WEBVTT

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.840
 Welcome to the Church Digital Podcast. Through this podcast, we'll talk about the technological

00:00:04.840 --> 00:00:10.920
 innovations within the church. But more than tech for tech itself, we'll address deeper questions.

00:00:11.760 --> 00:00:16.640
 Is disciple making possible digitally? How should we approach the digital mission field?

00:00:17.380 --> 00:00:22.440
 Can a biblically grounded church operate in digital space? Oh, and where does the metaverse

00:00:22.440 --> 00:00:27.920
 fit into all this? Whether you're a big or small church, an established church, or a startup church

00:00:27.920 --> 00:00:33.840
 plant. The Church Digital's goal is to help churches like yours learn to be a multiplying church,

00:00:34.260 --> 00:00:40.460
 digitally and physically. Our heart, that churches like yours will discover a newfound focus on

00:00:40.460 --> 00:00:46.800
 disciple making that will revolutionize your church. And now, here's your host, Jeff Reed.

00:00:47.320 --> 00:00:53.440
 All right. Hey, everybody. Welcome to Twitch Digital Church Network. I'm Jeff Reed. I'm founder

00:00:53.440 --> 00:00:57.900
 of Digital Church Network, work with Church Digital and a lot of really awesome organizations.

00:00:57.900 --> 00:01:04.560
 And ultimately, you're listening to my podcast. We're doing a live podcast recording here for the

00:01:04.560 --> 00:01:10.180
 Church Digital Podcast. Through the Church Digital, season four here of the podcast, we're doing an

00:01:10.180 --> 00:01:17.720
 introspective look on gaming churches. And so, different perspectives, different ideas. Mark Lutz,

00:01:17.880 --> 00:01:23.020
 excuse me, once again, mispronounced that guy's name. I've mispronounced it for years. So I'm going to

00:01:23.020 --> 00:01:28.040
 try it again here. Mark Lutz, lead pastor of Lux Digital Church has been on the podcast with us and

00:01:28.040 --> 00:01:32.720
 he's running tech in the background here with the vMix. So we'll bring him on in a second. We've got a

00:01:32.720 --> 00:01:39.160
 great guest today. We're diving in, talking about esports and maybe some of the ministry opportunities

00:01:39.160 --> 00:01:47.300
 that exist within esports. And I've said this publicly many times. I don't understand gaming culture. I am not

00:01:47.300 --> 00:01:53.700
 the expert by any stretch. The last game that I was relative in, that I was actually relevant with,

00:01:53.960 --> 00:02:00.020
 was probably GoldenEye, N64. Yes, it's coming back. Yes, my wife can still beat me up in the game.

00:02:00.100 --> 00:02:04.580
 It's a fact. She's incredible. Sniper Rifle. Beautiful, beautiful stuff. But hey, this is like

00:02:04.580 --> 00:02:10.400
 all this stuff, the Call of Duty, where we are now with gaming, like this is way out of my league. But I have

00:02:10.400 --> 00:02:18.420
 loved being a student in this season and starting to learn more, A, about the culture, but B, how we,

00:02:18.520 --> 00:02:24.280
 the church, can engage in that culture. Maybe a little different. It probably doesn't look like

00:02:24.280 --> 00:02:31.140
 what your typical church and how it engages with the culture in their neighborhood. Some of these

00:02:31.140 --> 00:02:35.680
 things are done a little different in gaming churches compared to what physical churches are.

00:02:35.680 --> 00:02:40.280
 I'm being a little facetious. It looks very different. But the fact is, is that we can reach

00:02:40.280 --> 00:02:49.040
 people in these spaces in different ways. And it is awesome to see God moving, even in amongst gaming

00:02:49.040 --> 00:02:56.360
 culture and nerd culture, as we learned last week with Bubba talking about a love thy nerds. You go

00:02:56.360 --> 00:03:00.780
 check out the Church Digital Podcast, the church that digital slash podcast to get caught up into that

00:03:00.780 --> 00:03:05.940
 and all the awesomeness that's there. But hey, thank you. Those that are watching this live,

00:03:06.000 --> 00:03:13.100
 by the way, we're doing this stream every Thursday live here on Twitch. So if you're listening to the

00:03:13.100 --> 00:03:21.220
 podcast, come into it live, come dive in, be part of what's happening here. Get your questions answered

00:03:21.220 --> 00:03:27.900
 on Twitch. And Pastor, if you don't have a Twitch account, now's the time. Swing over to Twitch TV,

00:03:28.100 --> 00:03:34.400
 create that account, follow the Digital Church Network, get caught up with what we're doing here and maybe start

00:03:34.400 --> 00:03:41.120
 to explore some of the other things and start to explore maybe what engaging and impacting in this gaming

00:03:41.120 --> 00:03:48.820
 culture actually looks like. So, hey, I see we've got some people in the chat. Chino, Mage, Digital Hexicon,

00:03:49.360 --> 00:03:55.580
 FlatCap. It's great to see you all. And so we'll be engaging in some questions, working through this. But hey,

00:03:56.200 --> 00:04:02.440
 Wizard, behind the curtain, I guess it's Mark. Push your magic button and let's bring their other

00:04:02.500 --> 00:04:10.320
 guests on. This is going to be fun. There you go. So before we get into Jono and start to really

00:04:10.320 --> 00:04:16.380
 unpack this, because Mark, this is a different software than what I had last week. Last week,

00:04:16.460 --> 00:04:23.240
 Andy Mage, Chino Mage, ran Ecamm, right? That's what he runs and you're running vMix.

00:04:24.500 --> 00:04:28.540
 Why do you all hate each other so much? Why can't you choose one software? Why does it have to be

00:04:28.540 --> 00:04:29.660
 different softwares?

00:04:32.260 --> 00:04:37.760
 Jono, is Ecamm... Do you know if Ecamm's Mac only? I think it's Mac, isn't it? Or is it not?

00:04:38.640 --> 00:04:42.220
 I have no idea. All this is new to me. I heard there's one called like Vod Ninja or something

00:04:42.220 --> 00:04:47.900
 like that as well. Vod Ninja. I just want to point out that Jeff did not mispronounce my name once

00:04:47.900 --> 00:04:51.140
 today. He mispronounced it twice. Yes!

00:04:51.440 --> 00:04:59.620
 Which is because it's not Lutz or Lutz. It's Lutz. Lutz? Call me here. Let's do it right now. Lutz?

00:04:59.820 --> 00:05:07.400
 Lutz. You got it. Lutz. Lutz. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I just came out of your neck of the woods, Jeff. I was

00:05:07.400 --> 00:05:14.100
 just in Orlando for a week and glad to be back on the show. And yes, today we are using a live streaming

00:05:14.100 --> 00:05:23.420
 software called vMix. It is probably professionally wise. It's like a step above OBS, which is open

00:05:23.420 --> 00:05:27.640
 broadcasting software, which is free to download. You can use it anytime you want. Cowboy Morgan,

00:05:27.740 --> 00:05:34.000
 thank you for the follow. I appreciate you being here. And yeah, so it's a really great piece of

00:05:34.000 --> 00:05:40.000
 software. Once you learn how to use it, it runs entirely off of your GPU. And so we've been using

00:05:40.000 --> 00:05:44.840
 it since I got problems with OBS in the early stages of Lutz. So that's what we're on today.

00:05:45.820 --> 00:05:53.220
 Okay. So evidently, Andy, Chino Mage is saying that he uses vMix as well. Last week was just a

00:05:53.220 --> 00:05:58.700
 throwaway. So who knew? Anyway, this is a new world to me. By the way, it's great to see you,

00:05:58.720 --> 00:06:04.760
 Cowboy Morgan and Mother Goose. Mother Goose. Awesome. Throwback to last week. Enjoyed it.

00:06:05.980 --> 00:06:10.840
 Jono! Am I mispronouncing that? No, you're perfectly fine. We don't have to do a countdown

00:06:10.840 --> 00:06:16.040
 to pronounce it or anything either. You got that right. Okay. All right. So I just want to make

00:06:16.040 --> 00:06:20.740
 sure I don't offend multiple people within the first five minutes. One person's okay. But if it's two,

00:06:20.900 --> 00:06:26.200
 that's probably going to be a problem. Hey, Jono, listen, it's great to have you on the podcast here.

00:06:26.200 --> 00:06:35.140
 And so as a resident expert on esports, man, I'm excited to dig in here and learn a bunch of stuff

00:06:35.140 --> 00:06:41.580
 that I don't know. What I do know is that my kid is very excited about esports. They've got esports

00:06:41.580 --> 00:06:48.220
 in his middle school and starting to do some things. They even want him to open a Discord account. And I'm

00:06:48.220 --> 00:06:52.760
 like, I don't think you're actually old enough to legally have a Discord account. But evidently,

00:06:52.760 --> 00:06:56.140
 your school says it's okay. That's a whole other conversation, maybe for a different day.

00:06:56.360 --> 00:07:01.560
 But start to unpack for me a little bit here. Well, you. Let's talk about you, Jono.

00:07:02.060 --> 00:07:04.980
 Who you are? What are you doing? How'd you get plugged into esports?

00:07:06.100 --> 00:07:10.720
 Yeah. So my name is Jon Merritt. Everybody calls me Jono. My mom started calling me that whenever I

00:07:10.720 --> 00:07:14.900
 was a young kid. And even the president of our university calls me Jono. So I go by Jono

00:07:14.900 --> 00:07:19.360
 online. That's been my gamertag, my username for probably like eight to 10 years now.

00:07:19.760 --> 00:07:23.600
 Before then, well, they were pretty cringe names. So I'm not actually going to name them.

00:07:24.140 --> 00:07:30.880
 But I got into gaming at a young age. I got into esports pretty early on. I really just loved watching

00:07:30.880 --> 00:07:36.600
 Optic as a kid. One of the professional Call of Duty teams just... I would get home from school and

00:07:36.600 --> 00:07:42.240
 every day I would sit and I'd log on and I'd watch... There was one of their early live streams where I'd

00:07:42.240 --> 00:07:45.480
 watch one of their old YouTube videos of them competing against another team. And it just created this

00:07:45.480 --> 00:07:49.700
 desire in me that as someone that was a part of traditional athletics with soccer,

00:07:50.140 --> 00:07:53.880
 that esports actually had a competitive side to it. Gaming had a competitive side to it where you

00:07:53.880 --> 00:07:58.220
 could push the margin and you could figure out a way to master your craft. And so I've always been

00:07:58.220 --> 00:08:02.140
 someone that's taking gaming probably a little bit too seriously. It's been something that I've

00:08:02.140 --> 00:08:06.620
 channeled all of my emotion and all of my being into for many years and returned to it recently

00:08:06.620 --> 00:08:11.720
 to start the esports program, Oklahoma Wrestling University, a little over three years ago.

00:08:11.720 --> 00:08:16.380
 Actually, a little under three years ago, about two and a half now. And it's been interesting.

00:08:16.380 --> 00:08:19.960
 It's been interesting to work in esports, be on the inside, work with a lot of different

00:08:19.960 --> 00:08:23.180
 people of all different backgrounds, and just get connected to something that was once a childhood

00:08:23.180 --> 00:08:28.100
 dream. God ended up opening so many doors to bring it to fruition. So I'm over at Oklahoma

00:08:28.100 --> 00:08:33.060
 Wrestling University. I'm the director of esports there. Recently, over the last semester,

00:08:33.060 --> 00:08:37.820
 the last like four months, five months, I owned a LAN center. So I got to have that whole experience.

00:08:38.260 --> 00:08:41.660
 Since then, I'm not with them anymore. But I'm still working in esports focus primarily.

00:08:41.660 --> 00:08:45.560
 on the collegiate program. And I'm back to creating content and reaching people in the

00:08:45.560 --> 00:08:47.840
 digital space with a competitive flair.

00:08:50.320 --> 00:08:57.900
 Very cool. So let's... Okay, so here's the deal. The Twitch audience, probably... Not probably.

00:08:58.040 --> 00:09:01.120
 I guarantee the Twitch audience is smarter than me in this space.

00:09:01.320 --> 00:09:07.780
 But I need to ask a couple really stupid questions up front because, well, I've got this podcast

00:09:07.780 --> 00:09:12.960
 audience and they're not as educated as on this gaming stuff as maybe some of the others here

00:09:12.960 --> 00:09:17.340
 in the room. So give me some grace, people in the room. I'm going to appreciate this.

00:09:18.120 --> 00:09:20.680
 Hey, define for me what actually esports is.

00:09:21.140 --> 00:09:27.300
 Like, you're doing this out of Oklahoma Wesleyan University. That's awesome. What is it?

00:09:28.360 --> 00:09:32.940
 Yeah. So you have your gaming, which there's about 3.2 billion gamers in the world is what

00:09:32.940 --> 00:09:37.980
 the stats are showing us. And a fraction of that is the competitive side of gaming. So esports,

00:09:38.140 --> 00:09:43.500
 think of it as the competitive branch to the casual just enjoyment of gaming. It's where players are

00:09:43.500 --> 00:09:46.960
 going to come together and they're going to be competing, whether that's in 3v3 in Rocket

00:09:46.960 --> 00:09:52.000
 League, 1v1 in Super Smash Brothers, or 5v5 in Valorant. There's a lot of different titles

00:09:52.000 --> 00:09:56.760
 that we're seeing pop up just over the last 15 to 20 years. A lot of people are probably

00:09:56.760 --> 00:10:01.480
 familiar with Halo. So think games like Halo or games like Call of Duty, where a lot of players

00:10:01.480 --> 00:10:06.400
 from all over are logging in and they're playing online and then they're eventually coming to

00:10:06.400 --> 00:10:09.600
 locations and they're competing in stadiums to play against each other in front of tens of

00:10:09.600 --> 00:10:20.140
 thousands of people. So you're literally running a, like, is this certified? Like what level of

00:10:20.140 --> 00:10:24.840
 recognition is this? NCAA? Like what is this at Oklahoma Wesleyan?

00:10:25.480 --> 00:10:30.000
 The NCAA hasn't actually gotten into the space. It's an interesting market right now,

00:10:30.060 --> 00:10:35.180
 the collegiate esports market. And so what's taking place right now is there's a lot of grassroots

00:10:35.180 --> 00:10:38.620
 movements that are starting, that are starting to get official support from the developers for the

00:10:38.620 --> 00:10:43.260
 games. And they're actually backing these leagues and putting in like an actual system where these

00:10:43.260 --> 00:10:47.760
 different colleges are coming together and they're competing. But the NCAA hasn't gotten into it.

00:10:47.840 --> 00:10:51.460
 We're seeing the NAIA get into it with the Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference, KCAC.

00:10:52.000 --> 00:10:57.420
 And then we're also seeing the ECAC get into it. So there are some traditional governing bodies

00:10:57.420 --> 00:11:01.080
 from traditional sports that are getting into esports, but the NCAA hasn't taken a crack at it yet.

00:11:01.540 --> 00:11:05.380
 From what I understand and what I've heard, they would have to buy out the developers and they would

00:11:05.380 --> 00:11:09.620
 have to spend probably billions of dollars to actually get the rights to be able to broadcast

00:11:09.620 --> 00:11:13.340
 and live stream these matches because there's going to be a ton of sponsorship dollars and a lot of

00:11:13.340 --> 00:11:14.520
 eyeballs on it. So...

00:11:14.520 --> 00:11:23.240
 Fascinating. Okay. So you're running leagues, you know, a step above intramural, unofficial

00:11:23.240 --> 00:11:31.380
 NCAA, but you're running these grassroots leagues through Oklahoma Wesleyan. So you're working with

00:11:31.380 --> 00:11:33.000
 college students.

00:11:33.880 --> 00:11:34.040
 Yeah.

00:11:34.440 --> 00:11:41.700
 Like, are they, oh, this is cool. Let's go, you know, try out for this. Are these, like, ringers that you're

00:11:41.700 --> 00:11:44.000
 recruiting? Like, what is this actually?

00:11:44.880 --> 00:11:50.720
 So in the last year, we had over 200 students try out for us. And basically, it takes on what soccer

00:11:50.720 --> 00:11:54.360
 would look like. So we'll have these online tryouts where students will reach out to me through

00:11:54.360 --> 00:11:57.840
 Discord. They're going to want to try out for one of our different teams, one of our esports that we

00:11:57.840 --> 00:12:02.620
 offer, whether it's Rocket League, whether it's Halo, whether it's Valorant. And then we'll put them in

00:12:02.680 --> 00:12:05.720
 scrimmages. They'll play against each other. And the best players that we want to pick up will

00:12:05.720 --> 00:12:09.840
 actually offer scholarship. It's on par with our traditional athletics. So we have students that

00:12:09.840 --> 00:12:14.080
 are getting a huge portion of their college paid for, just as if they came to our school for

00:12:14.080 --> 00:12:18.900
 basketball. And so then on the weekends, and even on the weeknights, we'll have anywhere from four to

00:12:18.900 --> 00:12:23.140
 eight matches against other colleges and universities in the various esports that we offer.

00:12:24.800 --> 00:12:31.040
 I love this. You're actually, like, scholarship-ing kids to play video

00:12:31.040 --> 00:12:38.460
 games. When did this happen? Forgive me. I don't want to be the old guy. I'm literally

00:12:38.460 --> 00:12:46.920
 the old guy right now. Like, get off my lawn. But no, like, what point did college become

00:12:46.920 --> 00:12:51.460
 scholarship-ing to play video games? Like, how old is this? Or how new is this concept?

00:12:52.200 --> 00:12:57.140
 It's super new. So 2016 was the first year. There was about seven varsity programs.

00:12:57.740 --> 00:13:03.340
 I believe it was 2018. And double-check me on this. 2018, we saw close to 70 varsity programs.

00:13:03.700 --> 00:13:07.480
 And now we're getting close to 100 to 150-plus varsity programs across the nation. That's not

00:13:07.480 --> 00:13:12.680
 even accounting for the clubs that are there. They're trying to get official collegiate support

00:13:12.680 --> 00:13:19.840
 from their institution. Wow. This is amazing. So at the college level, we're seeing a lot of

00:13:19.840 --> 00:13:26.600
 this activity. But like I said, my kids' school, in middle school, they're even starting to recruit

00:13:26.600 --> 00:13:32.480
 and play on. And he's playing... What's the soccer rocket game with the cars? What's it called? Rocket

00:13:32.480 --> 00:13:40.420
 League? Yeah. Like, I see him doing that. And I am horrible. Like, my coordination, I cannot

00:13:40.420 --> 00:13:48.800
 get the car fast hitting the ball. And like, it's ugly when I play that game. But... And so we're even

00:13:48.800 --> 00:13:58.920
 seeing esports drip down to the high school and the middle school level. Like, outside of my son doing

00:13:58.920 --> 00:14:04.240
 this, are there other... Outside of my doing it through school, I should say, are there other places

00:14:04.240 --> 00:14:11.840
 where they can connect? Does esports... Are there places where that connects with middle and high

00:14:11.840 --> 00:14:17.500
 school kids? Not very many. So during my time at Rewind Esports and Broken Arrow, that was actually

00:14:17.500 --> 00:14:22.200
 what we started to seek out to build was youth esports. And so bringing in different college

00:14:22.200 --> 00:14:25.100
 students, I would hire out some of our college students and they would be on staff and they

00:14:25.100 --> 00:14:31.100
 would be coaching one to two teams per week. And so the youth would come in and we'd have teams

00:14:31.100 --> 00:14:36.160
 of different ages competing in different esports. And so there's very few places outside of the

00:14:36.160 --> 00:14:41.100
 traditional school institution that's doing it. So there's about 100 schools, like high schools

00:14:41.100 --> 00:14:45.340
 in Oklahoma that do have esports programs. Middle schools are starting to get into it. I know I was

00:14:45.340 --> 00:14:52.540
 talking with Pastor Savage and his kid's middle school is looking at doing it. I think it's a

00:14:52.540 --> 00:14:57.900
 middle school. And so we're seeing a huge rise at the high school level because what are kids doing

00:14:57.900 --> 00:15:01.240
 nowadays? They're like you said, they're playing video games. They're going home. They're playing

00:15:01.240 --> 00:15:04.840
 Fortnite for six hours. And the beautiful thing is that we can meet them right there where they're

00:15:04.840 --> 00:15:10.000
 at. And we can create these awesome systems, these awesome boundaries, and awesome opportunities

00:15:10.000 --> 00:15:14.380
 that help streamline their path to success. And so no longer is your kid going to be playing Fortnite

00:15:14.380 --> 00:15:17.940
 for eight hours and not doing anything with his life. No, he's going to get picked up by a college

00:15:17.940 --> 00:15:22.000
 team and he's probably going to get close to 30% to 100% off his college.

00:15:24.400 --> 00:15:30.960
 So, I mean, that's such an interesting... So really, I should let my son play eight to 12 hours a day

00:15:30.960 --> 00:15:36.900
 on Fortnite. But by the way, it's funny. I actually... If you look up deerfedge on Fortnite,

00:15:37.020 --> 00:15:41.460
 my son's actually created a pretty decent account for me because I created the account because I used

00:15:41.460 --> 00:15:46.800
 to play it once or twice a year and was very passive. And he wanted to play, so I just gave him my

00:15:46.800 --> 00:15:52.800
 account. And at least I'm told he's done good. You guys can look me up and tell me I suck. That's

00:15:52.800 --> 00:15:58.980
 okay. By the way, hey, Ninja in the room. Great to see you. Pastor Des, good to see you as well. If

00:15:58.980 --> 00:16:08.460
 there's questions, feel free to throw them in the chat as we're hanging out here. Is the in-game

00:16:08.460 --> 00:16:15.420
 of esports, is it to get the professional scholarship? Is that why I want my kid playing

00:16:15.420 --> 00:16:21.580
 these video games? Is there other connection points that are helpful? As we're just really,

00:16:21.580 --> 00:16:26.220
 once again, I'm trying to get the basics of esports here. Yeah. Talk to me a little bit

00:16:26.220 --> 00:16:30.940
 where we're going. I would say that's the most stable in-game right now. We're actually seeing

00:16:30.940 --> 00:16:34.560
 a lot of layoffs and a lot of hiring freezes in the pro scene. They're trying to figure out their

00:16:34.560 --> 00:16:38.360
 model as to what's going to be effective for the business side of things. Right now, they're running

00:16:38.360 --> 00:16:42.380
 the traditional sponsorship model that you see like football and a lot of the different sports

00:16:42.380 --> 00:16:46.960
 running where you're slapping the logo on the billboard and just advertising as people are watching

00:16:46.960 --> 00:16:52.640
 the matches. And that hasn't driven enough revenue to sustain paying for these expensive

00:16:52.640 --> 00:16:56.720
 esports teams yet. And so what you're saying is you're seeing companies like 100 Thieves start

00:16:56.720 --> 00:17:00.720
 to build out companies that are sub companies of the actual entertainment organization, like

00:17:00.720 --> 00:17:04.080
 they're building out a keyboard company right now. And that's what's going to be funding the future

00:17:04.080 --> 00:17:09.760
 of esports. And so I would say the collegiate scene, if there's a... There needs to be a massive

00:17:09.760 --> 00:17:15.260
 connection point between traditional boards of administration at universities and healthy leaders

00:17:15.260 --> 00:17:19.740
 in the esports industry that are able to meet halfway to create successful programs.

00:17:19.740 --> 00:17:25.980
 I would say we're probably five to 10 years out from proper staffing and proper structure being

00:17:25.980 --> 00:17:30.700
 put into the collegiate space before it really starts to see some traction and where things start to just

00:17:31.580 --> 00:17:34.620
 get to the level of football and basketball and the other sports that you see.

00:17:34.620 --> 00:17:39.260
 And the major disconnection point right now, I think, is just a lack of understanding. But there's

00:17:39.260 --> 00:17:44.140
 a lot of people that are bridging that gap right now. We're seeing a lot of awesome business owners and

00:17:44.140 --> 00:17:48.700
 obviously at my university, we're seeing boards that are starting to see the value in it. And so

00:17:48.700 --> 00:17:53.340
 over the next couple of years, as more and more students get to it, and then I think as more of

00:17:53.340 --> 00:17:58.380
 the kids and grandkids, that's their primary thing that grandparents and parents are seeing their kids

00:17:58.380 --> 00:18:02.940
 interested in. The world that we create is the backyard that our kids are going to play in. It's the backyard

00:18:02.940 --> 00:18:07.660
 that our kids are going to grow up in. And so now we're creating these boundaries and these institutions,

00:18:07.660 --> 00:18:13.260
 and we're supporting these. And I think we're about five to 10 years out from a healthy industry.

00:18:13.260 --> 00:18:19.820
 Wow. So Christian Ninja, XGN Ninja, forgive me, I have no idea how to pronounce that. But hey,

00:18:19.820 --> 00:18:24.860
 it's good to see. I'm used to seeing you on Twitch or Twitter. E-sports in chat right now. E-sports

00:18:24.860 --> 00:18:32.780
 is far more popular to watch than NFL, NHL, NBA among young men and women, 17 to 25.

00:18:34.540 --> 00:18:38.140
 Is there Christian Ninja? Hey, we're all good with that. Thanks for that. I didn't want to be like,

00:18:38.140 --> 00:18:44.700
 "Hey, I got Ninja," because that would be a completely different guy. So talk to me. Are

00:18:44.700 --> 00:18:48.300
 we seeing that? Is there legitimacy in that stat? I don't want to call out Christian Ninja here

00:18:48.300 --> 00:18:51.260
 publicly, but that's some big,

00:18:51.260 --> 00:18:57.820
 big, big shoes, topping the NFL, NBA, NHL. Who cares about NHL? But the other two are kind of

00:18:57.820 --> 00:19:02.780
 big, right? And so e-sports is bigger than that? Yeah, e-sports is bigger than that. I mean,

00:19:02.780 --> 00:19:07.260
 it's global and football is only here in North America where it's super duper popular. And so

00:19:07.260 --> 00:19:11.100
 the amount of eyes that are getting on these tournaments is insane. And I think it's because

00:19:11.100 --> 00:19:15.580
 of the low cost to entry, whether it's like monetarily or even physically. And so you're

00:19:15.580 --> 00:19:20.380
 going to see so many more people playing video games and engaging with the content there because

00:19:20.380 --> 00:19:24.780
 they're closer to being able to enjoy that lifestyle as opposed to being in the NFL and

00:19:24.780 --> 00:19:29.340
 maybe not meeting the physical requirements to be in the NFL. And so it's a lot easier to get

00:19:29.340 --> 00:19:32.620
 into the pro scene, to get into gaming. And it's kind of like a gold rush that we're seeing right

00:19:32.620 --> 00:19:37.660
 now. And so I think a lot of what drives the popularity of e-sports is one, it's an escape that

00:19:37.660 --> 00:19:41.660
 a lot of people will go to on the casual gaming side. And so they want to learn how to do stuff.

00:19:41.660 --> 00:19:45.740
 But two, it's also something that's not far off. It's something that's

00:19:46.300 --> 00:19:49.740
 potentially possible for anybody to blow up. As you see on social media, it's

00:19:49.740 --> 00:19:53.340
 anybody can really just win the luck of the draw just because they're entertaining and they're funny.

00:19:53.340 --> 00:19:57.820
 I see a lot of like TikTok channels of there. This is one that keeps popping up and it's like

00:19:57.820 --> 00:20:01.900
 this like Call of Duty grandma and she just logs on and has a couple hundred people that are watching

00:20:01.900 --> 00:20:05.500
 her and she's playing Call of Duty. She's a grandma. She's doing it full time. So anybody can get into this

00:20:05.500 --> 00:20:10.140
 space with gaming and it's not too far off from e-sports. And so people want to see what the

00:20:10.140 --> 00:20:14.380
 top of the cream of the crop is doing and what they're competing in. And it's nowhere near as

00:20:14.380 --> 00:20:18.380
 popular over here in the West as it is in the East. It's blowing up over there in the East.

00:20:18.380 --> 00:20:22.700
 I mean, it's been insanely popular. It's not even blowing up. It's crazy.

00:20:24.860 --> 00:20:33.420
 Mark, Jeff, I just did a really super quick search just to get an idea and how legitimate

00:20:33.420 --> 00:20:39.260
 this is or not. But one of the first statistics that came up doing a quick search is that in the

00:20:39.260 --> 00:20:45.660
 end of 2021, they projected that e-sports was the second most popular sport in the country,

00:20:45.660 --> 00:20:54.380
 second only to the NFL at about 84 million fans versus the NFL at 1.41 million and the MLB being

00:20:54.380 --> 00:21:00.860
 at 79 million. And that is just here in the United States. That's not counting your global audience.

00:21:02.140 --> 00:21:07.100
 One of the sort of claim to fame of e-sports in general for quite a while was that it was actually

00:21:07.100 --> 00:21:15.740
 substantially larger in viewership and fans than several of the largest professional sports

00:21:15.740 --> 00:21:22.620
 organizations and tournaments or whatever combined them. And they weren't equaling what e-sports was

00:21:22.620 --> 00:21:28.300
 doing. So this isn't something that's brand new or a flash in the pan. It's not just growing,

00:21:28.300 --> 00:21:34.460
 but it's growing steadily. It's expanding steadily. And it's gaining the traction for the church's world

00:21:34.460 --> 00:21:39.340
 to look at this. It's gaining the attention and the traction with the next generation in a way that

00:21:39.340 --> 00:21:44.940
 professional sports, traditional professional sports is not. Where you're seeing younger and

00:21:44.940 --> 00:21:50.300
 younger people who are consistently less and less interested not only with playing, but also with

00:21:50.300 --> 00:21:55.740
 viewing professional sports, traditional professional sports. And we're seeing an increase in the desire

00:21:55.740 --> 00:22:01.420
 for watching professional e-sports. And not only that, but you're seeing them want to do both.

00:22:01.420 --> 00:22:08.700
 I was literally sitting with a man in Florida this past week. I think his stepson is going into high

00:22:08.700 --> 00:22:12.700
 school right now and he's kind of deciding what sports he wants to play. And his dad said,

00:22:12.700 --> 00:22:20.300
 yeah, but he also really loves gaming. And so it's not just either or, there's a lot of people who are

00:22:20.300 --> 00:22:27.100
 sort of into both because they have the competitive edge and e-sports and competing digitally in video

00:22:27.100 --> 00:22:34.540
 games is scratching the same part of the brain in many ways as the competitive aspect of the physical

00:22:34.540 --> 00:22:40.460
 sports that they're playing as well. And my question really for John that I'd love to dive into a

00:22:40.460 --> 00:22:47.100
 a little bit as we're in a series right now, Jesus, Gamers and Church. All of the other aspects of

00:22:47.100 --> 00:22:50.940
 what we're going to talk about, ministering to nerd culture, digital church expressions,

00:22:50.940 --> 00:22:55.180
 digital missionaries, we can see the immediate alignment between what the church wants to do

00:22:55.180 --> 00:23:01.420
 and what we're seeing happening in this gaming space. But e-sports, sure, I understand. Maybe your

00:23:01.420 --> 00:23:07.660
 church buys some Xboxes. That's what we did before. And yeah, churches really don't have anything to do with

00:23:07.660 --> 00:23:12.300
 the NBA, but we have upwards basketball in my community and kids can sign up to go play intramural

00:23:12.300 --> 00:23:17.500
 basketball. So I sort of get that. But how does this intersect with faith, spirituality, and the

00:23:17.500 --> 00:23:22.140
 church? You're working for a Christian school and running an e-sports program. So how does the

00:23:22.140 --> 00:23:26.300
 the spiritual aspect, the lives of your players and what you're doing intersect with, you know,

00:23:26.300 --> 00:23:29.100
 professionally and competitively, the e-sports stuff that you're doing?

00:23:29.100 --> 00:23:34.620
 Yeah, 100%. So that's actually something that I've been trying to figure out is how directly,

00:23:34.620 --> 00:23:39.340
 at least at the pro level, can you intersect Christianity into it? And do we build a professional

00:23:39.340 --> 00:23:42.860
 Christian e-sports organization? I don't know. We don't really have a professional football team

00:23:42.860 --> 00:23:46.540
 that's only for Christians to join. And so I've been trying to think through that

00:23:46.540 --> 00:23:52.220
 over the last couple of years. At the collegiate level, it's great because it's easy to get people

00:23:52.220 --> 00:23:55.740
 across the country from all sorts of different walks of life and gathered in one place because

00:23:55.740 --> 00:23:59.340
 they're on scholarship, they're traveling here. Normally, you can't just move a whole bunch of

00:23:59.340 --> 00:24:04.460
 people to come together and play video games together every single day for a cheap dollar sign.

00:24:04.460 --> 00:24:09.740
 And not that college is cheap, but it's probably the most societally accepted way to do that.

00:24:10.460 --> 00:24:16.620
 And so, I mean, we had every single Monday, 6:30 in the morning at a coffee shop, all of my captains,

00:24:16.620 --> 00:24:20.620
 we have a Bible study, we'd spend time in the Word, we'd read through a Psalm, and then we'd read

00:24:20.620 --> 00:24:24.540
 through a proverb, or sorry, we'd read through a proverb, and then we'd read through a parable.

00:24:24.540 --> 00:24:27.740
 And we would just sit there and talk about that. We'd have like an hour and a half session,

00:24:27.740 --> 00:24:32.860
 just an awesome Bible study. And so I think that with traditional sports, what you see,

00:24:32.860 --> 00:24:37.740
 the it's so weird, because like, it's something that takes place natural, it's not something that

00:24:37.740 --> 00:24:41.740
 I'm thinking, like, how do I, like, I do think through like, how do I have these healthy conversations

00:24:41.740 --> 00:24:45.740
 about Christ, because he's my Lord and Savior with my players, but it's not something that I'm like,

00:24:45.740 --> 00:24:50.060
 all right, I'm evangelizing my players, like, I don't, it just sounds weird for me to like,

00:24:50.860 --> 00:24:55.980
 I guess, say that out loud. But with my players, it really comes down to the relationship,

00:24:55.980 --> 00:24:59.820
 and just the conversations that are taking place. And you see that in the traditional sports world. I mean,

00:24:59.820 --> 00:25:04.700
 you look at, you look at Tim Tebow in football, you look at college football players, there's always

00:25:04.700 --> 00:25:08.700
 guys in Bible studies, there's FCA, things like that that are going on. And I think that those are

00:25:08.700 --> 00:25:14.380
 the best ways to intersect Christianity into the space. It's like gaming and sports are the fun

00:25:14.380 --> 00:25:18.460
 thing that people are coming to college for. But what's like the substance? What's actually going to

00:25:18.460 --> 00:25:22.540
 make you a better person? What's going to transform your life and help you to develop these skills and

00:25:22.540 --> 00:25:27.180
 these lifestyle patterns that are actually going to impact other people for the glory of God?

00:25:27.180 --> 00:25:31.180
 And so that's the beautiful thing is that we are a Christian institution. We do have chapel,

00:25:31.180 --> 00:25:35.980
 all the professors here are believers. And so for me, I see this as like an awesome opportunity

00:25:35.980 --> 00:25:39.980
 to bring people here from all sorts of walks of life where they can ask questions, they can actually

00:25:39.980 --> 00:25:43.820
 build authentic relationships with people, and they can go deep. And then they are presented with

00:25:43.820 --> 00:25:49.500
 the gospel in a way that's grace-filled and truth-filled that aligns with the scriptures. And then we can

00:25:49.500 --> 00:25:53.820
 send them out into the world. And so I kind of see this as like a training ground at the collegiate level

00:25:54.300 --> 00:26:00.140
 or a discipleship place where authentic discipleship can happen. And not all of my players are believers.

00:26:00.140 --> 00:26:08.620
 And so it's probably 50-50 on campus, I would say here, maybe even like 60-40. But the one thing that

00:26:08.620 --> 00:26:13.500
 I do love about my university is that we give people a chance to ask questions. And like I said,

00:26:13.500 --> 00:26:19.340
 it's not fire and brimstone, but it doesn't cheap away at the truth, the hard truths of the gospel.

00:26:20.060 --> 00:26:24.860
 But it's just about building relationships. And I think that's one thing that we tend to take

00:26:24.860 --> 00:26:30.140
 for granted when it comes to the Great Commission, is it's not like, it's while you were going,

00:26:30.140 --> 00:26:36.300
 make disciples. So whatever it is that you're doing, are you living in a way that you're presenting

00:26:36.300 --> 00:26:39.260
 Christ to other people through your actions, through loving God and loving your neighbor?

00:26:39.260 --> 00:26:42.460
 And so that's what I see esports as. This is another avenue to do that.

00:26:44.620 --> 00:26:48.300
 You could do that if you were a chef. You could do that if you were an owner of a restaurant.

00:26:49.180 --> 00:26:57.900
 I would imagine though, and I don't want to over-speak here, but an esports college student,

00:26:57.900 --> 00:27:01.980
 like that guy's got, or that girl, they got to be like a rock star.

00:27:01.980 --> 00:27:08.540
 I mean, they're literally getting money from a university for playing a video game.

00:27:08.540 --> 00:27:13.180
 Like, this is what everybody else is doing in their dorm rooms at a non-professional level.

00:27:13.180 --> 00:27:19.340
 And these are people that are actually a step closer than everybody else towards being that.

00:27:19.340 --> 00:27:22.700
 Like, are there, is this rock star status or am I over-speak here?

00:27:22.700 --> 00:27:27.420
 Yeah. So I have a player who is, I feel confident. He has some buddies that he teams with. I feel

00:27:27.420 --> 00:27:30.780
 confident saying that we have the best player in all of Latin America. That's at our university.

00:27:31.340 --> 00:27:36.620
 Um, his name is Lennon Mateo and he's, I think he'll make it pro before he ends up graduating.

00:27:37.180 --> 00:27:43.340
 Um, what ended up happening was recently he played in a league for Valor at VCT Latin America and they

00:27:43.340 --> 00:27:47.980
 beat out. And this is something that like, I'm still trying to grasp. They beat out all of the

00:27:47.980 --> 00:27:52.060
 other teams in Latin America and they're graduating into this league that's called the Ascension League.

00:27:52.060 --> 00:27:55.500
 And so if they end up winning this league, then they end up going to the franchise level,

00:27:55.500 --> 00:27:59.660
 which is the highest level against the highest teams. And so he won player the match for that,

00:27:59.660 --> 00:28:04.220
 that specific match and got interviewed in front of 1500 people on stream. Uh, this was about two

00:28:04.220 --> 00:28:10.220
 weeks ago. And so not only is he competing to go pro he's that good while he's in college. Um,

00:28:10.220 --> 00:28:14.300
 but he's, he's, I would say one of the best players, if not the best player in all of collegiate

00:28:14.300 --> 00:28:18.060
 esports. So we're really blessed to have him on our Valorant team. Uh, he's an awesome guy.

00:28:18.060 --> 00:28:22.140
 He's traveled all the way here from the Dominican Republic. And, uh, yeah, so that's the level of

00:28:22.140 --> 00:28:28.060
 players that are getting into the collegiate space. And so, and this, this may be crass,

00:28:28.060 --> 00:28:33.500
 so forgive me, but, but that's, that's a huge opportunity. I mean, you've, you've got the,

00:28:33.500 --> 00:28:40.220
 the Pele of, of, uh, e-sports at your school. And so the, the opportunity, yeah,

00:28:40.220 --> 00:28:44.780
 I just dated myself Pele rock with it, work with it, make it work. Okay. Uh, but, but the,

00:28:44.780 --> 00:28:51.340
 the fact of, Hey, if, if we could figure out how to get these people to leverage their influence for

00:28:51.340 --> 00:28:57.020
 the kingdom, to, to have this guy, the greatest e-sports player in all of Latin America to be able

00:28:57.020 --> 00:29:02.220
 to, to connect in. And I don't want to put this guy on, on a pedestal that that's unattainable,

00:29:02.220 --> 00:29:08.060
 but even just within his circle of influence that's happening naturally as a, because of

00:29:08.060 --> 00:29:13.580
 what he's doing. I'm having the same conversation with, with, with bankers, with soccer moms, with,

00:29:13.580 --> 00:29:19.820
 with everyday people. Like do that discipleship, do that relationship, do that sharing of who Jesus

00:29:19.820 --> 00:29:24.540
 is and what he's done in your life, regardless of that position. It just seems to me that

00:29:25.100 --> 00:29:32.220
 an e-sports personnel, uh, would have a larger circle of influence than maybe the average typical

00:29:32.220 --> 00:29:37.260
 college student. Like, does that make sense? Or would that resonate with, with some of these kids

00:29:37.260 --> 00:29:37.740
 that are Christians?

00:29:37.740 --> 00:29:41.900
 A hundred percent. And I think that, uh, what we see in the pro scene is there's a lot of people

00:29:41.900 --> 00:29:47.020
 behind the scenes that are Christians that do have big platforms where thousands, 10 thousands,

00:29:47.020 --> 00:29:52.620
 a hundred thousand people see them, uh, on camera every day. And they aren't open about their faith

00:29:52.620 --> 00:29:58.460
 on their broadcast or like in the public eye because they, I'll be honest, there's just not enough

00:29:58.460 --> 00:30:05.100
 connection between the capital C church and the e-sports space yet. And so I think if there were

00:30:05.100 --> 00:30:09.420
 more institutions that were behind these people, that would help them to know that they can go into

00:30:09.420 --> 00:30:13.580
 these spaces and be a little bit more bold with the light that God's given them. And it's a learning

00:30:13.580 --> 00:30:17.420
 experience too, because some of these people do get saved while they're at the top in the e-sports

00:30:17.420 --> 00:30:22.860
 industry. Um, from my player, Lennon, for example, uh, he gives God credit for the, the opportunity

00:30:22.860 --> 00:30:28.220
 that he's here. He's very, very, very humble. Um, he's worked incredibly hard. He's just now

00:30:28.220 --> 00:30:31.660
 graduating from high school. He was the salutatorian for his academy there in the Dominican Republic,

00:30:31.660 --> 00:30:36.460
 4.0 student and, um, almost a professional Valorant player. I believe he'll hit it here in the next year.

00:30:36.460 --> 00:30:41.340
 So, uh, there are guys that are in, you know, your TSM's, your phase, uh, that are behind

00:30:41.340 --> 00:30:45.180
 the scenes, they're believers and they're open. They're, they're in fellowship, uh, but coming together

00:30:45.180 --> 00:30:51.020
 and meeting these people. And maybe it isn't even like we create a content team that has Christian

00:30:51.020 --> 00:30:55.420
 professionals on it. Maybe it's just like, they need guys in these spaces that are just pouring

00:30:55.420 --> 00:31:00.060
 into them behind the scenes. So that way they can go out in the public eye and be that Tim Tebow in

00:31:00.060 --> 00:31:07.340
 the, in the Christian as a Christian in the e-sports space. So, but what a great parallel with the,

00:31:07.340 --> 00:31:11.660
 with the Tim Tebow. I mean, cause that that's, I mean, the guy that's that, you know, stands up in

00:31:11.660 --> 00:31:16.460
 front of the press and is like, I will never do that again. And just in how he was able to,

00:31:16.460 --> 00:31:21.420
 to leverage that and then leverage his Christian influence towards that. It's beautiful. Horrible

00:31:21.420 --> 00:31:26.940
 professional football player, but man, could he figure out how to leverage his college influence,

00:31:26.940 --> 00:31:31.500
 uh, for the kingdom? And he played baseball too, right? That didn't go very well as I recall either.

00:31:31.500 --> 00:31:36.300
 So, Hey, uh, so there's, there's a bootstrap, uh, by the way, Hey Viola, uh, thanks for,

00:31:36.300 --> 00:31:41.260
 thanks for the follow. Uh, bootstraps got it, got a question. Uh, do you see the presence of gaming

00:31:41.260 --> 00:31:46.780
 and campus ministry useful to reach out to more students? Um, and, and what he's talking about

00:31:46.780 --> 00:31:53.900
 here is actually like, I think cross campuses, um, like the ability to connect from one campus to the

00:31:53.900 --> 00:32:00.300
 other. I was actually thinking within the one university, but what, what, what are the relationships

00:32:00.300 --> 00:32:05.580
 that look like within the leagues that you're operating among the multiple universities?

00:32:07.020 --> 00:32:11.820
 Yeah. I don't know the specific, um, scenario in the specific university bootstraps. I'll be,

00:32:11.820 --> 00:32:16.220
 I'll be a hundred percent honest. There's, I saw a tweet and it was talking about, uh, just,

00:32:16.220 --> 00:32:20.460
 it was, it was over a hundred coaches and directors that are in the same position that I'm in, um,

00:32:20.460 --> 00:32:26.380
 that they're working 90 hours a week, um, even at some of these Christian institutions and they're,

00:32:26.380 --> 00:32:29.100
 they're burnt out. They're quitting after two years. And a

00:32:29.100 --> 00:32:33.340
 a lot of it's because the lack of understanding of the space. Um, I think that there's a lot of,

00:32:34.380 --> 00:32:37.820
 like I said, a lot of connection points that need to happen between not even just Christian

00:32:37.820 --> 00:32:43.820
 university boards, um, but also boards, uh, on, you know, on, I hate these words, secular,

00:32:43.820 --> 00:32:49.740
 but just, just regular campuses. And so if we can come in and maybe create some e-sports chaplains,

00:32:49.740 --> 00:32:55.340
 um, and then also properly staff out these programs, um, and that's, that's really what

00:32:55.340 --> 00:33:00.540
 it's going to take. So I would say that, uh, any decline that you're seeing is probably due to a

00:33:00.540 --> 00:33:07.740
 lack of understanding between just the generational gap, um, that the people that are being hired out

00:33:07.740 --> 00:33:12.380
 to build these programs out or build these clubs out aren't properly supported by the institution

00:33:12.380 --> 00:33:18.860
 yet. And I say yet, because I am hopeful for it. Um, you know, I've, I've been very blessed

00:33:18.860 --> 00:33:24.300
 to have my live stream into if ran this e-sports company for a season. And so I'm not in the

00:33:24.300 --> 00:33:28.140
 collegiate e-sports space to make money. I'm in it because I believe God's called me to be here.

00:33:28.140 --> 00:33:32.620
 Now I would love to financially do this full-time. Uh, and there's a lot of people that do want to

00:33:32.620 --> 00:33:35.980
 see this happen and see the threat because it is perfect for the, for the next generation.

00:33:35.980 --> 00:33:40.140
 And that's really what it's got to be about is how can we meet the next generation where they're at.

00:33:40.140 --> 00:33:44.700
 And I think if we continue to push that conversation, then people are going to be much more open to

00:33:44.700 --> 00:33:48.940
 innovating and investing in this space because it isn't a cheap thing to start a brand new collegiate

00:33:48.940 --> 00:33:53.660
 e-sports program. I mean, if you want to build a program that's like top level, um, or like

00:33:53.660 --> 00:33:57.740
 medium to top level, it's going to cost you between 50 and 150,000 to start that

00:33:57.740 --> 00:34:02.940
 that, get that going. But that's not going to cost you 10 million like it would to start a

00:34:02.940 --> 00:34:07.580
 football program to build this field. Um, and, uh, and to, you know, dig all these different things

00:34:07.580 --> 00:34:11.740
 and put all these different things in place that need to happen for any other sort of traditional,

00:34:11.740 --> 00:34:16.620
 uh, sports program. So I'd be interested to connect with you and maybe we can figure out

00:34:16.620 --> 00:34:23.180
 how to, how to help that campus. Uh, but I would say the, the number of gamers is on the incline

00:34:23.180 --> 00:34:27.340
 and, uh, there, there's constantly more people that are getting into gaming and it's, it's designed

00:34:27.340 --> 00:34:31.980
 to get people into it from the way that they code the games, the way that they reward you inside the

00:34:31.980 --> 00:34:40.060
 game. And so people need to have a healthy leadership, um, and healthy time management

00:34:40.060 --> 00:34:44.380
 skills and in order to succeed in this space, it's not an easy space to succeed in. So.

00:34:44.380 --> 00:34:51.980
 I totally can appreciate that. Um, let me ask this. What, what's the job profile for a gamer,

00:34:51.980 --> 00:34:58.060
 um, chaplain, uh, in e-sports chaplain, what do you need? What are you looking for? What are some

00:34:58.060 --> 00:35:02.140
 character traits? Like, like, tell me, uh, tell me how to solve this problem.

00:35:03.020 --> 00:35:07.980
 Yeah, a hundred percent. Um, I think someone that's able to be bivocational and move to the area of the

00:35:07.980 --> 00:35:12.700
 campus, if they're not already there, uh, would be awesome. Someone that can just be around the guys

00:35:12.700 --> 00:35:17.500
 in the afternoons during practice, um, and be a positive influence for them. Uh, thankfully,

00:35:17.500 --> 00:35:22.620
 I've been blessed. I've had probably four guys that have just volunteered their time, uh, to help

00:35:22.620 --> 00:35:27.980
 be with my players. So that way I'm not there living in the, in the e-sports arena all the time,

00:35:27.980 --> 00:35:31.980
 but they're also there helping be a positive Christlike influence in my guys' life. And so

00:35:32.540 --> 00:35:38.140
 some, there, there needs to be connection there. I think with the local church, uh, to, to create

00:35:38.140 --> 00:35:43.420
 chaplains as I guarantee all the youth pastors, all the different pastors are probably gaming and

00:35:43.420 --> 00:35:47.580
 they have youth kids that are gaming. So I actually just had a denomination reach out to me and their

00:35:47.580 --> 00:35:51.740
 entire district in this area of the United States wants to host an e-sports tournament, like here in

00:35:51.740 --> 00:35:57.660
 my city. And so I have a call with them next week about that. So I don't, maybe we can figure it out.

00:35:57.660 --> 00:36:02.460
 I don't know what it looks like what's on the traditional sports side. Um, but as a chaplain,

00:36:02.460 --> 00:36:08.140
 look like, and then maybe I can help. Yeah. What do you know in terms of traditional sports,

00:36:08.140 --> 00:36:14.060
 Jeff? Yeah. Like, uh, I'll, I'll just be honest. Like my, my lead pastor growing up was actually the,

00:36:14.060 --> 00:36:19.420
 the chaplain for the Miami dolphins. And so like, he did have a nine to five job. He was a pastor

00:36:19.420 --> 00:36:24.860
 somewhere else. Uh, but he, you know, and, and what it did for him was it got him, you know,

00:36:24.860 --> 00:36:30.860
 really good seats. Uh, he would leave church and go straight to the orange bowl, you know,

00:36:30.860 --> 00:36:36.380
 decades ago where the dolphins were playing at the time. Uh, and, and, but he was, was very involved

00:36:36.380 --> 00:36:42.940
 in the community around that, knew the players, knew the team. Um, and so was able to, to step in

00:36:42.940 --> 00:36:47.980
 from, from a bivocational standpoint. And, you know, Andy's asking or Chino's asking how, how does,

00:36:47.980 --> 00:36:52.540
 how does existing churches get on board with this? And, and, and I'm like, well, there's,

00:36:52.540 --> 00:36:57.820
 there's no shortage of pastors that are around. Uh, and, and some of them might be looking for that,

00:36:57.820 --> 00:37:01.740
 that extra thing. And you're not, you probably don't have the budget to pay full-time, but you,

00:37:01.740 --> 00:37:05.660
 you know, probably would have a budget to pay something. And then, and then you're, you're

00:37:05.660 --> 00:37:11.020
 modifying the relationship, the coaching, the discipleship. You're part as the, as the leader,

00:37:11.020 --> 00:37:16.620
 you're part of that, but you're not the, the end all to that. You've got someone that's walking

00:37:16.620 --> 00:37:22.300
 alongside. Um, it's, it's funny, like even just being the guy that works with a lot of digital

00:37:22.300 --> 00:37:27.100
 pastors, I can think of a lot of digital pastors that would be interested in an opportunity like

00:37:27.100 --> 00:37:34.780
 that. They may need to get more equipped in, in the, in the gaming space and in the vernacular and

00:37:34.780 --> 00:37:39.260
 understanding. But I mean, that's being humble and understanding you got something to learn.

00:37:39.260 --> 00:37:44.460
 So that, that's not even a big deal. Hey Mark, let me, let me ask you, did, do you have, uh,

00:37:44.460 --> 00:37:50.540
 like anybody in your church that's active in, in e-sports? Have you wrestled with, you know,

00:37:50.540 --> 00:37:56.620
 anything like e-sports and how to minister and reach into that? Like what, as a, as a gamer church,

00:37:56.620 --> 00:38:05.180
 I'm just wondering how much e-sports is on your radar. Yeah. I mean, gaming is such a wide swath,

00:38:05.180 --> 00:38:11.500
 right? It, and I think that a lot of times people who are not part of gaming culture don't think of it

00:38:11.500 --> 00:38:16.220
 that way. Um, I'm, I'm John, I'm sure you've had that experience, right? Where there's, there's just

00:38:16.220 --> 00:38:23.660
 like a very, um, uh, singular definition and understanding of what a gamer is. And, uh,

00:38:23.660 --> 00:38:30.540
 and people don't understand the nuances between genres of games and type of gamers and what people

00:38:30.540 --> 00:38:37.660
 are into. And it is, it is so ridiculously vast. Um, John shared a statistic right here in the

00:38:37.660 --> 00:38:42.220
 beginning of 3.2 billion gamers in the world. I think you probably shared that, uh, I think in

00:38:42.220 --> 00:38:46.700
 the pilot episode or episode one of this show, you know, roughly double the number of Christians on

00:38:46.700 --> 00:38:52.780
 the planet. Um, and that is as a staggering statistic. So to answer your question, Jeff,

00:38:52.780 --> 00:38:57.980
 we're not thinking really heavily about e-sports. I know that there are organizations that are on

00:38:57.980 --> 00:39:04.060
 Twitch who are Christians who are. Um, and, but when we think about this, we think when I think,

00:39:04.060 --> 00:39:09.100
 I think about like a spiritual guidance, right? In general, as a church, like how are we coming

00:39:09.100 --> 00:39:14.380
 alongside of a tremendous number of people who've been hurt by the church, pushed out by the church,

00:39:14.380 --> 00:39:19.500
 been told that their hobby and their interests are stupid and wastes of time and really don't have any

00:39:19.500 --> 00:39:24.060
 desire at all to step through the doors of the church. And that's kind of one of our hearts is like,

00:39:24.060 --> 00:39:28.780
 how do we reach that individual, right? The disillusioned, um, and the de-churched.

00:39:28.780 --> 00:39:32.700
 And then the other side of that for us is really content because video games isn't,

00:39:32.700 --> 00:39:38.780
 you know, it is e-sports and there is competition, but content creators, authors, writers, um,

00:39:38.780 --> 00:39:44.860
 you know, bloggers, uh, streamers, YouTubers, how do we come alongside of people like that?

00:39:44.860 --> 00:39:49.740
 And that is a little bit more, my Ben is someone who enjoys making content and podcasting and

00:39:49.740 --> 00:39:54.620
 streaming, um, to come alongside of people like that. So we don't do a tremendous amount with

00:39:54.620 --> 00:39:59.980
 e-sports. We don't, I, to my knowledge, I don't think we have anybody in our community who's like

00:39:59.980 --> 00:40:06.380
 a competitive e-sports player. The one person who is in my community is a professional soccer player.

00:40:06.380 --> 00:40:11.740
 Um, but that is obviously not e-sports. And so, uh, we don't really do a lot in the e-sports.

00:40:11.740 --> 00:40:14.140
 And so as John is talking about this stuff, it was like, man,

00:40:14.140 --> 00:40:19.420
 really interesting to see because in many ways, you know, you're kind of still on the spear tip of

00:40:19.420 --> 00:40:24.380
 this, right? Because the, in so many ways, the people who own the keys to the kingdom,

00:40:24.380 --> 00:40:29.500
 which really are like the vaults, right? The money vaults to pour out the financial resources

00:40:29.500 --> 00:40:34.140
 consistently and continually pour out those resources on things that they can understand

00:40:34.140 --> 00:40:37.420
 and wrap their minds around. And those things are often things, the collegiate level,

00:40:37.420 --> 00:40:41.900
 like football and baseball and basketball and softball and volleyball and things of that nature.

00:40:41.900 --> 00:40:46.220
 And so there's a lot of people who I think are saying, okay, we're understanding it. There's,

00:40:46.220 --> 00:40:53.020
 there's students who want to come to our school to play video games. Like, let's wave some money at it.

00:40:53.020 --> 00:40:58.140
 Like it's going to be almost for you. It's kind of like a joking amount, right? Of money at it. But

00:40:58.140 --> 00:41:02.620
 you're like, Hey, you're giving me the opportunity to step into this world. I think that's amazing

00:41:02.620 --> 00:41:08.220
 and super cool and really encouraging. But from everything that we're seeing statistically across

00:41:08.220 --> 00:41:14.540
 culture that isn't, that isn't becoming less anytime soon, that's only projected to grow and increase.

00:41:14.540 --> 00:41:20.380
 Yeah. A hundred percent. And, um, so I'll kind of give you an idea of what it looks like to start

00:41:20.380 --> 00:41:26.380
 a collegiate program, um, in e-sports apart from like a traditional sport. And so one thing that I've

00:41:26.380 --> 00:41:30.620
 been presenting and I actually had another university that reached out to consult me earlier this week,

00:41:30.620 --> 00:41:34.940
 because they're interested in getting into e-sports. And so, um, I said, I met with them and shared the

00:41:34.940 --> 00:41:39.900
 model of how e-sports functions. And my biggest thing that I've been presenting to people is whenever

00:41:39.900 --> 00:41:43.980
 you launch an e-sports program, kind of like what you were talking about, Pastor Mark, is that

00:41:43.980 --> 00:41:47.660
 you have your Rocket League. That doesn't play anything like your Halo. You have your Halo. That

00:41:47.660 --> 00:41:52.220
 doesn't play anything like your Valorant. Um, you have your Call of Duty. That's nothing like League of

00:41:52.220 --> 00:41:57.020
 Legends. And then also each of those respective e-sports, that's going to take you 10,000 hours to

00:41:57.020 --> 00:42:01.740
 master each of them. And so whenever you started your athletic department, you didn't just hire

00:42:01.740 --> 00:42:06.380
 one guy to coach your basketball, your volleyball, your soccer, your baseball, your tennis, and recruit

00:42:06.380 --> 00:42:11.580
 for those at the same time and be at all the matches and the practices for them. And so with e-sports,

00:42:11.580 --> 00:42:16.220
 the disconnect is making sure that you're hiring full-time coaches to recruit out maybe four to

00:42:16.220 --> 00:42:20.300
 five different Valorant teams. Maybe you have your two varsity teams, your academy team, and your club

00:42:20.300 --> 00:42:25.580
 team. That's under one guy. And then you would do that same thing for Fortnite and maybe Smash

00:42:25.580 --> 00:42:29.980
 Brothers. You squish those two together since they're not, they don't function the same way.

00:42:29.980 --> 00:42:34.540
 And so building out a program that's like an entire department, we're not there yet in collegiate

00:42:34.540 --> 00:42:39.340
 esports. Um, but that's the biggest thing because your Valorant practices, for example, Jeff, one

00:42:39.340 --> 00:42:44.300
 scrimmage, that's going to be about an hour, but usually my guys will have like two to three scrimmages

00:42:44.300 --> 00:42:48.460
 per night. That's about three hours for just one of our teams. And we have three other teams.

00:42:48.460 --> 00:42:52.940
 And so if I'm going to be at every single one of those teams practices, that's going to be probably

00:42:52.940 --> 00:42:58.700
 like 10 hours total of time invested every single night. And so that's really where the disconnect,

00:42:58.700 --> 00:43:03.340
 I think, is at the collegiate level. But again, I'm hopeful. I'm hopeful that it'll get the proper

00:43:03.340 --> 00:43:07.180
 investment that it needs to. I think that's just going to slowly change over time as the people

00:43:07.180 --> 00:43:11.180
 that were forerunners start to age into the people that are going to be blessing now, the early

00:43:11.180 --> 00:43:16.940
 adopters and then the late comers and stuff. So. John, I have a, I have a, I have a couple of

00:43:16.940 --> 00:43:21.420
 questions. It's okay, Jeff, about this on the collegiate level, because I think this does impact

00:43:21.420 --> 00:43:27.740
 the church as well. But there are some very unique differences between physical sports, traditional

00:43:27.740 --> 00:43:34.940
 sports and esports. And one of those is the rapid incline and decline of a skillset that you might

00:43:34.940 --> 00:43:39.660
 need. So for example, a school can invest in a football program because they can figure that

00:43:39.660 --> 00:43:44.300
 football is still going to be here 20 years from now. But what does a school do when they say we

00:43:44.300 --> 00:43:50.860
 want to invest in a Valorant team, but there's no guarantee that Valorant will even be on servers

00:43:50.860 --> 00:43:57.660
 four years from now, let alone a viable thing that people are actually watching. And how does a school

00:43:57.660 --> 00:44:03.020
 actually track and say, we want to start a program for this particular sport? Because it is a skillset,

00:44:03.020 --> 00:44:07.100
 right? Your players can't just swap and be like, I was a professional Valorant player.

00:44:07.100 --> 00:44:10.060
 Now I'm going to go play professional Hearthstone because that's what's hot right now.

00:44:10.780 --> 00:44:14.300
 It's not the same skillset, a card game and a shooter, a first person shooter are not the same

00:44:14.300 --> 00:44:21.660
 skillset. How do you even, how do you even manage that type of volatility that the gaming community

00:44:21.660 --> 00:44:26.860
 often has? So on the financial side, what it looks like is the PC that you're going to play

00:44:26.860 --> 00:44:29.900
 Hearthstone on? Well, maybe not Hearthstone because that doesn't, you could play it on your

00:44:29.900 --> 00:44:35.740
 phone from 10 years ago. The PCs and the equipment that you end up buying is still going to be viable

00:44:36.460 --> 00:44:40.780
 no matter what eSport team you end up having. And if you do have to end up switching. So like,

00:44:40.780 --> 00:44:44.940
 for example, CS, I wouldn't say CS is anywhere close to dying CS:GO,

00:44:44.940 --> 00:44:52.140
 but Valorant, it's close. It's in the FPS genre. And so I do have, for example, some of my players

00:44:52.140 --> 00:44:58.380
 that are here for Halo, they're playing for our Valorant team now. And so there are transferable

00:44:58.380 --> 00:45:05.180
 skills between the genres of FPS and then MOBA. But I would say that the main thing is from the

00:45:05.180 --> 00:45:09.020
 financial standpoint. And if the university is going to invest in an eSports program, that gear is going

00:45:09.020 --> 00:45:13.900
 to be viable no matter how often a game dies and then a new game gets brought on. The thing that you

00:45:13.900 --> 00:45:19.340
 need to figure out then is if there's a new game that gets started, then as a coach, I would get

00:45:19.340 --> 00:45:24.620
 into that early on and I would learn how to coach that. But bringing people on as you add more eSports

00:45:24.620 --> 00:45:28.860
 that are experts in that specific one is going to be really important as well. So I think that would

00:45:28.860 --> 00:45:34.860
 be where the biggest change in investment would be, would be having to bring on more staff.

00:45:34.860 --> 00:45:41.500
 Yeah. And how does that look? Let's say, you know, you bring on a player who you're saying,

00:45:41.500 --> 00:45:46.700
 hey, we want to give you a full ride, or we want to pay for 80% of your schooling to come and play

00:45:46.700 --> 00:45:52.460
 Smash Brothers for us. But then let's just say in a fluke alternate reality, in a parallel universe,

00:45:52.460 --> 00:45:57.180
 where whatever that WB Smash Brothers is actually does become popular in Eclipse Smash Brothers,

00:45:57.180 --> 00:46:02.060
 which didn't happen, will never happen. We understand that. But let's just say that does happen

00:46:02.060 --> 00:46:09.260
 and this player doesn't want to go. Does schools need to do things like create nuances inside of

00:46:09.260 --> 00:46:15.740
 players' contracts that say, hey, we can at any point cut your scholarship and cut the program

00:46:15.740 --> 00:46:20.540
 because the game just isn't profitable for us as a school anymore and we can't support you playing it?

00:46:20.540 --> 00:46:26.460
 I haven't had to run into that yet. I think the only thing that I've ever had to cut a player's

00:46:26.460 --> 00:46:29.420
 scholarship for was for bad attitudes or for failing their classes.

00:46:32.220 --> 00:46:37.340
 Yeah, I would hope that most directors and most coaches and administrations would give a student

00:46:37.340 --> 00:46:42.140
 at least a year and then would try to help them to move to a different academic institution if they

00:46:42.140 --> 00:46:47.580
 were going to do away with the scholarship at that point. Yeah, I haven't ran into that problem yet,

00:46:47.580 --> 00:46:53.660
 though. But it'll be something that I'll think about if that ever comes about. Yeah.

00:46:55.340 --> 00:47:01.020
 Hey, Bubba's asking a question in chat. Bubba from Love Thy Nerd. And so he was on last week.

00:47:01.980 --> 00:47:06.940
 In line with Mark's question, how often do you have players on multiple teams,

00:47:06.940 --> 00:47:11.500
 much like the college guy that's playing for the basketball team and the football team?

00:47:11.500 --> 00:47:17.580
 Like, do they do they double dip in some of these games or is it is it too hard just from an operations

00:47:17.580 --> 00:47:22.380
 perspective? It depends on the esports. So Rocket League, it's going to take significantly less for

00:47:22.380 --> 00:47:27.180
 you to play a series and compete for than it would be if you were to play like League of Legends and

00:47:27.180 --> 00:47:31.580
 Valorant at the same time, just because of the nature of how long a game takes. Rocket League,

00:47:31.580 --> 00:47:35.660
 one match is five minutes and then you play a series of five. That's going to be like 30 minutes,

00:47:35.660 --> 00:47:40.620
 maybe 35 minutes cap. And so I do have a player right now that's playing Rocket League and

00:47:40.620 --> 00:47:45.980
 playing Valorant for our academy team. I do have some soccer players that also play for

00:47:45.980 --> 00:47:50.700
 the JV team for soccer and then play for our Valorant team as well. The tough thing with that

00:47:50.700 --> 00:47:54.460
 is just the scheduling and making sure that everything's aligned. Obviously, if you have

00:47:54.460 --> 00:47:59.180
 someone that's part of a team, you want them to be able to commit to it. And so I have had students

00:47:59.180 --> 00:48:04.540
 that have done two esports. I had one that was doing Overwatch and Valorant and he was practicing

00:48:04.540 --> 00:48:09.740
 for four hours a day while being a college student. That's a lot. That's a lot of

00:48:09.740 --> 00:48:13.340
 time for a college student. And then also if that student needs to work a job as well.

00:48:14.540 --> 00:48:19.020
 Not that specific one, but yeah, I do have some that double dip in the different esports.

00:48:20.460 --> 00:48:25.740
 Interesting. It's interesting. Christian Ninja actually said something a little earlier. I just

00:48:25.740 --> 00:48:31.820
 would love to unpack it because I wasn't thinking this way, but maybe I do need to think this way.

00:48:33.100 --> 00:48:39.180
 Ministering to gamers in esports ministry aren't really the same focus. Actually,

00:48:39.180 --> 00:48:43.580
 I would love both of y'all's takes on that. John, I want you to go first.

00:48:45.820 --> 00:48:50.700
 So for the first four years of my time back in the gaming space, because I left for quite a while,

00:48:50.700 --> 00:48:55.180
 like I played for a YouTube team, a trickshotting Call of Duty team back when I was in middle school

00:48:55.180 --> 00:49:00.460
 and we had about 100,000 subs. This was 2009, I believe. I have to go back and look at the time.

00:49:00.460 --> 00:49:04.620
 And then I stopped playing for many years when I played soccer and came back to it years later.

00:49:04.620 --> 00:49:08.540
 And my first four years after coming back to it was completely different than these

00:49:08.540 --> 00:49:13.260
 last two years have been for me within esports. My first four years was completely dedicated

00:49:13.260 --> 00:49:17.180
 towards being a digital missionary online. And so I got into streaming. I got a scholarship

00:49:17.180 --> 00:49:21.180
 from my university and was using it as a platform to be able to just reach people

00:49:21.180 --> 00:49:25.900
 on the Twitch platform and be able to open up about my struggles with depression, my testimony,

00:49:26.460 --> 00:49:29.980
 and just doing life with people from all sorts of different places all over the world.

00:49:29.980 --> 00:49:35.980
 And so I started my live stream in 2017. I've reached partner numbers around the exact same

00:49:35.980 --> 00:49:41.980
 time that I started the program in 2020. And that was completely different than the approach that I

00:49:41.980 --> 00:49:49.820
 take with my players that are here in person. That's more of like a relational and it's relational,

00:49:49.820 --> 00:49:57.500
 but in a different way. The temperaments and the methods are different. It's the same Holy Spirit

00:49:57.500 --> 00:50:03.020
 that I let guide me whenever I'm in those conversations with people, but it's a different

00:50:03.020 --> 00:50:07.180
 audience. I would say with esports, like I said, it's going to take on more of like a traditional

00:50:07.180 --> 00:50:14.940
 sports model with like the FCA versus like the casual gamer. There's just a difference in personality.

00:50:14.940 --> 00:50:24.540
 I would say that's there. And it's tough because with evangelism and discipleship, it varies even more

00:50:24.540 --> 00:50:30.220
 on like the personal level based on the individual and how the Spirit's guiding you in those conversations.

00:50:31.100 --> 00:50:35.420
 But yeah, I would say the personality is different between someone that's hyper competitive

00:50:36.060 --> 00:50:40.780
 and is like constantly pushing themselves to win. And you know, the difference between

00:50:41.580 --> 00:50:46.860
 not the esports players or jocks, but if you can take the same idea of like how a jock would think

00:50:47.740 --> 00:50:53.420
 versus someone that is just a super niche, lore nerd, casual gamer, sometimes there's overlap there.

00:50:53.420 --> 00:50:56.300
 There's just a difference in human temperament and personality.

00:50:58.620 --> 00:51:00.700
 Yeah. Mark, does that resonate with you?

00:51:00.700 --> 00:51:08.460
 Oh yeah, absolutely. Like I'm not a competitive gamer. I'm far too fragile for that life.

00:51:09.420 --> 00:51:15.180
 And so I'm not a competitive gamer and I don't like our church isn't really geared towards reaching

00:51:15.180 --> 00:51:20.620
 people who are in that space either. Like that's not my heart. It's not what we're leaning into.

00:51:20.620 --> 00:51:25.260
 And there's other organizations out there, churches.gg right now, that's kind of getting out there.

00:51:25.260 --> 00:51:32.860
 Like one of their goals is to help churches run tournaments and help churches compete against one

00:51:32.860 --> 00:51:38.540
 another. And like, that's a really, actually really freaking cool idea. But it's not my bent, right?

00:51:38.540 --> 00:51:45.260
 Like I would, I have zero desire to get into that. And on top of that, like I would be just genuinely

00:51:45.260 --> 00:51:50.140
 bad at it because I just don't play competitive games. And in the same way, like, you know,

00:51:50.140 --> 00:51:55.740
 the people that we're reaching at Lux and like, we don't even, I don't even think about that.

00:51:55.740 --> 00:52:01.820
 Like we don't, we're using games as a common ground in a similar way that you would use a coffee shop

00:52:01.820 --> 00:52:09.740
 that people generally, you know, go to and meet at or, or maybe fans of football. And you're like,

00:52:09.740 --> 00:52:15.500
 hey, yeah, I'm trying to evangelize to people who are also Steeler fans because I am a Steelers fan.

00:52:16.060 --> 00:52:19.920
 And I'm not like, I'm not trying to go out and meet with,

00:52:20.140 --> 00:52:26.300
 the Steelers players, but I am trying to create a space where I can engage with people who enjoy

00:52:26.300 --> 00:52:31.020
 watching the Steelers play. And so I'm evangelizing and connecting with them.

00:52:31.020 --> 00:52:36.060
 And that is a lot more kind of our heart and direction. It's so, it's so odd for me because

00:52:36.060 --> 00:52:41.660
 the world is, it's so big and it's so easy when you're outside of it to narrow it down to kind

00:52:41.660 --> 00:52:46.700
 of like a pinpoint and just group it all together. And the world that Jono is in and the world that I

00:52:46.700 --> 00:52:52.860
 am in are radically different, like very, very, very different. We share a similar heart. We both

00:52:52.860 --> 00:52:58.940
 love gaming. We don't love the same games. Although you are like a Star Wars Old Republic

00:52:58.940 --> 00:53:03.500
 guy. And so you are an MMO guy. So there is at least a portion of you that's not the competitive

00:53:03.500 --> 00:53:09.660
 bent. You just want to go and do story and be part of the role playing aspect. And that is what I enjoy.

00:53:09.660 --> 00:53:15.660
 And I think that one of the things that you can learn from this conversation, if you are in church,

00:53:15.660 --> 00:53:20.460
 is that there is so much more here than what you might actually think that there is here.

00:53:20.460 --> 00:53:24.140
 That just because someone walks into your church and they're wearing a shirt that says

00:53:24.140 --> 00:53:28.380
 game on, and it has a picture of a controller on it, doesn't mean that they are the same as the

00:53:28.380 --> 00:53:34.620
 next person that walks into your church with a similar t-shirt on. That each gamers are vastly,

00:53:34.620 --> 00:53:38.780
 vastly different. And I've said this before, I don't think on a podcast before, Jeff, but

00:53:38.780 --> 00:53:42.460
 one of the other churches that are in our space is God Squad Church. And they've been around

00:53:42.460 --> 00:53:47.260
 a little over twice as long as we have been around. They're probably the longest standing

00:53:47.260 --> 00:53:52.860
 digital church that's at least in this space. And a lot of their church was birthed out of

00:53:52.860 --> 00:53:57.820
 Matt Sousa's love for first person shooters. And a lot of the people in their church are reflective of

00:53:57.820 --> 00:54:02.060
 that. Whereas our church was birthed out of a digital card game. So we have a lot of people who

00:54:02.060 --> 00:54:08.220
 are a little bit older and lean more heavily into being intellectuals because that's the group that

00:54:08.220 --> 00:54:13.340
 plays card games. They're not fast reflex people. They're people who want to, they're really

00:54:13.340 --> 00:54:20.380
 thoughtful about. And so the feel and the vibe even of our faith community is very different because we

00:54:20.380 --> 00:54:26.700
 came out of a different genre of game. And it is like an entirely different subculture. You're not

00:54:26.700 --> 00:54:32.940
 just talking about gamers. You're talking about hundreds of subcultures inside of the culture of gaming.

00:54:32.940 --> 00:54:41.020
 Hmm. So let me build on that because obviously contextualization, especially in digital environments,

00:54:41.020 --> 00:54:45.180
 you know, I think Mark, you were the one that said you actually have to aim to reach less people to

00:54:45.180 --> 00:54:50.060
 be more effective to reach more because if you try to reach everybody, you reach nobody. So draw a

00:54:50.060 --> 00:54:59.660
 smaller audience, i.e. card game digital and then Lux Digital Church is born. So is it safe to say then

00:54:59.660 --> 00:55:06.060
 it takes e-sports people to reach e-sports? It takes shooter people to reach shooter? It takes

00:55:06.060 --> 00:55:12.380
 card game people to reach card games? Do we want to take it to that extreme? And so it's really about

00:55:12.380 --> 00:55:16.220
 empowering e-sports people to reach their own people? Is this where we're going today?

00:55:16.220 --> 00:55:21.420
 I think there seems to be a common thread of the people group that you were a part of before you

00:55:21.420 --> 00:55:27.340
 were saved is the same people that God, after he's transformed you, calls you back to. I think

00:55:27.340 --> 00:55:33.180
 we see that with all specifically reaching the Roman people and then the Jewish people. And there

00:55:33.180 --> 00:55:37.580
 seems to be a level of God takes the things and the experiences that we go through in our life,

00:55:37.580 --> 00:55:42.620
 the gifts and the talents of things that we like, things that we're good at. And he molds those into

00:55:45.500 --> 00:55:49.980
 into a way that we can understand that and go back to that specific group of people and be effective.

00:55:49.980 --> 00:55:54.380
 And I think that's what Paul's talking about whenever he's talking about being all things to all people.

00:55:54.940 --> 00:55:58.780
 Whenever he's talking about how to the Jews, I became like a Jew to reach those that were under

00:55:58.780 --> 00:56:06.140
 the law and to the Gentiles. I became like a Gentile. And so within e-sports, for me growing up being a

00:56:06.140 --> 00:56:12.460
 super hyper-competitive Call of Duty player, there's always been a desire there to reach that specific

00:56:12.460 --> 00:56:19.740
 community. And knowing that language and knowing how to compete and knowing how to play games at a

00:56:19.740 --> 00:56:25.500
 competitive level, I can hang in those conversations and have those conversations with the best of the

00:56:25.500 --> 00:56:30.540
 best. And there's also a level of respect that's breeded between people that are in these different

00:56:30.540 --> 00:56:34.940
 subcultures. Whenever you are someone that's part of the in-crowd, whenever you do know how to talk

00:56:34.940 --> 00:56:39.020
 about the specific card games, whenever you do know how to talk about this specific e-sport,

00:56:39.020 --> 00:56:43.580
 there's a level of you have credibility. I'm actually going to listen to what you're saying.

00:56:46.540 --> 00:56:53.100
 Psychologically, it's common ground. That's what it is. And as humans, we want to open up to people

00:56:53.100 --> 00:56:58.460
 and things that we're familiar with. And so that's the familiarity that connects the individuals.

00:56:58.460 --> 00:57:01.900
 So that way, that bridge can eventually be built to share the weight of the gospel.

00:57:04.940 --> 00:57:10.460
 Fascinating. This has been a great conversation. With all the different

00:57:11.740 --> 00:57:15.100
 topics we're hitting here within this season, the e-sports is the one that

00:57:15.820 --> 00:57:22.380
 I just came in. I'm like, I have no clue. And so, Jono, this has been a great conversation digging into

00:57:22.380 --> 00:57:28.860
 it. Chino Mage asked the question. And so we'll land the plan on this, kind of.

00:57:28.860 --> 00:57:33.980
 I don't know if Chino really has a 13-year-old, but supposedly, if a 13-year-old wanted to get

00:57:33.980 --> 00:57:37.180
 involved in this stuff, how would they get started getting into e-sports?

00:57:39.340 --> 00:57:42.860
 That's a tough question because it depends on location. I would see if you could find

00:57:42.860 --> 00:57:46.860
 some type of youth e-sports thing that they can get into. Kind of like Jeff was pointing out earlier,

00:57:46.860 --> 00:57:53.180
 look for like a middle school program, something that's supported by the actual school that they're

00:57:53.180 --> 00:57:57.500
 going to. And then I would actually start as soon as they get into high school, start looking online.

00:57:57.500 --> 00:58:02.140
 There's a company called Stay Plugged In. They connect players with coaches and colleges all around the

00:58:02.140 --> 00:58:07.260
 nation. All around the nation. And so that's what I would do is as soon as possible, I would start

00:58:07.260 --> 00:58:11.980
 getting your student into... When do you go to high school? Is it 14 or 15? What is that? Freshman year?

00:58:12.860 --> 00:58:18.940
 I would just pay attention to the pro scene and learn as 15. Okay. Get as good as possible in the

00:58:18.940 --> 00:58:24.300
 safety of your own home. See if there's some official things that are backed by your school. And then also,

00:58:24.300 --> 00:58:36.220
 too, I think that we're seeing a rise in like para, not para-church, but like para-institutionalized

00:58:36.220 --> 00:58:40.620
 stuff too. So look for places like Rewind, look for places that are starting these youth e-sports

00:58:40.620 --> 00:58:44.620
 programs. Because I do think that in the next probably five years, we're going to see a ton

00:58:44.620 --> 00:58:51.420
 of people that are starting to build out this model that looks like what traditional sports do. So like

00:58:51.420 --> 00:58:56.380
 club soccer, club e-sports, start looking for things like that that your student or your child can get

00:58:56.380 --> 00:59:00.540
 involved in to where they can get coached by people that are a little bit older in their age and their

00:59:00.540 --> 00:59:05.820
 time in the e-sports industry. And I would just... This is fascinating. I would expand on that and just

00:59:05.820 --> 00:59:10.780
 say like if you yourself are a gamer and a competitor, like see if you can help start the club at the

00:59:10.780 --> 00:59:15.580
 school. Because there's kids there that want to do it, but a lot of times the school administration

00:59:15.580 --> 00:59:22.220
 just doesn't understand it. Like this is happening in my mother-in-law subs at a school and this is

00:59:22.220 --> 00:59:27.340
 nerd culture stuff. But they started a Dungeons and Dragons club. One of the teachers started a

00:59:27.340 --> 00:59:31.420
 Dungeons and Dragons club. They had so many kids sign up for it that they rotate every week a different

00:59:31.420 --> 00:59:36.300
 group of kids because they had dozens of kids who wanted to come play D&D and the teachers connecting

00:59:36.300 --> 00:59:42.540
 there. I have someone in our church who is, I think that Lord Shadow is... Lord Shadow is not a believer,

00:59:42.540 --> 00:59:49.100
 but Lord Shadow came to our church to play D&D and he runs a middle school D&D club at the middle

00:59:49.100 --> 00:59:53.660
 school once a week. And it's been something that's been on my heart. I'm an avid D&D player. If I was

00:59:53.660 --> 01:00:01.500
 an avid gamer and could kind of help a school get the equipment that they needed and begin coaching a

01:00:01.500 --> 01:00:07.260
 team of kids to play Rocket League or whatever, there are definitely kids in every school across

01:00:07.260 --> 01:00:12.220
 the country that want that. But a lot of times schools either A, don't have the funding or B,

01:00:12.220 --> 01:00:15.420
 just don't have the knowledge base to be able to do it. And most, I think, high schools and middle

01:00:15.420 --> 01:00:20.380
 schools recognize the validity of it and actually want it to be part of their opportunity for their

01:00:20.380 --> 01:00:23.980
 students. They see it, they want it, they just don't know how to take steps in that direction.

01:00:23.980 --> 01:00:28.780
 So maybe you can be the key that begins unlocking that for your school as well.

01:00:30.620 --> 01:00:35.900
 Yeah, I love that. Cowboy Morgan in the chat. I love this. When I was growing up,

01:00:35.900 --> 01:00:41.500
 churches paid missionaries to go overseas and witness. Now we're in a day where missionaries

01:00:41.500 --> 01:00:49.100
 witnessing online in games. And really, that's the heart of Digital Church Network is helping people

01:00:49.100 --> 01:00:53.740
 discover the influence they have digitally, including in video games, and even training

01:00:53.740 --> 01:00:58.460
 and equipping them with how to make disciples, how to grow into leaders, how to plant churches and

01:00:58.460 --> 01:01:05.740
 networks and things like that. And so recognizing the e-sports is a mission field.

01:01:07.020 --> 01:01:12.780
 And that to reach the mission field, you've got to reach an individual within the mission field and equip

01:01:12.780 --> 01:01:21.660
 them to reach the mission field. It has to be within. It is a huge opportunity for churches

01:01:21.660 --> 01:01:27.980
 and individuals and gamers and friends and people that are within this culture. It's a huge opportunity

01:01:27.980 --> 01:01:33.660
 for us to tackle. And so I've loved this conversation. I've loved where we're going with this. We are

01:01:33.660 --> 01:01:38.300
 three episodes in and all three of these have been, well, Mark's was a kind of iffy, but everybody else

01:01:38.300 --> 01:01:45.020
 was good. I probably butchered his name on that podcast too. But who really remembers? Anyway,

01:01:45.020 --> 01:01:51.660
 at least I don't. So, hey, listen, Jono, it's been great. But yeah, we're going to land the plane.

01:01:51.660 --> 01:01:57.500
 We're going to wrap up here with the show here talking about e-sports. Let's do Mark first. Mark,

01:01:57.500 --> 01:01:59.340
 as we're wrapping up here, any closing thoughts?

01:02:00.540 --> 01:02:06.300
 No, but go check out what is going on locally in e-sports in your area. Go check out Jono's stream

01:02:07.020 --> 01:02:12.620
 and literally just swing by and hang out with him and ask questions because you get him to listen

01:02:12.620 --> 01:02:18.700
 here, but you could go ask him questions live and have him respond to it every week for a lot more

01:02:18.700 --> 01:02:26.860
 hours than what you're listening to this podcast. So, just twitch.tv/Jono, J-O-H-N-O, and go check him out for sure.

01:02:29.020 --> 01:02:34.220
 Awesome. Yeah, go check that out. And Jono, any closing thoughts on your side as we're wrapping up?

01:02:37.980 --> 01:02:41.900
 I'm just excited for people to connect more of the Capital C Church with what we're doing here

01:02:41.900 --> 01:02:47.980
 in the space. It's been awesome to be here for seven years. And now we're just seeing so many

01:02:47.980 --> 01:02:53.100
 different people really flocked to the space. And usually whenever God lays something like this on

01:02:53.100 --> 01:02:57.580
 this many people's hearts, you know, he's really trying to reach people. So, I'm just really blessed and

01:02:57.580 --> 01:03:00.060
 honored to be on this. And thank you for having me today, Jeff. Thank you.

01:03:00.780 --> 01:03:06.700
 Oh, listen, this was solid. This was great. My mind is racing around the chaplaincy

01:03:06.700 --> 01:03:12.060
 program for e-sports. How do we start to get residents and send them into those spaces to help

01:03:12.060 --> 01:03:15.420
 help out? Yeah, send them to me.

01:03:15.420 --> 01:03:21.180
 There's lots of opportunity here. And so, we're going to keep the conversation going,

01:03:21.180 --> 01:03:23.020
 definitely. Who is it?

01:03:23.020 --> 01:03:25.500
 Cowboy Morgan asked, "How can you find the other episodes?"

01:03:26.140 --> 01:03:30.220
 So, thechurch.digital/podcast, if you want to listen to it on the audio site,

01:03:30.220 --> 01:03:33.420
 subscribe to the Church Digital Podcast and you can find them in there pretty easy.

01:03:34.300 --> 01:03:40.060
 And then I'm on YouTube. We're on YouTube. It's youtube.com/thechurchdigital. And there's

01:03:40.060 --> 01:03:45.020
 playlists there that you can find. Mark's episode and Bubba's episode there as well.

01:03:45.580 --> 01:03:50.780
 But hey, we're going to land a plane. This was awesome. I'm going to look at my son playing

01:03:50.780 --> 01:03:57.020
 e-sports in a whole new way. And hopefully, one day, I get the cash to check. No, I'm kidding.

01:03:57.020 --> 01:04:02.540
 That's not, well, maybe, but that's a conversation probably for the post-party.

01:04:02.540 --> 01:04:08.860
 But hey, so we're going to land a plane right here. Remember, podcast listeners,

01:04:08.860 --> 01:04:16.860
 you can find it on us here on Twitch, twitch.tv/digitalchurchnetwork. Every Thursday,

01:04:16.860 --> 01:04:22.860
 3pm, we're going to be doing Jesus Gamer Church Season interviews live here on the show. I actually

01:04:22.860 --> 01:04:28.460
 have no idea who's next. And so somebody, Mark nicely transitioned me off and I didn't take the

01:04:28.460 --> 01:04:35.900
 time to look. So we'll post it in DCN and social media as well. I want to say it's Jate. Is it Jate?

01:04:35.900 --> 01:04:42.860
 Somebody smarter than me has that information. But let's pretend it's Jate. Mark doesn't know.

01:04:42.860 --> 01:04:49.020
 He came back just to give me the hands up. So yeah, that's the way it rolls here with Digital

01:04:49.020 --> 01:04:54.220
 Church Network. It's a little chaotic, but we're going to land a plane. So for Jono, for Mark,

01:04:54.940 --> 01:04:59.820
 for Jeff with the Church Digital and Digital Church Network, thanks for jumping on the stream here.

01:04:59.820 --> 01:05:02.060
 And we'll see you next time on the show. Y'all have a good day.