The Uncommon Path
"The Uncommon Path" is a podcast that intimately explores the transformative journeys of individuals, featuring raw and unfiltered testimonies that celebrate the resilience, growth, and shared human experiences, offering listeners a source of inspiration and connection on their own life paths. Join us as we unveil the extraordinary stories that shape who we are.
The Uncommon Path
RERUN - Tim Moța - From Romanian Roots to Spiritual Leadership: Embracing Faith, Baptism, and Community Growth
Tim Moța shares his unique journey of faith, detailing how his Romanian heritage shaped his beliefs and spiritual practices. He reflects on the importance of prayer, baptism, and genuine mentorship as he navigates the complexities of faith, challenges in modern America, and the need for fostering spiritual hunger in himself and others.
• Tim’s background growing up in a Romanian Christian family
• The powerful influence of prayer observed in his family
• Reflection on baptism as a transformative experience
• Challenges of balancing faith with American cultural comfort
• Importance of mentorship and discipleship among young men
• The significance of leading a faith grounded in community and relationships
Tim encourages listeners to engage with their faith authentically and consider the personal and communal implications of their beliefs.
this podcast is currently called the uncommon path. Reason why is because we're just taking people that we know who love jesus, and basically asking them to share their story, basically their path with the Lord and how it started. What is God doing currently in their life? Today on the Uncommon Path, we have Tim Mota.
Speaker 2:Mota.
Speaker 1:Mota.
Speaker 2:Mota.
Speaker 1:Mza, tim Moza. Correct, I never knew that. Yeah, it's very interesting. I butcher everyone's names. Leslie gets mad at me. I'm just a simple man, guys. Tim Moza, and he is our. He's Antioch Raleigh's college pastor. You've been a college pastor for how long?
Speaker 2:A month.
Speaker 1:Okay, and you're doing a great job. By the way, I already love seeing the. I feel like there's a greater intimacy between the, like camaraderie between the college students than I've seen in the past. But that could be my imagination, I don't know. Thanks, you're 23?, correct, and you're dating right, yes. Okay, perfect why.
Speaker 3:Perfect, perfect, great. Wanted to know you're dating. Yeah, okay that's.
Speaker 1:That's, that's perfect. Um, all right. So with the title being the uncommon path, tim, tell us about your path. What does that look like?
Speaker 2:wow, what a question. What does my path look like? I wish everyone was here to see Ryan and Chris just throwing up thumbs and saying, hey, you know, we got it right. Um, but little victories. My path, that's a that's a great question.
Speaker 2:Well, I think my path started even before I was born, if I'm being honest, and the family I was born into influences the life that I live now and where I'm going.
Speaker 2:So, for those of you that don't know me, I was born into a family that was from Romania.
Speaker 2:Both my parents are from Romania, all my grandparents are from Romania, and that really influences my life in several ways, with my grandparents really seeing the effects of communism and my parents being raised in a communist country and following Jesus and trying to follow Jesus there. It's really challenging in a lot of ways where religion isn't really looked upon as something virtuous and valuable, but rather as something that can detract from like unity from an ethnic perspective, and so my grandparents on my mom's side fled Romania, seeking religious asylum here in the US in the 1980s, and then my dad came in 1998 to marry my mom. So, with all that being said, I was born into a family that really loved Jesus and really saw like the effects of what religious persecution could do to one's faith. I mean, my great uncle was imprisoned for three years. My I think one of my other uncles was beaten a few times. And then my great grandfather was a church planter in Romania and planted over 20 churches um also during communism so that was wild.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's. It's honestly sort of crazy, um. And so I grew up not really knowing much about my story, if I'm being honest, and not really knowing, um, all of that information. I knew I was born Romanian and I knew that my grandparents fled Romania to escape religious persecution, but not really like the depths and the intimate details of it all. I mean, no one can really handle that until they're probably in their teenage years anyway. But yeah, I grew up following the Lord, going to a Romanian church, and with that I knew everything that the Bible said and I knew how that applied to my life in some ways.
Speaker 2:But I didn't really have many close friends, if I'm being honest. My family moved from California to North Carolina when I was six and I don't think I really had a close friend until I was 11 or 12. And even then, no one that I could really count on and rely on until I was like probably like 15 or 16. And so that was like a constant prayer in my life of asking the Lord for friends and for people that I could just bear my soul with. If that makes sense, just let it all out. Confess the things I needed to confess my parents and my grandparents I would consider to be prayer warriors. I really learned from them what it means to pray.
Speaker 2:I remember I was on a trip to California to visit my grandparents for a summer and I learned just how much my grandparents prayed and just the depth that they have with the Lord.
Speaker 2:Like they would wake up, they would make breakfast and then, after they would have breakfast, they would just go to their bedroom and pray for 45 minutes and then at 11 o'clock at night, before everyone went to bed, they would go and pray for an hour, an hour and a half.
Speaker 2:And this wasn't just a normal Lord just come and move, it was just specific, intercessory prayer for friends, family and all the issues that were happening in their church and their lives. And that really shapes me at a young age of like man, like all right, these people know that God moves as a result of prayer and keeping that, like with my circumstances at the time, I was like really interceding and asking the Lord in the best way I could for friends. Like I would get home from school and I would like get on my knees and ask the Lord. I was like God, I just pray for a solid group of friends that I could like live my life with, and I would also ask the Lord for like small things, like getting into a good school, stuff like that. So prayer has always shaped my life.
Speaker 1:Um so prayer has always shaped my life and um but the like, so your prayers were. I feel like how old were you when you started Like?
Speaker 2:11 or 12.
Speaker 1:I feel like most kids at that age are like just throwing up flippant prayers of like well, I hope God does something, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, or like.
Speaker 1:God's really far out there, but maybe he'll hear my prayer. You know, yeah, yeah, or like God's really far out there, but maybe he'll hear my prayer. But it seems like you just had a faith at a super young age to like literally believe for the things that you were praying for. Wow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's just due to the generational inheritance that my family has cultivated, that my family has cultivated Like. One story was that my I think my grandpa was in like a worship night and like there was someone there that was never there before and well, come to find out that that person was involved with the secret police and they came and arrested a couple of people after the set, and so it's like stuff like that, or even like friends or family, like turning on you, uh, because you know for the safety of their own family or for money or for their business and um. But I think that if you find god to be real, I think it's really hard to change from that Um, at least instantly. It would take a lot of deconstruction in some ways.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So growing up, you like they're never. You don't remember there being a defining moment where it was like I'm following the Lord. It was just so integrated in your family dynamic that it was like, oh, so integrated in your family dynamic that it was like, oh, it's not, it's not. It's almost weird to imagine you not following the Lord.
Speaker 2:I would say it's weird for me to imagine not knowing about the Lord. Following the Lord's a little different. I think that I had to be taught how to do certain things by my family and then by other people. Like I didn't know how to spend time with God until I got to college. I had this idea of spending time with God is just like oh, I just read the verse of the day and then write a little bit about it in my journal and call it a day, and then write a little bit about it in my journal and call it a day. But knowing God is a real person. I think that you're right about that.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Wow, was baptism an important moment and element for you.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:In your family, I would think you know, just knowing a little bit. I don't know a ton about the communist kind of Eastern country, eastern Europe kind of history and Christianity, but one of my favorite books of all time top five is God's Smuggler and basically it's a story of a guy, a Dutch man, who his whole ministry is bringing Bibles into communist Eastern Europe during the 40s, 50s, 60s I think, 70s even and maybe later. Brother Andrew is his name, anyways.
Speaker 1:I'm not sure.
Speaker 3:Incredible book. You should all check it out. It's very. What was it? Called again Miracles. It's called God's Smuggler and he would just like. One of the cool stories was and I'll, then I'll get back. We rabbit trail a lot here, tim, but like he would go through.
Speaker 1:Father always said that the best rabbit trail leads to the juiciest carrot yeah, that's yeah ryan's grandfather.
Speaker 3:Man of wisdom, but we wisdom. But he would go through these border crossings and he would lay the Bibles on top of his luggage and the guards would be looking at his luggage, not seeing him.
Speaker 2:And they'd wave them on in.
Speaker 3:This was like you'd be going to prison, beaten you know, just for bringing bibles in, and so that was his whole thing and he'd bring these bibles into these churches and god would make all these divine appointments, because it was hard to find the underground churches and all that stuff. But anyways, I just that's why I asked about baptism is like, in those dangerous settings where you're kind of operating a little bit, baptism takes on a little bit of different meaning, right, because it's baptism's a public to your community event. You actually want people to see it, the right people to see it, and so, yeah, I was just wondering how that shaped if that was an event in your life.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think baptism was a little bit more significant for me and my family than I think most American families would think of it. I first wanted to get baptized when I was eight or nine, like a lot of the people at my church. But in talking with my grandparents they're like you need to make sure that, like this is something that you actually want and that you'll, you'll follow Jesus. Like you should wait until you're at least 12. And so I waited and I actually got past 12 and I was actually 17 when I was baptized.
Speaker 2:Wow, when I was baptized and I actually felt like the Lord was telling me to get baptized in a worship service that I had. It was a young adult worship service at my home church and it was just like a really like Harpenbowl sort of style thing and I was still learning to hear the voice of God at that time and I just felt like God asked me. It was like, hey, why don't you get baptized? And it hadn't actually crossed my mind in several years about getting baptized, but processed it with a friend and I really felt like my baptism was just like an not only like a public declaration, but like a transition in season for me, um, from like being, I guess, under my parents' faith to becoming a faith of my own.
Speaker 2:Um, and I think I also saw that in the season that came after baptism, which was enduring just a lot of questions of what does it look like to follow God in the midst of the life I was living in my senior year of high school. So, yeah, to answer your question, yeah, baptism was a big deal for me and my family. So, yeah, to answer your question, yeah, baptism was a big deal for me and my family, and it still is. I mean, like I think that I probably personally wouldn't want my kid to get baptized until they've endured at least something To know that, hey, like, this is your faith and your own, and not just something that your friends want for you.
Speaker 1:Dude, that blows my mind. My mind is blown because I was. I was baptized when I was seven, seven or eight, and it was one of those things. It was like, well, ryan asked jesus into his heart and now he's baptized and my life didn't change, you know, I mean, I was eight years old. I didn't really understand what I was doing. What do you? What do you guys think the balance is there, like, like, like the declaration for your own kids or for whoever like at an early age, like you know, declaring maybe as a prophetic act, or something like declaring, hey, my son chose to get baptized at age six, eight, ten, whatever. They don't totally understand, like what is involved in that. And then, what do you guys think about what you just said, tim?
Speaker 2:I'm not fully opposed to parents like desiring that their kids get baptized at a young age. Um, I just think wrestling out those implications with the kid is like of utmost importance. Um, and one thing that I've realized with baptism, just in my journey with Jesus, is that it's more than just like a declaration to the world. I think in Colossians it talks about like baptism corresponding with circumcision in the Old Testament. And Romans 6 talks about how, when we are, we have gone under the water, we are dead with Christ and raised in unison life. And I think that's more than just like, oh, this is what it represents, but an actual reality that happens in the spirit. And so, just like walking that out with a kid I I don't know Cause I'm not a parent, but I'm thinking of like from that perspective. I would want whoever's getting baptized to know that, yeah, that when you are getting baptized there is a death, that happens.
Speaker 2:But then there's also resurrection at the end of it.
Speaker 3:Man, I actually like to baptize babies as soon as they're born, just in case just in case something happens cover your bases.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, no, I'm just kidding a little sprinkling if you can't submerge them in water, just sprinkle them hopefully.
Speaker 2:Hopefully it works, yeah have you guys seen the seen the Eastern European baby baptisms?
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:Just look them up on YouTube. They're quite entertaining.
Speaker 3:I was baptized at 12 years old by a homosexual pastor, priest guy who was the pastor of my church that I went to.
Speaker 3:Hmm, Well, that's something yeah it's uncommon, right, but it was. For me, it was a big event, though, because I had gotten confirmed, which is a kind of a Catholic-y thing, high church, you know. Whatever. I was an accolade. I was the guy wearing little kid, wearing a red robe, with a big brass candle lighter, walking up the sides lighting the candles in the altar, like that. Wow, yeah, that kind of thing. So I did that and there's a whole backstory that's, you know, time for.
Speaker 3:But after going through training, seventh and eighth grade, like every wednesday and Sunday night to lead up to baptism. So it was a big event for me and it meant a lot. I realized when I was a teenager that you really should have been in immersion water, and I was in Mozambique at 20 years old and I got baptized there Some Mozambican pastors, pastors. That was a huge moment in my life too. But so I, yeah, I've thought a lot about baptism, and now I've had two kids get baptized and I was potentially going to have one get baptized this sunday, but I don't think it's going to happen, but is it?
Speaker 1:because he's wrestling with theological stuff.
Speaker 3:No, we actually, I think we kind of like tim you said, like we wrestled with it with them, like why do you want to get baptized? He's been wanting it for a year. Like why, what does it mean to you? Do you understand it? Um, he hasn't had a challenge to his faith really right at nine, yeah, um. So I like I, I didn't, I didn't think it was like too early, but I also didn't feel like it was, you know, too late at all. Um, but I'm actually going to take what you said the heart could well your granddad said the heart because I really think that's meaningful. I'm gonna, I'm gonna really meditate on that because I think that that's there's something really valuable at knowing that, against all of the potential things that could come against you, like this is the path I'm choosing, right, and I'm publicly saying that. And I think my son, cy, who is nine, understands that at a head level, but I don't know if he can fully get the context of what that means in the greater world.
Speaker 3:You know, he's a homeschooled kid. He's starts every day with reading the Bible with his brothers and his mom, and so it's just a little bit different, right so? But I know people who have been baptized, like friends, kids and stuff, and they've taken their kids through like a study or a workbook or something. But I think that's an extremely important point is you got to know what you're. The kid has to know why they're doing it, what they're doing it, and I think they need to have an unction from the Lord. Kids can hear the Lord, kids can feel the presence of God and the push of the Holy Spirit the nudge of the Holy Spirit Right and the push of the of the holy spirit, the nudge of the holy spirit right. So I think it's our job as parents to identify that um when and just pray into it and see when the time is right. It's not happening this weekend because of logistical reasons family planning travel.
Speaker 1:So silas isn't doubting anything about God, correct, okay.
Speaker 2:I almost had to leave the podcast.
Speaker 1:Might have to invite him on here have a big talk with him.
Speaker 3:And Silas would be a good guest one day. He's quite the nine-year-old.
Speaker 1:He'll be a great guest one day. He's quite the nine-year-old. He'll be a great guest one day. Man, that's crazy.
Speaker 1:I think it's always humbling to just remember how important things like that is, like how important I think when like baptisms, how important baptisms are, and also how important I think when like baptisms, how important baptisms are, and also how important communion is, because they're public things you're declaring and like in countries like where your grandparents grew up, and it's like a public thing like that could kill you, and it's the way the underground churches in China and like you know, fill in the blank all over the world. It's like we in the U S take so many of these things like for granted and they don't they almost don't mean anything to us. It's become like this ritualistic thing and we forget like the power that's in it and like the sovereignty that's in it, and so I'm always like man, I, I, I take what you share, tim, and I'm like man. I really, really want to have a conversation with my sons about that as well, cause I don't want it to be just a flippant thing.
Speaker 1:My dad still still. I have four half brothers and the youngest one is 18 years older than me, and so he's like 50 something and, um, my dad, like he does not follow the Lord at all, hasn't really followed the Lord and my dad still has that old like he's just that old mindset of like, well, he was baptized when he was seven, so yeah, he's going to heaven and I'm like, maybe like he doesn't like it, to me that doesn't matter.
Speaker 1:What matters is that the baptism didn't mean anything to him, like you just wanted him to have fire insurance and so you pushed to have this happen, you know.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Has it been hard for your family to live in the U? S, and I mean with, like I guess, the comfort in this country versus the discomfort that really irons out like faith and shapes your faith Like how has that been?
Speaker 2:That's a great question. Um, I would say that in many ways, like my family, has been sort of guilty of assimilating to the host culture of being American, and not necessarily like with thought, if that makes sense. Um, they came to america with three suitcases full of romanian blankets they didn't think to bring anything else and probably like 500 bucks cash wow so three kids, three suitcases, 500 bucks and the in the suitcases.
Speaker 3:Romanian blanket romanian blankets are romanian blankets like the best blankets or something.
Speaker 2:Well, they didn't think they'd have blankets in America.
Speaker 1:No way, yeah, no way. So their mindset they had no clue.
Speaker 2:They had no idea. No idea, well, romania's pretty cold, right?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's pretty cold. And where did they immigrate? To California.
Speaker 2:Yeah, LA.
Speaker 1:So they never used tropical paradise no, they brought these blankets. I love it and the blanket stayed in storage basically eternity. Yes, that's so dude it's, it's just so real though, like that's so real to tell to lug these blankets across the ocean I mean that probably, probably had a lot to do with being in a communist country being completely closed off to anything else and also not not knowing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, my parents thought, my grandparents thought that the capital of the us was la wow, they just didn. Like LA is not even the capital of California. Like they just had no clue. Wow.
Speaker 3:What was the actual like event that precipitated their, their move? Was it like just getting too much, too pressurized?
Speaker 2:I think a lot of um, my my grandparents family had already experienced a lot of the pressure, not specifically my grandparents, but like their brothers and sisters, um, a couple of them like tried to like we're we're thrown in prison for a couple years and they escaped, came to california, experienced like wow, the blessing of America, and started basically like trying to get them over. But coming back to what you were asking, ryan, about the disconnect between living in a country with suffering for the gospel in a country that's relatively fine here in America, for the gospel in a country that's relatively fine here in America, I think that it's so easy, just to get stuck in this rat race for more, and I mean there needed to be some of that in the beginning.
Speaker 2:My grandpa bought his first house using just cans.
Speaker 3:He went around.
Speaker 2:California with a bike and with a plastic bag and filled it with cans, and that's how he bought his first house using just cans, like he went around california with a bike and with a plastic bag and filled it with cans, and that's how he bought his first house.
Speaker 1:Um what?
Speaker 3:bro like in the redemption value on the steel and the aluminum can, yeah, yeah just turned them in and that was.
Speaker 2:That was the 80s for you, but wow, that's crazy um, but with that I think they lost the matthew 28. Go, therefore, make disciples, like they were. So caught up a lot of the romanian community and I've noticed this honestly with a lot of immigrant communities. They come with the intention of making a better life for their kids and for their grandkids, and oftentimes they do, but then they miss the mission of God as they're going along. They live as exiles for the betterment of the nation that they're in. A lot of my extended family has become business owners, politicians, et cetera, and they do well for the cities that they live in, um, but then they miss the spiritual aspect of blessing the, the host nation, um, that they're in. Have you been back?
Speaker 2:to romania I have, I've gone once yeah what was that like? It's very interesting. It was very interesting, I think I I really appreciated, um the simplicity of life that a lot of romanians live by, especially where my dad's from. In the south of romania, my grandma got running water in her house in 2013 um, so a lot of there. There's still like a lot of simplicity of life and an authenticity of faith, if you have one.
Speaker 2:Um so my, my grandma, my dad's side is um Greek Orthodox or Romanian Orthodox and like, even though they have like a different tradition and stuff like that, there's like an authenticity of faith that that you sometimes miss um being provided for in a specific way here in the U?
Speaker 2:S. But yeah, I love Romania. It's a great place. It's still very, um still a very dark nation. A lot of ways communism still hasn't really left. It's just with a veneer of corruption and there's still a lot of like spiritual darkness too. Just, I think it's like the capital of witchcraft in the world.
Speaker 1:Wow. So, really that's crazy, that was wild.
Speaker 2:Isn't that like? Transylvania is I mean, yeah, my uh mom was actually born in the city that vlad the impaler, who was dracula's like the person that dracula was based off of he was.
Speaker 1:She was born in that city that he ruled over no, whoa wow dude, I've been wrestling the last actually a couple of days, maybe about a week, I've been wrestling with like Was it a couple of days or a week, Ryan?
Speaker 3:Be specific.
Speaker 2:Well, are we talking about?
Speaker 1:the southern couple or like official couple, because it's probably closer to southern couple, like four or five.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've been wrestling with like all of these incredible breakthroughs that you hear in different countries happen because there is a need for faith and there is like a like so many people are in this almost corner of being like well, god's got to do something because there's no way out for me. And here in America it's like on the surface it's and I'm not just want to say right now I love the U? S, but I feel like it's on the surface it's this wonderful land of opportunity, but every single need is cared for. There's not really a dire situation. Hopefully you guys understand what I'm saying. Like, as a people, we are not in a dire situation. Hopefully you guys understand what I'm saying. Like, as a people, we are not in a dire situation.
Speaker 1:Like like another nation is under communist rule, like North Korea or China. Like, like I think one of my fears legitimately one of my fears has been like I want to be a man who loves the Lord with all of my heart and truly wants to trust that he will be the provider, the sole provider, of everything that I have. And living in a nation like this is hard to do that because you don't really have need for stuff. So, like, how do you, how do you constantly stay spiritually in a place of need in a, in a country that literally you can just have anything and everything you want or need. It's an open-ended question, but you almost have to make a way to limit yourself on what you get. You have to create a place in your own life that you are in constant need. That's kind of what I've been wrestling with.
Speaker 3:I feel like if you follow the Lord long enough, he puts you in those situations. Absolutely He'll call, like you know, count it all a blessing when you experience trials and tribulations. Right Cause it's a testing, it's a refining of your faith. So I would almost respond by saying you know, if you don't ever experience those things, are you really doing everything the Lord's called you to do?
Speaker 2:That's a great point.
Speaker 3:I'm willing to be wrong about that, but I you know, I think if you give your yes to the Lord in everything that he tells you to do, you do get into situations. Now we might not always have the financial risk that a Romanian couple trying to get to California would have. We have a bigger safety net maybe, but I still think there's like. I mean, I've had it in my life. You know my yes to the Lord means a lot more risk financially or a lot more risk. You know, stretching my boundaries. My fifth kid was an extreme test of my faith. I felt like when I had, when God brought that to me. But anyways, that's my thoughts on it.
Speaker 2:Tim, what do you think? Yeah, no, I completely agree with that. I think that when you're walking in the calling of the Lord, you're never going to be able to do it on your own, and that'll lead you to circumstances where you're going to have to exercise faith. Yeah, I think that there is a way that us, as Americans, need to posture ourselves to just ask the Lord for hunger, ask the Lord to put us in those positions, and that's a scary prayer.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but yeah, it's so good, I agree, but we just want to be like David, who just wanted to gaze upon the presence of God. And as we make those requests and really seek the Lord with all our heart, we'll end up in the positions that we'll need and we'll endure the suffering that we'll need to become like Jesus.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that is really good, I like that.
Speaker 3:Something Steve always taught me and Brenda.
Speaker 1:Steve who.
Speaker 3:Jellicorse.
Speaker 1:So, current pastor at Raleigh Antioch.
Speaker 3:Yeah elevated recently to a new, different role or something.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, that's true, my father-in-law is more context. Oh yeah, it is your father-in-law, it's my father-in-law.
Speaker 3:He and discipled me, and he always said said faith is spelled R I S K.
Speaker 1:So good.
Speaker 3:That one has stuck with me for a while, Like I can have faith that I'm going to eat dinner tonight, but I know I've already got groceries in the fridge and it's just going to take going home and cooking it you know, but I, yeah, I guess I had, you know, one little nanogram of faith that that's going to happen, but it's not like a big risk that I'm not going to eat tonight, right?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so if you elevate your mission, you know, then you elevate your risk. Tim, you're a man like, like, you've got these heritages that you kind of mentioned, like grandfather, church plant planter and communist nation planted 20 churches behind the iron curtain. It's incredible, yeah, um, and your grandparents. This legacy of faith, something that's come up at multiple times on this podcast, actually already in its short lifespan, is the thread of generational momentum and I'm curious, like how that heritage and these, these callings and these anointings, like how has that manifested in your life, like you now here, raleigh?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say that seeing my, my grandparents pray the way they prayed, that has a direct influence on the way that I pray today, and it's taken me a lot to get to the place where I can say that, say firmly, without hesitation, that like I'm an intercessor, but I feel like I've done that. I think that's also come from my grandparents. Um, my one thing that I haven't mentioned is that my dad grew up in an orphanage in Romania. Um, and so for him, his spiritual legacy that he has left me has been generosity. He is by far one of the most generous people that I know, and so just watching him live his life generously has been a way that I've been able to take away from my own life. And then, with my great grandfather being a church planner in Romania, like I never, really I never thought I'd be a church planner.
Speaker 2:If I'm being honest, I was going to be a sportscaster. If I'm being honest, I was going to be a sportscaster on ESPN. That was my goal in life. Um, I love sports, love stats, and so that was my vision coming into college. But the Lord grabbed my heart at NC state and was like hey, like you love, like being around the people of God and you love teaching and you know why don't you consider this? And I ran from it during college a little bit, but I mean, I'm the college pastor for a reason. If I didn't foresee myself doing this in the future, I probably wouldn't be the college pastor, and so I definitely think that is an opportunity that, if the Lord presents it, I'll probably pursue it, that if the Lord presents it, I'll probably pursue it. And so I think that's how all those three weave together in my life and how, like, the blessing of every generation has sort of come down onto my life.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's really cool. Yeah, that's awesome you mentioned, you prayed to get into a good school and then you got into NC State.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Sounds like a direct answer to prayer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, or you know, you could have prayed a little harder, gotten somewhere better. Maybe this is the wrong crowd for this, I guess, okay.
Speaker 2:Well, what's a little better. Yeah, Ryan, what would?
Speaker 3:be a little better.
Speaker 2:Yeah, what college did you go to?
Speaker 3:We'll just we'll keep going where we're going Waco Community Tech oh man, you poked a bear I did, I did so, tim, you are an intercessor and just wondering maybe why haven't you prayed for me? That's a great question. I've heard some other people get random prayer requests and just wondering.
Speaker 1:It's interesting because I wasn't really sure if you had my number, but I can absolutely share it with you. Yeah, man, I'd love to. I actually do have your number. Oh, you do. Huh, that's really interesting.
Speaker 3:I'm pretty sure you actually don't have mine Well.
Speaker 2:I might actually, maybe from the couch, maybe from the couch, yeah, yeah yeah. Hey, I'll add you to the calendar.
Speaker 1:I would love to benefit from some of those.
Speaker 2:Give me a number 1 to 31. I'll text you.
Speaker 3:February 29th, you're going to get blessed Every four years. Every four years.
Speaker 1:I got Ryan on the leap here.
Speaker 3:January 15th I got Ryan on the leap here.
Speaker 1:January 15th. Being the college pastor. What is?
Speaker 2:something that you're passionate about in that area? Yeah, that's a great question. I definitely really enjoy seeing men get connected and plugged in and like basically that transition from being a teenage boy to becoming a man, and that, honestly, has been one of the biggest blessings for me to see during my time in college is several of the guys that have discipled, just going from people that you know, like being under their parents house, having a faith that was their parents, but actually like transforming and walking that out into manhood.
Speaker 2:So I think that's a huge thing and also just the intergenerational component of like just blessing from and receiving from other people. So one thing that I started this semester is I have a group of senior guys that I meet with every Friday morning. Somehow all eight of our schedules coalesce to this two and a half hour block and that's a miracle in and of itself for eight seven college students and the college pastor to get two and a half hours together. Um, but it just worked out perfectly that I could get um older men in the church to come and invest and pour into these guys. So Ryan actually came last week and shared um his testimony and sort of what God's been doing in his own personal life and it I really love that, that that portion of older men investing younger men.
Speaker 2:Um just because, like, I know that so many people on our campus lack fathers, um, either their fathers just weren't present at all in the home or, uh, their fathers were present but didn't have fathers themselves. They didn't know how to parent, and so just really getting that investment has been been huge. Um, so I think those two things are probably what I would say are like the things I'm like really gung ho about.
Speaker 1:How do, how have you seen hunger stirred in those men and how, like with your experience, how do you, how do, in your opinion, do that Well?
Speaker 2:yeah, hunger stirred. That's a great question. I would. I would say just by being around people like. I think sometimes we don't fully value just the day to day life that we spend with people and in the mundane, like I'm not talking about like an hour here, an hour there, I'm just talking about like doing the dishes or cleaning up, um, and I've just seen their hunger stirred for more just by like watching me and watching the other guys in the college ministry, watching chris, just live life normally in the way that we jolly chris jolly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, um, used to be the old college pastor um, but yeah, just like watching.
Speaker 2:like I one of the guys that's in that group of seven um came from like a baptist background, really like was afraid of like the gifts of the Holy Spirit and throughout his time in college I watched him go from being like terrified to speaking in tongues. Whoa, that's awesome, which is absolutely amazing.
Speaker 1:That's cool, which comes from hunger, absolutely. That's cool, which comes from hunger, absolutely. Man, there's nothing more frustrating to me than loving a person and not seeing the hunger come alive Like I hate that it's so hard.
Speaker 3:It's so hard to watch that I think, tim, what you're saying about these kind of mundane times, I've often thought how much discipleship of the apostles happened just hanging out with Jesus, like not during the, the sermon times and the ministry time, the healing sessions, like how much of it just during the long walks they would take from, like, one town to another, the eating fish on the side of the sea, and like just breaking bread, doing life, cleaning up the crap, whatever. Um, so much because I I could tell you, like as a father of five sons, a lot of this training is like on the job training right, just like life, yeah it's not me sitting down being like let's crack open this manual or this bible, like it's it's not formal.
Speaker 3:It's like so much of it's informal right. So I love that that you appreciate that, because sometimes grabbing a burger with a guy will be exactly what they need, right.
Speaker 1:Right, I would. It's. It's all happens out of the overflow, like when when you do normal stuff and you live your life in a supernatural way or just a lover of Jesus, like everything that comes out of that overflow like is seen by others in a way that you don't even, don't even know you're doing it.
Speaker 3:Sure, I think men to bond over the like food and doing sport, like watching a sports game, Like. So part of it is also building the bond and building the bridge of trust and you got to do that funny, goofy stuff and challenging stuff and whatever you know, yeah, like one of my favorite stories about how it's.
Speaker 2:you know, got plugged in with our ministry. We were doing this s'mores and sports event on NC State's campus. He came to one of the events and then one of my friends saw him again, knew his name and he's like, wow, you remember my name. And then the next day he invited him to go to take some trash out to the dump. And while they're driving to the dump, dump happened to be this kid's birthday. He was from Pennsylvania. They ended up going and getting like a cookout milkshake and talking and celebrating together and it was like those small moments of like okay, knowing this kid's name and then an invitation to the dump and then an invitation to the dump, yeah, like, like, I mean I've.
Speaker 2:I've really found that most guys will do just about anything to spend time with other men, especially men that they admire or that they trust.
Speaker 3:That is so crazy.
Speaker 1:That's 100 true, 100 true what a freaking cool story man that was so was the the guy from Pennsylvania.
Speaker 3:It was his birthday.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3:And so he's like, yeah, I'll go to the dump with you on my birthday. Yep, was he at?
Speaker 2:NC State Yep at NC State yeah.
Speaker 3:Dude, I've been there man. So I'm from Illinois. I went to NC State, okay, and that early year. But by the end of the first year I year the early year, but by the end of the first year I was fully integrated in the jellicorse family. But like that initial first few months, you are a total like outsider. You're just wondering what's going on. You don't know anybody. Most people in college are yeah, at the beginning, even if you're from local. But I knew nobody and I didn't realize how many people went home on the weekends.
Speaker 2:Oh it's ridiculous.
Speaker 3:My biggest pet peeve I bet a ton more. Do now oh 100% Than even when I was young, but that was a big deal, like the halls were just empty and Saturday, sunday was like whatever. So then Daniel Jellicore started bringing me home, so I got you know integrated.
Speaker 1:That's awesome.
Speaker 3:But that's really cool, man. You know, integrated that's awesome, but that's really cool, man, that whole concept of boys becoming men is something I think about a lot.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because I have them.
Speaker 3:I have a 13-year-old 11, 9, 6, and 1. Ryan's got three. He's got his starter pack. And two more on the way soon and warren's getting there and like, but it's a huge thing that just I think about constantly and I want to get really right some. I would love to learn what's working in your shoes, like what, what you're doing, how you're seeing it. Do you go through any books? Do you, do you formalize in?
Speaker 2:any way, I mean partly yes, partly no, I think uh, chris jolly and I are both fairly intellectual people and very formational based chris jolly's intellectual that's sarcasm.
Speaker 3:He was the last guy on the podcast. What was the biggest word that he used. I don't know. I couldn't understand the podcast. I needed a dictionary.
Speaker 1:I actually called him on the way home and was like hey man, I'm not sure what you said but it was good sure what you said, but it was good, Because afterwards me and Chris looked at each other and was like, wow, that was. I took a deep dive somewhere.
Speaker 2:Hey, if there's any rich people listening to this podcast, please sponsor Chris and Grace so that way he can go to seminary. He needs it, thanks.
Speaker 3:Seminary needs him. Yeah, thanks, seminary needs him yeah. He might need it just as an outlet.
Speaker 2:Exactly as an outlet. That'd be great. He's so smart.
Speaker 3:Seminary to him is like me going for a run.
Speaker 2:Anyways, enough about Chris Whole podcast to that guy. But yeah, as I was saying about resources, we have a lot of spiritual formation stuff that we go through. So Dallas Willard, Richard Foster.
Speaker 3:Celebration of.
Speaker 2:Discipline, but, I think, something for teenagers. Have you guys heard of John Mark Comer? I have a few of his books. His books are fantastic. And then one of his friends his name is John Tyson. He wrote a book called the Primal Path and it's basically him taking his 12-year-old son 12 or 13-year-old son through a discipleship program alongside other men. And I haven't read the book, but I've listened to all the podcasts that he's done. I've listened to like 500 of his sermons and he's phenomenal. He's pentecostal, he's from australia, um, but he's also really into spiritual formation and culture and so almost all of his resources I recommend to my guys and they eat it up because the primal path it's great stuff.
Speaker 3:I'm absolutely going to check that out. John Mark Comer has been like a hub of interesting other interesting people. He's connected to so many awesome authors these days, like the book I'm reading right now is all about prayer. It's called what is it? Pray like monk, like fools, live like fools. It's a good book, fantastic book on prayer have you read it?
Speaker 2:uh, I've listened to the podcast of that one.
Speaker 3:Okay, that's tyler stanton yeah, tyler stanton, exactly fair enough, I do the same thing a lot. I'm like I'm not gonna buy, I'm just going to listen to all of his podcasts. I think you get a lot more that way, I do. But I mean, I knew that that guy you'd resonate with him because he's all about prayer. Yep, like deeply, deeply, and it changed my whole perspective on prayer actually reading that book.
Speaker 1:What was it called?
Speaker 3:Pray Like Monks, live Like Fools reading that book.
Speaker 1:What was it called?
Speaker 3:pray like monks, live like fools. Hmm, do this prayer walk in his middle school at like you know, whatever 11 years old top that's every morning before school on his own volition, do it again had a name of had every student's name. It was like a handbook this is back when I he's like my age, I think and they would print like a school guide with everybody's name address and phone number right. They would never do that now no but, he would.
Speaker 3:He would walk, he would prayer walk his school in circles like around it wow and uh pray for every person by name in his school and basically started this whole like little mini revival in his middle school in middle school middle school, or what we would call the midwest. I think he's from the midwest junior high school.
Speaker 2:That's what they call it up there school that's what they call it up there. That's insane. Yes, I mean john tyson. Just another plug for him. He got saved in australia and his youth group used to get up at 5 am and intercede for the city on a hill before high school. I'm like where's that? What's up with these people? Man, who's gonna be the next youth pastor that brings a antioch raleigh's?
Speaker 1:kids to the top of. I'm like where's that? What's up with these people, man, I know.
Speaker 2:Who's going to be the next youth pastor that brings Antioch Raleigh's kids to the top of Dorothea Dix and looks over Raleigh and prophesies the next revival?
Speaker 1:I don't know, chris, who's it going to be?
Speaker 2:I mean he has five boys, you have two. I mean you can make it work after Michael's done.
Speaker 3:You can't expect your kids to be more passionate about jesus than you are yeah, that's good I mean, it could happen, yeah, but you know, don't rely on it, right?
Speaker 1:yeah, for sure so.
Speaker 3:But if, if you elevate your passion and you start picking up the pace on your run with the Lord, much more likely that they will as well, because they're falling in your wake. I imagine that's true in a ministry sense too, like what you're doing Tim. It's hard to lead people beyond you it's hard to lead people beyond you.
Speaker 3:One of the things we do here, tim, is pray before you get here and just kind of wait on the Lord and either get like, oh, we've got like a question or a comment, or like a word, or something like that and I did that. Did you do that, Ryan?
Speaker 1:I did not actually.
Speaker 3:Okay, I did it and I did that. Did you do that, Ryan? I did not actually. Okay, I did it, I know.
Speaker 1:There's no shame in that, Ryan.
Speaker 2:I think this is a little more spiritual than that.
Speaker 3:I'm not trying to heap condemnation on you Coals. Heap burning coals.
Speaker 1:How about you share yours, and while you share it, I'll ask the Lord what he has forals. How about? How about you share yours and while you share it, I'll ask the Lord what he has for Tim. How about that? Will that satisfy?
Speaker 3:everyone, that will be the next best thing. You have obeyed the Lord. Okay, oh, my goodness. So I felt like I heard the word uh, vast, and then I actually felt like the holy spirit gave me a nudge to not just like, like to look up the definition, but not just the definition, like the history of the word, right, so look through the history of the word. It's all it's comes from the german waste. Like waste, like like open land, like you have that vast waste. That v in german is like w-a-s-t-e and like, almost like a barren um expanse, right, and I felt like the lord was saying to me is I just kind of meditated, prayed on this and just waited that you're going to be and already are like a um, you bring sustenance to emptiness, like you bring, you bring life where there has been emptiness you're a bringer of that and where there's a void or multiple voids, you know, you're called to go and bring the life and plant the you know.
Speaker 3:Plant the fields where there was barren wasteland is now thriving garden. That kind of metaphor right, yeah come on, but hearing your story, well, hearing your heritage, it sounds like that's in your blood really, this point, or in the spirit of one who, because that can both be intercessory and can be very practical in real life, of planting churches right, just like bringing the life to the, to the empty, empty places, tim, I feel like just it's not prophetic, it's just an observation, but like you're very, you articulate things very clearly.
Speaker 3:I appreciate that and your testimony and just kind of how you put thoughts together, how you respond to questions. It's just extremely poignant and clear. I can tell you thought about a lot of this stuff. I don't know. You know what I'm saying. Ryan Tim does that make sense. Yeah, thanks man. Yeah, I think you'd make a great public speaker, if you're not already doing that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I think you could easily a great public speaker, if you're not already doing that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I think you could easily do that.
Speaker 2:He preached on Sunday yeah, a couple weeks ago at church in Talley Dude.
Speaker 1:that was awesome.
Speaker 3:Oh, that was when the college students were on campus. Yeah, awesome. Yeah, is that message online?
Speaker 2:No, it wasn't.
Speaker 3:Well, I don't even know if it was recorded, man, I wonder if we knew a good recorder of audio that might have been available see if we can find someone no, I would love to hear that if it exists, but it's probably off into the ether at this point.
Speaker 2:I'll see. I'll see if I can dig it up. There might be one video out there, who knows?
Speaker 1:cool I got a picture for you are you drawing it? No you would wonder what you're doing with the crayons pass me that yellow colored pencil please.
Speaker 3:Yellow colored pencil on white notebook paper. That's going to be great.
Speaker 1:Ryan.
Speaker 2:So encouraging Is this from Kate.
Speaker 1:Oh gosh. So I got a picture of it was a gold, like almost musket ball, and it was kind of random and I was like what does this mean? And I kind of envisioned you shooting it and I felt like the Lord highlighted 1 Peter 1.7,. These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold. Though your faith is far and I felt like there were two main themes with this. A musket ball is so much more devastating than just like a clean bullet, and the other thing is that the musket ball was made out of gold, felt like there was this purification process that was refining like the actual ammo, and I felt like the theme was that the Lord said you create devastation and the enemy's plans and plots Mm-hmm, um, and I think that really fits with you being an intercessor.
Speaker 2:Hmm, I appreciate that, ryan, that's good. Yeah, I love first Peter that's. I've been in first Peter all summer long. Oh, that's awesome, and so it's been that. That really hits home Wow.
Speaker 1:Hmm, I wonder if I'm a little more prophetic than you, chris well, I didn't have any colored pencils, ryan next time on whatever this podcast is called super profit oh gosh, oh gosh, it's terrible. Any closing comments? No, okay, ted, thank you so much for being on here.
Speaker 3:It's a pleasure. It was very interesting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, all right, thank you. It's very interesting.
Speaker 3:Yeah, all right, it's our pleasure. No, it's really ours, tim, try to take it from us. My pleasure, all right, we're out, thank you.
