty of it. And that’s what I hope is the example that both of us are to people is man, these are just guys that are trying to figure this out along with us and that it is this relationship that we’re inviting people into to be a part of. And that’s why I’m always asking people to support our work and to look at what we’re really doing, because not only are we doing this over the airways, but we’re going out in these parishes and, I had a guy in I was in Scranton, Pennsylvania for a men’s conference with Deacon Harold Burke Sivers and some guys up there and, it was a couple hundred men there and.

I railed on confession a little bit at one of my talks about look It doesn’t matter what I say or what deacon herald says. It’s great stuff and it’s inspirational, you know If god’s working through us, yeah, But like you have two real opportunities for transformation in your life today it’s the eucharist at mass like receiving the lord in the eucharist But confession which is coming up next and I just harped on that like guys What are you hiding for?

What do you god knows what you’ve done? He knew what you’re gonna do before you were born all the stuff that we’ve talked about on here a bunch and this guy Came up to me, I was at the table and people were buying Rosaries and all that stuff and just you know saying they enjoyed the talk And this man came up in a tear in his eye and he basically told me that For the first time in 30 years, he had a full honest confession.

He’d been carrying something around for 30 years. And even though he’d gone to confession a bunch of times, he never really admitted that or never really confessed that. And he just broke down and I was like did you receive the Lord’s grace and mercy in that? And he just started crying and said, yeah.

And that’s the thing, man, I just this is where I think most people are in the world and in the country today Like they just need hope yeah, right and they need someone else to look to that’s been somewhere bad and gets out of it or someone that struggles in a way that like I feel inadequate too and how do you not feel that way and All of those things.

And they’re looking for somebody that can say, look, there’s a way out and there’s hope and there’s light. And, you’ll be able to breathe deeply again one day and things are going to get better. And it takes hard work on our part, but we need inspiration. And that’s all we’re trying to do.

Neither one of us like has degrees and all those things in theology. You were pretty close. You did a lot of studying, but like I, It’s honestly all this is born of the spirit of just saying like God I think you want us to talk about this and if you do then give us the words to say and that’s usually what we Pray every episode and this isn’t an episode as they look at us It’s just looking back on this time that we’ve spent together all these episodes and God willing hundreds more man Like where we can just continue to be inspired by God and meet people where they’re at and be a comfort to somebody on that drive into work, on that drive home in the gym when they’re in there working out by themselves, cutting the grass, on a walk after a fight with a wife, like whatever it is, like that we can be a voice for the Lord in their lives and continue to be that.

And, so I just want to, while we’re talking about that, thank everybody that’s listening. If you’ve ever listened to this once, or if it’s your first time, like There’s so much stuff out there to listen to. There’s a million Catholic podcasts and channels and the fact that you’re showing up here every week or whenever you remember to and listening to us or watching us on YouTube, it means the world to both of us.

And it really does because it makes us feel like what we’re doing isn’t a waste of time and it’s making a difference. And it’s just, I feel so lucky to be. Called to serve in the way that God has called us to serve. And that wouldn’t be possible if it wasn’t for the people that like, I can remember in the beginning, Victor, it’s okay, you got a nonprofit and, and we’re showing up at Deacon Jeff’s things, but there’s no money, there’s no this, there’s no that, and it’s wonderful people like our listeners that started giving and donating and, buying into the narrow road community when we were sending out the virtue books and when we were doing those extra videos and they gave us the leg up and the means to be able to continue to do this.

And. And I’m just so thankful. I don’t know that I always stop and say that enough, but to you people out there that listen and all you guys that have emailed and called in and written comments on YouTube, not the ugly ones, you guys, whatever but the good ones, the encouraging ones, the effort, the affirming ones.

Now, all of them. Thank you. Thank you for everybody. That’s taken that time to listen and just be a part of our lives. I really feel like we’ve got a big family of guys. And while we may not have faces with names just yet, it’s my hope and my prayers that. That one day we’ll be able to put faces with names and to meet a lot of you in person.

But yeah, it’s just been some of the greatest parts to me is just growing in my own faith through this just the coming in here and pouring my soul out as you do too, for people just to see that man, like just because you’re called to, to serve or to evangelize doesn’t mean you’re perfect.

Yeah. And that’s the thing, man, like God took us very small. Sort of half-hearted. Okay, we’ll try this. I don’t even say a full Yes. Yeah. But like, all right, we’ll give it a shot and look what he’s done with it. And it’s just amazing to see what the Lord can do with just that little Yes. And that’s always the crux of what we’re talking about.

Is what is God wanting from you? Where’s he wanting you to surrender? Where’s he wanting you to give more of yourself? And again, it’s scary. Like for the last five years of my life, I’ve lived not knowing if I’m going to be able to pay myself a lot of months, and support my family in this.

But the Lord continues to reveal that he is provider and that he is, he’s cares for us and the things that Jesus says in the gospels about knowing the hairs on your head and and. The way that he treats even the sparrows like God is here for all of us and he’s calling all of us to more and he’s inviting us to trust him that he’s going to be there.

He’s going to be that safety net. He’s going to catch us. He’s never going to invite us into something that if it’s really him doing it. Where he’s going to let us fall on our face because that’s contrary to anything that he wants and to the gospel, right? He wants us to go out and to call others and it’s been such a pleasure to do this here with you.

Same here, man. And you’re talking about it. I think we probably within the first year we realized our niche for the show or ministry was vulnerability. Cause we’re not a theological base where we’re, we’re not someone that would know everything about the Summa, and that’s great.

Cause go to those places, go to those, go to those shows that you’re interested in. And if we’re a stair stepper, we’re For you. And then you, and we’re, that’s awesome. If we’re just the basic food, the oatmeal of faith, that food for you, yeah, that’s right. We’re happy being that because I think, we’d rather be the ones that open the door and say, Hey, I was a captive once too of sin, and Christ sets you free, come and listen, be with us, and our group is that way.

And being a vulnerable is I think for men is. The most other than pride is probably the most difficult thing to get towards to be open even in our marriage, I think, I wasn’t totally vulnerable with Christy when we were first dating or even our first marriage, when we’re married first year marriage.

And then over time, I got to know what love, what really was like. Wow, this person really loves me for who I am, even all my faults, my, my insecurities and the inability for me to be everything that I think I would need to be for her. She still loves me, and that’s what God’s the same thing.

God loves us no matter what and what, all our we carry so much with us that we think that we’re not worthy of anything. And so we just drag our knuckles and put our head down when we go to mass saying, I’m here. I really don’t feel like I need to be here because we’re not giving everything to God.

We’re not like, say, you say, going to confession and we’re carrying something around forever that we’re not really releasing it or saying, God, take this from me, and that’s what I think this show is a great Stair stepper for people to come in. Yeah, no, it is. And that’s, you’re absolutely right.

Vulnerability and all those things are hard, man. It really is because the question we all wonder as men is, am I enough? And when you love somebody and you want to be with somebody, It’s hard to trust, whether it’s the Lord or with a good friend in your life or your wife or whatever it is it’s hard to trust because deep down all of us, because of the inadequacy wounds that we all have from the fall and things like that.

And the way a lot of us were raised is that question that we’re always asking is, am I enough? And we’re afraid that if we’re honest and we show somebody, we peel back the layers of the onion and show people there’s some rotted spots, there’s some bad spots that they’re going to go, you know what?

I didn’t sign up for this. Yeah. And thank God for Angela in my life and Christie in yours. Angela had every right to leave me and she didn’t. And you want to talk about coming into understanding a new kind of love is I can’t imagine anything now that Angela, like I have this understanding that Angela is going to love me through anything, but also I’m called to love her in that same way because of her love, right?

Because it’s not a one sided thing. And so it is very hard, but that’s exactly what’s transformative in our life. Catholicism and the faith isn’t just about showing up and going to church and checking boxes and just, letting faith be another thing you do in your life. Along with going to the grocery store and going to work and working out and all that stuff.

It’s the most important thing in your life and true Catholicism, true Christianity. Is in making these leaps and bounds and going into those dark places and going into those hard places And saying like i’m just gonna blindly trust in the lord and those that he’s put in my life To be here to love me to accept me and then I in turn am going to do those things for them that’s what the world you mentioned it earlier people fighting and strifing and not listening to each other and The world lacks relationship and that’s what we’re trying to promote during this podcast is accompaniment, right?

Just look, we’re not supposed to do life alone and life is more than about you. It’s more about your, more than about just your wants and your desires and your plans and your needs. We answer to a lord that has given his life for us and all he asked in return Is that we put others first and we live for others and that’s the thing that we’re trying to do through this and You know that’s something else I wanted to say before we wrap up here is just You know to all you folks out there.

I constantly get emails and people go i’m thinking the lord might be calling me to do this. I got a text yesterday from A friend of ours named Matt, that’s listened to the show forever. And he’s man, I’m thinking about quitting my job and going to the church, but I don’t like, I won’t, I don’t know how to support my family.

And I’m like welcome to the club, man. I didn’t know either. And, but you got to discern if that’s what the Lord wants. But what I would like to say is to people don’t ever discount what the Lord can do with anything. Because as we’ve recounted here over the last 35 minutes or so, Victor and I didn’t expect to be sitting here.

In 2024 on our 300th episode on our way to whatever the Lord gives us to do, and however many that is, like we didn’t, we thought, okay, we’re going to do this. And Deacon Jeff’s going to go like, all right, maybe I overstepped, maybe you had a little too, let’s take a break guys and never get back.

Yeah. He was at the center presumption. He had too much hope that we’d be able to do this, But we didn’t know and all we did was kept showing up every day and every week and just giving our yes and the shows that we didn’t think were good that’s what’s hilarious too. And we’re like, man, I don’t know if we should put that out and we had the courage to pray and put it out.

And those are some of the ones that we got the most comments ever on dude, this show was amazing. And we both thought dude, I don’t know, I’m worried about some of the things I said or. I messed up this, or I didn’t say this so I’m going to interpret what I said incorrectly. Yeah. And we put it out anyway.

And those are some of the most popular and the most commented on shows were just the imperfections, the things like that. And just showing up and going, you know what? We’re not, Born out of a machine and a robot, we’re broken people that don’t always say things perfectly, that don’t always have the right words that come out, but God still can use those things to do beautiful things.

And so for any of you out there that are feeling, that are, you’re feeling the Lord calling you, like so many guys will say, I want to start a men’s group, but I’m afraid, do it. Cause God’s not going to leave you alone. He’s not going to leave you there abandoned. He’s going to put things and tools and people in your life.

The way he put Victor in my life to help me do this and the way he’s put so many others in and Deacon Jeff and all the people that have been responsible for this podcast or built any part of this ministry. He’s going to do that for all of us. So I would encourage everybody like just to throw caution to the wind.

Don’t be. Stupid and run out there and without praying and thinking But spend time with your wife and people and if the lord is calling you to things Then have the courage to boldly take that first step and if that step doesn’t work out Don’t retract look for the next step. Maybe it’s in a different direction Maybe the stones to the right or the left instead of straight in front of you But continue to step out there for what the lord’s calling you to because you were made for greatness Our favorite quote right the quote that’s been this part of the show forever Is you were not made for comfort you were made for greatness.

The world offers you comfort But you weren’t made for that. You were made for greatness. And this show has been an opportunity for you and I to try to live as out of comfort and to try to be great. There’s probably a lot of people say you got a lot of work to do to be great. You’re still not good yet, but.

But we’re trying and for those of you out there that feel the call of the lord to do something similar Or to get out there and to do something different than you’re doing Don’t be afraid is what i’m saying because it doesn’t matter what you think It doesn’t matter what your fears and doubts are it matters that if you feel god’s calling you All you have to do is just pray, ask Him to give you the grace and the gifts to be able to do it, and then go out and try it.

And if it doesn’t work out, try something else. That’s how we found our way into starting men’s groups and everything else. We kept trying things until we found what the Lord wanted us to do. Now we’re doing it and the ministry’s been blessed in a way that it never has before. So there’s all those opportunities out there for you.

But Victor, like none of this would be possible without you. And I just want to tell you that again, man, like it has been a joy of my life to grow in friendship with you and relationship with you to be in here every week on the weeks when we’re mad and we’re upset and we don’t feel like doing this or we’re embarrassed about things that we’re going to talk about or just.

Just, man, doing life together, sitting on the patio out there, having a cigar and laughing you’ve been such a gift in my life. And I know that you’ve been a gift to all these people that I’ve listened to because many people have told me. So thank you for giving, 300 plus hours of your life to this ministry and to this work and to this friendship because I’m a better man because of it.

I appreciate and the same goes to you as well. I didn’t know where to land in my formation of ministry, my formation of faith because there was darkness for a while. Me just wondering our God, I thought you wanted me to do this and the door closed on that and I thank you for allowing the opportunity for me to sit here and share with everybody, the formation of my faith but also the formation of my life and My spiritual development and then, and hopefully sharing that together we put a product out for people to go, Hey, that’s just like me.

Because I think when we all realize that I’m not the only one dealing with this that I’m not unique in this, then we become like a formation of a partnership. And that’s what we are. I think we want to be seen as your partner, and help you go down that road of life because there’s always gonna be something to happen where, a sickness of a child when you’re worried about.

Is it more than that? Loss of a job, what’s going to happen? Fear of being sick or Just the life of repetitive sins and the tragedies of life and all the things, just the daily things of constant wearing you down a weathered rock, Lord, where’s my reprieve from everything?

Come to us, listen to us. We don’t have all the answers, but we have, we can share something with you. That’s the thing I think we’re both trying to be and what we’ve always tried to be is just ministers of hope, man. Like you’re going to see through it. You’re going to see through it.

You’re going to get through things. The Lord is going to give you everything you need. And we just need to be reminded of that. And each and every week, that’s what we try to do is, all right, what is the Lord saying? What did we read in scripture? What did father say at a mass? What is something that a breakthrough in our own lives that we just want to share?

Because we know again, we’re all the same. We may look different, sound different. And we’re all children of God and we’re all human beings. We all struggle with the same things. The fall was the great equalizer for all of us, right? Like we all struggle. We all fall short of the glory of God. And we can rise up together to be the disciples we’re called to be.

But by being honest, by being open, by sharing our lives with one another and growing in relationships so that we can meet him, that’s how you meet Jesus. You meet him through each other. Amen. Amen. And that willingness to be a guide or to be someone that’s being walked with and the faith, and that’s what this ministry was always supposed to be.

The tagline from the beginning was welcome to the pew, the place where everyday guys talk about everyday things in front of the one person that could do something about it, Jesus Christ, and that’s what it’s always going to continue to be. And again, I just, as we close out here. Folks thanks for listening to us.

I know there wasn’t probably some great profound spiritual knowledge It was passed on during this episode or something, there weren’t any how to’s other than Just go out and do what God’s asking you to do, but it’s been a pleasure on behalf of Victor and myself to be with you for all these years.

And we look forward to continuing to grow with you and to walk with you. I want to say thank you to each and every one of you that have given any amount of money to this ministry, whether it was one time or monthly or bought a rosary or a shirt or a mug, or just sent a check and said, Hey, Thank you for what you’re doing.

It’s helped me. Here you go. Help somebody else. Thank you. Each and every one of you. And for any of you that want to be a part of this journey, right? This team, as Victor said, of men that are out there helping other people. You can do that. If you’re asking right now, like, how did, how does God want me to help?

Maybe it’s sharing this podcast with somebody. Maybe it’s saying, Hey man, you struggling, listen to this and subscribe to this, send them one of your favorite episodes to guy, is struggling subscribe and share on the YouTube channel. Or if you feel led and you have the means, I know it’s tough right now with inflation and the world upside down, but if you have the means and you just want to help support us to grow, then you’re welcome to do that.

But thank you for all of you who have all of you that will And for those of you that are yet to listen that will one day we thank you all For your time for your talent for your treasure and for your friendship So victor, let’s take all this to prayer and end this episode 300 with our 300th prayer In the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit.

Amen Heavenly Father, you are so good and you are so gracious and you take things that are inept and things that are broken and things that aren’t perfect and you make them whole. Lord, thank you for using Victor and I through all these episodes and all these years to help people and most importantly to help ourselves, right?

That’s been a huge part of this, Lord, is not just getting on here and helping others, but you’ve grown us through our own mistakes and our failures and Lord, you’ve helped us to see that those things don’t, they don’t define us. They’re stepping stones. They’re paragraphs on a. on a page in a book that has got so many more pages to be written.

So Lord, we thank you for all these people that have listened. We thank you for our brothers in arms out there that are trying to live the faith each and every day. Help us to continue to give them hope. Help us to continue to share your mercy and your grace with the people that listen. Lord, thank you for our families, for the show, for this ministry, and for everything that you’ve done in our lives.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen. Thanks for listening to Just a Guy in the Pew. To find out more about John Edwards, or have him come to speak to your Or parish, group, or conference. Go to justaguyinthepew. com or send us an email at justaguyinthepew at gmail. com.

In this episode, I’m excited to welcome back Dr. Bob Schuchts, founder of the JPII Healing Center and co-host of the Restoring the Glory podcast. Dr. Bob is a renowned author and spiritual leader, known for his transformative books Be Healed, Be Restored, Be Transformed, and Be Devoted. Today, we dive deep into the power of healing, specifically for men, and how the upcoming Restored Men’s Healing Conference is set to impact men’s lives.

👉 Register for the Restored Men’s Healing Conference (In-Person & Live Stream)

We kick off the discussion with the story behind this new men’s conference, happening from November 14-16, 2024, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and what inspired Dr. Bob to create this event, modeled after his successful women’s conferences. Throughout the episode, we touch on several key topics, including why healing is so crucial for men, how we often ignore pain or trauma, and the father wounds many men struggle with.

We also reflect on personal stories about how Dr. Bob’s ministry has shaped my life, and how Jesus’ healing can help men confront the issues that have long held them back. Dr. Bob shares how essential it is to move past pain, addictions, and emotional wounds in order to lead healthier relationships and spiritual lives.

___________________________________________________________________________

---

Become a Partner in the Pew! Donate to the ministry today!

START A MEN’S GROUP IN YOUR PARISH!

www.justaguyinthepew.com

---

  Well, welcome back to the pew everybody. I am your host, John Edwards, and I’m excited to be with you today because we have a special treat. Today we’re going to have another guest on the show and it’s a guest that’s been here a couple times before and In fact, he’s going to be soon like one of those hosts of saturday night live the five timers But uh, he’s joining us for the third time.

This is dr Bob shoots many of you have heard me speak about him, uh frequently and often because he has been such a mentor and and has had such a great effect on my own life. But if you don’t know who Dr. Bob shoots is, he’s the founder of the John Paul, the second healing center. He’s the author of several books, including be healed, be restored, be transformed, be devoted.

You can find all those on his website at John Paul, the second healing center. org. He is also the co host of the popular podcast, restoring the glory, which you can find on any podcast platform out there. But most importantly to me, he’s my friend and I’m so excited. Uh, to have him joining us here again today.

So Dr. Bob, thanks for being with us and thanks for joining us on the show again. Hey, John. Thanks. Uh, always good to be with you. And I’m excited about, uh, the endeavor that we’re about to embark on. Yeah, me too. And that’s, that’s a great place to start. I mean, one of the reasons I wanted to have you back on today was to discuss that, you know, we’ve got, uh, coming up in a little less than a month now.

the first restored men’s healing conference, which is, uh, you know, a new initiative of your ministry and apostolate the John Paul, the second healing center. Uh, you’ve always had these undone women’s conferences that your daughter Carrie and a few other ladies helped put on. Um, but you know, you, you had come to me a few months ago, or actually it’s been a, I guess about a year or so and mentioned that you wanted to do something for men and.

So we’re going to have the first one of those. Um, I guess it’s November the 14th through the 16th at Christ the King parish up in Ann Arbor, Michigan. That’s a Thursday through a Saturday. And I’ll be joined by Paul George. Another great friend of your ministry and of mine, uh, is a, as the other presenter, and we’re going to be presenting these, uh, healing conferences for men moving forward.

And I know we’re both honored to. To be asked to do it and to work alongside you dr. Bob. Yeah, i’m excited for it. John Uh, just to give a little history that some people know probably a lot of people don’t know how we met and uh, It was when you were doing the the virtual conferences catholic virtual conferences And we were doing a series on healing And, uh, you had to fill in for somebody for the, for the role and it just turned out to be a great providence because, you know, we were talking about healing and, uh, I didn’t know your story and then in the middle of it, uh, you started sharing some of your story and, uh, just so powerful and we’re looking forward to having our, uh, Uh, people who attend the conferences, uh, really experience you and Paul.

I’ve known Paul for 30 years and, uh, go way back with him. And you guys have known each other for the last several, and I just think it’s going to be a great conference. I do too. I’m so excited for it. And, and. You know, I’ve always been drawn to you and your work since that, that, you know, meeting that you talked about, I remember you were so kind and you said, I want to keep in touch and I want to continue to talk.

And, uh, and you were true to your word and you invited me to come alongside and to experience some of the, uh, Events that you guys put on there the I am prayer training, which was a wonderful life changing experience for me and also found some new friends out of it too and father maliki and and some other folks and grew close to bart and and sister and the rest of your team there, but uh, and then you came here to memphis for uh for be heal or healing the whole person and uh That was a great experience as well, too So it’s been great to walk alongside you and You know, your ministry has influenced my own so much, uh, just by, uh, I remember one thing you said to me in the beginning was John, like, I don’t know that you realize it, but what you’re doing in these men’s groups is allowing a place for men to find healing and, and, uh, and to experience vulnerability and authenticity.

And I had never really looked at it like that before. And, uh, just this idea of healing and who Jesus was and seeing this different part of him through your ministry and the teachings that you guys have, have so profoundly shared with everybody. It’s really opened my heart. To to that being in my mind the greatest need of the church today is this individual healing That allows people to be able to move forward and as you well know, uh, one of the harder Uh, communities in the church to, to kind of get across to can be men, especially when you talk about healing.

Because I know when I first heard healing, I thought, okay, I got the heebie jeebies kind of. And then, and then I started thinking of all the television evangelists that, you know, hit me in the head and falling over and shaking and all that stuff. And so sometimes there’s a, um, maybe a careful. around of the word healing when it comes to men, because quite honestly, we don’t want to admit that there’s anything wrong with us.

And we’ve been told our whole life that we’re just supposed to have this gruff and tough exterior. So I wanted to kind of talk to you today about this conference. It’s going to be for men that, that we’re going to be putting on in a month. And then, you know, we’ll be doing that continually afterwards in the places that invite us to come back.

But I really wanted to invite you today to just talk about, you know, healing and men and why men need healing and. And just your experiences with all those things and, you know, kind of tied into what we’re going to be doing together. Yeah. Well, just for context, both you and I were athletes and you play, you play basketball, I played football and.

You know, I played, we all, we both played a lot of sports, but, you know, part of the attitude of an athlete. As you just get over the injury, you don’t, you don’t nurse it. You know, if it gets really bad, then you have to sit out a little bit, but you hate that. And so, you know, you go to the trainer room, you go to other places to kind of get better so that you can get back on the field, you don’t dwell on the pain.

Right? I mean, the pain is something you ignore, uh, until it gets too bad. So for a lot of us, that’s how we get through life. You know, we get married, we have a family, we begin to work, we begin to do other things and have that same attitude of, well, if there’s pain there, you just ignore it and you just keep going until it gets too bad.

And for both you and I, it got too bad. And I think what is the passion for both of us is that we deal with our pain in a healthy way much earlier. So that we don’t get to the place where we have to sit out of life, you know, you know Whether it’s affecting our family or whatever that is and and so to me, that’s the core of healing the core of healing is recognizing that we’re all struggling with our own sin with our own areas of brokenness in our life and None of us get away from that.

I mean, you know, it’s inevitable That we have that. And to ignore it is to our detriment. But not only to our detriment, it’s to the detriment of our families. It’s to the detriment of the people around us. And so, this men’s conference is geared towards men. You know, it’s, it’s why we’re doing a specific conference for men, because it’s geared towards men.

Both you and, and Paul work with men for years. I have, too. And it’s, it’s, It’s uniquely geared to men in the way that men can relate and I think that’s what’s going to be really helpful for guys Yeah, i’m excited about it, too I mean, we’re going to be going through the four identities and you can talk some more about that.

Um, but also just Why we are the way we are right the other way that we struggle and and where that all came from and you know, uh, You’re helping me uh with a book right now that hopefully will come out the next year or so and we’re talking about a lot of that in There too and Uh, just this idea of, of this brokenness and where it comes from, you know, so many people, you can blow off so easily, you know, okay, the fall, we messed up, there was punishment, we were removed.

I get it, but what does that really have to do with me? And I think that’s where a lot of times in our faith, if we haven’t been taught or we haven’t walked with people that understand it, um, we don’t really get what that has to do with us. It’s sort of the thing that for Adam and Eve, and it’s out there and it’s part of a story in our mind, like any other book, but what it is, is the truth of, of, of our ancestry and what our first parents and all those things.

Just like if I. Act a certain way with Jacob or the kids. It’s inappropriate or harmful to them. It’s going to be something I learned behavior that they pass on to someone else. And so I think that a lot of times we don’t even understand like Why am I the way that I am and why do I struggle the way that I do and even Great evangelists like st.

Paul. I mean, I would say this second greatest evangelist to ever live behind Christ Would say, you know, I do not do the the good. I want to do I do the evil I do not want and so I’d like to just kind of talk about that a little bit about you know There’s two great wounds that men face I believe and you and I’ve talked about this is is this father wound and the wound of inadequacy You Um, that a lot of us combat and, and really controls the way that we act and the way that we react.

And many of us don’t even realize that that’s where that’s coming from. Yeah. I think John Eldredge, who has done ministry with men for years, talks about, uh, This question that men have, uh, it starts as little boys. Do I have what it takes? And it’s, and it’s really the father, uh, who has the greatest influence in that, and being able to either bless us with you have what it takes, or to curse us by his behavior, his absence, like you really don’t have what it takes.

You know, I don’t have any I don’t have confidence in who I am because I don’t have that kind of blessing from a father, you know, and each of us have had good fathers in ways, and we’ve also been wounded by fathers in ways. And as fathers, we also do the same to our kids, you know, we, we bless them in certain ways and we wound them in certain ways, and we can do that in all kinds of different ways.

And so, just starting there, starting with that identity of being a son. Right? What was it like for each one of us, and we each know our stories, but what was it like for each one of us to be sons? You know, what were the good things? What were the things that blessed us in being sons? And what were the things that didn’t bless us, that left us handicapped?

And so we’re going to deal with that in the identity of son. And, and it is, so it’s something that like, again, I mean, we don’t even realize it, I know sometimes in my life, um, the way that I started to see those things was just, you know, I had a good relationship with my father to a certain extent, but it wasn’t always the relationship that I wanted, you know, in my life, I would have liked to have seen him more.

I would, he worked a lot and two jobs and all those things, but, um, you know, there’s ways that he responded to me because it was the way that he was treated or the way that. Uh, particularly that he was loved and, and sometimes, you know, when, when Jacob has done something particularly, you know, disappointing or something like that, I can react and hear myself say things that actually sound like his voice coming out of me.

And usually in those points, I’m going, man, I, I. I told myself I would never do that. You know, I told myself I would never treat my son that way or react in the way that, you know, that he did towards me. And, and this is what you’re talking about. Like when we, when we’re influenced by those and wounded people, wound people.

And this is why it’s so. Important for for us to do the work of healing, you know It’s not just about going to church and sitting in a pew and saying the right prayers It’s about letting the lord into these places in our life and and starting to ponder and to question Like, why do I feel this way? And why do I behave this way?

And why does this hurt? And where did it come from? And, and I think that’s one of the key things we’re trying to do here as we poke and prod into these identities is trying to give men a starting point. To be able to start looking and saying, okay, well, maybe this is where this came from, or, or maybe I should spend some more time here.

And it’s something that we all have to do, right. Or we’re going to continue to fall to the same things and get more and more frustrated. Yeah. And sometimes it’s not the dad. It’s sometimes it’s a mom, you know, it’s, uh, sometimes it’s brothers, older brothers or, or older sisters or peers, you know, all that’s part of our, uh, identity as brother, you know, both.

With our siblings and with peers and, you know, sometimes we’re not even aware of the things that really affect us and they, and they get into our identity. They get into our, our sense of who we are as a brother. So when we hear that Jesus is our brother, there may be a place where we pull back, you know, and like, I can’t relate to Jesus as a brother or Mary is my sister.

I can’t relate to Mary as my sister, uh, or Joseph as my brother or my, my cousins or whatever. The friends that I had growing up, you know, that, you know, if you think about it, There are certain events that happened, even if it didn’t happen in your family. It happened with your peers that were hurtful and Sure, that was in the past, but we carry it with us.

That’s that’s the key thing We carry it with us into the present and inevitably those things come up in our marriages and our dating relationships and our friendships as adults and then In our relationship with our own children. Sure. Yeah, it’s, I hear it so many times. I mean, I’m out, you know, a couple of times a month doing these, you know, the stuff we’re doing in our, in our work.

And, and I hear men that are just there, they say I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired of, of, of the same things of reacting the same way and being angry for so long and being so unforgiving. And, and, uh, you know, I worked with a guy a few months ago and, uh, he was telling me He finally had a breakthrough and he was angry all the time.

And that’s what he asked me to help him with. He said, I’m just so mad all the time. And I don’t understand it. Like I want to be happy. I want to be joyful. I want to, I want to be somebody that that’s just in any sort of moment. I’m I’m at peace or I’m at least have some, you know, a form of happiness in my life, but he said, I’m just always mad.

And so we were praying and working through things. And after a while, it, you know, he just had this realization when we invited Christ into the moment. He had a moment where a kid, uh, basically pulled his pants down on the playground in front of a bunch of people and then slapped him and, and, you know, and, and it embarrassed him and he had done what you said that a lot of men do.

We shove it down because it’s just get over it. Right. And I don’t want to think about it. I don’t want to experience that. I don’t like the way it makes me feel. So therefore I’ll just lock it in a box in my soul somewhere. And, and, and hopefully it’ll stay there. Yeah. And it doesn’t. And so this man in this experience, he, he came, he came to realize Jesus showed him this moment and he just started breaking down crying.

And of course we renounced lies and all those things that, you know, you’ve taught so many of us how to do through your ministry, but, um, all the, the anger for 25 years, 30 years of his life. Had gone back to this moment of of something that should have never happened to him um but he never really was able to deal with it and he shoved it down and Bob, that’s a huge point that I think we’re going to try to make to to men at these conferences is Like you can’t do that.

You can’t shove stuff down That’s not the way to handle it and jesus wants to come into those places and do what he does which is to heal Yeah, and you and I and and paul we all we’ve all done that we’ve all done that Had those experiences and shoved them down and kept going and had to pay for it, you know And yeah, whether it’s whether it’s in the way that we relate to people or just in our you know we just focus on work and we numb ourselves out or we have addictions like to alcohol or to drugs or to Pornography or whatever those are those are all medications to deal with our pain, you know That’s the only reason why we get stuck in those things because we’ve got a lot of pain that we don’t want to deal with And now that becomes a further pain that influences our relationships and really does damage to the, to the career that we have, to the family members or friends that we have.

And, and so it’s, healing is, is essential. That’s, Pope Benedict said that. It’s essential. That’s why Jesus came as healer. Like, it’s not a, it’s not a side issue or something for a few people that are really broken. It’s for all, every one of us. And it’s essential in our life. And if we understand redemption, we understand healing because that’s actually what redemption is.

It’s taking those areas of our life where we’ve sinned and had brokenness, had hurt, had pain, and allowing Jesus to transform our lives. And isn’t that, every one of us is for, is, needs that. In our life. Yeah. Yeah. Cause I mean, the, the point is Jesus says, I came so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.

Right. He wants us to live these, these full and joyful lives so that we can go out and be the people that he’s called us to be. But it’s. As you well know, too, by you and I’ve spent a lot of time talking about this in my own life and own journey and in each other’s, it’s so hard to, to focus on other people and to live as we’re called to as, as Catholics and disciples of the Lord, if we can’t get past our own shortcomings, because the.

The devil gets right in there, especially in that inadequacy thing. And what are you doing? I mean, every time I turn this microphone on, he does that to me. You know, what are you doing getting on there again? You’re going to go tell people how to love the Lord. Like you’re, you’re such a mess. Look at you.

And, and we have to be able to come out those things with the truth of the Lord. And so. Like, I, I really would love for you to talk a little bit about that and, and just where we’re hoping to give men these starting points through this, uh, conference and, and, uh, the things that we’re going to be doing for men now, because I think that’s the, the thing is people want what we’re talking about, but how, like I, do I just say Jesus heal me and then it happens or is there a process or, or, you know, how do I do this?

Yeah, you know, years ago we had men’s conferences through the center. My brother Bart and I and another guy Ken Kniepman did them. And just as guys showed up, we used movies just like you guys are using movies. We shared our stories, uh, and we just invited people to enter into reflecting on and looking on.

And you do it in ways that are attractive to men. You know, that men are drawn to. And that’s why we chose you and Paul, because I know you guys and I know you relate so well to men and have lived it yourselves. And so, you know, part of it’s going to be your stories, you know, each of you sharing your stories.

Part of it’s going to be teaching about these four identities. Part of it’s going to be using movie clips, you know, powerful movie clips that kind of get to our hearts as men, uh, to draw those things out. Uh, and then part of it is going to be. Prayer experiences and conversations and small groups and time for adoration, time for confession.

You know, just all the means of the church, uh, the sacraments and, and bringing all that together for the healing of men. That’s what Jesus does. Yeah. And one of the things I love about these type, uh, places that we’re building. I mean, really, it’s a place for men to come and, and to look around and see. And just like in the groups that we start.

You know, there’s a tendency for the devil to try to make us all feel like we’re the only one who’s broken. Or we’re the only one that suffers or the only one that watches porn or drinks too much or whatever it is that’s going on in our life, the only one who’s angry for no reason, whatever it may be, but coming to these places like that and looking around and going like I’m not the only one, right?

I’m not the only one that struggles. For so long, I mean, really the, the crux of what I want to do when people ask me, like, why are you even in ministry? It’s because I want people to experience the love of Christ and the freedom that can be found. Vulnerability and, and healing and all these things, as we said, are oftentimes considered taboo for a lot of men, but it’s exactly, it’s exactly the gateway.

And the doorway to what it is that you’re looking for, this freedom, this interior freedom and this peace and this ability to love well, I mean, I don’t think there’s any one of us that wakes up and goes like, I want to be a terrible husband and father today. Yeah. Yeah. None of us wants that. None of us, none of us wants the consequences of that, which is, you know, the, the rejections that we experience when we’re not loving well.

Yeah. Or, or the broken relationships that we have. But you know, I, I think there’s a tendency when we talk about a healing conference too, John, for people to say, well, it’s going to be, you know, just a bunch of stories and crying and pain and, you know, looking at stuff. But the reality is it’s a tremendous amount of laughter and joy and fellowship and, you know, that’s what I love about men’s ministry is like, we’re coming together and we’re just being real.

We’re being men. And we’re being with each other and, uh, There’s, there’s such a freedom then just to be, and I never laughed so much as when I’m with a group of men like that and that kind of environment, you know, it’s just like, there’s this great freedom that happens when men come together. We don’t have to worry about what the women are going to think or what, what our wives are going to think, or it’s just being together.

Yeah. No, I think it goes back to what you were talking about in the beginning, like with being former athletes, it’s like being on a team again. Yeah. It’s, uh, that’s some of my favorite memories were not. You hitting a certain shot or making a free throw to win the game or anything like that. Those were cool moments, but a lot of my favorite memories were like, you’re saying on the bus, laughing and picking at each other in the locker room going, man, did you, can you believe what just happened out there?

And all that kind of stuff. And, and you miss that because there’s men, you know, you, you come into. Uh, your life, you go to college, you get a vocational job, you get married and you kind of get your head down in those things. And, and you, you isolate a lot, you’ve got your work friends, but a lot of times those aren’t always authentic friendships.

They are friendships of convenience. A lot of time, they’re not very deep. And so you got the guy at the water cooler or sits next to you in a cubicle, but. You know, you, maybe you share a lunch every once in a while, but you don’t have a guy that really knows you and that’s really holding you accountable and walking with you.

And there’s something, I mean, even Jesus sent out the disciples two by two, right? I mean, he knew that there was something about men walking together and, and. And, and needing each other for that. And that’s what I’m excited about too, is just getting there with Paul and laughing and, and, and just inviting men into this notion of, look, this isn’t some kooky, weird thing where you have to have your guard up, like we all need this.

And, and, and that’s the beauty of it is we’re all broken, We all know each other’s broken. So we don’t have to act like we’re not, we can just come and show up in our imperfections and well, I’m here and I’m imperfect and I’m hoping to be better. And, and then to experience those fellowships and in that time together, the way that you’re talking about.

So I’m super excited about it too. And, uh, just really invite any man out there to come and join us. And there’s a couple of different ways. I mean, I want to make sure and cover that. Uh, Dr. Bob too is, you know, here in the beginning of the show, we talked about it’s going to be at Christ the King in Ann Arbor, Michigan, November the 14th through the 16th.

And yes, you’re all invited if you, if you have the time and the, and the means and the way to join us there, uh, to come from wherever you are and join us. I’ve got a guy that follows our ministry. That’s flying from California all the way to be there for it. Um, and that’s great. If you can be there in person, we would certainly love to have you.

For you to be there. But for those of you that may be listening, uh, that are thinking, well, man, I really need this. And I really would love to be a part of this. There’s also a live stream you can register for that. And so if you physically can’t be there, if money’s an issue or time off work or something like that, it doesn’t have to be an impediment to you because there’s also a live stream that you can be a part of and register for through, uh, the John Paul, the second.

Uh, healing center, uh, dot org website too. And you can join us that way. Um, you know, so at least you’re there to be able to, to hear the teachings, to experience these things and walk alongside us. So Bob, that’s something, you know, you’ve done a lot of these and all the different conferences you do. And I know the live stream could be very powerful for people as well too.

Yeah. Joanna’s actually. You and, you know, the Catholic, uh, virtual conferences that really inspired us as a ministry to do live stream during COVID. And uh, at first we were thinking, well, it’s, it’s a second rate conference. You know, it’s, it’s like, it’s not the same as being there. And there is something about being there in person.

Sure. We’ve been doing live stream conferences now for, uh, Four years, ever since COVID, uh, and we get all the time, we get people saying to us, uh, I’ve been to live conferences and I’ve been to these live streams and I got as much or more this time doing the live stream that I did in the live conference because I could stop it.

I could stop the conference when I was in the middle of something. And I could work, I could just stay with it and not rush past it. And then I could turn it back on and I was so much more ready for the next message, being able to do it that way. And we have testimonies on our conferences of people who have done livestream over and over and over again saying this was really powerful for me to do it this way.

And so if you can’t come, don’t think you’re, you know, like second best. You’re going to save a lot of money not traveling probably. Uh, so that’s an advantage, but. The conference is really powerful live stream, and you’re going to experience that if you can’t go and be in person, it’s great to be there in person.

Uh, great to have that time of sharing with the other guys and all those things. But the live stream is really powerful too. Yeah, that’s a great point. I didn’t think about that. It’d be sort of rude if somebody stood up in the middle of the live conference and said, Dr. Bob, can you pause a minute? I need to contemplate.

Right. He said, Yeah, yeah. Now you’ve got that, that, uh, that ability to do and the safety and the security of your own home and go through it at your own time. And, you know, some people are, are in a place where they’re just not comfortable being around a lot of people yet, and they’re, you know, introverted folks or whatever it may be.

And, and so maybe that’s the right path for them is to be able to, to kind, uh, deal with those things at home. Especially people that are dealing with a lot of trauma and wounds to be able to, to sort of receive that and allow themselves to react whichever ways that. That the Lord needs to, to have them, uh, you know, process their own healing.

So that’s another good point of it there too. So I’m super excited for this, Dr. Bob, go ahead. Yeah. And the guys that are there, you’re going to have access to the live stream also after you leave for a couple of weeks. So also know that, that you’re not going to be. Cheated out of that opportunity to go back and process and do that too.

Yeah, that’s a great point. So for those of you, uh, that, that may not have caught that, if you go live, you’re going to get access to the virtual streaming. Of the conference for a couple of weeks. So you can utilize the same thing, go through it. Um, I’m just, I’m really excited for it. I mean, so to lay it out for guys that may not know what it’s going to look like or how it’s going to go, you know, we’re going to start on Thursday evening.

Um, there’s going to be a music leader, so we’ll have music there alongside of us. Um, you know, on, on the first night, Paul’s going to lead. The teaching and I’m going to do a little bit of witness and emceeing and Paul’s going to teach. And on the nights that, um, Paul’s emceeing, I’ll be doing some of the teaching and sharing.

So each night you’re going to get a little bit of both of us and, uh, there’ll be opportunities for confession and, uh, for adoration and, you know, Tom for sharing and fellowship. And there’s just going to be so much. And what I love about this is it’s not just a, a one or two hour thing. We’ve got a couple of days to spend together and to really, uh, allow the word, the Lord to work through our lives.

And, and in a, one thing I want to say to people is I’m, I’m really excited about this too, not only to be a part as a presenter, but also to see what the Lord is going to do in my own heart and in my own, my own life, because that’s Paul and I will be the first ones to admit that we need as much healing as anybody else.

And so. I’m looking forward to jumping in the waters there with everybody else and seeing what the Lord wants to do in our lives as well. Yeah. And, and your listeners know a lot about you and some, some of your listeners know about Paul. So, but just a little more about Paul, Paul was a college athlete, uh, and then he was the chaplain for the New Orleans saints for a while.

Uh, and he also has written a couple of books, uh, Holy, Holy Grit, uh, is one of his books. Happiness something on happiness how to be happy rethinking happiness. Yeah rethinking happy rethinking happiness Yeah, so if you if you want to look up paul, uh, he also has been a consultant to men for years, uh, working one on one with men.

He and his wife have done marriage conferences, uh, and he and they were involved in, uh, he’s a speaker for, um, for the Steubenville Youth Conferences for a number of years. And so, a lot of you guys may have been exposed to Paul also, uh, but if you haven’t, he’s just been Great. Easy to relate to. Uh, he and John have been good friends since they met, uh, ran into each other in the airport, bringing me all that Cajun friend, uh, food.

We’re going to be better friends. I enjoy all that Cajun food. He brings every time he comes up here, but. Yeah, I’m excited for it. You guys are both Southern boys, but he’s, he’s a different kind of Southern than you are. Oh yeah. He probably could wrestle alligators and stuff. I hadn’t made it that far yet, but, but yeah, I’m excited to be with him.

And Bob, I just, I really appreciate it. I’ve told you this privately a bunch, but just, you know, your work and what you do and just how many countless people that you’ve helped, uh, anywhere I go, uh, and I know this is probably going to embarrass you, but, uh, I’m going to do it anyway, but like everywhere I go.

I run into priests that just, you have worked with you and men that have worked with you, women that have worked with you, families that have experienced the work that you guys have done. And so to be invited, to be a part of that is a serious, tremendous honor for myself and for Paul. And, and I’m just so excited to be a part of the team and, and to really try to follow in your footsteps and to try to give an avenue for men to find healing, because I just, you know, another thing that we’ve talked about before.

I really believe that the changes that we’re looking for in the world, the, the, the, the work that needs to be done to reorient the world back to Christ has to begin with men. If it doesn’t, we’re going to be just kind of treading water and not getting anywhere because men were made to be the spiritual leaders of their families.

And if we’re not living in that role, Families start to decline. They start to go by the wayside and we can’t be those men if we’re not dealing with the things in our own hearts. And I’ll often say, you know, for men, we’re always looking for a battle and it’s easier to pick up a broad sword and go out there and whack something out there.

It’s not so easy to fight the battles of your heart, but that’s exactly what Christ invites all of us to do is to go in there and let him fight those battles alongside of us and allow us to become these men that can not only transform our own lives. But the lives of our families and the lives of our parishes and the church and of the world.

Yeah, that’s why we, you know, when we were discerning who to invite for this, you and Paul were men that we could trust as authentic men who are living this. You know, it’s not, it’s not just theory to you. It’s something you’ve both have lived through and are living through and are relating to men all the time with.

You know, it’s like, this isn’t new for you guys. Uh, You’re all the time working with men, inspiring men, inviting men, uh, bringing men into their healing. And so we’re excited as a ministry to, to relaunch this. Uh, you know, I just had so much else going on in my brother Bart that we just couldn’t do the men’s ministry.

And we knew that it needed to be done again. And having you guys do that is really a gift for us. Well, put me in coach. I’m ready to play. Thank you for the opportunity, Bob. And thank you for joining us here today. I mean, I know that every time we do a show with you, uh, no matter what the subject matter, it’s always encompassing healing.

And I get so many emails from men that are just, uh, so thankful for the time that you’ve spent with us and for your knowledge and again, guys, if you haven’t. Explored any, uh, any of Dr. Bob’s books. I don’t know what you’re waiting for. I implore you to do it at just about every show that I do. But, um, be healed is an amazing book and a great place to start.

Um, for me personally, uh, because I also dealt with sexual sin and addiction to pornography and things like that. And had some, I was molested when I was younger and things like that. I, I found be restored to be really helpful with sexual wounds and kind of. Uh, going through the healing process there. Um, Angela and I obviously needed healing.

So be devoted was a great help to us, which was a book centered on marriage. And, uh, you know, Bob, you’ve been open and shared here about the struggles that you faced in your marriage, even as a marriage counselor. Um, you know, I, I remember one time specifically, you said to me, I called you and I said, I feel like such a hypocrite, but I’m telling all these people to do these things and I can’t do them well myself.

And you said to me. John, try being a marriage counselor and struggling in your own marriage. right? Trying to marriage therapist and struggling your own marriage. And so that’s something I’ve always loved about you is your honesty, your vulnerability, your willingness to, to share your own brokenness. And I think, um, it inspires me and I know it inspires so many other people.

So folks, if, if you haven’t checked out dr. Bob’s work, please go and do it. You can get the books on his. website, uh, JP2, that’s II. So JPIIhealingcenter. org. You can also find them other, many other places out there that sell books. I would give his podcast, Restoring the Glory, which he does with Jake Kim, um, a fellow, uh, Therapist and a friend of dr.

Bob’s. He’s also the husband of heather kim the co host of abiding together. They have a wonderful podcast It’s helped a lot of people and then of course all the offerings that they offer there Uh through the center whether it’s prayer ministry training or or the healing the whole person undone Unveiled which is the marriage conferences and now this restored, uh men’s healing conference.

So yeah Bob, thank you so much for the world. Please jump in if I could add two books coming out You Uh, that, uh, we’re going to be especially helpful for men. One is called trusting our father’s provision. And it’s looking at our role as providers. And how do we trust the father in that? And some great stories.

And then how do we become good stewards of what God’s given us? And then the other book is a book of prayers. So you talked before about the renouncing prayers. So we put them all together in a short booklet. They’re going to be coming out soon. So have guys looking for that. Well, I’m excited for both of them, especially that first one, which you mentioned that some places I still struggle sometimes in my own life is, uh, you know, there’s always more room to give it over to God and to trust further.

But. Um, that’s hard for men, right? Because you’ve been told your whole life, you got to do it yourself and you got to make your own way. So thank you for continuing to listen to the Lord and for writing things that men find so helpful. I’m excited for both of those. And then hopefully I can get what we’re working on.

We’ve got another book. We’re doing a partnership with you. Your book is going to be very connected to the men’s conferences, right? Yeah, i’m excited for it So i’m working on it every day. I promise bob i’m trying to get ready to get over to you guys to to publish So i’m, uh, you know it’s harder than I thought it would be but It’s also a great healing experience for me to go back through some of these things and And see what the lord wants to do with them.

So Yeah, it’s it’s Again, i’m honored to be working alongside of you in that project as well, too Yeah, that’s what is it power perfected and weakness. Is that yeah power made perfect power made perfect finding true strength in christ Is the working title for it now, but yeah, it’s it’s about all these things.

It’s about going back to the beginning and And understanding like why do I you’re really talking about the inadequacy wounds and the father wounds and why do I feel? I feel this way and why do I try to overcompensate and all these things? And, you know, really this false idea of the power of power, the world puts before us and where did we lose this power?

What was this power? And obviously it’s, it’s based on a second Corinthians chapter 12, verse nine, which has been a big part of my story in life of, of finding true strength in Christ, when God looks at Paul and says, no, I’m not going to remove that thorn because my power is made perfect in weakness. And so, yeah, I’m hoping to, to, to have your guidance, to write that in a way that’s helpful to men.

Yeah, just to, just to say to the men that are listening, if you look at men’s magazines traditionally, what are they all about? They’re all about power in one way or the other, you know, like GQ, weightlifting, the kind of car that I drive, the kind of money that I make, the kind of athletic ability that I have, you know, just we’re, we’re driven to power, but it’s false.

It’s the way that the world teaches us about power is false. It’s empty. And so what’s true power? True power is Jesus. You know, there is nothing more powerful than the son of God coming as a baby. And then dying on a cross and then resurrecting from the dead. I mean, that’s power, but it’s power that’s dependent on the Father’s love.

And that’s what this conference is all about. It’s about how do we move from the world’s definition of what it means to be a man to living in the reality of what it means to be a man in Christ. And, and John has a, Particular testimony and ability to speak to that and so does paul. Yeah. Well, thank you.

Dr Baba, i’m so excited. I’m ready to go tomorrow. You got me jacked up for this. So For all of you listening, please like consider joining us whether it’s it’s in person If you’re around the michigan area or the ann arbor area, michigan’s place. But if you’re around the Ann Arbor area and can join us, please do that again.

The dates are November the 14th to the 16th. If you’re a parish or a diocese that’s looking for healing opportunities for men, I know that Uh, many diocese and many parishes have had the JP2 Healing Center in for, uh, healing the whole person or, or undone or unveiled. This is now another offering that you can offer for men.

And one thing that you, you all have told us there and Carrie, your daughter has shared with me multiple times is that everywhere they go during the women’s conferences, men Uh, they always ask, when are you going to have something for men? And now, uh, now you have that and you’re able to offer that. So if you’re looking for that, um, we’re, we’re looking at, at, at booking dates now for next year and, uh, into the years to come to, to go to places and to put on these men’s conferences, uh, to promote and to invite men into the healing power of Christ.

So Bob, if you’ve got anything you want to say there or anything you want to throw in as we close out here, please do. Yeah. Great way to start. That would be a few. Wanting to do one in the future, get your priest and get a group of men, small group of men, and do a virtual conference together, like do this virtual conference and watch it together, or bring that group to Ann Arbor with your priest and experience it together.

And then you’ll be on the top of the list to be able to be, uh, places to host. Yeah. Yeah. And this is brand new. So folks, like if you look at some of the other conferences that, you know, That, uh, Dr. Bob and his team have been putting on, they’ve been doing them for a number of years. There’s a lot of people that know about them.

There’s wait lists. And sometimes it can be, you know, a few years to get on that, to get, to get the conference to you. This is launching right now. So if you’re interested at all, you know, you. You can go to the, the JP two healing center. org website and, and submit about it and, and ask questions about it.

And we can start to work with you and your, your parish and your diocese. Cause that’s, that’s the thing. We want to go out and do these things everywhere and invite men into this healing so that we can start to transform the lives of the men in the church. And as we said, we could start taking back this world for the Lord and, and, uh, and help families in the church to grow.

What was that Dr. Bob? Performing, performing an army. Yeah. Amen. In doing it in the right way, starting with the battles of our hearts, right? Yep. Yep. We’re engaging the battle. That’s what this is about, engaging the battle so that we can be the warriors. Yeah. Yes, sir. Well, but Dr. Bob, thank you for your time.

I know you have so much going on and it’s always a joy to be with you. As I’ve said multiple times, I love you so much. I tell you every time I see you probably get sick of hearing it, but I love you. I thank you for your friendship and for your mentorship and just your kindness to me and inviting me into your work.

It’s such a privilege and an honor to be your friend and to work alongside of you. Thanks, John. I love you, too, and I love your family and love the work that you’re doing. All right. Well, folks, for more information about restored men’s healing conferences, or for anything JP2 Healing Center related, whether it’s the books or the other conferences, you can go to JPII.

org. Healing center. org. Again, that’s J P I I healing center. org. Dr. Bob, thank you for your time. I can’t wait to see you next week when we’re together for our team retreat. That’s right. We’re going to have a lot of fun. Yeah. Yeah, we are. I’m excited. Don’t wear me out on cornhole. I heard you’re very good at that.

So just take it easy on a beginner. All right, Dr. Bob, God bless you. I love you and take care. Love you. Take care, John. All right. Bye.

In this week’s episode, I’m diving deep into a question that we don’t often ask ourselves: “Are you being kind to yourself?” Not in the sense of pampering or indulgence, but in how we speak to ourselves, care for our mental and spiritual well-being, and confront the challenges life throws our way.

After a busy few weeks on the road and dealing with personal struggles—including trying to write a book and battling spiritual attacks—I found myself caught in a cycle of negative self-talk. From questioning my role as a husband and father to feeling overwhelmed by ministry work, it seemed like the devil was hitting me with every doubt and lie he could muster.

But here’s the truth: God doesn’t want us to live in that darkness. He calls us to renew our minds, as St. Paul says, and to take every thought captive to Christ. In this episode, I share the powerful moments when God intervened, reminding me of my worth and guiding me to be kinder to myself. I talk about the importance of resting, leaning on God’s grace, and breaking free from the lies that make us feel unworthy or inadequate.

We also explore how these personal struggles affect not just ourselves, but those around us—our families, our friends, and our communities. When we’re not kind to ourselves, it’s hard to love others as Christ calls us to . . .

___________________________________________________________________________

---

Become a Partner in the Pew! Donate to the ministry today!

START A MEN’S GROUP IN YOUR PARISH!

www.justaguyinthepew.com

---

 Welcome back to the pew. Everybody. I’m your host, John Edwards, and I’m excited to be bringing you another episode of just a guy on the pew this week. Now, folks, I’m really excited because I just got back from a trip to the West coast. I was in beautiful Folsom, California and a wonderful Paris, St.

John the Baptist shout out to all of you, man. What an amazing restored parish mission. And what an amazing men’s group that’s launched there. I’ve been working with Tyler and his group of guys his guys that he found to build a leadership team for a year. We’ve been training them and having multiple training sessions on the four pillars and what they are, what they mean, why you should run them, what they could do for your parish, right?

We helped him build that team and train them for their different responsibilities to run those nights. And just to be able to go this weekend and see it all come to fruition was amazing It was a super well attended mission. It was packed. There were tons of people everywhere Tyler had a bunch of guys sign up for the group.

They’re going to kick their group off this thursday So please pray for them for their leadership team and for all the men that will be in attendance Also, there was a woman there named trista shout out to her and her group of women They are using the mission, the restored parish mission to reignite, to relaunch their women’s ministry.

And man, they had a ton of women signing up for that too. It was just amazing to see. So thank you to everybody there that helped with all the food and serving one another and put the tables out and the chairs and all the things. It takes a village and all of y’all showed up. for a wonderful event, folks.

This is what we’re doing every week for the last three weekends. Now in a row, I’ve been to two places in Indiana, South Bend and Muncie. Now I’ve been to Folsom. We’re going to Scranton next weekend. We continue to travel and be invited to these parishes and to these conferences and to these leadership summits to change the hearts of men to, to call men into more.

And that’s what we’ve been doing. And sometimes along the way we get to help women too, which is a great bonus. But folks, people are being. Minister to through this ministry. They’re being lit on fire for the Lord, whether it’s through the missions, through the conferences, through the leadership summits, through these men’s and women’s groups that are being launched through the podcast.

The Lord is just using this ministry to touch a lot of people’s hearts. And so if you want us to come to your parish, if you want us to do what you just heard me do with Tyler, right? Walking through from step one to put boots on the ground in your parish, that’s, what’s different about us. We’re not just sending you a DVD set and a binder and saying, good luck with it.

We hope that you have success. We actually come to your parish trying to be modern day St. Paul’s right to come there and to teach what we know works to help you launch life changing ministries to men and women in your parish. And to help you every step of the way that’s what’s different about this ministry and that’s why It’s working in urban places in rural places in large parishes and small parishes in big diocese and small diocese It works everywhere because it’s about the model and teaching people to accompany each other not about a series a content series Or whatever else those things are needed To be successful, you gotta have the things that we’re teaching people around the country to do.

So folks, if you want us to come to your parish, go to our website at JustaGuyOnThePew. com. You can sign up to have a call with me there. You can fill out the form, give us your information, set up a call, and then we can start working with you and your parish. Folks, we are booking up right now through 2025 and 26 to go and do these wonderful things.

So if you’re interested in us, go today. Go and click those buttons on the page that allow you to sign up and get in a conversation with us so we can start planning to help your parish in the near future. Folks, look, also, while you’re at the website you can do a lot of things. You can subscribe to our podcast on any of the audio podcast platforms out there, any of your favorites.

You can subscribe to our website. channel, which I suggest you do because then you could see us and watch us and listen to us as well. You can buy merchandise. We have our rosaries and coffee mugs and koozies and fishing shirts and t shirts and all that stuff can be found there too. And then the most important thing you can do there folks, is you can donate to our ministry.

And that’s what I want to ask you to consider right now. I want you to consider becoming a monthly partner in the pew. Everything we’re doing is helping to change lives, whether it’s through the podcast, through these missions, through the leadership summits that we work with the diocese and these individual parishes, everything we’re doing is helping people and it just, I don’t say that unhumbly, but I see the emails that come in every weekend, people are coming up to me and they’re sharing this, the impact that the ministry has had.

Folks it’s getting to the point now where I can’t do it by myself I need to bring on other people and I have people interested in joining us But we need the donations the revenue to be able to bring them on they have to support their families and in order to do that. We have to be able to pay them And so right now we need your help.

We need your support, not only to bring on people, but to continue to grow everything that we’re doing, this reaches people so you can become a monthly partner of the pew, which means someone who just commits to support us on a monthly basis, whether it’s five bucks or 500 bucks or anything in between, all of it counts.

And every bit of it. It helps us build up what we need to go out and get the resources we need to continue to build things to help people and to be able to go more times in a year to build these ministries and parishes to grow our staff and to make that possible. So folks, if you’ve given to us in the past, thank you for that.

If you haven’t yet and you’re considering it, please consider doing it today. You can do it at just a guy on the pew. com. There’s a donate button on the side of every screen with a little heart there. You can find it in the menu at the top of the website as well, or you can go to the show notes on YouTube or on the audio versions.

And there’s a link there that takes you right to our donor box website, and you can choose to give to us monthly there. Please consider it because we need your support now more than ever so we can continue to do the work God has called us to do so Thank you folks again All that can be found at just got in the pew.

com whether you want us to come to your parish Or you want to start supporting us, you know pay it forward, right? That’s what people say if you’ve been helped consider helping someone else and allow you this ministry to help you do that So thank you for your time with that folks I’m in studio this week by myself not by choice but it was a two day trip, out there and back left on friday and came back on Sunday evening, got home about five, five 30.

It’s Monday now, as I’m recording this episode for this week. So I didn’t have a lot of time to get with Victor to get on the schedule, to do an episode, but the Lord had some things that. I experienced in the past week, in the past month that he just wanted me to share with you and so I wanted to just ask yourselves a question, ask all of you a question out there that I really have come to understand a question that I could answer one way myself, if that makes sense.

And that question is, are you being kind to yourself? I know it sounds simple and you’re like, Oh, what do you mean, John? Am I pampering myself? No. Are you being kind to yourself? And the way that you treat yourself and the way that you talk to yourself and the way that you take care of your body and just your mental state and all those things because folks, I got to tell you I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but over the last three or four episodes we’ve been talking about desolation and we’ve been talking about, patiently waiting on God and then how to take action.

When you’ve heard the voice of God in your life, or when you know that he’s telling you to do something, how to then get up and let the waiting be over. All those things came from a place I’ve been in my own life lately. I started to write the book and I guess I thought that would be a breeze and it hasn’t been, it’s been difficult.

I have a lot of things I want to say, but how to say them and how to put them in things and what matters, what doesn’t, and where to even begin and where to go from there. It’s all a lot more difficult than I thought. And then of course, anytime you try to do anything good for anybody it’s always difficult, right?

So writing a book, of course, I’m going to experience a lot of spiritual attacks. And even this podcast, this is probably the 37th take just to get started to get to this point on this podcast. And the last it’s been 34 minutes since I started it and here I am just now seven minutes into this.

So you can tell you how long it’s been, I’ve been trying to get this going. So we’re all getting in a place where we can be under attack. And I certainly have been lately myself. And. As I always try to talk about things. I’m not trying to make the show about me, but all I know is to talk about my own experiences because I know I don’t experience these things alone.

Every time I’m on the road, people are always going, man, that talk on identity and how to speak to yourself and renewing your mind. Like it just, it brought me a lot of healing and it’s teaching me a way to, to deal with the negative stuff in my life. And folks, so many people are there right now. All you have to do is look around at the world.

The world’s a very unhappy place now in a lot of like even in church Sometimes you go and people are just negative, right? And why is that? It’s because a lot of us were not being kind to ourselves where we have the negative self talk We have the negative self images, right? Like i’m always hearing women and people around me going.

I hate the way I look I hate the i’m that how out of shape i’ve gotten I don’t like anything about myself and then we all know the way that we allow the devil to talk to us in our heads and We can just take a baseball bat to ourselves and just beat ourselves by the way that we think and the way that we talk about each other and We talk about ourselves to ourselves.

I should say not about just each other but to ourselves and Certainly, that’s what i’ve been doing lately I’d gotten to some pretty depressing places and you know was praying my way through it and trying to and still doing all the things that And I try to do in my life to to grow in my relationship with the Lord, the daily mass adoration the liturgy, the hours individual, just one on one prayer with the Lord.

Meditative prayer, all those things and trying to do things for other, I was others. I was doing all that, staying in my men’s group and contributing there. But man, it was, it’s just been a rough time lately and I’m starting to come out of it. Thanks be to the prayers of all of you and to just God’s grace.

It’s never leaves and just friends in my life that have helped me shine lights on a light into the places where there’s been darkness and that’s really what we have to do in those moments. And, I want to talk about it for just a minute. I’d been in these places and when we get negative with ourselves and we just start giving into all that negativity.

And not only do we start to just bring ourselves down, but we start to bring everybody around us down too. That’s the thing. We think that we just get caught up in our own mess and we’re trying to put on these smiles and these facades that everything’s fine, and yet it’s still hard to be that way, right?

You can be short with others. You can have a short temper and a short attention span and patience, and I know over the last month, like I haven’t been the husband and father that I should have been. I know that I’ve been there physically, when I wasn’t out of town. But a lot of times when my children and my wife was talking to me, my mind was still stuck in the things of the ministry or stuck in the things I was thinking about myself, the way I was feeling about myself.

And I wasn’t really ever present to them because I was just stuck in this like quicksand of my own mind and of the situations of my life. And really lost sight of a lot of the blessings and things like that. And that’s what can happen when you allow yourself to get to those places where you’re just, everything, like it starts off with one thing that’s bad and then another thing and another thing.

And next thing you know, you’re swirling down the toilet bowl of your life, or you’re running down a rabbit hole and. And just keep going and going deeper and deeper into this introspection into this And this negativity sometimes that we could find there and so You know That’s why I asked the question.

Are you being kind to yourself? Because when we get in those places generally we’re not first of all, we’re just beating ourselves in our mind Making agreements with the devil. You’re not enough. You never will be you see you’re not a good husband You’re not a good father. You’re not a good disciple.

You’re not a good evangelist in my case, right? You’re you’re you’re a fraud you’re a fake nothing you do is ever good. You can’t write this book, even though you’ve been trying, see, you’re not supposed to, so you might as well quit. Those are all the things I was hearing and then just agreeing with even though I didn’t realize I was agreeing with them.

Sometimes I would catch myself just nodding you’re right, I’m not good enough, and why am I even trying? And man, is this never going to get better than this? Like, how come I can’t ever just get all this negativity out of my mind? And folks we’re broken and we’re fallen. The negativity is always going to be there, but it’s what we do with it.

That makes the difference in the world. And as I said, I’d reached out to several friends, my friend, David, I’ve mentioned several times on here and I talked to him, on the way to South Bend a couple of weeks ago, and it was a very great conversation where. He started preaching truth to me about, who I was and what kind of man I really was and why I did the things that I do and reminded me that I’m not this piece of garbage that I’ve been telling myself I was lately.

And we’ve all been there. Like I hear sister Miriam, James Hyland, talk about that stuff. I hear dr. Bob talk about that. I hear Christopher talk about that stuff, so everybody deals with it. It’s not like we’re all Just these amazingly wonderfully formed. Got it all figured out evangelists that never struggle we do And that’s what I love about this show is I can share that with you so that you have hope like You don’t see me and go man.

Well, john edwards is just perfect got it figured out. So what’s the I’m, nothing like that. So what’s where’s the hope for me? Hopefully this gives you hope that i’m not perfect and i’m broken just like everybody else And it’s our brokenness as a friend recently told me that qualifies us it’s what qualifies us to do the things that God’s called us to do. And so our brokenness doesn’t have to be a hindrance to us. It doesn’t have to be a ball and chain, right? We don’t have to be shackled to this negativity in our life through it. We can be that way if we allow ourselves we can certainly allow ourselves to be taken to a spot to where it’s just like Woe is me and we’re never going to be better than that.

But the thing is, we drag ourselves down, we drag everybody else down with us, right? And that’s what the devil wants. I’ve said multiple times on here. He’s like a sniper, man. And he doesn’t shoot you in the head, doesn’t shoot you in the heart. He’s not going for an instant kill. He shoots you in the gut where you slowly bleed out over weeks and months.

You’re miserable and you’re in through that miserableness if that’s even a word Like through your pain and the darkness and the suffering you’re going through you bring other people down with you And that’s the bad part of it. Jesus said to love others as we love ourselves so folks if we’re not loving ourselves at all if we’re not being kind to ourselves if we’re Not doing the things we need to love ourselves then we’re gonna bring down everybody else like my wife and I got in a lot of fights over the last month and it was basically me because she was Like lamenting and she was not just lamenting but what’s the word i’m looking for?

She was just begging me to come out of this nonsense that I found myself in right this negativity that i’d let myself get To and I would argue with her and I would fight with her and it would bring her down It would bring the kids down right? And that’s the kind of person I don’t want to be, right?

It’s another way of sometimes being self centered, like you’re the only one with problems and everybody needs to look at your problems and people need to feel sorry for you. And that’s the kind of place where you get when you’re in that negative place. And man, that’s what you can’t, if you’re not loving yourself well, you can’t love others.

That’s what I started to realize, it was like, dang, man, this isn’t just affecting me. I’m bringing other people down because I refuse to come out of this place. I’m refusing to love myself while I’m refusing to be kind to myself. And some of you may listen to that and go, dude, that sounds like some, new age self help stuff.

No, it’s not. We have a choice and I’m very lucky to have Dr. Bob Shutes as a friend in my life because I reached out to him this past week. He’s the one that’s helping me publish the book and working on the book with me. And I called him. I’m like, Bob I’m struggling in this book. I feel like a total failure.

I can’t do anything right with it. And, you’re asking me to do these healing men’s conferences and I’m realizing like just how still broken I am and I was just pouring all this out and he’s John, that’s all of us. And he’s yeah, every time I write a book, I go through that same kind of thing.

Every time I try to do something good for somebody that there’s the potential for those things to come, those attacks, right? It’s just part of the spiritual warfare of trying to be the person you want to be and trying to live as a disciple of Christ. And his point was, it’s not just whether you’re doing those type things and you’re some, you Evangelist or a teacher or a priest or a deacon or someone in that in those, capacities for the lord But everyday people are just trying to be good people Right for their husbands, for their wives, for their children, for their friends, for their church community.

And so I was talking to Bob about this. He’s John, you have to be kind to yourself. He’s you’ve been on the road like the last four or five like weekends out of six or seven. Like you’re traveling a bunch and you’re doing the work the Lord has but what do you do when you get home? I was like I spend Sunday afternoon with my family and then I get right back to work Monday.

He’s John, you need to rest. Like you’re working seven days a week and you’re wondering why you’re dealing with all these battles and these difficulties because when you’re never slowing down to rest, you’re never slowing down to take care of yourselves. He’s and I know you have that thing that all men have and a lot of people have is if I’m sitting down, I’m not doing anything and if I’m not doing anything that I’m being wasteful, right?

Like I need to make I need to cut hay while the sun shines, right? Make hay while the sun shines and while yes We need to stay busy and all those things that we talked about a couple weeks ago We also have to have time to rest like we have to have time to rejuvenate like we’re not machines You can’t just go And so that was one of the things that he pointed out was like john You gotta rest like and that doesn’t mean Okay I won’t look at emails today and then go do something else or Go do all the yard work that you need to do that day because you’re taking off he’s like you need to sit down and just and watch your favorite show or read a book you like or Just nap or rest and that always has come across as like lazy and self serving to me, but it’s not it’s what we need to rejuvenate right so to be ourselves in that way and then This is really what I wanted to talk about in this show today Like I want this is one thing that he stuck with me and I actually had an opportunity To practice it this very weekend as I was traveling to fulsome, right?

So he said john here’s the thing like in these moments when the attacks come we have a choice He said to either love ourselves well or to hurt ourselves even more. Because what happens is like the devil knows the places you’ve been wounded before. Maybe it’s criticism from a parent. When you were growing up, you were always told that you’re lazy or you’re always told that you don’t work hard enough.

You’re always told this about yourself or this about yourself. And so whenever anything happens, like your mind goes to those places of wounding, right? Your mind goes to those places of critical criticism. See, they’re right. I’ve always been that way and I’ll always be that way. There’s no hope for me. I might as well quit trying to be better because I’m always going to be X or I’m always going to be Y or I’m always going to be Z because that’s what I’ve been told by these people or by these teachers or these coaches or my family or people I work with all my life.

And so when the negativity comes, when the devil tries to attack us, he attacks us in those places where we already have wounding, right? Those places that we’ve never dealt with, right? That we’ve never looked for healing with, we’ve never allowed the Lord into. And he’s so sometimes when these attacks come, The Lord allows them because it’s an opportunity to go back at those places of wounding and to really look and try to heal those And when bob said it to me, it’s just so powerful because he’s right like we have a choice It’s what saint paul means by renewing our mind.

Like we don’t have to just focus on the negative We don’t have to just be neurotic about those negative things when they come we have a choice of letting those go in one ear and out the other we do it all the time with the good stuff People tell us good stuff about us all the time.

We’re like, oh, thank you I appreciate it. And then we never give it a second thought in those times of negativity That’s not the truth. This person the other day told me they appreciated me. They affirmed me in what i’m doing They affirmed me in who I am. Oh no, that’s nothing. I need to focus on this negativity That’s the way we can get but bob brought to bond again He’s no you have a choice like you don’t have to You don’t have to do that like you could choose to love yourself in that and I was like How and he’s like by being kind to yourself rest when you’re tired, right?

When there’s when those negative things come and they’re lies call them out for being lies Renounce those lies that announce the truth take them to Jesus. All right, give them to him That’s what st. Paul means by take every thought captive and obedience to Christ take that thought hold it go That’s not the truth and then give it to Jesus so that Jesus can give you the truth back he can love that truth back into you. But folks, so many times we don’t do that. In a moment of struggle or suffering, we, it’s really about how we’re going to treat ourselves. Are we going to continue to just wake up every morning and walk up, say, Hey Satan, and he hands you a baseball bat and then throughout the day you just continue to beat yourself to a pulp?

Or are you going to look at him and go, not today, Satan, not today. I’m going to choose to love myself well. You can take that baseball bat and go beat yourself up with it because I’m not giving into it today. An example of this is I was flying to Folsom, it was a long trip. We flew to Denver, had a layover there, then flying out to Sacramento’s, six hour flights or whatever.

Long day. And I had an interaction with somebody via text that’s very important to me and very important to this ministry and has been a father figure to me and just a great relationship with. And there were some things that I was asking them and I got some negative responses, just very abrupt and.

And things I didn’t expect and immediately like I felt rejected and I felt abandoned, I was like, okay See look they’ve left you too, or they don’t they’re not interested what you’re doing either or they’re not going to help you either and that’s really where i’d been like the lord’s not helping me with the things I need in my prayer life and the way that the consolations I need and the affirmations and I’m not, he’s not helping me with this book.

And, in, in we’re struggling to find the funds and the things we need to really grow so that I can bring on other people that I’m not wearing myself out, having to travel every weekend and being gone from my family every weekend just to keep the thing afloat, right? All that stuff was coming and I just felt rejected and abandoned in another way.

And. I was walking through the Denver airport. I’d stopped to get a donut or something I had in the bag and I was walking to my gate and I just stopped right there I was like man, this is one of those moments bob’s talking about. Dr Bob’s talking about like I feel this just woe is me and this self pity and this negativity and this whole demeanor Like, coming on, demeanor change coming on right now.

And I’ve got a mission to do. I’ve got to go out to this parish and be the person God needs me to be. And the people need me to be. And see this through. And I can’t go in there with this mindset. I got to my gate and I got on the plane and I got seated. And I just sat there and I started to pray.

Because I still was feeling those feelings come on and the anxiety that comes with them. And the craziest thing happened like all of a sudden as I was praying the Lord came in this experience I was like Jesus. What do you want to say in this moment? What do you want to say to me? And so I had this prayer experience.

I’ve never really felt by myself I felt it working with dr Bob or others when we’re praying healing prayer But I was sitting there and all of a sudden I saw like an eight year old version of myself and it was a specific picture I remember just I was a little chunky and you know walking around in sandals and this old he man shirt I used to wear and Just look like little me and as I was standing there I walked up and this younger me was standing under this tree And oddly enough it resembled the trees that are in bob’s book like be healed and some of the other ones he’s always talking about how you know this tree above the ground with your sins and all this stuff And so I was just under this like fruit tree And I walked up and when I tapped the younger my younger self on the shoulder he turned around he was crying and he just looked scared and afraid and alone and I could just feel all that coming from him the rejection the abandonment the here we go again It’s coming again, and I know it in the fear and in the moment like I could see How these things make me feel they make me feel like a scared little boy, they make me feel like helpless they make me feel abandoned or rejected and so in a moment like I just felt this great love for this little boy and then I needed to care for him for my younger self and I knelt there and I just embraced him and as I did like I started to cry like physically You And the chair just tears were running down my face and I was telling my younger self as I held his head to My chest the way I’ve held my son Jacob so many times.

I just said John, It’s okay Like you’re good and you’re loved and you’re not rejected and you’re not abandoned And you don’t have to feel that way i’m right here and I started to hold myself if you will in this way and just listen to him just cry and You And then look up at me. My younger self looked up at me and was just like, thank you for not leaving me.

Thank you for not abandoning me. And as I was holding him, I felt this warmth come over me, just all over me. And through him, like all of a sudden there was this light. And I, as I turned around, I looked and the Lord, Jesus was behind me. And he was kneeling down and he embraced both of us and he started To reinforce the truth of what i’ve been telling my younger self like john You’re always loved and you’re never abandoned and you’re never rejected And those things are lies from the evil one and there’s the things that you’ve allowed to bring you down lately and to convince you that you’re no good and john We made you we don’t make bad things Are you broken because of the fall?

Yes, are you going to struggle your life with these things? Yes You But this is an opportunity to preach the truth to yourself and to love yourself and to be kind to yourself. Right folks, that’s the choice and that’s how when these things start to come again and again Like we invite the Lord into it.

That’s what it means to take every thought captive I got on that plane and instead of freaking out and going down a rabbit hole I sat there and said Lord, I got three and a half hours. What do you want to do with me? And just immediately he showed up with all of that and he started to love me, you know What he wanted to do.

He wanted to love me through it and through his love. I was able to love myself it was such a powerful moment such a power experience because I was able to just see myself and just see this stuff that i’m feeling today as an adult Comes from somewhere, right? It comes from younger me It comes from places where I felt rejected places where I was made fun of when I was younger Places where my relationship with my father wasn’t that great places with relationships with women I had in my life weren’t that great just all these things that have happened to us.

We all have wounds We all have places of hurt and folks as men were told to shove them down and not deal with them and we do We’re always gonna experience things like this and we not only hurt ourselves You We hurt those around us. Jesus said to love others as you love yourself. If you aren’t loving yourself, you cannot love others Well, it sounds selfish to love yourself first, but folks if you’re not in a position to love yourself You can’t love anybody else if you’re not being kind to yourself if you’re not getting any sleep if you’re drinking your problems away And you’re always hung over or you’re doing drugs And you’re always hung over or you’re choosing other things to self medicate with You’re never going to feel physically well, you’re never going to be rested, you’re never going to have a positive attitude, you’re always going to be looking at yourself in a negative light.

And that’s going to spread like a cancer to everybody around you a lot of times I like to blame Angela for the fights or the things that were wrong But if i’m being honest with you here recently All those things came from me and my refusal to deal with things and to really sit with the lord and allow him to love me through them I was choosing to hate myself.

I was choosing to further hurt myself I was choosing to go down those rabbit holes with the devil I was making agreements with him and it was destroying everything for the last month of my life Sure, I could go and do things, but inside I was tormented and I was hurting. Folks, I’m sure there’s a lot of us there right now.

I’m sure there’s a lot of us in dark places. There’s a lot of us that are hating ourselves right now. You’ve done things wrong in your life. You’re broken. You make mistakes. You fall. You fail. But it’s not about the falling. It’s not about the failures. It’s about getting back up again. It’s about what you’re going to do in that next moment of temptation.

And I’m not just talking about temptation to pornography or drinking or whatever temptations to hate yourself temptations. To just pour it on temptations to beat the snot out of yourself. Stop doing that John paul ii say john paul ii says darkness can only be scattered by light Hatred can only be conquered by love if you’re tired of feeling the way that you do If you’re tired of the negativity and the constant battle you have with yourself And the negative thoughts where you’re telling yourself you’re a piece of garbage and you’re never going to be more than that Or you’re not a good mother.

You’re not a good husband. You’re not a good father. You’re not a good Wife you’re not a good employee. You’re not a good friend. You’re not a good disciple of Christ. If you’re spending your life telling yourself all that, then stop. I’m telling you right now, I’m trying to do for you what Dr.

Bob did for me last Friday. He gave me a gift and saying, John, like you have a choice to love yourself or to hate yourself in those moments. And what you do is going to affect everything around you. So in that moment, I took his advice and I took those things to Jesus. And Jesus came and he does what he always does when we allow him to be a part of our life.

He heals. He comforts. He releases the captives, right? He sets us free from our bonds. I sat there on that plane for a good hour, just emotionally, spiritually, mentally, physically holding my younger self, consoling myself, preaching truth to myself. And for the first time in a long time. Those negative things dissipated.

I didn’t have ill will towards the person that I’d had those disagreements with that started me down this path. In fact, I prayed for them and I wished them well. And I remember that deep down those people loved me, and I didn’t know what they had going on in their life right now. May have caused them to act the way they acted, but either way, it wasn’t my business.

My business was to love myself and to love them. Guys, if we want our relationships to be what they can be, if we want to be joyful, If we want to be people that actually live the love and the discipleship that we practice Then it starts with loving yourself well, and it’s not some weird self help thing get rest when you need it If you’re doing things that aren’t good for you Stop it All right If you’re allowing the devil to get in your head and talk all the time then start preaching the truth Stop it and call jesus into the situation Because we need to love others the way that christ called us to and the only way we can do that is to love Ourselves well To meet the devil right there at that battle line and go, no, not today.

You’re not crossing this threshold. You’re not crossing the threshold of my heart, of my mind, of my household and my family, of my business, of any of that today, you’re staying out there and I’m going to choose to love myself through the mistakes and through my imperfections and through the places that I’m not perfect.

Folks, you start to do that. You could teach your kids to do that and you could save them a lot of the pain that you felt in your life too. Ever since I got back and right and ever since I had that conversation with Bob, it’s been night and day different between Angela and the kids and I’ve chosen not to spend so much time on myself and to spend much more time on them.

That’s where you go. When you’re negative, you start just centering on yourself and what was me isolate loneliness, all that stuff. But when you love yourself you start preaching the truth to yourself. You start to find that affirmation, that courage that self confidence that only comes from the grace of the Lord.

And you go out and you realize my life’s not about me. It’s about others and let me go and live well for them. Folks, that’s the question I’m going to leave you with. Are you going to, are you kind to yourself? Are you being kind to yourself? Are you loving yourself? Cause if you’re not, the Lord is bringing you an opportunity right now today to do something different in your life, something that will not only affect you, that will not only change you, but we’ll change those around you.

People will see that light as john paul ii said darkness can only be scattered by light and hatred can only be conquered by love So start doing those things start loving yourself start letting the light and the love of the lord come in your life Get out of the gutter You’re allowing yourself to be in and choose to be something different and have that choice backed up With the strength the courage the hope the love and the mercy and the grace that only comes from jesus christ Let’s take it to prayer in the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit.

Amen You Heavenly Father, I thank you for this day. I thank you for the opportunities you give us to enter into difficult times. Lord, help us all to see that those moments of temptations, those moments of suffering and struggle. Are not just a one way ticket to darkness and despair It’s an opportunity to choose like a fork in the road the path that we want to go down One of self destruction and hate and loathing or of love of kindness and of building up father Are you giving us everything we need in your grace and your mercy?

All it takes is us believing in that and going out in our lives and living in each and every day I pray that those listening and myself will learn to live this lesson And to be the people that you called us to be in the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit Amen

In this episode, John and Victor dive into the importance of taking action in your life and not procrastinating when you hear God’s call. We discuss how easy it is to say “someday, Lord” but remind ourselves that tomorrow isn’t promised—action is required today. We also share personal stories, insights from scripture, and examples of how to overcome fear, hesitation, and the urge to put things off, whether it’s battling addiction, making life changes, or answering God’s call to serve.

📚 Bible verses for reflection:

Matthew 25:1-13 (Parable of the Ten Virgins)

___________________________________________________________________________

---

Become a Partner in the Pew! Donate to the ministry today!

START A MEN’S GROUP IN YOUR PARISH!

www.justaguyinthepew.com

---

Welcome back to the Pew everybody. I’m your host, John Edwards, and here across the table from me. I’m very excited about. Out is my co host and cohort, Victor Adams. I’m back everybody. I’m here. We miss you. I was out of town. Yeah, I was out of town. You were out of town. And the reason is I was visiting my family down in Quincy.

Also happened to get the Florida state Memphis game. Yeah. Everyone knows what happened. I don’t need to go into that, but anyways, Christie had a great time, cheered her team on for victory. It was great to see my folks, my aunt and uncle in Quincy, Florida, and really do a quick stop down there and come back to Memphis.

Yeah, man if you’re going to lose, you at least lose the team you like, I don’t know what that word means. You could have lost the Florida or Miami and that would have been a lot more painful than the team you actually cheer for here. Yes, I’ve accepted that. Yes we need work.

But like I said, I am cheering for Memphis now and really hoping that they continue to do well. I think they’re, I think they got a great quarterback and a great team and we’ll see how they go. And Lord knows Memphis had plenty of years of Memphis state years and all that stuff of being at the bottom of the barrel and 10 people being in the stadium.

I’m happy for them. But. Look, you got to visit your family, all those things. You got to have a good trip. I was out of town too. That weekend I was in Muncie, Indiana this past weekend. And South Bend, right? Yeah. In South Bend this past weekend. So got to go up into the Notre Dame area.

They were playing a game. I didn’t get to go cause it was at the same time. actually it started right as I was leaving the mission and heading back to Chicago. But man, both weekends were full of just fantastic people and warm receptions and really just people that, that understand what we’re trying to do.

And we launched a couple of groups in those places. The Muncie one, we’re going to even continue to launch at a greater scale through the men’s conference in October when we go back. But there in South Bend, they had a great group of guys. We’ve been training and leading for months. And man, I just know that the Lord is going to do things and build fruit that lasts there.

And so many of the people that were there became monthly partners in the pew. I want to say thank you right now to all of you first for the warm reception that in both towns, at both places, Indiana is a great state and know how to make people feel welcome. So thank you to both places. But we had a lot of people that joined us as partners in the pew.

And what that means for those of you don’t know, is they joined us as a monthly supporter. Whether that was 5 or 20 or 10 or 50 or whatever it was. All of it helps and it matters so much because we have this mission. There’s a great need out there. We have people in the wings that we’re talking to right now about working within 2025 and 2026 and we’re having to bring on other people to be able to meet that demand, right?

We’re talking to other folks that, that I’m not really naming right now, but we’re excited to announce when we can, that we’re bringing on, but to be able to do that, it requires. It requires resources and those are things that as you grow, you can’t grow unless you have that support. So thank you for those of you that have come on board as partners in the pew.

And for those of you who are considering joining us as partners in the pew, I always tell people are looking for something to be a part of. They’re looking for a way to evangelize. They’re looking for a way to make an impact and a difference in the world. This ministry is doing that. And you could do that alongside us by becoming a monthly partner in the pew.

It’s easy to do. You can go to our website at just a guy on the pew. com. There’s a. button that slides up and down on the page on the left side of the screen with a little heart that says donate. You can click there. It takes you right to our online donation platform. There’s also a thing in the menu items at the top that you can click right there too, if you don’t see the other button.

But either way, we appreciate the support. We’re humbled by it, and it helps us tremendously. It’s hard to grow when you don’t know what you have, and it’s hard to plan for the future when you don’t know what what you’re working with. So as you people continue to help us. And be the blessings that you are we’re able to make those decisions and move forward in the work that God has us to do So thank you for that.

And again, you can find that and everything else we do at our website So if you’re looking to buy shirts mugs rosaries all that stuff, shop at our store You can find that at just to get on the pew. com If you want to book a schedule a call so we can come and help you The way that we helped in south bend and muncie and so many other places You can do that on the website If you’re interested in just seeing where we’re going to be And if we’re going to be near you or if you want to schedule, To register to go on a pilgrimage with us Then you can find all that at just a guy in the pew.

com. It’s a one stop shop for everything You can even subscribe to the podcast there and our youtube channel So go check out just got in the pew. com The next time you get a chance and consider joining us as a monthly partner in the pew Victor that’s always a mouthful So thanks for everybody listening to it and thanks for you patiently waiting for us to get back to the show It’s always good for updates.

So yeah, that’s good. Yeah, man. It’s always fun to give shout outs to places We’ve been and And just to share a little bit, man, so people can see and be excited like we are you can hear about it all the time but when you’re there and you see it and you’re just, you’re seeing the impact the ministry has and what God is doing with all of it, it’s just a tremendous thing.

And I can’t help but share at the beginning of these shows, man, I’m not trying to waste people’s time or bore people. There’s probably some people that skipped the front five minutes, trying to get to the show but I just want to share the joy of it so that people can see that something they’re listening to, something they belong to, something they’re partnering with is making a difference.

So if I say go back 20 seconds, you need to go back 20 seconds. If you skipped to this point, you may make people mad. There was somebody that showed me, they were listening to us at two times speed the other day. I was like, how do you do that? But he said he was trained and I just, I know maybe it works for us because we’re from the South and we speak slower, but.

Somebody like Father Mike Schmitz on Tom’s too, I wouldn’t even, my ears would explode. Like steam would start coming out of my ears. But anyway, I digress. The last couple of weeks, Victor, we’ve been talking about a lot of important things. We talked about desolation the last time you were in here and struggles and personal places I’ve been and you’ve been in it before and the difficulty of sitting in that.

And as I thought about that after the episode, I came back, when you were gone. And did a show on waiting for God and talking about how difficult that can be. But that’s exactly what the Lord wants us to do, right? It’s not on our time. It’s on his and we learn a lot of virtues in that waiting, right?

It’s painful. We don’t like to slow down. We don’t like to be quiet. A silence is a killer for a lot of us because of these phones and just the culture in the world that just throws busyness at you all the time. And so to sit down just feels awkward and it makes you anxious and the devil’s constantly whistling your voice to get up and do something else.

But how we have to persevere in that desolation, but also in that waiting that waiting for God, because it’s that’s where we find our marching orders. So that’s where we left off when you were here. When you were gone was with the Waiting for God, and as I was thinking this week, it’s funny.

I did a show yesterday called Marriage Unhindered on Relevant Radio with Doug. Great guy. Met him at the National Eucharistic Congress and he asked me to come on. So that happened yesterday and was live. I was sharing my story, just about the whole thing, the drugs the walking away from God, the Angel, the grace of Angel being in my life and obviously what’s happened since.

And, we got to talking about addiction and things like that. And he said some things on there that really struck me. And there was a reflection in the gospel reading today, the reflection I read from the legionaries of Christ spoke about this a little bit too in today’s gospel. But. Just this idea of how we could someday, we can be in the opposite place where the Lord is spoken clearly into our lives after our waiting, after our times of desolation.

And their answer is someday, Lord, like someday. And we do that a lot in our lives with a lot of things, and I know that I’ve done that in my life. There’s still times where I know the Lord is calling me to do something and I try to put it off. I procrastinate. And so where we’ve been talking about waiting.

Yes, the point is we need to wait for God in those difficult times, in the peaceful times. We always need to be looking for the direction, the guidance of our loving father and the direction that we receive through the Holy Spirit. But the thing is, some of us sometimes we get in that position of waiting and we never stop waiting, right?

Like we either are unsure or maybe we’re sure and it scares us about what God is asking us to do. So we take that mentality like, okay, I hear you God, but I don’t know that I’m ready for that yet. I don’t know that, that now’s the right time. Lord, I got a lot of things going on. And so in that trepidation, in that fear, in that anxiety, sometimes where we’ve waited the way we’re supposed to, and we hear an answer, sometimes it’s not the answer that makes us comfortable.

And sometimes it’s not the answer we like. And so it can cause us to procrastinate and it can cause us to give that sort of I hear you Lord, but someday type response, right? The great stories in the Bible are those that say. You got the wrong guy, God. Cause, cause there’s many stories where that begins the formation of that person working, hand in hand with God’s will.

And all of us are called to work in God’s will, and like I said, whether like for you starting this nonprofit, just got a pew other people like, like me being a convert from the Protestant faith to the Catholic faith and what can I do? Something I love to do, and our daughter, she goes up and she’s an altar server.

And then Christy was like what can I do? And, now she’s in the choir. So we’re all involved in mass and the worship and being part of the liturgy, which is a blessing for all of us. It can be that big as starting a nonprofit or serving in your church or serving your community. You’re doing something being God’s, hands and God’s feet for the people in need. And if you’re thinking about something like that and you’re just didn’t know how to start, maybe this is that, that urge to like really look into what you can do because God asks all of us to do something for his kingdom.

Yeah, he does. And we never know fully what that is. Yeah. You get inklings sometimes, yes, you’re lucky and the Lord says, okay, and it makes it clear to do this. I know people that said, Lord, do you want me to start my own ministry? And if you do open the door to this room, I’m in, and the door opens, and nobody’s there. Like I’ve heard stories like that. So sometimes God is very clear. And sometimes it’s just, that’s what the waiting is for, right? We talked about last, I talked about last week is like when you wait, you actually learn God’s mannerisms. You learn God’s voice you learn how he moves, you learn to see him in things.

So it’s not Lord, give me a sign. And you wait for lightning to strike in that moment or whatever, because that doesn’t happen as often as we would like, but you just learn just like you do your wife or anybody else when you’re around them enough. How they act, what they’re thinking, what they feel.

You start to build that two way communication, if you will, with God. And when you hear those things, the next step is to get up and to do something. And that’s where the devil, he doesn’t like that you’re listening. He doesn’t like that you’re waiting. Certainly doesn’t like when you begin to hear God.

And when you get directions from God, what is he going to do? He’s going to show up and he’s going to start whispering in your ears and all the things we talk about all the time. Like you’re not good enough. You’re not equipped enough, Victor. What are you going to do? This is how you make your living.

If you leave the ministry a Protestant ministry and go to be Catholic, what are you going to do? You’re married. You can’t be a priest and deacons don’t get paid. And what are you going to do? And I know there’s so many ministers I know personally that I’ve walked with in the last couple of years.

They’re like, dude, I’d be Catholic in a heartbeat, but I don’t know how to. Yeah. How to support my family. Yeah. And that’s a real thing. Yeah. Like you, you’ve given all your time in seminary and all these things that you’ve gone and this is what your heart has wanted you to do. But sometimes what God wants us to do isn’t always what we want.

Or what seems to be the easiest thing. But the thing is here. Once God gives us an idea of what’s clear, then we have to take that step forward, innit? And you’re right. Like Moses, he’s one that’s I stutter, Lord. You find somebody else. He tried five or six excuses of why God shouldn’t use him.

Gideon talked about why he shouldn’t use him. Everybody looked at David and was like, really? Like him? Look at these other dudes. They all look like, the ultimate warrior or whatever. And you’re with this scrawny kid like this happens a lot with God. But the thing is, we have to be able to move forward and be, and to take action.

But what happens a lot, Victor, is we procrastinate because one, we don’t believe we’re worthy, all those things. But two, like we just, sometimes when we get direction, we’re fearful of what it’s going to take to do that, or what it’s going to cost us in those things. And we do it in our health decisions, right?

How many of us every year at the beginning of the year, I’m going to, this is this year I’m going to change my life. And, and sometimes the doctor is telling you like, Hey, if you don’t change this, or you don’t quit drinking, or you don’t quit eating like you are, you’re going to have a heart attack.

And we know there’s consequences. We know there’s things that could happen if we don’t change our behaviors. But we, I will someday, right? I will after the Christmas season, I’ll get back in shape after the Christmas season, or I’ll quit eating after like this, after I enjoy this last bag of chips in the closet or I’ll, I’ll go to confession.

It’s only a chocolate cake. Or I’ll go to confession when the right priest did I like that’s nice to me is going to be in there. The one that’s easy on me or I’ll, we procrastinate about these things and. On everything work decisions when you know Hey, maybe it’s time to move on for a job, but you’re scared again about things.

And those are natural feelings. If we feel that we’ve heard the voice of God, then we got to quit saying someday. Because what happens is, and this was the point of the, of Doug, who’s been a counselor and a marriage therapist and addiction therapist and all that stuff that’s on marriage, unhindered on relevant radio.

When we were talking about the story, he said, yeah, man, that’s just the thing I’ve heard so often over the years from addicts is I’ll quit when I’ll stop when, and when he said that, man, it was like a knife went in my heart because that’s how I was for years. I remember saying to myself I’ve met this beautiful girl, God, you’ve finally given me what I’ve been asking for, in my broken prayers because I didn’t really have a relationship.

It was just asking God for things with no action on my end at all and no worship or anything like that. But he finally gives me this beautiful girl better a better girl than I could have ever have dreamed for in my life a better woman to Court and to marry. I just sound like I was from like the 1800s to court like people like what the heck is a court?

It translates to dating, to get them digits. I don’t know But to talk to and into and to start building a life with and I know I have this problem of addiction in my life You know the binge drinking the drugs the pornography all that stuff and I was thinking well, you know What i’ll stop before we get married Cause that’s what I always told myself.

I’ll quit when I get married, I’ll grow out of those things. Like Paul says, you’ll put away childish things, but I didn’t man. I was doing drugs till seven in the morning and I did not the day I got married, right? I thought I’ll quit when Jacob’s born. Like when we have our first child and I didn’t I’ll quit, after, when my mother died, it’s time to get straight and get my stuff right.

But all that did was fuel me to go further. I’ll quit, the next time we have children and we had twins and I didn’t write and finally God sat me down. But to be honest with you, Victor, so there’s a good chance I could have died or been caught by Angela and lost everything and made some very bad decisions in my life.

I don’t think I would have ever done it on my own, right? Like I really don’t. I just, because that he’s right. What we do and not just with addicts, but a lot of us in our life, like we just, it’s always tomorrow. It’s always tomorrow. And we live in this way where we feel like we just warrant a tomorrow every day of our life.

Yeah. We live as if we’re going to all live to be a hundred years old. Or 120 or whatever right and that’s not the case, we don’t know what’s going to happen I mean we’ve seen people over the last, you know That we know over the last few months pass away that are barely older than you or I we’re not promised tomorrow right and we put a lot of decisions off in our life And it’s certainly the most important decisions on changing our lives stopping addictions Giving our life further to Christ we put those on tomorrow and tomorrow and that the truth is Victor For some of us tomorrow may not come right and like you said tomorrow men exist and let until you start today yeah, if you start today if you start praying today if you start Going to mass today if you start speaking Kindly to your spouse today or your children or somebody that way you change that behavior today As you listen to this if you change what you’re struggling with today You’re not putting you’re saying tomorrow when I wake up be a better day or the week can be a better day Like I said, it’s always difficult to start something new in the present moment because you’re scared to do it you’re concerned that I will be I would change people won’t want to be around me You know all these as you said the lies say if you change You For the good, then all the people that you hang out with won’t want to be with you or your whole, shift paradigm shift of who you are changes because you’re afraid of who you might become if you change your life.

Sure. Yeah. Or just yeah, all those things, what it’s going to cost you or just, it’s hard. If you lived in habits your whole life or for a long period of your life, it’s hard to break those things. And the reality of what it may cost you. If you’re addicted to something, a lot of pain, a lot of anxiety, a lot of stress.

That’s been your coping mechanism forever. So what are you going to cope with now? There’s all that anxiety. And so we choose to eat back into that comfort area and like that prison cell that the devil’s had us in for all, we become like our own jailers. We just go, you know what?

Nope. I don’t like the way that feels, or I don’t like the way it’s beginning to feel to even think about change in my life. So I’ll just stay in here and we stay, we put an arm dog collar back on that the devil has on us in our life. Sure. And that’s not what we’re supposed to do. Like the Lord is speaking to us.

And for those of you who might be sitting out there, you’re like, this is a hard conversation for, you hear your conscience is the voice of God in your life. I really believe that. I believe like when you when things, when you know, you’re doing things that aren’t good for you, or, you need to change behaviors in your life and you’re hearing it from your soul, like you’re feeling it inside and your gut starts to twist.

When you even think about I know this. And I need to, but like that is God giving you the directions you’re looking for. We sit about, we talk about sitting and waiting. That is one of the best, the biggest ways that God shows you that he wants you to move in your life Is that conscious that we have that feeling the thing that keeps eating at you and won’t go away, right?

It’s this thing because the Lord is not he’s not punishing you He’s continuing to point out in your life the things that are keeping you from him And so those things are difficult, but if we don’t listen to that if we continue to think well, it’s going to be much harder To change than it is to sit here.

We’re wrong. Yes. It’s hard to change, but things that are worthwhile are hard. And the opposite of that is if we procrastinate, we’re going to miss out potentially on being with the one that we’re supposed to love the most and the eternal life that he calls for. I was watching a clip from that movie that came out a year, a couple of years ago from Paul about Paul with Jim Caviezel playing Luke and all that, and he’s talking to The guy that’s imprisoned him that is eventually going to stand over his execution.

And this, they were, this is a creative license in the movie. But he begins to talk to the man about how, as humans, we look at, we, we step into the ocean, we pick up water, and we hold it in our hand, and the water quickly runs out, and we believe that’s the life, that’s the life that we have here, and it runs out of our fingers so quickly, and we’re all, we’re so concerned about how quickly that water is running away, but if we look up, we see the ocean of water, and the endless amount of water that is eternal life.

And he looks at the guy and he says, I hope that one day you stop looking at the water in your hand and you start seeing what at the water that’s all around you and what’s set before you. And it just gave me chills because again, I believe that God gives me signs when it, when I’m on the right track of what he wants me to talk about in a given week.

And that was another like random Instagrill. Instagram reel that, that popped up in the midst of all the dumb ones nobody wants to watch. But it led me also to scripture. Matthew 25 1 through 13. We’re all familiar with this, but this is the parable of the bridesmaids, right? And this is what Jesus says, he’s telling this parable and he says, Then the kingdom of heaven shall be compared to ten maidens who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom.

Five of them were foolish and five were wise. For, when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them. But the wise took flask of oil with their lamps. As the bridegroom was delayed, they all slumbered and slept. But at midnight there was a cry, Behold the bridegroom, come out to meet him. Then all those maidens rose and trimmed their lamps.

And the foolish said to the wise, Give us some of your oil for our lamps, or going out. Here they were like, Oh man, we messed up. Share with us what you have. And it says, But the wise replied, Perhaps there will not be enough for us and for you. Go rather to the dealers and buy for yourself. And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut.

Afterwards the other maidens came out also, saying Lord, open the door to us. But he replied, Truly I say to you, I do not know you. Watch therefore, for you neither know the day nor the hour. This is Jesus himself saying look. I’m going to give you everything you need. I’m going to give you the hints.

I’m going to lay things out before you. Maybe not a hundred yards at a time like you want. Maybe that one pebble, that one stone to step on next, I’m going to give you what you need, but you got to be ready. And when you do, after the waiting, after the times of silence and listening that we talked about, I talked about a week ago.

So there has to be action. And this is what he’s saying. These people showed up, they looked apart, they had the lamps, but they didn’t fill them with any oil. They didn’t prepare. And so they all fell asleep waiting on the Lord. And the ones that were that awoke when he came that had the oil were the ones that were invited in.

The ones that had stayed persistent and kept things ready and took action when they were called to take action were the ones that reaped the benefit, the eternal reward. But the ones who didn’t had to then go and try to make up for all this time. Where they didn’t have action where they didn’t take action and the time had passed.

And that’s what we risk when we do the same thing in our lives. And you can go any further than that is that’s a story of our hearts, is our heart on fire, on flame for God, or is it on flame on fire for something else? Is it, are we being distracted in our life by our job, our career politics, or anything else that like, it takes away from our focus of being trying to love perfectly as God wants us to be to love, our neighbor as ourselves, to love God with all our heart, strength, body, and mind.

All these things, this is what Christ said to us, and the, those that were. I’m going to do everything I can because God loves me so much and I love him and those that fell asleep probably just there. They love God initially, but they are distracted by the things where they allowed some, some anger or envy or that someday Lord mentality.

Yeah. Yeah. I’ll get ready when he gets here. I’ve been waiting forever and, they said in the Bible, the end’s coming or he’s coming, but yeah, it’s been 2000 years. So I guess I’ll do the deathbed confession, slide in home safe, kind of thing. But that does, that’s not guaranteed for all of us.

No, it’s not. And Fulton Sheen even says something to that, our guy, Archbishop Fulton Sheen, he says, God has promised men pardon if they’re penitent, but not if they procrastinate. So he promised you mercy if you’re repentant and you take action in your life, you’ve listened to the Lord, you hear your conscience, you make, you take action.

You waited for the Lord. He’s spoken and you take that action. He promises mercy, but not if you procrastinate and John Paul, the second Pope, John Paul, St. John Paul, the second. Another one of our heroes and favorite saints. He says the future starts today, not tomorrow. He goes on to say he who takes the road of later ends then on the road of never.

I know some people who seem to turn life into a perpetual waiting room. The trains come and go and they say, I’ll leave another time. And he goes on to say, too, I’ll make a confession on my deathbed. But the thing is, they missed the train. They missed that confessional. And that’s not what any of us want, right?

That’s what any, not what any of us needs. And for those of you who want me to explain it a little even simpler, there’s an old comedian that my dad used to listen to in the car from Yazoo City, Mississippi, Jerry Clower. And he used to tell this joke on this tape my dad listened to all the time. And he talked about, there was this town and a flood was coming.

The dam was breaking near the town and this flood was coming. And so this police officer. He went through the town and he started, on the megaphone, telling everybody to evacuate. And so he pulls up to his house with his old man and his wife, and he says, get in the police car. The water’s coming.

You got to leave. And the old man says, Nope, God’s going to take care of us. And they sat there rocking in their rockers. So the dam starts to break more water, starts to break loose. And all of a sudden the sheriff comes by that house again on the boat and he looks at the husband and wife and this time they’re sitting on the roof of the porch.

And he says, come on, get in the boat. This is one of your last chance. We don’t know if we’ll be able to make it back. Get in the boat. The water’s coming. It’s going to get higher. And he says nope. Go on. God’s going to take care of me. So then next thing you know the dam breaks fully the waters flowing through the town and the man and woman are sitting on the very edge of their chimney on the very roof.

The only part of the house that’s out of the water and they come out in a helicopter. And they’re sitting there all the helicopter noise with a megaphone. Grab the ladder, climb up. This is your last chance. This is our last pass. Jump on the ladder and come and be saved. And the man says, no, God’s going to take care of us.

Next thing you know, the helicopter leaves, the water rises, they drown and they’re dead. Next thing they’re in heaven. They’re standing before the Lord and they look at God and say, Lord, what gives? We thought that if we waited on you, if we were just You know patient and we were faithful then you would save us and he goes you dummy I sent you a car a boat and a helicopter, right?

Yeah, right So god sends us these signs But it’s up to us to take action when we see them And we can’t be people like i’ve been in my life like you’ve been in your life Like other people have been in theirs these people that just say someday lord. I know what you want of me I know what you’re asking of me, But someday Lord, because Victor, as we’ve talked about here, these popes and the, these saints are future saints in Fulton Sheen in the gospel, Jesus himself has told us in this parable, there may not be a tomorrow.

This isn’t to scare people, right? I’m not trying to go, Ooh, get scared and do something. It just realized that this time we have is limited. It’s short. It may not seem like it, but a hundred years is nothing in the span of God and the time of God. And a hundred years, many of us won’t get. So yes, we’re supposed to wait for the Lord. We’re supposed to listen and to endure the, all the things that come at us when we’re trying to just sit in that silence. But when we feel that nudge, when we feel that conscience speaking to us, when we feel the Lord urging us to move forward, then it’s time to act.

We can’t be people that just sit around all the time and procrastinate and wait for some perfect conditions because they’re never going to come. I could tell you in every hard decision I’ve made in my life since I quit my job, none of them I ever knew was a sure thing. None of them I ever. I had a written affidavit from God that said if you do this everything will turn out fine.

It took faith. It took trust. And it took me understanding His voice and being able to try to do the best I could to follow Him. But in the end of it all Victor, it took action. And so that’s what we’re calling everybody here today. Listen to what you’re hearing. If something is hitting you in the gut over and over again If you’re in a place of addiction or a place of bad habits or repetitive sins, or you’re in a place where you need to, you know you need to change jobs or you need to be a different man for your wife and your children.

You know that repeats again and again in your interior life. You feel it in your conscience, you feel it in your gut. So stop fighting. Stop saying someday, Lord, I was lucky in my life. That my that the Lord sat me down in a jail cell before I killed myself before I died of an overdose Before Angela left me and took everything when she found out the Lord gave me a chance that he doesn’t often give to everybody So don’t play russian roulette.

Don’t roll the dice with that Listen to what God’s saying in your life right now and move forward to make the decisions to be the man He’s calling you to be right and by what you’re saying is say to yourself today Lord. I will do this I will stop this. I will be better this I will you know blank, follow You know, whatever is that you’re struggling with say today God I will do this.

Amen make that promise A set goal in your life today. Yep the future is one foot forward at a time and it’s time to start walking So let’s take all this to prayer in the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit. Amen Heavenly father you ask us to wait and be patient to listen to your voice There is a time for that lord, but when we hear your voice You call us to take action So often we like to procrastinate, so often we like to say someday Lord, but that’s not the path of a true disciple.

When you call us to act, we must move Lord, and we do so in faith in you and in trust in you, and after we’ve learned to hear your voice. Lord, help us to listen to our conscience, help us to move forward in the way that you call us to, and help us to take our courage always in you, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

This week, I’m diving deep into what it means to truly wait on God. We live in a world where we’re always on the go, but sometimes, God calls us to slow down and listen. It’s not always easy—trust me, I struggle with it too! But the grace we find in that quiet waiting can be life-changing.

Join me as I talk about how I’ve navigated moments of feeling distant from God, and what I’ve learned about hearing His voice in the stillness. We all need patience, fortitude, and hope, and I hope this episode helps you find some in your own journey.

___________________________________________________________________________

📚 Bible verses for reflection:

Psalm 130:5 – “I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits, and in His word I put my hope.”

Isaiah 40:31 – “But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”

Micah 7:7 – “But as for me, I will look to the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me.”

Matthew 10:30 – “But even the hairs of your head are all numbered.”

Luke 22:44 – “And being in agony, He prayed more earnestly; and His sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.”

___________________________________________________________________________

---

Become a Partner in the Pew! Donate to the ministry today!

START A MEN’S GROUP IN YOUR PARISH!

www.justaguyinthepew.com

DOWNLOADS

Get a copy of my new eBook, “12 Ways Guys Can Get Closer to Jesus”!

JUSTAGUYINTHEPEW.COM/EBOOK

---

Hello my friends and welcome back to another episode of just a guy in the pew. I am your host John Edwards and I’m super excited to be back in the studio putting down another episode that hopefully you and those around you will enjoy. But folks this week I’m going to be doing it by myself. Victor and I were both traveling last weekend.

He was in Tallahassee for the Memphis Florida State game, which by the way, my Tigers came out victorious over his Seminoles. Not trying to rub it in, just stating the facts, but I was also traveling myself. I was in Indiana. Up there in Muncie starting a men’s group and giving a restored parish mission So we weren’t able to get our schedules together, but the lord had some things he put on my mind and my heart So I wanted to go ahead and try to share some of those things with you this week folks before I get started doing that Just want to say thank you to the folks in muncie to jason and father eric and everybody else that came out to the mission you guys gave such a gracious reception and i’m so excited for the men there as we Move forward and launching that group and just seeing what it’s going to do for that Paris and for that area So folks, thanks for welcoming me.

I’ll be in south bend indiana this coming weekend on the 20th and 21st I’ll be up there at St. Adalbert Parish giving a restored parish mission and launching a group there. So if you’re in town and you’re not at the Notre Dame game, come and be with us. In fact, the game’s not until the afternoon, so you could spend the morning with us and then drive over to the game.

But I’ll be up there and I’m excited to be with Deacon Jose and everybody up there as we launch another ministry of men. And we give a mission there for men and women Then finally at the end of the month the last weekend of the month the last saturday of the month I’ll be in fulsome, california, which is shaping up to be a massive mission They’ve got a ton of people registered and we are looking forward to being out there with tyler and everybody else at st John the baptist out there in fulsome, california.

So if you’re in any of those areas Come and be with us. Stop by, come to the mission, come and find out how you can be part of the men’s group. People are always writing in saying, where are these groups? Where can I go to find one? Where can we go to listen or to see you or to be a part of it? The events you’re doing.

If you want to know that answer, you can go to just a guy in the pew. You can click our events and book me page. There’s a calendar there that lists the next three events we’re going to be doing, but you can click a button and it will expand and show you every event that we have through 2025 that we have booked so far.

So folks, we’d love to see you. We’d love to have you come to the events and I’d love to meet you in person, especially if you’ve been listening to show and been following us for a long time. So check out all that and find out where we’re going to be. I also want to invite any and all of you to become monthly partners in the pew.

That simply means people that will give and support to our ministry and the work that we’re doing here each and every month. That’s useful because we need to know what kind of funds we have to be able to grow and to support this ministry. We’ve got people we need to bring on. Because we are getting booked up more than we’ve ever been.

It’s crazy. The Lord is telling me in my prayer that I have to bring on other people because I simply can’t help, handle it all myself anymore. I just can’t, there’s too many engagements and too many things. So we need to bring on some people. We have some great people in mind, but to be able to do that, we have to have the funding and the resources to do that.

So I would ask that any of you that have enjoyed listening to the show, that have been touched by anything that we’ve done, that have gone to any of the retreats or the restored parish missions or men’s conferences that are part of any of the groups we’ve launched. That you consider paying it forward, paying it to the next guy.

So that we can go and build these places and other parishes, and we can continue to help people through this podcast and through all the things that we’re doing in the ministry. So if you want to become a monthly partner in the pew, you can do so by going to just a guy in the pew. com there’s a donate button on the side of the screen.

That’s on every screen as you scroll. It’s also in the top menu items there. It says support or donate You can become a monthly partner with pew in a matter of minutes through our donor box donation platform and folks I could tell you it would humble me and I would be so grateful if you would because Gosh, the lord is doing great things in this ministry each and every week.

I hear stories. I get emails from people just about How their lives are changing and how men are becoming the men they’re called to be for their families. And that’s what we need now more than ever. So folks go there, check out all that we’re doing. You can also see the pilgrimages we have going on our website.

Everything is there. So go to just to get on the pew. com to give, to support, to find out our events and to just join us on pilgrimages or anything else. So folks, thanks for listening to that as we jump into the show. So folks this week, it’s so funny. I always look to God to say, what do you want me to talk about this week?

Because we’ve got almost 300 episodes now, right? That’s a lot of stuff to have talked about and sometimes I can feel the pressure of what are you going to talk about next and I don’t try to just go searching for something I oftentimes just try to look at my own life and See where God is moving in it or the things that i’m experiencing myself and realizing that you know we’re all human beings.

We’re all You know, we all go through the same things. We all deal with similar things. And so I try to look there in my own experiences to try to share what’s going on in this week is no different. And if you were listening to the show last week, that Victor and I put out a show on persevering in desolation.

And we talked about. What it was like in those moments where it feels like god is abandoned you or left you or you can’t feel god And the truth of it as we said is god never really abandons you there’s a lot of times in our life where we’re looking for god or we’re looking for answers and it could seem like we’re waiting on god and that’s the thing.

I want to talk about this week is waiting on god I mean it is You know, desolation, consolation, all those things. We could feel like we’re waiting on answers. And a lot of times in our life, we have a decisions or places we’ve come to where we need to lean on God. And we’re trying to, when we go to him in prayer and we’re trying to listen or feel him and this past weekend, I, in Muncie, even I was talking about this.

One of my talks I was talking about spiritual warfare and the different voices, that we can hear in our head and in our lives. And, I always talk about how the devil is the loud one, and he’s usually You know sitting there accusing us or are trying to convince us that we’re never no better than our worst sins and How loud he is and how he could say things like you can’t you won’t you never you know You shouldn’t you don’t deserve you’re not worthy All those things he says but I talked about hearing our own voice like distinguishing between his and our voice and then especially listening for god’s voice And after I, was through with that talk, we were on a short break and waiting for the third talk of the mission, the one on relationship with Christ, one of the guys came up to me and he said, Hey, you were talking about the voices and man, I could totally feel what you’re saying about the devil.

I experienced that in my life. And just those negative voices that we hear, the negative voice, it’s of the evil one. He said, but you mentioned like listening for God and that God’s in the whisper. And I, I was talking about in the old Testament, how, Elijah didn’t hear God in the storm or the fire and the earthquake or whatever.

He heard him in the whisper and the silence and that still quiet voice. And that’s the way I’ve heard God so often in my life. God doesn’t show up with a bullhorn most of the time and go, Hey, you look at me and listen. Although we probably all would wish that because it’d be much easier to find his voice and make decisions and, get that confirmation that we’re making the right choices and moving in the right direction.

But oftentimes it’s not that way. It never really has been in my life. It’s been this. Small whisper in and a lot of times the times where I’ve heard God has been where either one of my own volition and my own choice slowing down and stopping and Trying to be more present to him or in the case of going to jail where he actually sat me down in a place where I had to slow down and that’s the thing like Not only do we need to persevere as we talked about last week in desolation just persevere in seeking god But there’s another aspect to it We need to be patient in our waiting on God, right?

That’s the thing we have to wait for. And that’s what I told that man. I said, look, here’s the thing. It’s hard to hear that whisper because we’re never willing to slow down. I, we live in a world that tells us to go more than ever. And we feel like we have to be doing something all the time to, to be productive, right.

To show something for our work. I don’t know about you guys, but I always feel like in my life, I have to go. If I sit down and I stop what I’m doing, even for a second. To enjoy something or just to be still I feel guilty there’s something I should always be doing if i’m at home there should be some laundry or I should be cooking dinner or I should be doing yard work or I should be, you know tidying up around the house or You know doing something like I really feel guilty a lot For sitting there and not doing anything on purpose like being idle And I know that we hear idle hands are the work of the devil And that’s what i’m talking about like people saying look you need to be doing something You need to be doing something But God didn’t make us human doers.

He made us human beings. And this is something we’ve talked about before on the show. And while yes, there is merit to making sure the time you spent is a value and you’re getting things done that you need to get done, right? That we’re not being lazy or slothful. There’s a point to that. But there’s a difference too in between being lazy and slothful and actually taking time that we have purposely set aside for being with God to wait on him.

All right. And part of the reason we don’t want to slow down is because we actually have to start thinking about things in our life that maybe we don’t want to. Like it’s in those slow moments that things start to bubble up that need our attention. And oftentimes we don’t want to give our attention to those things.

So we busy ourselves to take our mind off of it, right? When there’s bad things going on in our life, or when there’s a decision that we’re waiting to come down for some way, or we don’t want to sit and ponder and just fixate on that, so we want to busy ourselves, and that’s a good thing for some, but for others, we can get so busy that we never sit to listen to God, and that’s the thing.

He is found in that whisper. He’s found in that stillness. That’s also why the devil, the world, and the flesh around us try to put everything around us to keep us from being with God. Everything to distract us, like these stupid things here, these phones, the ding and you got emails one second and notifications from all your apps and social media, alerts and all that stuff and the news cycle alerts and all that stuff is meant to distract you.

And so often it comes from me right in the middle of when I’m about to sit down with God and it’s ding, don’t forget this. And it might as well be Satan going, ding. Don’t sit down with God. I don’t want you to. So look over here. It really is like squirrel, for a dog where a dog is just intent on something and then boom, there goes a squirrel and you’re off in the grass somewhere in that.

The deep hedges, off to yourself and lost. And that’s what the devil is trying to do because he knows when we slow down and we take time for God in our lives, we’re actually going to have a chance of hearing him. We’re actually going to have a chance to connect with him and he doesn’t want that.

And that’s why waiting for God is so hard because we get impatient again. We feel like we need to be doing something. We feel like we’re failing at life. If we sit down and we aren’t just going every second, I don’t know about you, but even at night when I try to go to sleep, it’s like. I fight with my mind to slow down and to stop and to give me peace and to give me rest.

It’s because most of the time during the day i’m not taking opportunities to stop even if it’s just for a couple of minutes to acknowledge god and acknowledge that need a break from the going right from the hamster wheel From the never ending highway of life, busyness that is brought before us all the time And so when this man said this to me, I was like look you have to be intentional I was like, you have to find time to pray.

And he said I do, and I go to adoration and things like that. And the thing is, it made me think about that. And even my own experience in adoration yes, I will take time to go to adoration and be with God, but how often do I have a stack of books, like from my hands of where you barely see my face of all these things in case I need some sort of inspiration or in case I need to read something, or I’ve got my rosaries or all these different devotional things to bring with me in case I need something.

But folks, honestly, if I’m being truthful with you about how it is for myself, sometimes I do it because I’m afraid to sit in silence, right? I need to be doing something even in that. What am I going to do if I just go sit and I look at the Eucharist and the monstrance? Right and I just focus on that and you can feel that tension like oh, I better take something in case I get bored or in case I run out of something to say Or in case I need something to commune with god and look I know that we need places to start Our conversation with god that’s good to take A magnificat or something in there and maybe look at the daily reading and ask god then To put it down then and say lord.

All right, where do you want to take me through this? What sticks out? There are good things like that. But folks a lot of times we’re being honest We take those things in there for distractions as well Because we’re afraid of simply being still and we get worried about well, what if I fall asleep or what if I this You know what?

At least you fell asleep in the arms of God, right? Like we just we said all this stuff before us because we don’t like waiting on God. We’re impatient we don’t and we don’t like sitting in that awkwardness I we don’t like feeling like we don’t have anything to say and that’s why so many of our prayers are Practiced and we say the same thing over and over again because we could feel like we did something then But the point of being with God is not feeling like you’ve done something The point is being with him, like literally taking that time out to listen to share, of course, what you need, not like God doesn’t know what you need, but to help you voice that to him, to get it out and then to listen, and then to flip the switch and close the mouth and open the ears. But again, we don’t want to do that because we feel like we have to be running the conversation. We feel like we have to be saying something. If we’ve run to the end of our words and that must mean we’re at the end of our time with God, and that’s not the truth.

Like everything in this world pushes us to be doing stuff. To try to be as efficient in our lives as we can be by trying to do 24 billion things at the same time. And the same thing with our phones. You can have 8 billion apps doing 8 different things. Our schedules are just full of constant running and things over things and meetings after meetings and all this other stuff.

We feel like we got to keep up with the Joneses to be just as busy as somebody else, but the Lord is inviting all of us. To slow down, to be willing to sit in that awkward silence, and to listen and to wait for him. That’s where we hear him and we see it with Jesus, right? Jesus would even go, he would steal away to pray, right?

It says he went off on a mountain to pray. He went away in a place to be by himself because he needed to hear the voice of God. He needed to hear his father because that’s where he got his marching orders. That’s where he started to figure out everything in his life. So not only is it about persevering in these times where we feel we don’t feel God or we’re not getting answers that we want.

Part of that perseverance is having patience. It’s waiting on God and it’s in the waiting, which often feels uncomfortable and we get frustrated and we get angry. It’s I’ve been doing that and God’s not telling me anything. We have this tendency to look at these as things where we’re not getting our way or we’re not getting an answer when we want to.

It’s some sort of punishment, but actually what it is a gift from God. There’s grace in the waiting Like that’s what i’m coming to find out in my own life if there’s grace in the waiting Right and just those moments because god is bestowing grace upon you so that you can build virtue yes god could snap his fingers at any time and do whatever he wanted to give you whatever he wanted to But what kind of people would that make us be probably more demanding?

And wanting to slow down and listen to him less and just demanding and hoping that we can treat God like a vending machine, right? Just, okay, now I want this, now I want that, it needs to fly out of the chute and be in my hand instantly. But if that’s what we’re doing, we’re treating God like a genie instead of our Lord and our Father, right?

It’s not about rubbing a lamp and getting what you want. It’s about sitting there and do these things that the Lord knows that you need. Jesus has told us that he knows the hairs on your head, right? He gives the everything to the birds of the air. How much more important are we? Jesus tells us these things.

But he also invites us and shows us through his own acts to go and to sit in the silence and be patient That is the hard part and through those things we find the virtue. All right, look at jesus in the garden He went in his times of suffering in his times of needs and he was sitting there sweating blood and he was fearful But he went and he spoke to god and he listened to him and he what did he find he found the fortitude he needed to move forward in the plan that god had for his life his earthly life there You He moved forward with that in the strength that he found in God because he was patient enough to wait, right?

And he spent so much of his time being patient. That’s what we have to do, right? Waiting is something that is going to be a part of every aspect of our life. All right, and we have to get away from this notion and this push for the culture in the world that we got to have something right now.

And if we don’t, then we need to be upset. We need to lose our peace. Now, we need to learn to understand maturity. We need to learn to understand to be patient and be grateful in the situations that we are. Even in our worst moments, we’re still six feet above the ground. We’re still breathing. We still have an opportunity for blessings in our lives and to be a blessing to other people.

The grace is in the waiting. Now, what do I mean by that? In the waiting, like I said, we find virtue. The first of which is patience, right? We learn that hey, slow down, slow your roll, ease up, take a breath, and just look at the graces that are around you already. Have a conversation with God you need to have, but slow down and be patient, right?

St. Thomas of Aquinas talks about this. He says, grant me, O Lord, my God, A mind to know you, a heart to seek you, wisdom to find you, conduct pleasing to you, faithful perseverance in waiting for you, and a hope of finally embracing you. We hear it from St. Basil the Great too, he says, And so let us be glad and bear with patience everything the world throws at us, secure in the knowledge that it is then that we are most in the mind of God.

Folks, this is the grace of the waiting, right? And we hear it in the scriptures too, it’s Psalm 130 verse 5. It says, I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope. It goes on, Isaiah goes on to say in Isaiah 40, 31, He says, but they who want, who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength.

They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. Micah, even in chapter seven in verse seven, he says, but as for me, I will look to the Lord. I will wait for the God of my salvation. My God will hear me. This is what’s so great about patience, right?

Is sitting there and what an opportunity to sit with the Lord and just to imagine yourself at the Lord’s feet. And whether he’s giving you an answer or not What a grace it is to just be in his presence and to be received by him And that’s what all these things are saying. St. Thomas Aquinas is like saying To be faithful in his perseverance and waiting for you.

How do you do that with patience? And what is the benefit of patience fortitude, right? When we actually sit down and we make ourselves be patient and we quell the voice of that spoiled little kid that the world tries to build in us that we want what we want right now and Give me give me god And why aren’t you answering me?

And if you don’t, then I’m going to go have a pity party because I didn’t get the answer right now. I’m speaking about this folks, because I know that’s where I’ve been in my life all the time. What gives God, I’m doing what you’re asking me to do. I’m trying to live this life. Why won’t you give me answers right now?

Why won’t you tell me what I need to know? Because God knows better than you and he has better timing than you. And what he asks of you is not demanding from him. Cause think about how ridiculous that is and how insolent that is to demand things from God. But he waits for us to be patient and to trust in him.

And to know and to believe that he really has our good in mind. And while it may not be on our time, it’s on his time. And guess what? His timing has saved me from a lot of things I thought I wanted. Then when I turned out seeing what he was doing, I was glad I didn’t get right. But it helps you with fortitude because you’re able to start growing in patience and growing in this, in these virtues, which lead to other virtues, fortitude.

Like I’m going to sit here and I’m going to grow my will. I’m going to grow my strength, right? That I don’t have to be some flippant child that needs something right then and there and demands it No, I could sit here in my love of the lord and find this fortitude And those moments of going you know what the devil’s coming at me and he’s in my ear and see god’s not good God doesn’t love you.

God’s not giving you what you want. If he was a loving father, he would I could sit there and go, you know what? Get behind me. Satan. As we heard Peter say in this past Sunday’s readings, or as Jesus say to Peter, get behind me, Satan. That’s what he says to Peter when he’s hearing a voice that is contrary to the will of his father, and contrary to the plans of God.

He says that to Peter, get behind me. Satan. We should say the same thing in those moments of, but you deserve this. You need this. You’ve worked hard. Like why isn’t God giving you an answer? Why is he, you’re showing you a hundred steps right now instead of the one little dim light he’s showing in front of you.

Get behind me satan. We need to be stronger than that right to build our fortitude so that we can withstand these attacks and withstand these temptations and these self absorbed thoughts that lead us away from god and not to him that make us be some demanding servant instead of A quiet and listening and loving and trusting servant, right?

It’s that perseverance and that patience that teaches us obedience in all things But also in that patience and that perseverance and that obedience we find hope Because how often no matter when you how long you’ve been waiting Sometimes you’re waiting so long you forget you’re even waiting But then god reveals this some gift to you Or some grace he’s bestowed on you and you’re like, oh That’s what I was waiting for That’s what you were doing That’s what I didn’t see And folks I gotta tell you i’ve seen that so many times in my life when I was working for that small ministry cardinal studios when I first got out of my job at napa auto parts Like I worked for them and it seemed to be going good and then all of a sudden things happened Where it wasn’t feasible any longer for them to employ me.

They had to go in a different direction You know for where god was calling them And that was right at Christmas Eve one year. Like I was literally about to go to Mississippi and be with my dad. And in a moment’s notice, like I found out that I wasn’t going to be with him the next year. I thought I was calling to have a call to find out about plans for next year.

And the plan was God had a different plan for my life. And so I started this very nonprofit that we’re in now and doing the work that we’re doing. But in the beginning of that, like I took money. I didn’t have, I started this nonprofit. And I was like, okay, God, where are you? What do I do? What do I do in a nonprofit?

How am I going to survive? How am I going to feed my family? What do you want me to do? And weeks went by and I felt myself getting full of despair and darkness and hurting and getting angry with God and say, God, where are my answers? I’ve done what you wanted me to do. So many people in this world don’t care about you and I’ve given up everything.

I’ve taken a massive pay cuts and I’m sitting here on the floor of my bedroom. Each and every week, watching my wife go to work and support my family while I’m sitting here playing ministry. And I’m so angry. I was so angry. The point where I threw a Bible across the room on my bed and said, you know what?

God, I give up. I give up. Like you either got to show me something or I quit, which I don’t recommend you demand things of God. But it was a week later. I had one event that got canceled. I was even more in a depression of that. Cause at least I would be able to hand some finances to my family at the time.

But all of a sudden I got a call from a friend of mine who wanted to start an online conference company. We didn’t even say that. We’re just like, we want to do a, an online conference because the Eucharist, we were unable to get to the Eucharist because of COVID everything was shut down. And all of a sudden we did that and the Lord blessed it.

It turned into a ministry in a company that supported my family and help give me time to build out just to get on the pew and what it was going to be. And we were able to help so many people through the process of all of that. So God wasn’t working on my timing. He was working on his. And so here’s the thing, all that aside.

Now I can go back anytime that I’m like, God, where are you? God, what if I, I take the step and why won’t you just tell me this is what I need and why don’t you make it clear? And why don’t you make it obvious? I can look back on the times where I trusted and I waited for God and see that he has never let me down, that he’s never left me desolate and alone.

Even in the times it felt like that, he showed up with a better plan, with a better option. He showed up to lift me out of that darkness and to show me what he had in store for me the entire time. But folks, it took patience. I learned in all those times where I was being short sighted, where I was demanding things of God, that he had his own timing and no matter how much I wanted it to be right now, and I wanted a plane to fly by with a banner with exactly what he wanted me to do, that didn’t happen.

But because of those hard times, I was able to go through because of those times of desolation, because of those times of wondering and waiting, I found out that he had a better plan and I grew in virtue. I learned to be patient with God, trusting in the places where he’d already shown me That he was who he says he was, and he was good to his word.

Folks, this is why it’s so important to wait on God. This is why it’s so important to slow down and to listen to him. To fight the noise of the world and the anxieties you have when you sit for a moment. That’s where you exercise patience. When all those annoying things, and those things that are on your mind, and the grocery list, and the chores, and the errands you have to run, when you’re in adoration, That’s when you sit there and you go, get away from me, get behind me, Satan.

I’m gonna be here, I’m gonna spend this time, and I’m gonna sit patiently, quietly waiting on the Lord. Because I know that eventually He’s gonna show up. I know that eventually He’s gonna make it obvious what He wants in my life. I know that He’s gonna, He’s gonna show me the next step that I need to take in my life.

That’s where we grow to hear the voice of God. That’s where we grow in patience that leads to fortitude, and that fortitude leads to that hope. That’s what I’m talking about. When God has shown up and you have time and time again seen that in your life because you were patient enough to wait on him, then you start to grow in that virtue of hope.

That virtue is so necessary in our faith. That virtue that keeps us away from falling to temptation and turning away from God is that hope that’s found through patience and fortitude, but none of those things are found Without waiting for God, it’s in the waiting that we see a gift. We see the waiting now.

A lot of us in our lives is a pain. As a nuisance as a punishment, but it’s not it’s another invitation from god It’s another gift from a god to enter into that quiet relationship where you can learn his voice Where you can learn his mannerisms where you could see his movements and you can learn more about yourself and grow in virtue as well Folks, that’s what we need now more than anything and there’s saints that say that There’s saints that say let us be patient and bear with patience everything the world throws at us securing the knowledge That is then that we are most in the mind of god st Basil fulton sheen says page patience is power patience is not an absence of action as many of us think it is Rather it is timing it waits In patience, it waits for the right time to act, for the right principles, and in the right way.

Patience is not an absence of action, he says, rather it is timing. It waits for the right time to act, for the right principles, and in the right way. That’s who God is. And that’s what he shows us when we have the virtue of patience. St. Faustina says, patience, prayer, and silence, these are what give strength to the soul.

That’s what waiting for God gives us, is that. And then finally, St. Augustine says patience is the companion of wisdom folks. If we want the answers we’re looking for, we’re looking for the wisdom to move forward in our life, then we have to be patient, have patience in prayer. And in silence, these are the things that give strength to the soul.

In the words of St. Faustina, that’s where I invite you to this week. So the next time you want to seek God, the next time you’re looking for answers. Take time to sit down. Don’t feel guilty about it. Prepare the time, make a deal with yourself about the time you’re going to give and no matter where the devil shows up and the distractions, cast him out.

Get behind me, Satan. Sit there, make the commitment to simply sit there and be quiet. And when you go to adoration and all that stuff, if you want to take something to get you started, fine, but don’t take so much stuff that just distracts you. Sit there in the awkwardness, in the weirdness, in the uncomfortableness that you could feel sometimes.

And sit there and wait for God and I promise you he will show up He’s done it in my life and he will do it in yours Let’s take you to prayer in the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit. Amen Heavenly father So often in life we can get rushed We feel like we need to be doing everything and to be moving nine to nothing every single second of the day But lord you made us human beings not human doers So remind us in those times that we feel that we need to be rushed or we need to move or we need to get Up That you want us to sit you want us to be still and you want us to listen for you Lord, the grace is in the waiting for you help us to remember that and help us to find perseverance Patience fortitude and hope in the moments that we wait on you In the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit.

Amen