WEBVTT 00:00:00.300 --> 00:00:02.580 Welcome to the Church Digital Podcast. 00:00:03.360 --> 00:00:07.220 Through this podcast, we'll talk about the technological innovations within the church. 00:00:07.580 --> 00:00:11.040 But more than tech for tech itself, we'll address deeper questions. 00:00:11.660 --> 00:00:13.260 Is disciple making possible digitally? 00:00:13.720 --> 00:00:15.720 How should we approach the digital mission field? 00:00:16.020 --> 00:00:18.580 Can a biblically grounded church operate in digital space? 00:00:19.020 --> 00:00:22.900 Oh, and where does the metaverse and artificial intelligence fit into all of this? 00:00:23.640 --> 00:00:25.800 Whether you're a big or small church, 00:00:25.800 --> 00:00:30.640 the Church Digital's goal is to help churches like yours learn to be a multiplying church, 00:00:31.000 --> 00:00:32.500 digitally and physically. 00:00:33.000 --> 00:00:34.620 And now here's your host, Jeff Reed. 00:00:35.040 --> 00:00:40.220 Hey everybody, welcome to episode 315 of the Church Digital Podcast. 00:00:40.520 --> 00:00:41.720 My name is Andy. 00:00:42.100 --> 00:00:43.840 Of course, I am not Jeff Reed here. 00:00:43.980 --> 00:00:48.300 And we were giving Jeff another week off to recover from everything that happened in Korea 00:00:48.300 --> 00:00:49.300 at the Lausanne Conference. 00:00:49.300 --> 00:00:53.900 And I'm sure he's going to be full of stories and connections 00:00:53.900 --> 00:00:55.880 and networking opportunities. 00:00:56.120 --> 00:00:59.020 And, you know, the things that happen at major, major conferences like this, 00:00:59.140 --> 00:01:02.100 especially a global conference like Lausanne was. 00:01:02.220 --> 00:01:07.340 But actually today, we are taking over the podcast yet again, 00:01:07.400 --> 00:01:10.500 just like we did last week when we got a chance to talk with Ian Simpkins, 00:01:10.680 --> 00:01:12.160 who if you do not know Ian Simpkins, 00:01:12.280 --> 00:01:14.600 please go give him a follow on all of the socials. 00:01:14.900 --> 00:01:19.900 That dude is doing digital in a minimal and simplistic way. 00:01:19.900 --> 00:01:23.420 And yet it is anything but minimal and simplistic in its message. 00:01:23.620 --> 00:01:25.380 And my goodness, go listen to the episode. 00:01:25.480 --> 00:01:26.700 Go follow Ian Simpkins. 00:01:26.900 --> 00:01:27.780 That's episode 314. 00:01:28.100 --> 00:01:29.380 It'll be in the doodly-doos below. 00:01:29.640 --> 00:01:32.620 If you're watching this on YouTube or if you're listening on podcasts, 00:01:32.620 --> 00:01:33.640 it'll also be in the show notes. 00:01:33.720 --> 00:01:35.520 But this is episode 315. 00:01:35.520 --> 00:01:39.220 And we, as the hybrid disciple, are taking over. 00:01:39.420 --> 00:01:46.300 And one of the things that Ashley and I really were doing when we were recording these episodes, 00:01:46.300 --> 00:01:51.860 we recorded them all in batches, and that's just kind of little tricks of the podcasting trait. 00:01:52.480 --> 00:01:57.180 And one of the things that happened was, as we did a bunch of our interviews in season 2, 00:01:57.300 --> 00:02:00.120 we noticed that there was kind of a common theme happening. 00:02:00.560 --> 00:02:05.320 And that theme was discipleship happening in unlikely scenarios. 00:02:05.320 --> 00:02:08.760 And this episode with Katie Ballmer, who you're going to meet in just a few seconds, 00:02:09.220 --> 00:02:13.160 is unlike any other episode that you're going to hear. 00:02:13.240 --> 00:02:17.320 Katie is a podcaster, she is an author, she is a motivational speaker. 00:02:18.380 --> 00:02:21.620 She does, you know, she runs the Truth in Your 20s. 00:02:21.680 --> 00:02:26.220 Like, it is a very women and female-centric thing. 00:02:26.420 --> 00:02:30.100 But don't let that kind of shut the episode off and just be like, 00:02:30.160 --> 00:02:31.920 well, this is only for women and yada, yada, yada. 00:02:32.440 --> 00:02:37.800 There's so much truth that Katie brings to the idea of digital discipleship. 00:02:37.800 --> 00:02:42.680 And more than just digital discipleship, doing discipleship in different spaces and places 00:02:42.680 --> 00:02:44.140 than we're used to. 00:02:44.680 --> 00:02:46.240 And she's incredibly encouraging. 00:02:46.540 --> 00:02:49.500 She is one of the coolest people you ever get the chance to meet. 00:02:49.640 --> 00:02:54.360 And Ashley and I enjoyed our time so, so much with Katie. 00:02:54.520 --> 00:02:59.320 So, okay, enough about me and all of the things that are happening all around, all of that. 00:02:59.480 --> 00:03:01.940 I need to get you to this episode here. 00:03:02.020 --> 00:03:05.060 You're going to hear a little bit of intro, and then we are going to be off and running. 00:03:05.140 --> 00:03:07.720 So here we go, episode 315 of the Church Digital Podcast. 00:03:08.260 --> 00:03:08.960 Let's dig in. 00:03:25.520 --> 00:03:29.260 Well, we're back, and we are opening episode five here, 00:03:29.260 --> 00:03:33.220 much like I have been opening the rest of our episodes in season two so far, 00:03:33.320 --> 00:03:37.280 with the saying, this is a fun one, but it is. 00:03:37.420 --> 00:03:38.220 This is a fun one. 00:03:38.500 --> 00:03:42.300 Ashley and I here on The Hybrid Disciple are joined by Katie Ballmer, 00:03:42.480 --> 00:03:45.000 the host of The Truth For Your 20s Podcast. 00:03:45.480 --> 00:03:50.880 And she's got books and speaking gigs and all sorts of things all over the place. 00:03:50.920 --> 00:03:51.540 She's a mentor. 00:03:52.060 --> 00:03:57.820 She's really passionate about helping college-age women figure out their place in the world. 00:03:57.920 --> 00:04:00.820 And it is such a kind of a niche, but it's a broad niche. 00:04:00.820 --> 00:04:04.240 It's something that is also desperately, desperately needed. 00:04:04.380 --> 00:04:08.060 And so in this episode, Ashley and I kind of get into the history of where Katie was 00:04:08.060 --> 00:04:12.300 and how the woman at the well story changed her life and changed her outlook on ministry 00:04:12.300 --> 00:04:16.440 and really affected her deeply and really has been affecting her ministry. 00:04:16.440 --> 00:04:20.680 And the stories that she's able to tell about the women, the young women that she's affecting, 00:04:20.780 --> 00:04:26.820 and also the young men and sometimes the dads like myself that she's affecting is just fantastic. 00:04:27.260 --> 00:04:31.780 I can't wait for you to hear a lot of this, but I also can't wait to hear some of your follow-up. 00:04:31.940 --> 00:04:38.880 We've been getting a lot more engagement and follower stuff, traction on YouTube and on Instagram. 00:04:38.880 --> 00:04:43.260 And if you're not actually following us on YouTube or Instagram or on TikTok, 00:04:43.480 --> 00:04:48.700 and if you're not one of those that has actually hit the old subscribe button or thumbs up or anything like that, 00:04:48.760 --> 00:04:49.860 please go and do so. 00:04:49.900 --> 00:04:51.280 We'd love to hear from you. 00:04:51.940 --> 00:04:55.440 Obviously, it helps get our numbers up and all that, and we're really cool with getting numbers up. 00:04:55.480 --> 00:04:58.100 But more than that, we get a chance to actually converse with you. 00:04:58.180 --> 00:05:02.080 We want to create this hybrid disciple community wherever we are at. 00:05:02.180 --> 00:05:03.440 So go and do those things. 00:05:03.440 --> 00:05:10.620 All of the links are in the doodly-doos below if you're watching on YouTube and if you're on TikTok or on Instagram or anywhere else that you can find us. 00:05:10.960 --> 00:05:14.820 They will be in the show notes of this podcast as well as in our bio. 00:05:15.020 --> 00:05:17.040 Okay, enough of me blathering on. 00:05:17.380 --> 00:05:20.160 Let's get to Katie Ballmer here on the Hybrid Disciple. 00:05:25.600 --> 00:05:32.320 Well, our next guest here on the Hybrid Disciple, if you are watching on YouTube or any other places that we are streaming this 00:05:32.320 --> 00:05:39.120 or that you can watch this on demand, she seems to be in some sort of Florida room, except I don't think that she's actually in Florida. 00:05:39.240 --> 00:05:41.440 Katie Ballmer, thanks for joining us on the show. 00:05:41.940 --> 00:05:43.320 Where are you in the world? 00:05:43.720 --> 00:05:44.720 Thanks for having me. 00:05:44.820 --> 00:05:49.500 I am in the mountains of Chattanooga, Tennessee, so not Florida, but I am a plant nerd. 00:05:49.800 --> 00:05:54.460 So what I'm not doing, what we're going to talk about today, I'm fiddling in the garden and with my plants. 00:05:54.580 --> 00:05:56.460 So here's my other children behind me. 00:05:56.680 --> 00:05:57.180 I like that. 00:05:57.240 --> 00:06:02.500 Okay, I was going to ask if you had named them, you know, Fernie and, you know, Rodriguez or something along those lines. 00:06:02.740 --> 00:06:06.740 The mountains of Chattanooga, actually, I used to live just north of Atlanta. 00:06:07.540 --> 00:06:10.300 So, you know, Chattanooga was less than an hour for us. 00:06:10.320 --> 00:06:11.320 And I'd always get up there. 00:06:12.800 --> 00:06:15.620 Chattanooga has this one thing that I don't know if you're familiar with. 00:06:15.660 --> 00:06:16.780 It's called fiber internet. 00:06:16.960 --> 00:06:18.920 You guys have fiber internet everywhere up there. 00:06:19.440 --> 00:06:20.120 We do. 00:06:20.300 --> 00:06:21.240 And I didn't realize it. 00:06:21.320 --> 00:06:22.140 It's called Gig City. 00:06:22.460 --> 00:06:25.760 So my internet's faster than yours, probably. 00:06:25.920 --> 00:06:26.180 I don't know. 00:06:26.240 --> 00:06:27.420 I didn't know this, but this is a thing. 00:06:27.500 --> 00:06:28.060 Yeah, it's pretty cool. 00:06:28.440 --> 00:06:29.900 I am insanely jealous. 00:06:30.000 --> 00:06:33.100 I actually, I petitioned my wife to move up there. 00:06:33.500 --> 00:06:37.340 She said no, because that's where we can't go there just for the internet. 00:06:37.340 --> 00:06:39.040 Like you'd need to give me some sort of other reason. 00:06:39.260 --> 00:06:40.300 And I couldn't. 00:06:40.440 --> 00:06:43.660 So, hey, Katie, throughout this, throughout the show, if you can give me a reason to move up to Chattanooga, 00:06:43.660 --> 00:06:45.880 like I'll be there in some moments. 00:06:46.140 --> 00:06:46.360 Notice. 00:06:46.740 --> 00:06:48.340 I'll be glad to show you the mountains in the distance. 00:06:48.340 --> 00:06:48.920 They're gorgeous. 00:06:49.120 --> 00:06:49.380 Awesome. 00:06:49.520 --> 00:06:49.820 Love it. 00:06:49.880 --> 00:06:50.140 Love it. 00:06:50.180 --> 00:06:50.460 Love it. 00:06:50.720 --> 00:06:55.660 Well, Ashley actually introduced me to Katie through, yet again, we were talking off camera 00:06:55.660 --> 00:07:00.220 and behind the scenes and a lot of people talking about the fact that you can't make real relationships 00:07:00.220 --> 00:07:01.560 online and do all these other things. 00:07:01.700 --> 00:07:04.900 And Ashley and I have never been online, even though we've done a thousand podcasts together. 00:07:05.440 --> 00:07:09.700 And both Ashley and I feel like we could just go hang with each other's families for days 00:07:09.700 --> 00:07:10.500 and be comfortable. 00:07:10.960 --> 00:07:12.700 Ashley, you actually met Katie online as well. 00:07:12.720 --> 00:07:14.880 Can you walk me through all of that and how you got introduced to her? 00:07:15.340 --> 00:07:15.600 Yeah. 00:07:16.160 --> 00:07:26.660 So, Katie and I both have TikTok and we both, I would say our target audience is the opposite side of the same coin. 00:07:27.340 --> 00:07:33.340 So, young women predominantly, I would say 18 to 26 or so. 00:07:33.900 --> 00:07:40.760 And she, the women that I kind of target are women who have gone through really grimy situations, 00:07:40.760 --> 00:07:47.020 may still be in really grimy situations, whether it's through sex work or sex trafficking or strippers or, 00:07:47.280 --> 00:07:54.200 or, you know, just people, young women whose society is a whole kind of set aside because of my testimony. 00:07:54.200 --> 00:08:00.640 And Katie works very closely with young women who just are more, I would say, mainstream, 00:08:01.180 --> 00:08:09.540 but who really may struggle with self-worth because that's a common thread among young women today. 00:08:09.720 --> 00:08:17.900 And so, I, the FYP, which if the, it's, I don't know how, it's just the way that TikTok determines who 00:08:17.900 --> 00:08:20.680 you want to see and who should see you. 00:08:21.480 --> 00:08:27.800 I don't know if she saw me first or I saw her first, but I, we, I started seeing her content 00:08:27.800 --> 00:08:31.360 and followed her and she started seeing my content and followed me. 00:08:31.500 --> 00:08:39.080 And then we just, she has a podcast, which we'll get into, and she asked me to hop on her podcast. 00:08:39.260 --> 00:08:40.860 And so, I did that probably a year or so ago. 00:08:41.580 --> 00:08:46.700 And ever since then, we've just kind of, you know, made sure and stayed in touch a lot of TikTok back 00:08:46.700 --> 00:08:50.920 and forth. TikTok sometimes will do this wacky thing where it, for whatever reason, won't push 00:08:50.920 --> 00:08:55.980 your content out unless somebody's viewed it a certain number of times. And so, we've like got this 00:08:55.980 --> 00:08:59.880 cheat code where I'll be like, hey, I just posted this. It's not doing anything. Will you please go 00:08:59.880 --> 00:09:06.260 do all of the things that it like pushes it out of purgatory on TikTok and she'll do the same with 00:09:06.260 --> 00:09:13.100 me. Um, and I listened to her podcast now, um, as a single woman, a lot of the things that she talks 00:09:13.100 --> 00:09:18.360 about actually applies to me, even though I'm much like double the age of the girls that she's, uh, 00:09:18.420 --> 00:09:24.120 targeting, you know? And so, yeah, that's how we met. And, um, she loves Jesus and I love Jesus. 00:09:24.120 --> 00:09:27.740 And so that's been just the commonality there. 00:09:28.260 --> 00:09:33.480 Hey, uh, yeah, Katie, the, the host of Truth For Your 20s podcast, uh, again, thanks for being 00:09:33.480 --> 00:09:37.760 here. So first off, tell us all about the podcast, how you got all that started, like how you got 00:09:37.760 --> 00:09:42.160 ministering to women that are in your 20s. Cause like none of us on this podcast are in our 20s 00:09:42.160 --> 00:09:47.460 anymore. Uh, and so where, where did you kind of get the genesis of that idea and all of those 00:09:47.460 --> 00:09:51.420 things? Yeah, there's several different genesis. So I, depending on which roadmap we're going to 00:09:51.420 --> 00:09:57.300 take here to explain how I got there, but yeah, so I, my husband was in youth ministry. So when we 00:09:57.300 --> 00:10:01.240 first got married, he was in youth ministry, which kind of naturally you become a big sister. 00:10:01.480 --> 00:10:06.440 You know, we were in our twenties, but just naturally kind of became a big sister to, 00:10:06.520 --> 00:10:12.100 to young women. But even before then when I was in college, so I got saved as a senior in college. 00:10:12.100 --> 00:10:16.100 So like kind of walking out of that, but through those days, definitely living for, 00:10:16.100 --> 00:10:21.060 I say boys in Bacardi, you know, like all the things the world have to looking, looking for love 00:10:21.060 --> 00:10:26.580 and all the wrong fraternity boys, all the things. And the woman at the well story. Thank you. Um, 00:10:27.620 --> 00:10:32.360 John chapter four is what changed my life. Uh, the longest recorded conversation with a heartbroken 00:10:32.360 --> 00:10:38.040 girl. I just love it with all of my hope, all of my soul. And it shook me in all the best ways. 00:10:38.120 --> 00:10:41.520 And I was like, does, does everyone know about this woman at the well? This is the coolest thing 00:10:41.520 --> 00:10:47.160 ever. So, you know, I started talking about it and for sure, very early as a baby Christian, 00:10:47.160 --> 00:10:53.260 I heard God was like, I want you to go share this with sorority women. And you know, as we do fingers 00:10:53.260 --> 00:10:59.400 in the ears, what? Nope. Don't hear that moving on. So ignored that call. Um, get married, find my 00:10:59.400 --> 00:11:04.260 husband, we get married youth pastor. So I'm doing the good Christian things. I'm a big sister to, 00:11:04.360 --> 00:11:11.240 to youth girls. I, I dive into homeless ministry. This was just a long, you know, look at me. I'm such a 00:11:11.240 --> 00:11:17.320 Christian. I'm saving all the homeless people in the world. Find myself depleted. I had put my heart 00:11:17.320 --> 00:11:21.780 and soul and everything into helping this one particular girl. She was going to be a success 00:11:21.780 --> 00:11:26.520 story. Like we had pulled out all the stops, got her a part. She was living in a car, but we got her 00:11:26.520 --> 00:11:32.420 an apartment. We got her a job like, yay. Until I realized I wanted a better life for her much more 00:11:32.420 --> 00:11:38.160 than she did. She let all the pieces fall. I'm in the closet having a hissy fit. God, can't you see, 00:11:38.160 --> 00:11:41.460 you know, what a good person? Like, what are you doing? Like, are you asleep up there? 00:11:42.040 --> 00:11:46.160 And again, he was like, when did I ever ask you to do any of this? Share your story with sorority 00:11:46.160 --> 00:11:52.000 women. And I was like, oh yeah, I remember that. So this is how stubborn I am and how God has to be 00:11:52.000 --> 00:11:59.880 like slap slap for real. So there's a lot of story to that too. But long story short, I started getting 00:11:59.880 --> 00:12:03.960 involved in my sorority. I was at 80 pie. So I, you know, it was a kind of an easy door to get back 00:12:03.960 --> 00:12:07.860 involved with that. Like, you know, Hey, I'd like to be an advisor. I'd like to serve. And 00:12:07.860 --> 00:12:13.420 very shyly was like, Hey, so I kind of have this passion. My background is in marketing this whole 00:12:13.420 --> 00:12:19.280 time. I've worked in TV, print, radio advertising. Saw how, as Ashley talked about 18 to 24 year old 00:12:19.280 --> 00:12:24.360 women really do have trendsetting power. And there's so much good that they could do in the 00:12:24.360 --> 00:12:28.020 world. If they realized how powerful they are when it comes to marketing, I learned this through 00:12:28.020 --> 00:12:33.080 marketing and then realize, you know, why don't we use this power for good? So I shyly mentioned to 00:12:33.080 --> 00:12:38.600 these girls like, Hey, I see sorority women have cool influence if we can use it for good. And they're 00:12:38.600 --> 00:12:43.300 like, well, why don't you come talk to our chapter about that next Sunday, 225 girls, the mic is yours. 00:12:43.300 --> 00:12:49.960 And I'm like, I'm sorry, what? So that was my very first speaking opportunity, which has now grown 00:12:49.960 --> 00:12:55.400 to, I've gone to 70 colleges nationwide. That first time I had no idea what I was saying, but obviously it 00:12:55.400 --> 00:13:01.260 grew and became what I do now. Yeah. And there's lots of other cat little rabbit trails along the 00:13:01.260 --> 00:13:05.220 way that this path has taken me, but don't want to answer your question in three hours. So that's 00:13:05.220 --> 00:13:09.560 the short of the story. No, that's what we do here. Three hour, three hour answers is good. I have one 00:13:09.560 --> 00:13:15.140 last question before one more question before I turn it over to Ashley. Did it feel as you were going 00:13:15.140 --> 00:13:21.660 back into a sorority to really offer your services as an advisor, did you, did you see any of the impact 00:13:21.660 --> 00:13:24.920 you were actually going to have, or was it kind of, you were focusing on the day-to-day minute 00:13:24.920 --> 00:13:28.120 by minute kind of discipleship pathway that you were going to be taking? 00:13:28.460 --> 00:13:34.740 Yeah. I would say I had no idea. And really kind of to get me in that I was a, so this whole time 00:13:34.740 --> 00:13:40.980 working in advertising also became a yoga instructor who saw that coming and had a young lady at my 00:13:40.980 --> 00:13:45.440 church. So I hear this, I had this, you know, meltdown moment in the closet. God, can't you see 00:13:45.440 --> 00:13:49.200 how hard I'm working? He's like, hello, share your story with sorority women. But then I'm like, 00:13:49.240 --> 00:13:52.740 what does that even look like? I'm like 30 years old at this point. Do I go knock on the beautiful 00:13:52.740 --> 00:13:57.220 sorority mansion? Hey, God told me to come talk to you guys. You know, that won't be awkward. 00:13:57.420 --> 00:14:03.220 Call the police on me. But a young lady at church said, Hey, aren't you a yoga instructor? Can you 00:14:03.220 --> 00:14:09.780 come do a yoga class for our sisterhood? And I'm like, can I ever? And this was an 80 pie and that's 00:14:09.780 --> 00:14:14.220 what I was. So it was like a natural lead, started doing classes with them, started to get to know the 00:14:14.220 --> 00:14:19.940 president. And then that's when she invited me to come speak. And so yes, no, no clue. 100% 00:14:19.940 --> 00:14:24.580 God wanted me to get there more than I did. I did not have a vision for it. I stumbled like a 00:14:24.580 --> 00:14:32.680 doofus along the way to get to where I am now. Yeah. It's amazing. I think all the time that when 00:14:32.680 --> 00:14:40.520 I look at like the totality of my life, how even the weird, seemingly obscure things that you happen 00:14:40.520 --> 00:14:47.660 to fall into, um, how those things even play a role in what your ultimate purpose and calling is. 00:14:47.860 --> 00:14:58.740 And the concept that God wastes nothing is so, so true because even, even I say all the time, 00:14:58.740 --> 00:15:07.000 like I grew up in the middle of nowhere, Northern New Mexico, like 15 miles from a town of 2000 people, 00:15:07.000 --> 00:15:14.140 two hours from a single stoplight. Okay. I was obsessed with West coast gangster rap 00:15:14.140 --> 00:15:19.080 in high school. Tupac. Yes. And my dad would be like, 00:15:19.220 --> 00:15:24.100 my dad would be like, I don't understand how you identify with this at all. It just doesn't make 00:15:24.100 --> 00:15:29.840 any kind of sense. Like F the police. Like there are no police here. Like, why are you even like, 00:15:29.840 --> 00:15:38.780 she doesn't make sense. Right. Like nothing. Um, and you know, my church predominantly focuses on urban 00:15:38.780 --> 00:15:45.640 spaces and we have a whole section now called hip hop hermeneutics and it's like lessons in hip hop. 00:15:45.640 --> 00:15:53.820 And like the little, you know, the 13 year old kid in the middle of nowhere, New Mexico that should not 00:15:53.820 --> 00:16:00.060 have been obsessed with, you know, all of the West coast hip hop things, it all plays into that. So 00:16:00.060 --> 00:16:03.960 it's always interesting to me when I hear people's stories and they're like, well, I just happened to 00:16:03.960 --> 00:16:11.640 start teaching yoga. It didn't really make sense. And, and then that one seemingly minute thing that you 00:16:11.640 --> 00:16:18.180 just did because you enjoyed it can be something that, that completely launches an entire section of 00:16:18.180 --> 00:16:24.740 ministry that you would have never, um, you know, even imagined doing. And so I think that that's, 00:16:24.840 --> 00:16:30.240 that's just an interesting thing about God. Like as people, this is obviously a minor preaching moment, 00:16:30.240 --> 00:16:34.840 but as people are going through life, you know, don't think that the obscure thing that you're 00:16:34.840 --> 00:16:39.800 really interested in isn't one of the things that God wants to use. I mean, even gaming, like, 00:16:40.660 --> 00:16:45.180 you know, you have people who are super obsessed with video games that are now able to minister to an 00:16:45.180 --> 00:16:50.620 entire group of people that nobody else can reach just because they like to play call of duty. You 00:16:50.620 --> 00:16:56.180 know, um, it's not a minor thing. Like God puts those, the things that we like and the things that 00:16:56.180 --> 00:17:02.320 we just, we desire to do. I think that those are all intricate parts of who he creates us to be, 00:17:02.360 --> 00:17:08.580 to reach the people that we need to be able to reach. So, um, whenever you decided to launch 00:17:08.580 --> 00:17:14.580 the podcast specifically, what was your mindset behind that and what caused you to want to step into the 00:17:14.580 --> 00:17:15.660 podcast space? 00:17:15.900 --> 00:17:20.920 Yeah. So that's actually the youngest of the things I do, if you will. So, you know, I started, 00:17:21.120 --> 00:17:27.900 well, I kind of dove into what I'm doing with the ministry to sorority women, but that wasn't really 00:17:27.900 --> 00:17:33.080 a thing until I launched an ebook. This was the, they told you to do this back in the day, like to do an 00:17:33.080 --> 00:17:37.820 ebook to get people to put, get on your email subscriber list. No idea what I was doing, but that 00:17:37.820 --> 00:17:42.480 ebook, um, I had some sorority women. This is really good. We can, we can shoot the cover of it. We can 00:17:42.480 --> 00:17:47.660 help lay out the graphics and it turned into an actual book just printed through Amazon. Like 00:17:47.660 --> 00:17:50.980 the average person could do this. I had no followers. I was like, you know, no idea what 00:17:50.980 --> 00:17:56.300 I was doing. So I had this actual printed book. I go to some conferences and I'm like, Hey, you know, 00:17:56.300 --> 00:18:01.420 very shyly again, I have this book that I see the incredible trendsetting power of sorority girls, 00:18:01.420 --> 00:18:05.480 but it's probably not good. And they're like, yeah, why don't you come speak to our chapter? 00:18:05.620 --> 00:18:11.120 That's how I got speaking opportunities. That's how it started. And so anyway, the pod, that was 00:18:11.120 --> 00:18:16.280 the book and then the speaking opportunities, the podcast happened, it's probably about four years old 00:18:16.280 --> 00:18:22.720 now. And so that happened just really wanting to talk, have longer conversations about things I was 00:18:22.720 --> 00:18:28.220 saying on social media. As we know, our attention spans are getting shorter and there's only so much 00:18:28.220 --> 00:18:33.460 you can say in 15 second tech talks or even, you know, a minute long. And there was just so much 00:18:33.460 --> 00:18:38.080 more to be said and so many more conversations I want to have. And the podcast, I was actually being 00:18:38.080 --> 00:18:42.040 interviewed on several other people's podcasts, which is wonderful. And I was like, I have a lot 00:18:42.040 --> 00:18:48.000 more to say. So I did that. And then I thankfully have had the opportunity to interview a lot of people 00:18:48.000 --> 00:18:53.600 too. A lot of it is interview style, but I get to, I'm on the list for a lot of publishers. So people, 00:18:54.140 --> 00:18:58.620 interesting people who have books coming out, I get to meet them. And I always say, ask them at the end 00:18:58.620 --> 00:19:02.680 of every interview, if you could have coffee with your 20 year old self, what would you say? And that's 00:19:02.680 --> 00:19:07.180 so fun. Cause I get to hear from really cool people who are doing good in the world, what they would 00:19:07.180 --> 00:19:16.420 say. And yeah, so that's kind of how that all came to be. And how do you feel? Because we give advice 00:19:16.420 --> 00:19:23.960 a lot to, to spiritual leaders and pastors and people in nonprofits, et cetera, about the digital 00:19:23.960 --> 00:19:29.340 space specifically. And you hear gurus, like I jokingly say, don't come at me in the comments, 00:19:29.440 --> 00:19:35.780 but my patron saint is Gary V. So the patron saint of marketing, Gary V, you know, he says that he 00:19:35.780 --> 00:19:40.060 thinks everyone should have a podcast, that there's literally no one on earth that should not have one 00:19:40.060 --> 00:19:48.600 because one, you can chop it up into short form content, but two, that we all know at least 00:19:48.600 --> 00:19:56.440 several interesting people that don't ever get their stories out there or whatever the case may be. 00:19:56.980 --> 00:20:04.860 So as you stepped into the podcast space, what are your thoughts about ministries having a podcast 00:20:04.980 --> 00:20:10.660 outside of just their general ministry stuff, like outside of preaching, outside of, you know, 00:20:11.080 --> 00:20:14.120 social media, outside of that? What are your thoughts on that? 00:20:15.200 --> 00:20:19.360 Okay. About a podcast. I don't know that I would say everyone needs a podcast. It's a lot of work. 00:20:21.040 --> 00:20:27.480 I mean, Gary V is great. And maybe I can certainly open to be argued with that, but I will say that 00:20:27.480 --> 00:20:33.020 everyone needs to be showing up online. That is such a low hanging fruit. Literally like before we got on 00:20:33.020 --> 00:20:38.460 this call, I got a comment on one of my posts and I get this all the time. You guys, are there any men 00:20:38.460 --> 00:20:44.160 talking about healthy dating culture? Like Katie is, I get that all the time. And I'll talk to guys every now 00:20:44.160 --> 00:20:49.540 and then, and I'm sure there are, but I just don't hear it. If there were a thousand, there needs to 00:20:49.540 --> 00:20:57.080 be a thousand and one because especially Christian voices, like how crazy for you to be thinking I'm 00:20:57.080 --> 00:21:02.000 not good enough. I'm not smart enough. I don't know how to do TikToks good enough. Just say something, 00:21:02.320 --> 00:21:08.040 fail, get it wrong, learn, delete the stupid posts. Once you see it's better in a year, but you have to 00:21:08.040 --> 00:21:14.360 start somewhere. I mean, some of my first TikToks were stupid, but I had to start to figure it out. 00:21:14.360 --> 00:21:21.120 And yeah, I'll get on my soapbox about this, but your listeners are the target audience for me to 00:21:21.120 --> 00:21:27.020 strangle with love and tell you and shake you behind the shoulders, like show up online. Your voice is 00:21:27.020 --> 00:21:33.520 needed. There are a million loud voices out there. There are not enough true voices. And as someone 00:21:33.520 --> 00:21:38.500 who speaks to young people, there's a lot of confusion. Again, even if you see three people on 00:21:38.500 --> 00:21:43.620 your, you know, your brows that are saying something similar to you, your voice is still needed because 00:21:43.620 --> 00:21:47.400 you might be into gaming. Like you said, you might live in a different part of the country. You might 00:21:47.400 --> 00:21:52.400 have brown hair or blue. People are going to relate to you differently than Joe Blow, who's saying the 00:21:52.400 --> 00:21:57.160 same thing. Say it, say good things on the internet, please. This is me begging. 00:21:58.020 --> 00:22:06.180 I think that it's interesting that I have recently become friends on TikTok with a lady who she was 00:22:06.180 --> 00:22:12.720 in pornography for seven years. And now she's very active in anti-pornography initiatives and she's 00:22:12.720 --> 00:22:20.260 loves Jesus and married, has kids. And she and I got into a conversation about that very thing that 00:22:20.260 --> 00:22:25.800 from certain vantage points, people might would say that she and I talk about the same thing. We 00:22:25.800 --> 00:22:30.220 actually talk about very different things because pornography and prostitution while they're on the 00:22:30.220 --> 00:22:38.160 same road or in different lanes. And so somebody had told her, well, I already follow this girl over 00:22:38.160 --> 00:22:44.680 here and she says, blah, blah, blah. And we were kind of chuckling about it because if you were to scroll 00:22:44.680 --> 00:22:50.820 through the people that follow me versus the people that follow her, they are drastically different 00:22:50.820 --> 00:22:58.060 people. They are not even remotely the same people. And it's not because both of our audiences don't 00:22:58.060 --> 00:23:04.240 understand or relate to the other person's stuff. It's just the way that I package things and deliver 00:23:04.240 --> 00:23:09.960 things is a completely different way than the way she talks about things and packages things. And I think 00:23:09.960 --> 00:23:17.420 that we have to wrap our heads around that the gospel is the same way. Whenever you are in faith circles, 00:23:18.420 --> 00:23:26.500 there are ways that, I mean, you can take mega famous pastors like, you know, TD Jakes, who is a phenomenal 00:23:26.500 --> 00:23:33.980 preacher, obviously known all over the world, is nothing like Stephen Furtick, nothing. Now, he did mentor 00:23:33.980 --> 00:23:40.280 Stephen Furtick. I think that they have a pretty solid relationship, but stylistically, visually, 00:23:41.100 --> 00:23:47.280 there's no, so would you tell either one of those men to stop preaching because they weren't like 00:23:47.280 --> 00:23:54.000 the other man? That's just completely insane. Like, of course we wouldn't say that. Like, you know, and you 00:23:54.000 --> 00:24:00.280 could, I mean, you could compare Mike Todd to Billy Graham, like they're both, you would never tell either one of 00:24:00.280 --> 00:24:07.000 them to stop sharing the gospel because they just identify with a completely different group of people 00:24:07.000 --> 00:24:13.660 than, you know. I do sometimes wonder what Billy Graham would say about each individual, like new 00:24:13.660 --> 00:24:18.220 up-and-coming pastor. Like, I'd really like to hear his thoughts sometimes, but that's a rabbit trail we 00:24:18.220 --> 00:24:26.360 don't have to go down. So, yeah, I think that you're right. I think that, I do believe, though, that if you 00:24:26.360 --> 00:24:36.200 are in a medium to large size church and you have the staff for it, I think that they should have podcasts 00:24:36.200 --> 00:24:43.480 outside of just traditional church. Because sometimes, for instance, Impact Church, I am in 00:24:43.480 --> 00:24:53.080 Phoenix, Arizona in Scottsdale. That's a big church, and there are so many retired and current professional 00:24:53.080 --> 00:24:58.920 sports team people that go there. That church is known for that. Like, people retire from the NFL, 00:24:58.920 --> 00:25:03.500 they move to Arizona because the heat's better for their joints, and they all go to church at Impact. 00:25:03.500 --> 00:25:11.400 And, you know, to sit down and have weekly conversations with these solid believers that are 00:25:11.400 --> 00:25:18.280 men that have that presence in the world because of what their career has been could be game-changing. 00:25:18.480 --> 00:25:25.120 So, it's kind of like, I think that, that ministers that are in that space that have the staff 100% 00:25:25.120 --> 00:25:28.560 should do that. Yeah. Yeah. Their voice is needed for sure. Show up. 00:25:29.600 --> 00:25:36.320 Show up. Yeah. Yes. So, I actually, following up on that, you're, you're, you're, you're, 00:25:36.320 --> 00:25:42.200 your target audience is obviously women. Do you have, that's a two-part question. Number one, 00:25:42.260 --> 00:25:48.540 do you have men that listen to your show? Number one. And number two, if they do, do you ever get 00:25:48.540 --> 00:25:55.100 any feedback, positive, negative, otherwise, from men who are trying to actively partake in what 00:25:55.100 --> 00:25:59.100 you're, what you're putting out into the universe? I know that they're there. Obviously, it's the 00:25:59.100 --> 00:26:05.060 minority. I have heard through DMs or emails or whatever from a few. And it's funny, I got an email 00:26:05.060 --> 00:26:09.780 one time it was like a 40 year old dad and he's like, I know I'm not your target market, but no, 00:26:09.780 --> 00:26:13.700 I have daughters and just thank you for what you're doing. And, and so that was really kind. 00:26:13.940 --> 00:26:19.520 I can't think of ever having pushback from guys. So that's nice. Now, what's funny is I'm a speaker 00:26:19.520 --> 00:26:24.160 to sorority. So I traveled to all these sororities and more often than not, there's at least one or two 00:26:24.160 --> 00:26:28.920 guys in the audience, even if they're just doing sound or he's the fraternity sorority life director 00:26:28.920 --> 00:26:34.620 or whatever. And I'll say, you know, like, um, women's empowerment gets a bad rap because then 00:26:34.620 --> 00:26:38.660 that gets until the feminist rabbit train. And that's not what I'm about, but I'll say things 00:26:38.660 --> 00:26:44.020 like raise the bar and dating, don't date dirtbags, stuff like this. But 10 out of 10 times, the guys 00:26:44.020 --> 00:26:49.840 are always like, thank you for saying that. Um, these are good guys who, uh, you know, agree with what 00:26:49.840 --> 00:26:55.300 I'm saying about stop putting up with guys treating you like crap. I mean, most good hearted guys are 00:26:55.300 --> 00:27:00.700 like, yes, thank you. So I guess the short of the story is I don't have a lot of guys in the 00:27:00.700 --> 00:27:05.100 audience. I know, but the ones that I do, I've always heard good things about, and I have had 00:27:05.100 --> 00:27:10.980 probably the most common guy related comment I get is that like, are there guys out there saying 00:27:10.980 --> 00:27:15.380 what you're saying, Katie? And I'm like, maybe, I guess, I don't know, but if you know who they 00:27:15.380 --> 00:27:19.960 are, tag them and I would love to be friends and help cheer them on and share their stuff. And I'm on 00:27:19.960 --> 00:27:26.280 your side. I love that. You're that listeners. You're in your, you know, if you know about 00:27:26.280 --> 00:27:34.280 males, if you want to step in and have a wide open niche, like Katie's handing it to you on 00:27:34.280 --> 00:27:40.320 a platter, like getting solid relationship advice. Yes. We can set up a phone call. Basically what I'm 00:27:40.320 --> 00:27:46.040 asking guys who, who want to talk about what it looks like to date with integrity, what it looks like 00:27:46.040 --> 00:27:51.740 to, Hey, you know what? It turns out God's design is best. He isn't trying to hold out on you because 00:27:51.740 --> 00:27:57.500 he's mean. He loves you and he wants what's best for you. Um, grace with truth. Uh, these are 00:27:57.500 --> 00:28:02.860 conversations that need to be had because I can tell you Cardi B and a lot of other people are just 00:28:02.860 --> 00:28:07.040 saying a lot of other things in the world and there's confusion if nothing else. And there might 00:28:07.040 --> 00:28:12.960 be lack of conversations at home and their 19 year old friends are much help. So they need positive 00:28:12.960 --> 00:28:19.400 voices in the world. And we always say I'm a mentor. I do online mentoring as well, but sometimes the 00:28:19.400 --> 00:28:23.700 people who mentor me and the people who mentor the people on the other side of this, uh, conversation, 00:28:23.700 --> 00:28:28.820 you might not have met them in real life, but you thanks to this world that we live in this modern 00:28:28.820 --> 00:28:33.640 day, you can be a mentor to potentially thousands of young men or young women by picking up your 00:28:33.640 --> 00:28:38.660 smartphone. It was in your pocket. It's just amazing. So with that in mind, whenever it comes 00:28:38.660 --> 00:28:45.640 specifically to discipleship, because we really want people to understand, you know, mentorship, 00:28:45.900 --> 00:28:53.160 discipleship, those are very synonymous things. Um, I think mentorship is a more broad term used in a 00:28:53.160 --> 00:29:00.400 more secular society. Discipleship, I think is mentorship, um, with just a deeply spiritual element 00:29:00.400 --> 00:29:09.500 that is obviously focal. Um, what would you say, how would you say discipleship plays into what you're 00:29:09.500 --> 00:29:15.440 doing? Because you're in an interesting place where you don't necessarily know what someone's 00:29:15.440 --> 00:29:21.220 spiritual walk is. Like they might be believers in Christ. They may not, you know, they could be 00:29:21.220 --> 00:29:27.360 agnostic or there's so many, a myriad of things. Um, and, and I think it was our second episode. 00:29:27.360 --> 00:29:33.840 I talked about the difference between covert and overt discipleship. So there's overt discipleship 00:29:33.840 --> 00:29:38.420 where someone knows you really well. You absolutely know they're a believer. And they may even ask you 00:29:38.420 --> 00:29:43.620 like, Hey, you know, Katie, I see you and your husband have an amazing marriage. You have healthy 00:29:43.620 --> 00:29:48.840 dynamics. I know that you love Jesus. This is something I want. Will you disciple me? Like, 00:29:48.880 --> 00:29:54.000 can I purposely step under you? That's like overt discipleship, right? Like it's overtly, 00:29:54.000 --> 00:29:59.160 you're clearly discipling them. There's no secret. Then I said there, I believe that there's something 00:29:59.160 --> 00:30:04.360 that's called covert discipleship, which is when people want to be around you for whatever reason. 00:30:05.400 --> 00:30:15.740 And you're not necessarily full on, like giving them like biblical truth with the, with the proper 00:30:15.740 --> 00:30:22.280 jargon, right? Like Jesus said, or the Bible says, or, but you're very definitely giving them 00:30:22.280 --> 00:30:29.600 biblical and scriptural principles. And they walk away with a seed planted in them. And I think that 00:30:29.600 --> 00:30:34.920 that's, I call that covert discipleship. Like you're discipling, you're just like under the radar. 00:30:35.640 --> 00:30:42.920 So I would, my question is whenever it comes to discipleship and what you do, how would you, 00:30:42.960 --> 00:30:51.900 how do you kind of define the two? Um, and do you believe that covert discipleship is a thing? 00:30:52.900 --> 00:30:54.620 Covert's the more under the radar one, right? 00:30:54.960 --> 00:31:01.360 Yeah. I haven't thought a lot about it, but my hot take is yes. I say, I do that when I go to colleges 00:31:01.360 --> 00:31:06.720 because I, when I speak to, you know, I'm booked by universities to speak to 400 girls that they're, 00:31:06.780 --> 00:31:11.820 you know, their sorority, like they're a Panhellenic or whatever it may be. I am speaking the truth. 00:31:11.880 --> 00:31:15.680 I am doing a lot of things, pointing them to good habits, good, healthy behavior, 00:31:16.280 --> 00:31:21.820 but it is not like a Christian message. Now my podcast is definitely faith-based, my social media, 00:31:22.060 --> 00:31:27.560 that kind of stuff. Um, when I do online mentoring, a lot of people will book a call with me and I 00:31:27.560 --> 00:31:33.220 almost always there. And I asked like, do you want faith-based advice? And they know me enough 00:31:33.220 --> 00:31:37.080 before they book a call and spend money. Like they probably know what I'm going to say. Right. 00:31:37.680 --> 00:31:43.180 Um, for the six week mentoring, I say like, if you are not interested in biblical advice, 00:31:43.180 --> 00:31:47.040 I'm not your girl because I can't do that deep dive and not point you to Jesus. Cause I'm not doing 00:31:47.040 --> 00:31:53.240 either one of us any favors. Um, I can think of very few conversations I've had with just the one 00:31:53.240 --> 00:31:58.400 time call that they were like, yeah, I'm not really interested in that. Most of the time they are. So 00:31:58.400 --> 00:32:03.620 I guess the sort of the answer is when I go, when I'm, you know, going to a college, I do have a more 00:32:03.620 --> 00:32:08.260 like under the radar, if you will, um, type of conversation. And then hopefully pointing them down 00:32:08.260 --> 00:32:12.940 to a more intimate here. Okay. Hopefully you liked what I said. Hopefully I gave you some good 00:32:12.940 --> 00:32:17.980 advice, but I can't do any magic. The only one who can is Jesus. And here's some more information 00:32:17.980 --> 00:32:22.160 about him. And here is what changed my life. The woman, the well story, if that pertains to them 00:32:22.160 --> 00:32:26.740 or whatever. But, um, yeah. And then like, I guess coming back to our earlier conversation, 00:32:26.900 --> 00:32:32.060 the woman, the well, this story has been around for a while. Right. And it was like brand new to me. 00:32:32.380 --> 00:32:36.980 And I remember doing a Bible study at our local college and sharing that this was another girl. 00:32:36.980 --> 00:32:42.000 She's like, wait, did you know that like, she left her water jar there and went to go speak to the 00:32:42.000 --> 00:32:45.620 town? I'm like, I mean, yeah, that's kind of like the main part of the story. Like, of course I know 00:32:45.620 --> 00:32:51.520 that, but she's, she's 20. This is brand new to her, you know? And so back to our conversation of 00:32:51.520 --> 00:32:57.220 like, you think everything's already been said. You think that all the main stories, like maybe 00:32:57.220 --> 00:33:01.420 someone out there doesn't know that David killed Goliath and why that's important. Right. And if 00:33:01.420 --> 00:33:06.020 that's a story that like totally is important to you, share it, share it, why it applies. 00:33:06.020 --> 00:33:13.180 Yeah. I have a, I have a very similar love affair with the story of Rahab because in the story of 00:33:13.180 --> 00:33:18.140 Rahab and I grew up in church, you know, I had obviously read it many times in the story of 00:33:18.140 --> 00:33:26.300 Rahab, she hangs a red cord out the window. And, um, I actually teach a lot when I preach about 00:33:26.300 --> 00:33:33.380 things in the Bible. Um, because I feel like if, if the story felt the need to mention that object, 00:33:33.440 --> 00:33:39.900 that there's probably a lesson tied to the object. And so anyone who understands the historical 00:33:39.900 --> 00:33:43.580 significance of that red rope, it was something that she would have had to hang over her door to 00:33:43.580 --> 00:33:49.080 let people know that she was a prostitute. And in order for her and her entire family to be saved, 00:33:49.080 --> 00:33:56.100 she had to hang what she was out the window. She had to fully own who she was to first let her 00:33:56.100 --> 00:34:02.660 saviors know that she was this thing so that they could rescue her. It was like a way of identifying 00:34:02.660 --> 00:34:08.240 her, right. That's how they knew not to kill her, but also the amount of freedom that brings. And if 00:34:08.240 --> 00:34:14.840 she had hidden it, they would have all been killed. And for me, symbolically, you know, it's very much 00:34:14.840 --> 00:34:22.000 a, a, if you, if you've been through something grimy in order to bring salvation to yourself and 00:34:22.000 --> 00:34:28.100 generations of people after you, you need to own what it is that you've done and who you are. 00:34:28.180 --> 00:34:33.940 Don't be ashamed of it because that's how salvation comes. And that's how freedom comes is by hanging 00:34:33.940 --> 00:34:40.000 this thing out the window. And I have preached that at multiple women's conferences, obviously 00:34:40.000 --> 00:34:46.300 longer and more articulately than that. Um, and over and over people are like, I have never, 00:34:46.300 --> 00:34:52.480 ever, ever, ever in my life, like correlated those things. And so you're right. And it goes back to 00:34:52.480 --> 00:34:58.440 what we're saying about how something that I say will hit one particular group of people, 00:34:58.440 --> 00:35:03.520 even if it's the same story. I mean, you would probably teach the story of Rahab from a different 00:35:03.520 --> 00:35:07.800 vantage point. Uh, Andy, you would teach the story of Rahab from a different vantage point. 00:35:07.960 --> 00:35:17.120 And so it's the necessity for being very present online, I think is really kind of the, the, 00:35:17.120 --> 00:35:24.100 the main thing that people need to hear. I think is just, it's not about, oh, there's already 500,000 00:35:24.100 --> 00:35:29.520 pastors that are preaching. And it's funny because, so Andy and I have been on a podcast recording 00:35:29.520 --> 00:35:36.280 like grind. We recorded several last week. We've recorded several this week. We're basically recording 00:35:36.280 --> 00:35:43.320 a whole season in two weeks. And so we've had lots of conversations. Um, and so, but what I'm 00:35:43.320 --> 00:35:52.260 noticing is in every single conversation, what comes up is it really, you cannot focus on the size of 00:35:52.260 --> 00:35:58.260 the audience, rather the impact that you could potentially have on a single individual. And that 00:35:58.260 --> 00:36:05.260 has come up, Andy, I think in like every single, like all of them, it's like every single one of 00:36:05.260 --> 00:36:12.340 them is like, we, if you, you can't be focused on, well, I may not have as large of an audience 00:36:12.340 --> 00:36:17.800 on my podcast as Katie has on her podcast, or, you know, you may not have as big of a following 00:36:17.800 --> 00:36:23.140 on Tik TOK as I have on Tik TOK, but does it really matter though? Because that one person that 00:36:23.140 --> 00:36:27.220 needs to hear it, God's going to make sure that that one person hears it. But if your voice can't 00:36:27.220 --> 00:36:33.320 be found, then it becomes a problem. And so I think that that's interesting, Andy, that 00:36:33.320 --> 00:36:41.140 I mean, and we've had people, you, then we interviewed Ken Arrington, who's in Puerto 00:36:41.140 --> 00:36:44.720 Rico planting gardens. You know, do you follow him on Tik TOK? 00:36:44.720 --> 00:36:46.060 No, it sounds fascinating though. 00:36:46.380 --> 00:36:51.300 He's, he's amazing, but you should follow him. Um, but he's like a biblical historian and 00:36:51.300 --> 00:36:57.120 like does crazy, amazing things with him and his wife, but you two are very, very different 00:36:57.120 --> 00:37:01.240 and you are saying the same thing. And then Ian Simpkins, we interviewed him. He said the 00:37:01.240 --> 00:37:07.200 same thing. Like, it's just been like person after person. So I think this, this season is 00:37:07.200 --> 00:37:12.080 like, and it's the same thing that God's been putting on my heart since December that I've 00:37:12.080 --> 00:37:18.260 been posting about on Tik TOK and my Instagram, which is impact over accolades. Like God is a 00:37:18.260 --> 00:37:26.700 hundred percent more concerned with your willingness to show up and, and be impactful than, than he is 00:37:26.700 --> 00:37:29.700 with whether or not you have a zillion people that are listening to you. 00:37:29.700 --> 00:37:34.760 Yeah. I have a quote in my little quotes that inspire me thing. Anyways, uh, obedience doesn't 00:37:34.760 --> 00:37:40.180 require an audience. And so it's just showing up. And now of course there are ways to show 00:37:40.180 --> 00:37:46.280 up better. Like people listening are obviously people who have great things to say. And you 00:37:46.280 --> 00:37:51.140 YouTube that all day long for just different ways to, to film your videos, to make it effective, 00:37:51.140 --> 00:37:57.080 but don't, don't let perfection stop you because it's better to take some action than wait for 00:37:57.080 --> 00:38:01.240 perfection. Cause that's never going to happen. But yeah, I mean, make your video a little 00:38:01.240 --> 00:38:05.420 engaging if you can do a little bit of work, but mostly just hit publish. 00:38:05.920 --> 00:38:12.260 Yeah. When I first started, and even now kind of my Tik TOKs and I mean, I film like cinematic 00:38:12.260 --> 00:38:19.560 commercials for professionally, like that's what I do. And my Tik TOKs, I am like, meh, 00:38:19.720 --> 00:38:24.800 I'm just going to talk into this phone. Cause originally I kind of like whenever God was like, 00:38:24.900 --> 00:38:28.940 well, it wasn't God. Well, it was, I guess it's probably God through my daughter. My daughter's 00:38:28.940 --> 00:38:34.120 like, mom, you need a Tik TOK. And I'm like, I'm not doing that. And so I did it very begrudgingly, 00:38:34.120 --> 00:38:40.740 you know? Um, and so I definitely didn't put any effort into it. And now I try to do more and I 00:38:40.740 --> 00:38:47.120 just find that my lane seems to be just film what you film and put it out. Um, but I agree. Like 00:38:47.120 --> 00:38:51.620 there are so many ways to learn how to be more engaging. So Andy, what were you going to say? 00:38:51.820 --> 00:38:56.220 I was going to ask you. So Katie, you are relentlessly positive. And I mean that in a good 00:38:56.220 --> 00:39:03.000 way. Um, like there, there is a, sometimes you meet people that, uh, the positivity is forced. 00:39:03.400 --> 00:39:07.960 Um, but everything that I've seen from you on social media, I've, I admit I have listened to 00:39:07.960 --> 00:39:13.440 probably a number of your episodes, uh, covertly. Yeah. Uh, I have a 17 year old daughter. And so, 00:39:13.440 --> 00:39:19.120 um, I'm, I'm, she's my girl. She's going to college next year. We have a 19 year old son and 00:39:19.120 --> 00:39:24.100 I was fine kicking him out of the house, but the 17 year old girl, uh, I don't, I think she's 00:39:24.100 --> 00:39:27.900 actually currently like right above me sleeping, taking a nap before she has to go to work or track 00:39:27.900 --> 00:39:31.480 practice or something. Like, I don't want her to leave the house ever. I want to like, you know, 00:39:31.520 --> 00:39:37.020 just, just, no, she's not going to leave. Boys are idiots and stupid. And I, you, the world is bad. 00:39:37.280 --> 00:39:43.440 And so what you're saying is relentlessly positive to women. And I super appreciate that. Do you ever 00:39:43.440 --> 00:39:50.360 find yourself getting into a rut because of that? Do you ever find yourself like repeating the same 00:39:50.360 --> 00:39:54.340 thing over and over and over and then going back to the Lord and saying like, Hey, I need something new 00:39:54.340 --> 00:39:59.640 here. Or are you just like that superhero single-minded? I'm charging this thing down and I'm 00:39:59.640 --> 00:40:06.440 running it down. Come hell or high water. Great question. And thank you. I, I, we love our young 00:40:06.440 --> 00:40:11.040 women. I have two daughters as well. Uh, I always say, you know, having two daughters makes me very 00:40:11.040 --> 00:40:14.540 passionate about the next generation of young women. So that's another thing that God did. It's funny. 00:40:14.540 --> 00:40:19.040 I would have told you as we pretend like I know that I was going to have three boys. And again, 00:40:19.120 --> 00:40:25.520 God's like, that's cute. But let me, let me show you what you need. Um, so to answer your question, 00:40:25.720 --> 00:40:31.460 um, okay, well, one funny story, it is actually a perfect example of this. I have a video that I did. 00:40:31.520 --> 00:40:37.360 It's not even my audio. I said, just a reminder, he's not your soulmate. Why your soulmate would 00:40:37.360 --> 00:40:44.160 actually want to date you. Okay. I've posted it twice. It performed all right. I was in this TikTok rut, 00:40:44.160 --> 00:40:49.020 as you alluded to earlier, Ashley, where none of my videos were getting any, so it's like, whatever, 00:40:49.160 --> 00:40:53.720 let me just post this again. I posted it before we'll post it again and see what happens. It is 00:40:53.720 --> 00:41:00.180 still going crazy with over a half a million views at this point. I've had people, how dare you? My 00:41:00.180 --> 00:41:04.920 soulmate is going to date me. He loves me. Wow. Thank you so much for saying this. It's just the same 00:41:04.920 --> 00:41:13.120 exact video that I posted before. So I've been very encouraged to do the same thing. I have reposted some 00:41:13.120 --> 00:41:17.640 content. I've said the same thing different ways there. I talked to something about how, 00:41:17.840 --> 00:41:23.800 when our grandparents dated, they had less options, but the marriage, you know, usually had a longer 00:41:23.800 --> 00:41:29.180 longevity in those days. Now there's a million different factors we can unpack, but are we really 00:41:29.180 --> 00:41:34.840 better for having thousands of options that we swipe through on the internet? I said this whole thing 00:41:34.840 --> 00:41:41.040 in about a minute video. I said the whole lot better, right? And then I, I kind of unpacked that and it said the same 00:41:41.040 --> 00:41:48.520 thing in seven seconds. So it's just so interesting that you can kind of say the same thing. And especially if you've been on 00:41:48.520 --> 00:41:54.920 or, you know, any form of social media for a while, you said the same thing six months ago, say it again. You can post the 00:41:54.920 --> 00:41:59.320 same exact video like I did with that soulmate thing, or you can just unpack it in a different way, you know, 00:41:59.340 --> 00:42:05.720 different song, different video, different, whatever. So I don't think, I guess I have social proof that 00:42:05.720 --> 00:42:09.580 saying the same thing doesn't get old. And I think about the way we are, you know, like we scrolling 00:42:09.580 --> 00:42:15.540 through, Oh, wow, that's really good. But even when I see the same persons post the same thing, thank you, because I 00:42:15.540 --> 00:42:19.640 needed to hear it again. Or maybe I missed it the first time, or maybe I wasn't following you a year ago when that went 00:42:19.640 --> 00:42:27.300 viral. I don't know, but I've never had someone say, how dare you post the same thing? You know, like, so I don't think it 00:42:27.300 --> 00:42:33.260 ever gets old, especially when we're doing what we're doing and we're saying what we're saying. And your audience is the 00:42:33.260 --> 00:42:37.980 same. Like none, no one listening is like going to be, I don't know, selling snake oil or saying 00:42:37.980 --> 00:42:42.840 unuseful content into the world. They're saying positive things that need to be said and need to be 00:42:42.840 --> 00:42:50.760 repeated. So I don't know. Thank you for the comment about positivity. But I do think I, and I'm a very 00:42:50.760 --> 00:42:57.260 tenacious person. My background is in marketing and sales. And so maybe I guess I, maybe I see things a 00:42:57.260 --> 00:43:03.920 little differently, but I am very excited about maybe a little bit blindly optimistic about the next 00:43:03.920 --> 00:43:07.740 generation of young people. And I do see the good. Yes, there's bad. There's, but you know, 00:43:07.740 --> 00:43:12.180 every person in their fifties looks back and say, Oh, the younger generation there, 00:43:12.320 --> 00:43:17.820 they, since the beginning of time, people have done that. And I disagree. Like, of course there's 00:43:17.820 --> 00:43:22.580 bad, but of course there's so much good too. And if we focus and call out the good in these younger 00:43:22.580 --> 00:43:25.860 people, that's what they need. They need a permission slip. They need someone a little bit 00:43:25.860 --> 00:43:30.840 ahead of them in life. Seeing I see good in you and I'm cheering you on. And here's how I want to help 00:43:30.840 --> 00:43:36.440 you. Like, that's what we can do as not 20 somethings anymore. And I just want to be a voice 00:43:36.440 --> 00:43:40.500 and an encourager. I have a lot of conversations with people. They book me for calls, not necessarily 00:43:40.500 --> 00:43:43.740 for mentoring, but they want to do what I'm doing. They want to be a speaker. They want to do social 00:43:43.740 --> 00:43:50.040 media. And again, it's not competition. Let me help you. Let me share your stuff. Let me support you. 00:43:50.460 --> 00:43:53.240 So yeah, as you can tell, I have strong feelings about all of that. 00:43:53.780 --> 00:43:58.820 Yeah. And I don't, I don't mean to, I don't mean to say that, you know, you are, your, your message 00:43:58.820 --> 00:44:03.220 is the same over and over. So forgive me if it came off that way. What I, what I mean is in the, 00:44:03.220 --> 00:44:08.740 the translation I was trying to jump there is that the discipleship is literally saying the same thing 00:44:08.740 --> 00:44:16.060 over and over and over and over. And for me, I was pastor for, I've been a pastor for 15 years 00:44:16.060 --> 00:44:20.800 and there are times even in my pastoral ministry, I'm saying the same thing over and over and over 00:44:20.800 --> 00:44:24.780 and over and over. Same, same, same rhythm, same everything. Obviously you got to try to make it 00:44:24.780 --> 00:44:29.500 fresh and try to do all the things there. But, but there are times in when I'm discipling somebody, 00:44:29.500 --> 00:44:33.220 it's like, man, can you just, can you not get it? Can you just not get it? And that's me being a 00:44:33.220 --> 00:44:38.020 hardheaded, like I'm a, I'm a one and a three on the Enneagram. Like I'm, I'm very braggadocious 00:44:38.020 --> 00:44:42.460 and I, that's your three as well. So that's, I think that there's a marketing thing there as well. 00:44:42.460 --> 00:44:47.220 Like that's just, that's how it is. Uh, but, but, but for me, like I run out of energy and 00:44:47.220 --> 00:44:52.020 the thing that amazes me about you is that you, you haven't, you, you, you're not running out of 00:44:52.020 --> 00:44:56.540 that energy. Like you're continuing to, so, so I commend you for all of that. This is me patting 00:44:56.540 --> 00:45:04.020 you on the back and saying like, well, okay. My mom is 70 and she does all the plays for the 00:45:04.020 --> 00:45:07.900 middle, all the costumes for the middle school play. Like she's just a little ball of energy. So 00:45:07.900 --> 00:45:12.600 I think I got it for her. Wow. But I do that for mentoring. I feel like I say the same thing on 00:45:12.600 --> 00:45:18.780 calls. So I ended up recording the same things I go over for a digital course. And I encourage like, 00:45:18.960 --> 00:45:21.980 Hey, why don't you buy this instead of booking a call? Cause it's cheaper. And I'm probably going 00:45:21.980 --> 00:45:29.260 to answer your question. Well, we are pushing up on time. So I, I think the last question that I have 00:45:29.260 --> 00:45:36.440 for you is something that's definitely happening across churches in America is there's just this 00:45:36.440 --> 00:45:44.660 mass exodus of Gen Z from the church, from the traditional church specifically. They are very 00:45:44.660 --> 00:45:51.600 hungry. I work with a ton of Gen Z. You do as well. Andy does too. There, it's not that they don't want 00:45:51.600 --> 00:45:57.580 to have a relationship with God or they don't want to have a relationship with Jesus. They just feel some 00:45:57.580 --> 00:46:03.800 kind of way about traditional church settings for a myriad of reasons. Some of them valid, some of 00:46:03.800 --> 00:46:12.140 them are not valid, but you know, valid to them. Um, so if you were talking to a room full of, 00:46:12.140 --> 00:46:22.820 of pastors that were wanting to figure out a way to re-engage Gen Z specifically in an impactful way, 00:46:23.140 --> 00:46:30.660 what would your advice be to them? Yeah, there's, there's a lot to, I think the first thing is like 00:46:30.660 --> 00:46:34.960 it or not. And again, every generation has done this. We don't want what our parents had. We think 00:46:34.960 --> 00:46:41.400 that it's an uncool outdated. It doesn't apply to me. And we can argue that because the gospel is the 00:46:41.400 --> 00:46:47.760 same and it's, and it's always good and it's always applicable, but I think that they are craving 00:46:47.760 --> 00:46:52.160 something deeper. We love this about this generation that they do want. Um, you know, 00:46:52.160 --> 00:46:57.860 we have that Asbury revival as an example of people. Yeah. Young people do want a deeper dive. 00:46:57.860 --> 00:47:03.580 And so our church did something recently and it was, they encourage people to fast. They're encouraged, 00:47:03.700 --> 00:47:08.420 like just some go up to the church and pray. It was open 7am to 7pm, just a more intense, 00:47:08.580 --> 00:47:13.420 which sounds crazy. Cause a lot of people think, Oh, you know, Gen Z wants to sleep in all day and not 00:47:13.420 --> 00:47:18.260 work. And I mean, I'm sure there's statistics on that too, but what I see is the thing, the people 00:47:18.260 --> 00:47:23.380 who are interested in church, they want, they're searching for what's real. And if we can give them 00:47:23.380 --> 00:47:28.320 a taste of here, you know, we don't have it all figured out and say that too, like here, I'm a 00:47:28.320 --> 00:47:36.100 pastor who, you know, I, I don't, this is not a facade. This is just a broken man or woman trying to 00:47:36.100 --> 00:47:40.720 figure it out. Here's what I've learned this week when I was studying scripture. Uh, I think this is 00:47:40.720 --> 00:47:45.620 interesting. What do you think? Have a conversation. And I think that what I see is a lot of pastors 00:47:45.620 --> 00:47:50.740 doing that, having a lot of great conversations. I see, I'm excited about what I see in the church, 00:47:50.780 --> 00:47:56.160 that it's not just a, here I am in my suit and I don't like anyone who thinks otherwise. I think 00:47:56.160 --> 00:48:01.460 that that's definitely not the trend anymore. I'm sure somewhere in Nowhereville, uh, there, 00:48:01.500 --> 00:48:06.760 there is that happening, but again, maybe I'm just blindly optimistic, but I do see very good 00:48:06.760 --> 00:48:12.580 things happening. I do see very good conversations happening. I would encourage them to ask. Maybe 00:48:12.580 --> 00:48:17.580 they, surely they have a connection to some Gen Zs. We love you guys. We want to open the doors for 00:48:17.580 --> 00:48:23.360 you. How can we make that possible in our zip code with our resources? Um, invite them to invite their 00:48:23.360 --> 00:48:28.100 friends. What would that look like? What would you want to invite your friends to? And you got to be 00:48:28.100 --> 00:48:32.840 realistic. You're not going to have a full band or whatever it may be. But I think that a lot of 00:48:32.840 --> 00:48:36.380 pastors might be surprised by the answers because they may think that they have to have a passion, 00:48:36.380 --> 00:48:42.720 you know, type of performance, but I don't see that. I see a lot of Gen Z just wanting and craving 00:48:42.720 --> 00:48:48.840 something that's real. And, and I would say if there is a conversation with a young person or any 00:48:48.840 --> 00:48:55.520 person, like I don't go to church because X, Y, and Z happened. I get that. But I would say, 00:48:55.520 --> 00:49:01.720 don't judge, don't judge Jesus based on Christians. We get it wrong. The church gets it wrong. We're 00:49:01.720 --> 00:49:06.660 all a bunch of broken people. And if we were all perfect, then it would be messed up when I attended 00:49:06.660 --> 00:49:14.180 or when you attended, you know? So just conversations to have just some, you know, vulnerability to be 00:49:14.180 --> 00:49:17.600 like, we're all figuring out. Would you like to join the party as we figured it out together? 00:49:18.180 --> 00:49:19.080 Something like that. 00:49:19.080 --> 00:49:23.180 I mean, that's like a, that's like a mic drop moment from Katie right there. Like we're all 00:49:23.180 --> 00:49:27.480 broken. We're all messed up and broken people. She's just going to walk away with a clock on her 00:49:27.480 --> 00:49:28.760 neck. I like Flava Flav. 00:49:30.320 --> 00:49:31.820 Flava Flav, you made my day. 00:49:32.400 --> 00:49:36.400 Yeah. Come on. Like nobody, nobody knows Flava Flav anymore. I guess that's the. 00:49:36.860 --> 00:49:37.480 All three of us. 00:49:37.480 --> 00:49:38.000 He's a Swift. 00:49:38.000 --> 00:49:38.800 Yeah. Yeah. That's the. 00:49:38.800 --> 00:49:39.820 Did you know this? Yeah. 00:49:40.300 --> 00:49:43.560 Yeah. No, I saw you. I saw you lift up there. You're going to have to catch it on YouTube 00:49:43.560 --> 00:49:47.840 if you didn't get a chance to do that. Katie, last, last question for me. What's, what's 00:49:47.840 --> 00:49:51.000 going on in the future for you? What are the, what's the next weeks and months look like for 00:49:51.000 --> 00:49:53.320 you in terms of podcasting and life and all the things there? 00:49:53.460 --> 00:49:59.200 Oh, well, I have a dream for another book, baby, based on my home girl at the well. 00:50:00.000 --> 00:50:06.700 So look for that. Hopefully I, yeah, I'm just loving the girl, the age of our daughters. 00:50:06.700 --> 00:50:11.360 We're just very involved in their lives, soaking in those moments as they are getting older, 00:50:11.360 --> 00:50:17.360 as you alluded to, I'm right there with you and, and just loving it, loving life, loving 00:50:17.360 --> 00:50:21.000 all the things we're involved in all the sports and all the things going on. Um, and of course 00:50:21.000 --> 00:50:26.220 my plant babies as well. And we have a puppy that made me question my life decisions. She's 00:50:26.220 --> 00:50:31.240 almost a year old and she has a handful. It gets better with the puppy. Trust me. It's, 00:50:31.240 --> 00:50:36.660 uh, we've gone through that a couple of times. They, they stopped chewing on the 00:50:36.660 --> 00:50:40.500 my, my, my latest puppy. She chews on the baseboards every once in a while. And I just, 00:50:40.640 --> 00:50:45.720 I can't figure it out. And that's going to be frustrating to fix. Is your puppy at that point 00:50:45.720 --> 00:50:45.900 yet? 00:50:46.940 --> 00:50:50.720 No, but get that apple spray. There's this bitter apple spray you can spray on stuff. 00:50:50.960 --> 00:50:51.560 Okay. You have that. 00:50:52.080 --> 00:50:52.300 Yeah. 00:50:52.520 --> 00:50:52.780 Okay. 00:50:52.940 --> 00:50:53.160 Yeah. 00:50:54.160 --> 00:50:55.560 No, she's just psycho. 00:50:59.080 --> 00:50:59.440 Okay. 00:50:59.540 --> 00:51:00.460 You know, some of them are. 00:51:01.820 --> 00:51:02.480 I love it. 00:51:02.480 --> 00:51:03.000 Some of them are. 00:51:03.840 --> 00:51:04.480 I love it. 00:51:04.660 --> 00:51:05.840 But our daughter loves her. So. 00:51:06.480 --> 00:51:10.360 Oh, of course, of course, of course. Uh, we are so appreciative of you joining us on the 00:51:10.360 --> 00:51:14.000 Hybrid Disciple. We're going to have all your links and all of your, all of the, everything 00:51:14.000 --> 00:51:16.920 for Katie in the show notes and in the description below. Katie, thank you so much. 00:51:17.720 --> 00:51:18.860 Yes. Thanks for having me. 00:51:18.860 --> 00:51:18.860 Thank you.