Who Owns Your Future?

00:00 Holy Spirit, Lord Jesus, Abba Father, we come to you today grateful, grateful that we get to do this. It's not just the name of a show, it's a mantra for who we are, and it's a declaration of gratitude to you. So, Lord, as we talk today, we consecrate our words to you, pray for our listeners, so thankful for them. May they find encouragement and hope and inspiration in what we do today. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. It's Wednesday, July 22nd, 2026. We get to do this. This is episode number 42. This is the life we've been blessed with.

00:40 This is a gift for we get to do this. This is a chance we dare not miss. This is the life we get to do this. Well, how are you doing, brother? I'm doing great, actually. Yeah, apologies up front to our listeners who are like, I've been waiting all day for the show. How come we didn't get the show yet? Oh, there you go. Yes, there were reasons. The main reason being we had a death in the family, and that would be the No Agenda family, but also the Curry family and the Dvorak family as John C.

01:17 Dvorak passed two days ago. And I wanted to make sure that you heard it from No Agenda first before we just started discussing it here. Fully appropriate. And wow, this is a good time to have a pastor as a friend because it has been just the wildest week with the arrival of our granddaughter. Huge celebration. I mean, just insane. Of course, we had left Holland, so we had missed the barely. How many days was it? It was five days, five, six days. Yeah. That's still relatively close.

01:57 I know, but we in time terms. But we were living in a socialist country in a hotel room for two weeks. I couldn't take it. That's enough. Couldn't take it any longer. Now, we had stuff to do. And so Sunday did the show with John C. Dvorak. No Agenda. Great show. I listened to over half of it, and the energy was there. Everything was there. It was, man, both of you were in full form. Yeah. And when we end the show, we don't really say, we don't really talk much. It's like I'm looking for opening clips, that little opening bit, and then we go through the credits and usually we'll be laughing about because I've set my robot up to do the clips and like, well, let's see if that stupid robot got the credits right.

02:45 And we went through that and then we select the art, which is sometimes a discussion, but we both agreed, yeah, yeah, that's a good one. We'll use that one. Do the title and then wait until everything's published. We check and make sure it's on the website. Okay. All right. We'll talk to you on Thursday. Yeah, adios. Yeah. And that was it. And you've done this for 19 years. Yeah. In October, it'll be 19 years. 19 in October. Yeah. And for a majority of that, twice a week. So this is my work wife. No kidding. Yeah. And so was it, yeah, Monday. Right. Monday. I'm on my way to go play chess with Willie. You know, that's my Sabbath, and it's part of the joy of

03:28 not really doing any work and just resting. And I see John's wife, Mimi, pop up on my screen calling. And I'm like, and she's on the West Coast. I'm like, this can't be good. And she told me, I mean, I had to pull over the side of the road. Oh, no doubt. I just, what? I flabbergasted it. So I literally went from that super high from, you know, not even 24 hours before that to just, oh, oh, wow. And it was now the thing that I love. And by this, this is in the newsletter.

04:08 John had done the show and Mimi was at the house because, you know, they have a place in Washington. So it was nice that she was there. And, you know, they had dinner and they were joking and laughing and sitting on the couch watching an old NCIS. And John was typical fashion grousing about the actor and an obvious hole in the plot. And as Mimi describes it, it was just lights out. Wow. Complete lights out. That was it. There was no, no, there's nothing, there was nothing to do. Everything just, everything turned off like he was unplugged. And I'm thinking, brother, sign me up for that one. I know. I said the same thing to him now. That's how I want to go. Sign me up. But I want to be watching Wind Calls the Heart.

04:54 That's how I want to go. And not anytime soon, but yeah, when it's time. And so, you know, so. so now this just started this whole process. Oh, gosh. Now, there were very few, we kept it within the close family because we want to just make sure. Because really, no agenda is, you know, it's hundreds of thousands of people worldwide, and they need to hear it from us first. Agreed. You know, the obvious question is, what now? And so this is kind of the place where I'm at now. Well, what now? That's a. You've been in a cascade. I mean, like Niagara Falls coming over the ridge, you know, of just, okay, there's a lot of decisions that need to be made in a relatively short time.

05:37 Yes. And what's interesting is that it is as if, well, that's not as if, but the devotionals that pop up, the things that in my own devotionals book, it's like, did you, God, did you put these on this date for all this to coincide for me to read this right now? And I'll just, I just want to go through a couple of the scriptures that I have not sought out scripture. They have literally come to me, you know, through the UVersion app, through my study Bible app, through things people have emailed me. I mean, literally, just, I should read this, just before I got into the car to come over here,

06:23 I got an email just out of the blue from John Dew. I've no idea who he is. And he says, praying for peace for you and everyone this morning, Adam. He has no idea what's going on. Wow. Just out of the blue. And I, okay. Thank you. You know, that is, I thank you. I needed that more than you either. Holy Spirit knows. The Holy Spirit does know. So the scriptures that have been popping up for me, Psalm 37, 23, which is, I mean, it's a Pastor Jimmy Pruitt classic. That's my go-to. But it wasn't from you. It popped up elsewhere. Beautiful. And this is the, this is the NLT.

07:07 The Lord directs the steps of the godly. He delights in every detail of their lives. Because, you know, we hear it more like the Lord orders your steps and delights in the details of your life. And this is how I'm taking it because I am just trying to listen and praying. And Lord, what am I supposed to do? Where am I supposed to go with this? What is the next step? Are you opening doors? Am I supposed to, you know, I just, I've just been asking, asking, asking. As well as the details of just handling the immediate. Oh, that's a good point. Talking to the family, the grief wave that hits. So this is the devotional that went with that scripture. The person in whom God delights is one who follows God, trusts him, and tries to do his will.

07:53 God watches over and makes firm every step that person takes. If you would like to have God direct your way, then seek his advice before you step out. And before I ask you a question, it goes into Proverbs 19, 21. Also just came up. There's no coincidence in the kingdom. There are many plans in a man's heart. Nevertheless, the Lord's counsel that will stand. Wow. And that's the New King James Version, which I kind of like that. I do, too. Do you know an NLT version or how would you? Yeah, the NLT is a little more casual, colloquial, conversational, narrative style.

08:35 New King James Version takes the Elizabethan English spin out of it, but still holds that same classical for some reason. I'm an NLT NASB guy, not a New King James Version guy. No, it's good. So here's the one that really, and I think I shared this with you. This came from my daily devotional for men, which my daughter gave me for Christmas, Boyd Bailey. And it was a little bit longer than this, but there was multiple parts with the scripture in the middle.

09:12 God's will is a continuous journey of discovery and faith. True obedience requires stepping into the unknown without being paralyzed by uncertainty, trusting Jesus as our guide while staying flexible to the Holy Spirit's direction rather than locked into our own rigid plans. Then they break it up with a scripture, Hebrews 11, 8. By faith, Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went even though he did not know where he was going. And so the devotional closes out by saying, Are you inspired or intimidated by your faith adventure? Do you anticipate or dread doing the next right thing as you fulfill God's calling on your life?

09:54 on your life? Yes, Christ must come to you in clarity before you venture out for him in obedience. But once you are sure of the Lord's leading, do not let up until you have arrived at his destination. Go on your great adventure with God, like a visit to a new country. Enjoy the new sights and people. I love that. You sent that piece to me, and I said, that will be a next week's sermon. It was such a good statement. It's good. So the question, because I've always felt like I, you know, when I'm asking God, is this what you want me to do? It's not like, you know, it appears in the clouds.

10:37 Yeah, Adam, that's the thing to do. But after asking and praying, I feel confident now. This is new for me because now I'm in a scenario that is not the same as my other times talking to God and asking him. Is it just grief speaking? You know what I'm saying? It's like, how can I trust what I'm hearing? I'm hearing things for sure. But can I trust, you know, now I'm doubting. Like, is this the right way to go? Is this the right thing to do? This is a situation that's new for me. So if you have any counsel or words on that, that would be probably appreciated. There's a great, a great scripture. It says, I'm paraphrasing because I don't have it in front of me, but

11:23 a matter is established out of the mouth of two or three witnesses. I'm laughing because I wrote that one down as well. Okay. Yes. Well, that's a good one because to me, it gives us an insight into how God speaks to us and establishes a matter in our heart, in our mind, in our spirit. So you'll hear something. You go, is that God, me, or the devil? You know, I mean, one of the three, right? Yes. But it'll be established out of the mouth of two or three witnesses. You'll hear it again from somebody else. Like some of these scriptures that just seem to come randomly, just out of nowhere.

12:00 They're all thematic. They all fit in the same flow. That's God speaking to you. So I've learned to trust multiple anchors, multiple, God speaks in multiples to me. So like I'll hear something, I go, man, that is so good. But I used to say that must be God, and I'd run off with it. And then it wasn't a good idea. Maybe not a God idea, but a good idea. I've learned as I've gotten older to, when I get something I think is a clear word from God, to not just act immediately, but to wait for those two or three witnesses. Yes. And it may come in a scripture. It may come as a lyric in a song. It may come as in a conversation.

12:40 Somebody says something. I go, whoa, there it is. And I always have this thought, this is that. This is that. This is that. And that's based out of scriptures where Jesus said, this is that, which was said by the prophets. This is that. So out of the mouth of two or three witnesses. So I listen for multiples for confirmation before I just go. I've learned the hard way. Okay. Because I tend to go ready, fire, aim instead of ready, aim, fire. And so I've learned to, you talked about my pauses. Those pauses are there. They're hard learned. So that's just one of the things that helps me establish, is it God, me, or the devil?

13:20 He'll bring clarity. Yes. So there are multiples that that is happening for sure. But also, it hasn't all come at once. Right. It doesn't. And I will say that when I heard all this, when this happened, I turned around. I called Willie. I said, Willie, you're not going to believe this. He's, you know, Willie is like, oh, what a beautiful man. I said, Willie, I'll make it up to you. Don't worry. Don't worry. And I told Tina, and she just like, you know, just melted because, you know, she's known John forever, too. He's family. He is family. And then I say, you know, I'm just going to go to the car wash.

14:02 And, you know, there's a good way to isolate. Yeah. Well, I just needed to. And when our car wash, you also, you know, I've learned now. I got a nice car, so you got to wipe it down and do all the little bumpers and everything. So I'm just taking my time. It's 95 degrees. You know, I'm sweating. And that's when the first thing started coming. And I wasn't even asking for something. It was just like, okay, here's one. Here's one. Here's one. Gosh, it's, I think I was telling you just before we started recording, speaking of multiples, that Tina and I have been rewatching West Wing. I'm not even sure why, but

14:45 it's actually quite an entertaining show. And it was back when kind of wholesome television days. days. And, you know, a dream that your president would be as cool as President Bartlett. And there's this scene where he has to make a decision about pardoning a guy on death row. And, you know, to go through a longer story to make it short, the reference to him being indecisive came from his pastor. And he told the story of the guy who was drowning. And then a guy comes by in a boat and says, Hey, you want to get in my boat? And the guy says, No, no, the Lord will save me. And helicopter comes over. And you want to want, here's the ladder.

15:29 No, he will pick up at the helicopter. And the guy says, No, no, I'm waiting for the Lord to save me. And then a guy comes with a ladder. He says, Climb up the ladder. No, no, no. And so he drowns. And he's at the Pearlie Gates. And God says, What were you doing, man? I gave you a helicopter, a boat, and a ladder. And so that's three. Yeah. And there's your multiples. There it is. Yeah, that's very helpful, Jimmy. And hopefully that'll help others, you know, our listeners, because we're all trying to hear God, right? I mean, those of us who name the name of Christ, we want direction. We honestly don't want to make a mistake. So we're asking God, show me what to do. But then there's the waiting game, the in-between,

16:10 the in-between what you need and when it's coming. And so, like you said, it doesn't always come all at once. No. But I always recognize it because it resonates. Wait, that's just a different way of saying the same thing. Yeah. Okay. That's the second time I've heard that. So that's when I starts, it starts to really get my attention when I've heard it twice. And then basically I'm just listening for the next for the third time. Yeah. And when that happens, it's green light go. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. That's very helpful. Hope that helps. Now, just I want to say that, you know, no agenda is not just ending tomorrow, and there's lots of stuff to work on, lots of things to think about, lots of praying to do.

16:49 We get to do this is fresh and new and building. And so, you know, regardless of anything, you and I are going to continue on this. And, bro, we have a website now. Yeah. We're legit. Yeah, we're getting, we got a newsletter out, which thank you, Tina. Yeah. Yes. We so appreciate it. She signed as the, what does she sign off as? It's like back office worker. Back office manager. Management, right? In a little, in a little closet. Tina. Yeah. A little closet for an office. So you can go to wgtdt.com. Wegetto this.com was taken. But I kind of like WGTTT. Once you get used to it, it doesn't exactly roll off your tongue.

17:33 You know, you just go WGTDT. There you go. Yeah, once you split it, WGTDT. Okay, that's cool. And it's a substack, which we had discussed. Yeah, I love substack. You'll be able, and we already got, actually, we already got a comment. Yay. We got a comment from Jody White. Of course. I don't know. Jody. Yeah, you did the Pinkle Princess. Pickle Princess. Yes, I do. She says, just sending more encouragement your guys' way. I look forward to the pod podcast every week and can't wait to see what great things you are doing for the glory of the Lord. Thank you very much. Oh, so cool. Hey, we got another thing. Okay. Let me look it up, though. I got to find it because it's from Brett Hahn, the Amrev.

18:15 Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. American Revolution guy. He writes some fantastic stuff. He wrote this. Oh, how does it do that? Okay, here it is. Thanks for that. There it is. Hey, Pastor Jimmy, love the new We Get To Do This newsletter. If you guys need help with anything else, website set up, just let me know. Happy to give back with my time, talent, and treasure. Yes, bing, bing. My wife, my wife and I run a marketing, consulting, and custom AI development firm. So happy to help support you both in any way we can. Spread the news of the show. That's the absolutely. That is the number one thing you can do is tell people about the show.

18:55 We're going to do show notes with every episode now, which will be fantastic. I really like this experiment of using Substack for everything because it's so different. And look, we can easily put together a website, but now everything just kind of happens in this Substack world. It's easy for people to comment. Easy to subscribe. Everything is easy about it. And I like the vibe of the community that hangs out there. And we can always change if we want to. But right now, I think it's a great way to experiment. We're still trying to figure out how to get PayPal links in there because we do like Time, Talent, and Treasure.

19:39 We got Stripe stuff and everything. But, you know, we'll get to all that right now. Just people signing up. up to the newsletter. And then you'll also automatically be notified when the new show comes out. There'll be every episode we'll post the links in there. Hopefully it'll go to the Godcaster app as well. You know, this is where platforms get kind of interesting. Like, well, yeah, you can post that you can't really do something from somewhere else. You know, we'll see how we work that out. We'll figure it out. Yeah, we will. But people should get the Godcaster app regardless. Absolutely. That is where you can get a lot of great podcasts and live streams and music streams. So I was in, it kind of came, oh man, this was also perfect.

20:24 Yesterday, I had a long-standing appointment for my hair in Austin, which I like for a number of reasons. One, I've known Johanna for, oh, man, 15, 15 years. She's been doing my hair. We've, you know, we became friends. Right, of course. Just kind of comparing notes about, and she's very kind of down the middle on political issues. And, you know, she doesn't really go one way or the other, but she's a very loving, kind of holistic crystal type girl. Austin. She's an Austinite.

21:05 Yeah, pretty much. And I don't mean that in disparagement. No, no, no, no. It's sponsored. There's a vibe. There's a culture. And she'd actually moved to Taylor, Texas with her partner, and they recently decided to, it's funny how she says it, to consciously uncouple. So he stays there. And she now got her own place back. It's so austen. But, you know, and I've been very, of course, she's witnessed my faith journey. Yeah. And I've prayed for her dad when he was in hospital. And I've prayed over her. And, you know, she's never had any issue. You know, you have to know that Taylor, Texas, that whole community got ripped apart right down the middle between, because a whole lot of Austinites moved out there, particularly when Samsung was going to build this huge chip fab out there.

21:55 And so you had a lot of Austinites moving in. You had the old school Taylor people. And to coin the phrase, it became the Pride people against the Churchies. Oh, boy. I mean, literally, and it splits that community in half. It just, you know, you either had an American flag in your coffee shop window or a Pride flag, and people wouldn't go to one or the other. But that's how Johanna would characterize it. She said, you know, the Churchies versus the Pride. Anyway, neither here nor there. I love her just for who she is. And she would always give me the canary in the coal mine, like, oh, man, you won't believe what the women are saying. Because, you know, she has the clients who are

22:38 right on the pulse of everything. In fact, she had to tell me quietly about things because they kind of got a little worried she might be turning MAGA. I'm not kidding. I'm not kidding. So anyway, so. That girl deprogrammed. Well, so I'm sitting there and so first she says, Are you reading the book that everyone's talking about? You know, I got to be honest. You know, I haven't had a lot of time to read what is this book that everybody is, when I hear everybody's talking about, everybody's reading. Okay. It's called Theo of Golden. And turns out that, yes, Tina's heard of it.

23:20 Many of her friends are reading it. And Johanna gives it to me and she says, she shows me on their phone. It's about religion and faith and belief. I'm like, and everyone's reading this? Oh, yeah. Oh, it's a huge shit. Everybody's talking about it. And okay, okay. Well, that's interesting. Coming from her and that everybody's reading it. And I later confirmed Tina says, oh, yeah, Theo of Golden. Yeah, I want to read it. Everyone's talking, all her church friends are reading it. And so I'm not sure what exactly I have started reading it. So I'll get back to you on that. Thank you. But then about

24:06 maybe half an hour later, she says, Adam, I want to come out to Fredericksburg. She's come out several times with her friends, you know, because she loves wine. And yeah, I'm going to come out to Fredericksburg, and I would love to come to your church one Sunday morning. Wow, beautiful. I mean, this is literally my mouth went, what? She says, you know, because I talk about you and I talk about, she sounds like you have such a lovely community. And she's like, you know, I would really come to church. I'd love to come to your church with you on a Sunday morning. And she says, I don't. don't want to be the person that says no. Wow. Wow. And I have never pushed or encouraged or I've just been myself and just told her.

24:50 You're just leaking. You're leaking. Leaking. Yes. And it was, I could not wait to get home to tell Tina that. Well, I'm looking forward to meeting her. Oh, no, you will. Of course. Of course. I want to meet her. Of course. Let me see. Theo of Golden by Alan Levi. Let me see. A stranger named Theo arrives in the small southern city of Golden at the local coffee house. Pencil portraits of the townspeople hang on the walls. Theo begins buying them one at a time, giving each portrait back to the person that depicts, asking only for their story in return. Portrait by portrait, secret surface, regrets are shared, and ordinary lives are quietly transformed. A novel about generosity, being seen, connection, and small miracles of kindness.

25:35 Number one New York Times for three weeks. Well, it's interesting that Johanna said it's a religious book. That was her exact words: it's a religious book. So we'll have to see what that is. I mean, I love the premise. I love that. That's a creative premise. So, anyway, so how about all these things that are happening in this? It's only Wednesday. Right. We just, we're not, we were not even the hump day, hardly. Got a note from Jim McCasslin. Adam, love the new, or to me, new podcast. It's really helped. This is, you know, I guess he's a no-agenda guy listening, so we get to do this. It's really helping me on my walk with Christ, which honestly has been stagnant for most of my life.

26:20 But God uses a lot of people when they are older. Look at Moses and Abraham. What are you saying? And then he's going to send us some challenge coins. So very cool. When I hear these things, man, I just melted while we do this. Yes. This is exactly. This is why we get to do this. This is why we get to do this. Absolutely. I love that. Appreciate that. What do you got, brother? There's a lot of things that you had a welcome back from, you know, you did the message on Sunday. Yeah, I came back two weeks ago and both Sundays. I didn't do the message. Right. People are like, are you okay? Where are you going up there? What's going on? You've been gone a long time. And it's because we had the 250.

27:01 So we had Rick Green get up and do that. I couldn't have anybody else. No. And then the last time we had Todd McDowell from Caleb Global talking about Israel and just the why bless Israel kind of thing. It was so, so rich. Yeah. We're having him back in August by the 26th on the evening, two 45-minute sessions, and it's on World Revival. Nice. And so he's going to lay that out. Super excited about that. World Revival. Yeah, yeah. The Global Revival. And, you know, brother, I'm telling you, I don't know what this Theo of Golden is, but I'm sure this is related to revival somehow.

27:39 Could be. I'm always a tiny bit leery when I hear things like this because we've, you know, when somebody passed along the secret to me, I was like, well, yes. No, I understand. This is different. But the way I took it in the sequence of she talks about this book and then she wants to come to church. Right, right. That was the sequence that I received. I'm looking forward to diving into a little bit on that. I'll have to look at it. Of course. And of course. I'm a shepherd. So you're a shepherd. Yes, you are. And protect the sheep if need be. Amen. So I stepped up into the pulpit back in the saddle, so to speak, for the first time in weeks.

28:15 I don't even know how long it's been. And oh, it felt good. It's like putting on old catcher's mitt that you've played with for years, you know, and somebody gives you a new one and it's like, ah, I got to break this in. But man, when you step into it, all you know, the leather's right. It fits right. So it just felt like being home. And I've just been since our break, our vacation, I've just been so gushing with love, gratitude, and appreciation for our church family. Yeah. I know I'm the pastor, so of course I'm going to brag, but it's, but truly, it's exceptional.

28:53 Everyone who visits our church, for example, Todd McDowell and Papa Don Finto from Nashville, Todd several times to me off little one-off conversations. He said, Jimmy, this is we've got, we go to hundreds of churches. This is different. This is the community you have here, the graciousness in the people here. He said, the openness. He said, this is not normal. I looked at him and I said, thank you. And I'm aware of that. And I'm very grateful. Can you define that? Because, you know, obviously you've pastored at churches. You've planted a few churches. You've been around, as we say. What can you pinpoint it to?

29:38 Well, when Annette and I came here, one of the things we came off of a, what I would call our wilderness wandering for a season, you know, a couple of three, four years, and we learned a lot from that. We also, the Lord, in a good way, stripped a lot of things from us, a lot of things that our agenda, our way of doing, are what we want to, our vision of success, those kinds of things. Sure, sure. And stripped all those things away. And we came back into the church ministry after working in the world for a season in the business sector with just a new appreciation for what we get to do, but also an understanding that people are tired.

30:20 People are working hard, a new love for people, and a lot of compassion for where people are in this world and the brokenness in this world. So we step back into the pulpit with a strong vision, but a vision that we only want to align with God's heart. And if it's not in alignment with his heart, it's gone. I mean, so we've been here 10 years sowing into that mentality, also with the idea of we have the pleasure and the privilege of living in a small town in America. And there's something about small town community that is unique and beautiful in Americana.

31:00 Yeah. And we're like that in Fredericksburg. You know, I see people, I go to the grocery store, HEB, it's over. I cannot just go get a gallon of milk and walk out. Not without stopping and talking. And it's not because people are stopping me necessarily. I may be stopping them and going, man, so good to see you. How are you doing? How are your calves doing? I mean, you know, I had a guy talking to me about his beef, you know, yesterday. And I was just like, yeah, we had a great conversation about beef. But, you know, it's living in a small town. And we've lived, I lived in Los Angeles. I was nearly born in Los Angeles. I've lived in Kansas City. I've lived in Dallas-Fort Worth, Nashville. I've lived in some big cities.

31:44 But there's something about a small town culture. But Fredericksburg's unique too, because it's not just small town culture. People move here because they want to be here. Yes. And there's a different spirit behind that. Or they're led to be here. They're led to be here. And there's a different spirit behind that as well. And it's a spirit of gratitude. So when you get a bunch of people together who are happy to be where they are and thankful that they get to live here, we get to do this. I didn't just make that up on the fly. I mean, it's an atmosphere that we live in here in Fredericksburg. It is. It is a bit like living on a cruise ship, honestly. I mean, everything without the norovirus.

32:26 Yeah, exactly. No, all the good parts of it. The food, the drink, the culture, the fun. It's really a fun town, but it breeds this community that I'm just so thankful for. And that and I all the time are just, can you believe we get to live here? And that we've had the privilege of doing the thing we love the most, and that's teaching, preaching about Jesus, making disciples, growing in our faith with others in a community. And we get to do it in Fredericksburg, Texas. So it is special, this town. And so that is conveyed through the culture of our church as well. That's why almost everyone who visits here ends up either moving here or they really want to move here.

33:10 They really want to move here. And it's not just because of the church. It's the community itself. So we're representative of that. And so we're a fun bunch. We are, man. Our old people are fun. Yes. Our old people are great. They're a little scary. But also, it's the Woodstock generation. They're still wild at heart, you know? Still there. I love how everyone's always coming together and like, hey, you know, so-and-so's got a baby. Let's do a food train. So-and-so's wife is, you know, having a procedure. We're all helping each other. Yeah. You know, the floods, once again, we've got, you know, our church jumps. We're still everywhere. A lot of churches, of course, jumping. We also have like 25 churches around here, which is also.

33:52 And they're active. They are active. Yeah, they're engaged. But as I was telling Johanna, I said, you know, you love our church because it's not just a church. It's like a clubhouse, man. There's stuff going on there. You know, there's stuff happening all the time. And how many people in our youth group now? Do we have 70, 80, 90 people? We have a big youth group. We took, I think, 80 to camp. Yeah. But also, we're doing a cool thing. We're doing a backpack drive for the kids and teachers. So they start off saying, we want to get 150 backpacks. And then they said, we want to get 175. It kept going up. Oh, no, it keeps because we don't want to disappoint anybody. We've gotten 200 backpacks. back to backpacks, and they're full of school supplies.

34:32 So we get to bless 200 families, 200 kids with backpacks, full, you know, everything for free. Then we're doing, we're raising money for 18 teachers who we're going to pay their help give their supplies that they otherwise pay for themselves. You know, gift cards for restaurants, for stores, and we get to bless. I think this is the thing that, well, it's not the thing I like most, but something I really enjoy about our church is how when the congregation ties and blesses the church, and the church does things with that in the community.

35:13 Absolutely. You know, like, didn't we pay off all the school lunches and the deficit, which was, I don't know, $11,000 for kids who just weren't able to pay for it. So we struck that record. I mean, this is amazing to me. This is a lot of people. This is what family does, right? We take care of our own. I love that spirit in a small town. We take care of our own. Instead of leave them be, it's we take care of our own. And I love that. So that makes it special. So we have a we've got the best of both worlds. We've got a big church, large church, you know, anywhere from sick wind to nearly 700 last Sunday. That's in the middle of the summer. So think about the fall. And we're building an overflow space right now that's about to be done.

35:57 We're right in the middle of that. So we get the accoutrements of a large church. We got a sound system. ACDC could do a concert here. I mean, we've got the full meal deal. You know, we got all the accoutrements of a large church, and yet we still have that small town heart and soul. Yeah. Yes. And I just love it. I mean, we still wave at people when we drop down the street, man. Now, this doesn't mean that people can't have this sense of community in a city. Oh, no, I agree with that. Because you can. You do that around a church community. That's how they have community. Yeah. All these people, you know, and people say to me all the time, like, you know, you don't know what you're talking about.

36:39 It's very lonely out here. I said, you know, could I just recommend go to a church? That's it. You may not be ready to cross the line yet. Go meet some people at the church. In Nashville, when we were working, I was working for Dave Ramsey and it was working for a dental practice. Our community became our church, Grace Chapel, which is phenomenal. Sounds like a little tiny country church. It's like 15,000 people. Whoa. But you find your community in that larger community. Yes. And you become, you tend to sit in the same spots. You tend to go to the same classes. And then somebody says, hey, let's start a small group. So you start a small group, which we did called Deep End. And they asked me to lead it. But we did it at a mansion of one of our of a Nashville producer.

37:23 Oh, cool. We did it at their house in Brentwood. So it was, we created community within the larger setting. So that can be done anywhere. But I must say, I'm a little partial to small town America. Oh, yeah. I mean, and I mean, I've lived in cities most of my life. When I was younger, we did live outside of Amsterdam, which was kind of cool in a very small village. So I had kind of a dual situation going on there. But when we were in Austin and we just said, nah, now it's time to get out. And then Tina just said, no, about Fredericksburg. Be in the globe. Literally. I'm like, okay. I've been there, but it really didn't matter because I have no business in Austin.

38:07 I don't have to be there. We live wherever we want. I've been there. It's like, it's kind of a cool town, you know? And then we open up Zillow and boom. Oh, well, that's exactly the house we like. They bought it the next day under contingency of selling our home in Austin, which we sold in 24 hours. No, there's all kinds of moves there. There's nothing like driving up in the parking lot and seeing 120 F-150 for it. But it's Wednesday morning and there's 25 cars in the lottery. There's always something. And there's Tommy waving at me. Hey, Adam, how are you doing? And he's got to come talk to you. Tell him what's going on.

38:45 I'm glad I came early. I love that. Don't you love it? Every day I walk into this building and you got to stop and talk to the staff. Hey, how was your day? How was last night? We had some stuff going on. We had 46 people come to Blair and Evans' class on experiencing God. Oh, yeah. 46 people. Wow. Wow. Isn't that cool? On a Tuesday night. Man, I wish you could have met my grandfather. I mean, too. Eugene Gene Curry, who, you know, he and I will someday. Well, yes. And you will love him. So they, for all intents and purposes, lived in small town, well, Armonck, New York, which is, you know, borders on Connecticut. Yeah. And, um, he was originally a real estate guy, but then he went to war, and

39:31 he became the guy that sat up all night on his Corona typewriter, writing letters to the president, to congressman, voicing his opinion. He would write op-eds. Many got published in the New York Times, not all. Beautiful. He was engaging his leadership before it was cool. Or before completely. But also on Saturdays, he would go to the I forget the name of it. Miamis. It was a home for elderly ladies, and he bring flowers for every single one of them. Wow. And he said, oh, I'm just off to visit the lady. I think he also liked visiting the ladies, honestly.

40:12 He thought he liked chatting with them. Sure. And when the family came over, oh, let's go to Hanker's, go get some corn and hanker's corn. That'd be ready. And then it was all St. Stephen's Church. I was baptized there as a young child. And, you know, that's kind of that. I think we have a family plot. Yeah. Although, I don't know. Look at the seeds that were sown. So I'm feeling all these things that I saw, but didn't get from my parents, got from my grandparents. And so now I'm feeling like, oh, man, not only do I need to give my granddaughter all the little cookies she's not supposed to have, but I got a lot of other things I got to instill into her.

40:53 So I'm looking forward to that very much so. Beautiful. Very much so. Just to talk about the, and thank you for reading the briefing on Sunday. Oh, it's so good. Because this, and I just want to tell everybody who's listening to our podcast about what President Trump was really saying in his address to the nation. I know it seems like 5,000 times the straight of hormoose open and shut since that speech, but the whole point was we need to fix the plumbing of our voting system.

41:29 And it's not necessarily about voting machines and all. It's really about we need to identify who we are when we vote, when we register to vote, that just needs to be a check. You got to use your ID for everything else. Everything else. The continuous noise of, well, it's racist and it makes voting difficult is, of course, nonsense, and everybody knows this. But it's not just Democrats that don't want this. This is, you know, this mail-in boat, you know, mail-in by ballot. And I used to vote by absentee ballot, is what it was called. I was in overseas. I remember that. And my mom would make a big deal. We're going to go talk to the embassy. We want our ballots and you get your ballot and you send it back because we want our vote to be counted and it's important.

42:14 And so we would always do that. You know, this has become basically a scam over the years. Right. Where in some states, every resident gets a ballot whether you want it or not. And, you know, there's no real check and balance of who signed it, who sent it. Who's alive? Who's dead? And this is, it is. Who's eligible? It is not just Democrats who have used this. I totally agree. You know, so it's not a partisan thing, but it is bipartisan on them not wanting to sign it. And that's my point. It's not just Democrats saying no. It's Republicans and Democrats alike slow walking it in the Senate. So I called my senator. I called my representative.

42:55 Very nice. Federal and regional and left messages. I talked to one of the aides and just said, hey, I'm a pastor of a church of a thousand plus people. And I want you to know we appreciate this bill, the Save America Act. And he was blown away. He said, man, we'd love to get these calls. Well, he was like, thank you for taking the time to call in support because most of the calls they get are negative. But it also matters because this is. Because then they get encouraged. They know it's important to their consideration. They bring in their step and they step back into the halls. And it has to be a call. Emails don't work. It doesn't work. It goes into a big bin. It doesn't get seen. Calling works every single day.

43:37 And it's easy. Nine times out of ten, you're going to get a voicemail, and then you get two, and it takes you over to their voicemail. Hopefully, their aide listens to it and passes the goodwill. Well, they have to because eventually the voicemail box gets full. So I think they do listen to it. I do too. Yeah. It's part of their job. We vote with our, our voice is heard with both our vote and our call, our voice. So we need to do that. Be diligent. And it's an important one. And that's what President Trump was saying. He's like, I'm not doing anything. You got to pass this. You got to pass this act. It's important. We got to do it. And anyone who's coming up with reasons not to is, in my book, an American. They're hiding something. They're not good. everybody's pocket. It's not good what you're doing right now.

44:23 Simultaneously, this was what was interesting. The State Department did an entire symposium, like a whole day on international terrorism. Our Treasury Secretary, I love General Patton, is what I call him. He, Scott Besson, it seems like such an obvious thing that our Treasury, who runs the real financial networks, knows how money moves from point A to point B, that they would be looking at stuff. It seems like no one ever did, or they didn't want to, or told not. And he's like shut off so many different avenues of illicit money flows.

45:03 It's crazy. He's making Doge look like a kindergartner. And now they're going through the Smithsonian Institute. Oh, yeah. I mean, the Smithsonian Institute is not necessarily keeping to their mission anymore. And there's also money that flows through that. Absolutely. That's what I'm thinking. But our Secretary of State, Rubio, man, he had just a firebrand speech. And I had already clipped this. And you sent this morning, you said, hey, look at this speech. I'm like, Brother Jimmy, I literally have this stacked up for the show today. And I'll play this and just want to talk about it briefly. Here we go. That was the wrong one. Show's over.

45:48 Hold on. I love that we don't edit this stuff. Here we go. This is what radical leftism is. It may wear various different slogans and ideologies across place and time. They can call themselves anti-capitalists or anti-imperialists or communist or anarchist or Marxist. But the fundamental character is always the same. It's always the same. It is a poisonous resentment cloaked in the language of equality and justice and liberation, an overwhelming need to tear down what greater men have built, to wreck what is beautiful and what is right on behalf of people who are only filled with

46:27 ugliness and have nothing else to offer the world. Through violence and through terror, they once again seek to impose their ugliness on all of us. The old dogma was wrong. The old dogma was wrong. None of this is driven by idealism. It is not utopian. In fact, it is the opposite. One of the criticisms you sometimes hear of communism, for example, is that it sounds good in theory, but it never works in practice. That's actually not true. Communism does not sound good in theory.

47:04 The world it envisions for all of us is small, flat, gray, leveled of all exception, drained of all that is good and noble in the human soul. The world it envisions is a world without courage, a world without creativity or ambition, a world without heroes or glory or great causes to strive towards, without a world without miracles, without myths, without men who rise above the rest to do incredible and extraordinary things. And the world communism envisions is a world without God. For these architects of revolutionary violence, the towering achievement of our civilization, for them, it's an unbearable humiliation, a reminder of what they cannot do and a reminder of what they cannot be.

47:52 And this is, I mean, this is a powerful statement. And I'm so happy it's coming from our existing administration. Because what he's saying is, and it's going to be very interesting in the midterm election and into the next general election. And of course, you and I will be all over it. When you see these DSA candidates, Democrat Socialists of America, they literally are saying we need to break apart the system from within, revolution from within. And, you know, that's rarely the way it actually goes, funny enough, with socialism.

48:33 But he, but Secretary Rubio is so spot on. And yes, the ultimate truth about socialism and communism is no God. That's the basic bottom line. And I've seen, I've probably participated in ignoring God, ignoring the roots of even of European countries. I mean, the churches, if they're not being burned down, they've been turned into Airbnbs and WeWorks to the point where we went to a church in a school auditorium.

49:13 Yeah. So, you know, but you see how it's almost felt like we're hiding out here. You know, we're okay. It's just us Christians here in the school auditorium. I'm glad they need a school auditorium instead of a home. Yeah, absolutely. It's growing. Absolutely. Absolutely. He said without God, without miracles. Without miracles, without heroes, and without great men doing things above and behind. In a very short amount of time, pack that in. Let me read to you what Jillian Michael said.

49:49 Okay, right. Yes, because she played this clip. She did, and I was like, what? But I like what she said. She said, Marco Rubio just exposed what the political elite never wanted you to hear in a moment that is sending shockwaves across the internet. He completely dismantled radical leftism live on air, tearing down decades of political propaganda in under 60 seconds. Everyone thought he was going to give a typical politician response, but what he revealed at the very end changed the entire conversation forever. Yeah. Brilliant. Hey, Jillian. Well, there's more people who are starting to see this.

50:25 And as much as, you know, I'm like, hey, you know, let's all calm down about a million mosques built in the last 24 months in Texas, et cetera, et cetera. What we are seeing is Islamists teaming up with the socialists. This is where the danger comes from. And it's not just danger for our country and our republic. It's actually dangerous for the socialists because they're the ones that get killed first. And the weak brothers and sisters, bring in your LGBTQ. You are the first ones who are going to get killed.

51:04 That's exactly right. It's historical. So, you know, I pray that people will snap out of it. Snap out of it. A couple things before we go. We got prayer requests from Ian Cummings. His dad has not been doing well, suffering cytokine release syndrome, CRS. It's from chemo. And so just want everybody to pray for his dad. Heard from my friend Pete, Pete in quotes,

51:42 who was very brave and prayed through what actions he had to take for his addiction, his alcohol addiction, came clean with his wife. He said, hey, man, I just want to let you know, I was in the ICU for three days. I'm out now. And now the hard work begins. And so I'm praying for him, and I hope everybody else will as well. It's just, I'm so proud of that guy for doing that. And then without even asking, we got two donations already with our quest for a value for value, which, you know, of course, this is a value for value podcast, which means the best thing you can do is tell people about the podcast.

52:23 That's very valuable. That's very valuable to us right now. But as we grow and as we move and spend more time on this, all parts of value for value become important. And why does it not surprise me that right away we get Steve and Stephanie in Las Vegas supporting us with $33.33. Really appreciate that. Yeah, Steve and Stephanie. And $75 from the Pickle Princess. Oh, my God. AKA. She's awesome. Jodie White says, I love you guys. Keep up the good work. Thank you so much. That is so, so appreciated.

53:01 WGTDT.com is our website, and that's where you're going to find real show notes this time. I'm going to put something in the show notes so people go, oh, they talked about this. We're legit. We're getting legit. We're getting legit. Yeah, we are. Yes, man. We're working on it. Working hard on it. It's fun, brother. I love this. I love doing this. This is so. How long has it been since you built one from the ground up like this? Has it been a while? Because, I mean, you do several podcasts 2.0. 2.0. Everything's different. Okay. 2.0. I mean, all podcasts are communities. That's the bottom line. So the biggest community is the No Agenda community.

53:44 And that's just been built up over almost 19 years. MoFax was a part of the No Agenda community. Podcasting 2.0 is a very small, it's only a couple thousand. Well, it's because y'all speak another language. Totally. I tried listening. No, no, no. We also call it the board meeting because we're technological. We are a bunch of. we're misfits. We're a misfit. It's like someone said, hey, let's put this band together. And some dude comes up with a banjo. We got a guy playing spoons. Someone on the, you know, on the theremin. And, you know, but all of this together is working to make podcasting better.

54:26 And, you know, podcasting is owned by no one. So we're just trying to help keep it open-free. And that's for selfish reasons, too. I want to make sure that I can continue to create podcasts. Now, Curry and the Keeper really started because we didn't know anybody out here and we were just going to check out some wineries and talk about wine. And we thought maybe some people send us some wine and we can drink the wine. We've got a lot of seven episodes. Seven episodes. And then it turned out that this was really about us and our faith journey. And so all of this, I think, led to what this is. And now there's a new community that we're going to build together.

55:08 And I'm very excited about it because when I see these notes saying, hey, I'm coming back to my faith, or it's been a long time. That's huge. This is the success. This is the reason why we've been asked to do this, I feel. Well, it's not about clicks, likes, and sponsors. It's about people. And a true community is about people. And the success is the community, the people. Always. The interactions. I love interacting with some of the guys on X and Substack. And I'm excited about that growing because, you know, I've been to a few of the No Agenda meetups, and I just always leave going, this is so cool to have this community and people not content to just stay on their computers or their pods, but come together

55:56 and get to know each other. Man, I've enjoyed that so much. Every time you ask me, I go, okay, I'm there. Well, it's on a Saturday. I'm there. Because I get to meet people that I'm going to somehow build some level of a relationship with. And isn't that real riches in life? It is. It is. To me, real riches isn't getting a sponsor by Roe or some of these different big sponsors. It's about people and it's about holding each other's arms up through the tough days and celebrating the wins together. We'll take that as the plane stick in the landing, man. I love that. Perfect. We get to do this and we will get to do it next week.

56:37 WGTDT.com. This is the life we've been blessed with. This is a gift we get to do this. This is a chance we cannot miss. This is the life we get to do this.