In this episode, we take a break from our usual political discussions to have a heartfelt conversation with Jonnie Taverner, a passionate speaker and host of the Refuge for Freedom Stories podcast.
Jonnie Taverner joins us to share his inspiring journey of faith, discussing his personal experiences and how he came to know Jesus Christ as his savior. We delve into the profound impact of spirituality on our lives and the importance of having an open heart to God's guidance. Jonnie shares stories from his life, including his upbringing in a broken family and his eventual return to faith, highlighting the transformative power of God's love.
We also explore Jonnie's work with the Refuge for Freedom Stories podcast, where he shares real-life stories of individuals whose lives have been changed by the power of God. From former addicts to successful professionals, Johnny's podcast showcases the diverse ways in which faith can transform lives.
Additionally, we discuss the Exchange Life podcast, co-hosted by Jonnie, which focuses on the concept of exchanging our old nature for a new life in Christ. This episode is a refreshing departure from our usual content, offering listeners a chance to reflect on their own spiritual journeys and the role of faith in their lives.
Join us for this enlightening conversation, and don't forget to check out Jonnie's podcasts and writings on Substack for more inspiring content.
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(00:01:19) Introduction and Welcome
(00:02:45) Technical Difficulties and Live Broadcasting
(00:03:02) Tonight's Special Guest: Johnny Taverner
(00:13:28) A Conversation on Faith and Spiritual Journeys
(00:52:03) Johnny Taverner's Podcasts and Writing
(01:00:16) The Worth of a Soul and Podcasting as a Mission
(01:07:33) Closing Remarks and Contact Information
- Wayne Rankin
- Rosanna Rankin
[00:00:04]
Unknown:
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[00:00:46] Unknown:
Welcome to the podcast where every episode promises an unfiltered dive into the eclectic, the profound, and sometimes the absurd. No topic is off limits. Nothing is sacred, and political correctness takes a back seat.
[00:01:20] Unknown:
Well, hey, folks. This is Joe Rusciello, and it is great to be with you tonight. And we are coming to you live from the Asylum Studios, broadcasting from the pimple on the backside of Texas, the beautiful city of Eagle Pass. And we are going to endeavor to bring you the best quality talk radio we could muster without all the bluster. Welcome to the podcast. Hey, folks. It really is great to be with you. It it truly is. I look forward to this every single night. And, when I say every single night, I'm talking about every single night. We have been broadcasting every night since Sunday.
Haven't missed a day. And we're here tonight on a Thursday night. I don't know what that was, but we're here with you again on a Thursday night. This is just not working tonight. I'm telling you. Everything you can possibly imagine is is is just not working right. But what we're here, we're trying anyway. We are again, of course, live. So, there's no stopping, no no cutting, no editing. There's nothing we're gonna do. If we're struggling here a little bit, we're struggling. There's nothing I can do about it. But, we are here again. And, gonna take a break tonight though from the usual, political talk because, we need a break every now and then. You know, it's a lot of stuff going on in the news, a lot of stuff going on in the world. And, you know, it can kinda wear you out a little bit if you keep focusing on it too much. You keep talking about it too much. And, so you know, what we're gonna do tonight is, like I mentioned last night, we are going to be sitting down with, with, Johnny Taverner and, just having a just a a good conversation.
Now in, in full disclosure here, we did record this, this segment earlier today because, Johnny wasn't able to come on a live show tonight. So, we, we recorded the show earlier, and we pieced it all together into one to one show. And, I really think you're gonna enjoy the conversation. We covered a lot of ground, and, we talked a lot about faith. We talked a lot about the scripture. We talked about a lot about the Lord Jesus Christ. And again, like I said, it's a lot different than the usual conversations that we have here on the podcast. So, I hope you like it, and I hope it's something that you find beneficial. And and I I hope it answers some questions that you might have, about your faith. And, again, if you have any questions about it, you could always reach out to me, at [email protected], or you'd be able to reach out to John at, at at, his well, he's gonna give the he's gonna give the email address, and his website in the interview, and we'll have it in the show notes as well.
Alright. But, of course, before we do any of that, I'm gonna ask you to do just a couple of quick things for me, if you would. Would you please head over to our website and, look for that contact form, open up that web form, send us over any questions, comments, cares, or concerns that you have. Let us know what you're thinking. Let us know any cons anything that that that's bothering you, anything that you could suggest to us that we maybe could do better, or perhaps, maybe there's somebody there's a guest that you'd like us to try to get. So you can leave all that information for us in the contact form. Now if you don't wanna use the contact form, fine. You can always email us at [email protected]. Also, while you're on the page, look for the support, page as well. And remember, this is a value for value podcast. So all that means is that if there's if you've received anything of value from what we're doing here, from any of the conversations that we've had, any of the any of the political discussions that we've had, we're all we're asking is that you return that value to us in the form of a donation, and you could do that in any amount. You could do it in one of the three t's. You could do your time, your talent, or your treasure.
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It's a great, great incentive, for it, and you're helping out a company that's fighting for free speech and no censorship. Alright. So check them out. We look forward to seeing you there. Alright. So what we're gonna do here right now is we're gonna switch over, to the, the pre recorded video with, Johnny Taverner, and I hope you like it, and we'll see you in just a moment. From our short short break, this is Joe Rossello, and you are listening and watching the podcast. And, one of the one of the things that I really enjoy about our show is the fact that while we'll sit and we'll talk about politics and we'll get into all kinds of crazy, things with that and stories and conspiracies and and and all that fun stuff, sometimes we do take a break from all of that heavy lifting, and, we like to kinda branch on out into, other types of conversations that are equally interesting, equally important to us. And, probably one of the most important parts of my life is my spiritual walk.
As I've told you folks before, you know, I am a I am a born again Christian. I've been saved for about twenty five years. I've done other podcasts with bible studies. And, recently, I came across a profile on a on a PodMatch, site that that I use. And, I don't know. The the the guy's profile kinda jumped out at me. I like the fact that, that he's living up there in, in in in the great state of Canada. And, so I wanted to bring him on here. Now he's a speaker. He's a trainer. He's a budding author. He's also the host and producer of Refuge for Freedom Stories podcast. He's also the cohost of the Exchange Life podcast and author from Glory to Glory substack.
And more importantly than all of that, he is incredibly passionate about the Lord Jesus Christ. So, folks, I would really like to welcome Johnny Tavener to the podcast. Johnny, are you there with us? Yeah. I'm here. Great to be here, Joe. Thanks very much for having me. There you go. Hey. It's great it's great to have you here, brother. And, I just wanna thank you again for taking the time out of your day. I know we were talking earlier. You said you had the grandkids around. So, you know, getting to spend time with the grandkids is great. I have I have three of my own, and, I don't get to see them as often because I live down here in Texas, and they're up there in in, in New York City. So, but, you know, we get to talk every now and then. But, this is great. I'm I'm really glad that we were able to connect up on a PodMatch, and, I'm looking forward to, seeing where we're gonna go with the conversation today.
I was looking over your profile, and, I really wanted well, actually, you know what? Before I even get into that stuff, I wanna ask you the most important question. Sure. The burning question. How are things in the fifty first state?
[00:15:53] Unknown:
Yeah. Well, they're they're, they're awesome. You know, our our recent alignment of our political leader is very similar to how the Democrats replaced Joe Biden with Kamala Harris. Yeah. During an election, you know? So, like, there's a lot of parallels there. There's a there's a ton of parallels in the, the previous liberal government and, you know, their ideologies and the things they support, mostly against the will of the Canadian people. And so it's gonna be interesting. Like, they do have to have an election sometime this year. Not quite sure when that's gonna be. There's a lot of discussion that it's gonna be immediately because the polls, believe them or not, look like the, the Liberals have a advantage right now because of the change in leadership. But it's really not a change in leadership. It's just a name and a face.
And so it'll be interesting to see what happens. You know, I've seen some conversations of people discussing, you know, mister Trump's president Trump, excuse me, his idea of creating a fifty first state. And you guys have a lot of advantages financially and resource wise and protection wise, all that kind of stuff that, you know, our country has been suffering under the the situation that we have now for a long, long time. So there are definitely some advantages to that. But, of course, being Canadians, we have pride in our country, and we are a proud people. We've fought many wars together with the Americans. And, you can look in the history books if they haven't changed them yet, and it still talks about the bravery and the courage of the Canadians in war. So, it wouldn't be an easy thing to do, but, I don't know. We'll see what happens. It it's it's greater than out out of my hands anyway. Oh, yeah. For sure. For sure. I I don't I don't know because,
[00:17:41] Unknown:
it you know, I've been to Canada a few times, when I was living up in New York, and, it was just so easy to get there. So, you know, I've I've been there a few times, and, Canada's a beautiful place. I I I like going up there. The my only concern is I you know, I'm I'm a I'm a conservatarian, you know, conservative libertarian in a lot of ways. My concern would be that the fact that the the Liberal party in Canada has such control over the country itself that it would tip the balance here. And, you know, we would have more opportunities for radical left leftism to enter into our political system.
So, you know, it's it's it's, you know, six of one, half a dozen of another.
[00:18:29] Unknown:
You know? Yeah. But you only have two parties. We have, like, four or five.
[00:18:33] Unknown:
Yeah. Oh, true. Well, that would change, though. Well, may maybe not. Yeah. They might. They they might they might just merge all into, you know well, no. We actually do have more than just two parties. We have actually several parties. We have some really far, far left socialist workers parties and communist party, you know, and all that. We also have the far right parties as well and the libertarians and you know? So we have a few I wanna say we probably have about on paper 10 or 12, but Mhmm. They pretty much all align with the two major parties. So but, you know, it it's it's what it is. It's just what it is. But time around.
But absolutely more important than all of that nonsense. And like I said, we were talking we we always talk politics. We wanna get away from politics for a little while today. I wanna ask you about your relationship with with God. I wanna ask you, how did you come to know Jesus Christ as your savior?
[00:19:28] Unknown:
Yeah. So back like, I guess I go way back to, to when I was growing up. Like, I came from a broken family. My dad left when I was 11, and so my brother and I live with our mom. And, you know, I can remember standing in the court of law when they were going through their divorce and the judge saying to me, who do you wanna live with? And, I mean, I'm 11 years old. How would I know? Right? But I saw, you know, things that were going on. I I heard the one side all the time, and I said, well, no. I'm gonna stay with my mom. So my brother and I stayed with our mom, and we had some really tough times. Like, we were on welfare, social assistance for three years. And it was it was brutal, you know, really hard to make ends meet.
And when I was, 19, I started going to a church. I thought it was I thought it was a Baptist church, but it was actually a Brethren church, but I didn't know that till years later because I didn't know anything about it. And, one one Sunday, the, the guy at the front who was preaching gave a message, and I just thought to myself, you know what? Like, I really need to go up there and talk to this guy about about God and getting to know him. And and so I I gave my heart to Jesus that day. It was in the summer. I know I can't give you an exact day. A lot of people can, but I can't. And, I remember just this the weight kinda lifting off me, and and I had this Cheshire green cat smile on my face for hours you couldn't wipe off.
And so, you know, when I went home and I explained to my mom what I had done, like, she wasn't real happy about that because, you know, she was involved, like, in the occult and astrology and, like, all that kind of stuff. And so, of course, you've got those those spirits fighting against each other. Right? And then, the bible talks about, you know, seed falling into good ground, falling into rocky ground, and and so on. And so I really didn't have a a deep, rooted faith at that point in my life. I was still very young in my faith and and, and the relationship I had with this girl at that particular church at the time, we broke up and and it made it hard to go to church, you know, and and and see that person there.
So I I kinda drifted away from going to church. I never really thought about going somewhere else because that was the only church I'd ever really known. And, so I fell back in with the old crowd and, you know, just got into, you know, a stupid life and doing stupid things like we all do when we don't know God. But when I was in my early twenties, God started to draw me back. And, you know, he the bible talks about how he takes the scales off our eyes, and we start to really see the world for what it is. And I can remember, you know, standing in a bar one night, and I looked around, and I thought, like, what am I doing here? Like, I don't belong here. Like, the like, this revelation of I was in the wrong place, and I just shouldn't be there and that kind of thing.
And then there was a couple of times when I I can remember looking in the mirror, like, after, you know, a night of partying or whatever. And and I just I looked at my face, and I I just saw, like like, this morbid kinda, like, death type look on my face, and it still sticks with me now. And and all these different kinds of things like that, god was drawing me. So then there was a point when I was, in my mid twenties where, a friend of mine I had grown up with, a really sad story, his younger brother, died when he was 12. He got electrocuted.
And then, my friend, I used used to ride bikes and and, so I got rid of my bike and and I gave him my bike jacket because he didn't have one and he bought himself a bike. Well, he ended up getting t boned by a car, t boned a car, pulled out in front of him and he got killed instantly. And, my my other friend called me up and said, hey. You know, he's had this accident and he's died. And at that point in time, even though I was being drawn by god, it didn't kinda wake me up immediately. You know, it didn't make me think, oh, man. Like, there's life and death and that kind of thing. But it was just one of the many different ways that God was kind of reaching out to me, you know, through this process.
And then not long after that, I I met a girl who's now my wife, and she had just become a born again Christian. And that spirit of life that was in her, that, you know, that effervescence that we have when we first get saved, that joy, like, it was it was right there in front of me again. And it wasn't long before or it wasn't long after, I mean, when, you know, I started going to church again. And then, of course, I gave my heart back to the lord. So life doesn't come without its challenges. You know? Everybody has them even after we give our hearts to the lord. And so he's helped me work through a bunch of different things and and and that. And I remember, like, my my dad and I, like I said, he left when I was very young, so I didn't really didn't really have a lot of interaction with him for a lot of years.
And, you know, because I grew up in an environment that had a lot of bitterness and anger and and unforgiveness, you know, from my mother's side, A lot of people would think that that would stay with me and have an impact on not wanting to see my dad. But in actual fact, I remember being at work one day, and, it was back in the middle nineties. I I was just diagnosed with, type one diabetes. So I'm I'm insulin dependent now for, you know, quite a long time. And, I remember standing in the shower at the end of the workday, and I I was praying to God. And I said, God, like, what am I gonna tell people about being a Christian? I said, I can't promise them health because I just got diabetes.
I can't promise them wealth because at this point, I'm married. I've got a house and a mortgage and all that, you know, debts and stuff like that going on. And I said, you know, I can't promise them happiness because we all have struggles that we have to work through, and those are emotional times. Right. And as clear as as clear as your voice is to me today, I heard God say to me, but I put love in your heart and you can forgive your dad. And I'll tell you, it's it from that point on, like, there was absolutely no anger in my heart towards my dad. There was nothing, you know? Now I didn't have a close relationship with him, but he did end up coming back into our lives later on before he passed away. And, but there was still no bitterness or anger or anything there, and, you know, we tried our best to present the gospel to him whether he accepted the Lord or not. I don't know.
But, you know, God's been very, very real in a lot of ways.
[00:26:03] Unknown:
Oh, amen. Amen. Yeah. That's that's a that's an amazing testimony, brother. It really is. Mine isn't as, what's the word I'm looking for? Exciting, I guess? I wouldn't call it exciting. Yes. Well, the up and downs. Well, let's put it this way. I I I I I had a very strong I was very influenced by an uncle of mine, and he was the first person in my fam. My family is a staunch Roman Catholic family. As but as I got older, you know, they they kinda drifted away from it. And part of my testimony is and I'll tell you why that in a second. But, my uncle was the first person in my family to step away from the Catholic tradition and, embrace, Christianity.
I didn't realize at the time that the denominational choice that he made what you know, is really not very Christian, not really, you know, Bible Christianity. But, nonetheless, he, he gave me my first Bible when I was eight years old. I still have it. It's in my bookshelf in the other room. Nice. And, you know, I I I love that book, and I I used to sleep with it under my pillow. You know, it was it was one of those things. It was my cherished gift. And, when he would go to school, he would go to he he ended up going to seminary. He went to bible school, then he went to seminary for this denominational, that Dominochim became part of.
And, when he would come home on his breaks, he would bring all of his books, from from the from that semester, and he would leave them behind. And I was, again, very young, and I'm flipping through these things, and I'm reading these things, and I'm kind of absorbing it all. As a matter of fact, I had a a friend of mine tell me that, a couple years ago, he was like, he goes, hey. Do you still you still you still into into the Lord? And I was like, yeah. Of course. Why? He was like, oh, do you remember when we were back in school, you used to carry around a Bible everywhere you went? And I was like, I did? Really? He was like, yeah. You don't remember during gym class, we would sit in the bleachers and you would you would teach us the Bible? I was like, no. I remember that. And he was like, yeah. I remember that. I remember that. I was like, alright. I'll praise the Lord. You know? It's just our started. Yeah. But, but what my uncle would do is when he also would come home on these breaks, he would take all my Catholic catechism books, and then he would he would rewrite them. He would cross out pages with a big red marker, and he would say, this is not what happened, and he would staple something to it. And I wouldn't know until I got to catechism class, and I'd open up the book, and and there it is. And then I would get in trouble and, you know, but it was planting a seed at a very, very young age.
And, I I would get into arguments or debates rather with, with the with the nuns and the priests and and and whatnot. And and I I remember the last time I set foot in the Catholic church for many, many, many, many years was, it was right before you had to make your first communion. The priest came into our class, and he was like, okay. Well, what we're gonna do is you have you have to go to confession, and you have to confess your sins. This way you could be forgiven of them, and then, and then you you're able to receive communion. So he goes, does anybody have any questions? So I put my hand up, and I said, well, where does it say that I have to tell you what I did wrong?
He's like, excuse me? And I was like, what does it say I have to tell you what I did wrong? You're you're you're just a man like I am. Didn't go over very well. After a bit of a back and forth, I'm trying to shorten it up, bit of a back and forth, he took me by the hand outside to my mom who was waiting for me, and he was like, we don't need his kind here. And my mom said, really? Well, then you don't need us here either. And that was the last time my mom and my family attended church regularly. They would only now, at this point, well, they weren't going on, like, holidays, occasions, like that. So fast forward, you know, many, many years, I just there was this one day I just, I don't know. I I just was felt very uncomfortable with my life. I just felt there was something missing.
There was just something just very empty. And, I started looking around for my Bibles. And, you know, I found them, and I I found these old Bible studies that I was that I I would do with my uncle, and I was just rereading those things and studying on my own, reading on my own. And, I was working for New York I was working in New York City at the time, and I was, I was in law enforcement. And, I had gotten transferred to a new command on on, in in Manhattan. It's West Street and Houston Street, just a few blocks away from where the World Trade Center was. And, I got transferred there. I knew the commanding officer because when I went in the academy, he was one of the academy instructors.
So, he knew who I was. I knew who he was, and, we had a good, working relationship. And, he was like, I'm I'm glad you're here. We need good people in in in the house here. He goes, the only problem is is I gotta put you on the overnights. I'm like, yeah. That's fine. I'm I'm fine with that. And he was like, alright. Great. He goes, and he goes, it's your turn. My turn? For what? He goes, you have to ride with Gail. I was like, okay. Who's Gail? And he told me her full name, and I was like, okay. What's the problem? And he goes, well, she's one of those born again Christian types. She's gonna talk to you here all night long. It's your turn. And I was like, alright. Well, I I can handle that. You know? I I I studied enough on my own, and I used to refer to myself as the pope of the Worldwide Church of Joe, and I can do you know, I I know my stuff. So, we started working together, and, my first night on the on the tour when she came out of the locker room, she looked at me. She goes, are you saved?
And I was like, here we go. You know? So I said, can we get some coffee first? So I said, alright. You driving, though. So she so we get in the we get in the patrol vehicle. We we take off, and we're doing our thing. So she goes, you still haven't answered my question. Are you saved? I said, well, what do you define as being saved? And that started a debate. And we went back every night. Eight hour shift. All we did was debate, debate, debate. But friendly. It wasn't like we were hostile to each other. I expressed my views. She expressed hers.
So one day she said to me, it was a Sunday morning. She was like, hey. You know what? There's this I forgot to tell you about this Christian radio station you might wanna check out. Sure. What is it? She told me what it was. It was, an one of the AM stations up in New York. And so I started listening to it. I I drove home. I listened to it, and I heard, I heard Jay Vernon McGee, for the first time ever. I don't know if you're familiar with Jay Vernon. Yep. Great. He's a Presbyterian, so I'm not gonna hold him at fault for that. But he's, a great he's a great teacher, and I I had no idea that he had already been with the Lord for many years because everything that he was talking about seems so relevant and pertinent to my life at that particular moment.
So, I would listen to him every morning on the drive home, and I would purposely drive home slower just so I could hear the rest of the story. And, and that just kinda wore on me. And I just listened. The more I listened, the more I wanted to. And the the the more I wanted to listen, the more I wanted to read, and I started just, again, just throwing myself back into it. One night in February, that was July 17, I think, or something like that. I got in my car and I was like, oh, I'm gonna listen to the traffic reports, you know, it's a Sunday night. I'm like, well, yeah, the traffic's always the same. You know, it never changes. So what's the what's the point? Let's see what's on that Christian radio station. So I I I put it on, I'm driving to work, and I hear this this radio preacher and he he's he's preaching a message on hell and who's going there.
Alright. And then what he would do, it was like a call in show. He would do, he would preach a little bit and then he would stop and take phone calls, answer questions, you know, and it didn't have to be on the subject. It could be on on whatever. And, just listen to him, and I'm like, okay. This guy knows what he's talking about. He's, you know, he's pretty good. And, not that I was in a great authority at the time, but, you know, but from what I understood. So, he gets back to preaching again, and he's he was just hitting these points on hell. And it just seemed like at the end of every sentence, like you said, like, you know, it's as clear as day, heard it. It just it was just this this this voice in the back of my head that said, I'm talking to you, Joe.
This is for you. Are you paying attention, Joe? Are you listening, Joe? And you're going to hell, Joe. You know? And when I tell you that, it literally scared the hell out of me. It it literally did. I wrote down the name of the show, and I wrote down the phone number. I was like, well, when I get to work I didn't have cell phones at the time. When when I got, I got to work, I was like, I'm gonna call. If the show's still on, I'm gonna call. And, of course, the show wasn't on when I got there, and that was fine because I had already chickened out by the time I got there. The, but I I looked up the the name of the church that was sponsoring the show, and it turned out to be the church that he was pastoring.
So, I read up on them a little bit, and I was like, okay. Well, you know, yeah, okay. I agree with that. Well, that makes it that makes a lot of sense, You know? Well, I never heard it put that way before. That that yeah. That okay. You know? Like, I'm getting goosebumps talking about it. So, I said, alright. I'm gonna call this guy. I'm gonna call this church. And I called the church, the phone number for the church, and I was like, hey. You know, I got his voice mail. I was like, hey. You know, I heard you on the radio. Must sound like an idiot. You're on the radio. You're the you know? But, he, but he called me back in, like, ten minutes.
And, we sat on the phone for about an hour. And, man, I love talking to him. It was it was amazing. And he was like, hey. Why don't you come to church someday? I was like, oh, no. No. No. No. Not come to church. You crazy. Building will fall down. I walk in there. And he was like, no. No. Come. Come. I was was like, how about this? How about I come and meet you at your office? And we'll talk first, and then go from there. He was like, well, you know, we we rent space. We don't have a church building of our own. We we rent space in a community school in Lower Manhattan. Oh, really? Where? And he told me where it was. And I was like, you're kidding me. That's a block away from where I work. So he was like, oh, yeah. Yeah. That's great. Yeah. So how about this? Let's let's because you work overnights? I said, yeah. I said, let's let's meet he goes, let's meet for dinner.
Okay. Sure. So, bro, I I took I had this big red duffle bag. I stuffed every book you can possibly imagine that I had and what I was studying. And I carried that thing with me into the into the city that night. I met up with him. We went to this restaurant. We sat down. We started going, you know, talking about just mundane things. Had the meal, and he goes, well, look. He goes, this is not you know, it's great that we're getting to know each other, but we're not here for that. I was like, yeah, you're right. No problem. So I reached down and picked up the bag, dumped it all out in the table. He looked at he looked it all over as and he goes, what's this? I said, this is what I've been reading and studying on my own.
So he looked it over. He was like, okay. And then he just pushed it all to the side. He goes, you don't need any of that. And he took his Bible out, put it down on the table, and he goes, this is what you need. And, he opened up that Bible, and he started he started showing me scriptures after scripture after scripture. And the more scripture the more I the more he was showing me, the more I was like, oh, I need more more more more. Tell me how rotten I am. Tell me what a sinner I am. Tell me how bad I am. Tell me tell me, please. And, I know it sounds crazy to somebody who's not a Christian to understand that, but, yes, I, yeah, I need to hear that.
You know. That's why that's why, you know, that's why the Bible calls, that that's why the word of God calls the word of God a two edged sword. It has the ability to cut you down to pieces and has the ability to heal you at the same time. It's two edged. So listening to that, I was I just I was just sucking it up. And before I knew it, I was like, oh, man. I gotta get to work. You know, I have roll call in, like, like, like, thirty minutes. I gotta I gotta be ready. So we left, and as he he walked with me back to the command, and, as we're walking, he was like, I just need ten more minutes.
He goes, I don't wanna let this pass. Alright? He goes, I I just need ten minutes. Let's can we go some place and sit down? So I said, yeah. Okay. We walked out onto Pier 34, which is on the corner of of, Canal Street and West Street in in Lower Manhattan, just down the street from my office. And, we went to the second bench on off of off of the gate. And he opened up the word of God, and he started taking me down what's called the Romans Road. Now, are you familiar with the Romans Road? Okay. Yeah. So he started taking me down the Romans Road. Now, for those of you who are listening who might not know what the Romans Road is, it's it's, it's it's a lot of scripture out of the book of Romans. You know, it starts off with Romans three twenty three, Romans six twenty three, and and and so on. And, it all culminates with, Ephesians two eight and nine, which is.
[00:39:11] Unknown:
Oh, you got me there.
[00:39:14] Unknown:
Yeah. You're gonna have to look it up. Alright? For by I will. For by grace are
[00:39:20] Unknown:
Are you saved through faith and not of works? Because it's not of yourselves, but of the Lord.
[00:39:26] Unknown:
For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.
[00:39:32] Unknown:
Correct.
[00:39:35] Unknown:
So while he was taking me down the Romans Road, though, this is this is this is interesting. Mhmm. There was some guy on a bike. Don't know where he came from. Don't know you know, I'm not saying some I'm not saying there's something spirit, like, mystical or anything like that. I'm just saying he was there. He was riding around. He starts riding in circles around us while we're sitting on the bench. And as he's riding around in circles, he's just yelling at us, and he's cursing at us, and all kinds of stuff. And, you know, all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I mean, he must have looped around us about six or seven times.
He hits something on the pier that made him flip over the handlebars of his bike and crack his head open on the on the, on the deck of the pier. So I I'm law enforcement, you know, I I I I gotta help the guy. So I'm trying to coordinate everything. I'm trying to reach my command and, you know, trying to get everybody down there and calling an ambulance and all that stuff. And, ambulance finally comes, and I'm I'm of course, I'm coordinating the scene here. I'm directing everything. Well, this is what happened. This is what's going on. While I'm doing that, the pastor walks over, and he takes me by the arm. Like, he just taps my elbow, and he was like, what we're doing is more important with their than what they're doing. He was they're trying to save his life. I'm trying to save your soul.
And I was like, okay. You know? And I just kinda I followed along, and I went with him, and, you know, we prayed for the guy, and, you know, and then he, you know, he finished up through the through the Romans road, and he asked me he asked me, do do you wanna ask Jesus Christ to be your savior? And I was like, absolutely. And I dropped down right there on that deck on that deck, cried my eyes out, asked the Lord to save me, confessed him as my savior, got up just like you, the Cheshire cat grin, I felt like every weight had been lifted off of me. It was the most incredible feeling, that first moment. Now people ask, well, well, do you did you know Jesus Christ at that point? Well, no. Not really. I just met him.
You know? Yeah. You know, it's gonna take time to build that relationship, but I knew that I was saved. I knew that I knew and I understood what he did for me, the sacrifice that he made for me. So, after that happened, we I went up to my command, and, I I go walking in into the muster room, and Gail comes out of the locker room. And I never I did not tell her anything about the night. I had not told her a thing about me calling the pastor and meeting with them. Nothing. She comes walking out of the locker room. She looks at me. She goes, you got saved. Yep. And I was like I was like, what are you talking about? So she goes, don't you let the devil get in here now. You go, no. No. No. Don't you play with me. She goes, you got saved.
And it was it was an most incredible experience in my life, so I'll never forget it.
[00:42:21] Unknown:
Yeah. You know, there's there's a lot of points in your in your, testimony there that kinda stuck out to me was God orchestrates our lives, you know, and he will have these divine connections where we cross paths with people through a conversation or a meeting or we read something or we hear something, and it's all orchestrated to bring us to him. And, you know, the devil in the world will lie to us all day long. You know, there's there's the voice of God, and there's our own voice, and then there's the the devil in his minion's voice. And God puts all these things in our path to help us discern the difference. So when you said, you know, he's reading, you know, you're listening, you're saying, that's for you, Joe. Like, all those kind of things. Right? Yes, Joe. It's this I want you to hear. Like, God does that. And and I I think the people who don't know God, sometimes they fail to recognize God's voice in that, like, gut feeling or that kind of thing, but but they should really be sensitive to that because, you know, we all make mistakes, and there's times when God wants to speak to us whether we're a believer or not to prevent what he knows could happen in our lives. Right? So I think that people should be encouraged to kinda pay attention to that. And if they have a sense that, you know, I'm gonna call Bill today because I just have a feeling I need to call Bill.
Mhmm. And, you know, I've seen that over and over and over again. And then when you talked about the guy riding on the bike, again, these divine connections and divine circumstances and so on, the guy wipes out, bangs his head on the ground, and splits it open. Well, what happens when you split your head open? It bleeds. You shed blood. So God God God gives you a visual right then and there. That's right. The blood that you need, right, that shedding of blood to get saved. Like, there's there's just so many things that that God was doing in your walk with him. And I've talked to a lot of people as well about their experience of getting saved.
Everybody's created uniquely different. God knows us before he even creates us in our mother's womb. Right? He gives us all gifts and talents and abilities and purpose and plan and assignments and so on and so on and so on. And not all of us are empaths. Not all of us are emotional type of people. Right? There's a lot of that are type a people. There's a lot of type b people and so on. Not everybody experiences that emotional upwelling of tears flooding and things like that. I've talked to a number of people where it's been like a logical intellectual decision. Like they looked at the evidence and said I can't argue with this anymore. Like yes, Jesus is Lord. He I need him as a saviour. And they make a logical decision, but they don't have that experience of that emotional side. Right?
So it it's interesting just how how God works in in everybody's unique way to to touch their life, to to give them the opportunity to give their heart to him. Exactly. Exactly. And and just I I know a lot of people,
[00:45:21] Unknown:
that that came to Christ by trying to dispute Christ Mhmm. Or or disprove the scriptures. You know? I I great guy. I I met, at the first church I started going to after I got saved, that that the church that the pastor was was was the pastor of, he told me that he was a a a devout atheist when, he started sitting down and started going through the Bible because he wanted to prove that it's a myth, it's a fairy tale. And he tried to go back and say, well, you know, every every culture on on the Earth has, or every civilization on Earth has a flood story.
And Mhmm. I'm like, yeah. And I'm listening to him, and he he was like, and then one of the things that stuck out at me is how how similar they all are in detail. And he started exploring that, and then doing studies like that, not being able to disprove it led him to come to realize, you know what? If I was a betting man, I wouldn't take the chance with the odds that this book is right. Yeah. You know? Yeah. And, and he he came to Christ. And and when I tell you that he came to Christ, I mean, I he told me his whole testimony, and I'm I'm not gonna repeat it. You know, it's not my job to do that. But, you know, based on what he had told me, man, if there was anybody that that was gonna be the gatekeeper to to to to hell, he was one of them, you know.
And, you know, and and then knowing that about his background, to hear him pray. Oh my gosh. It he Yeah. When he would pray, you actually felt like you were standing in the throne room of God before the throne of grace. I mean, this guy was just unbelievable. And, and just to see that kind of a turnaround in somebody's life because of trying to disprove who Christ is. So, yeah, the logical approach sometimes, you know, fails. But, yeah, unfortunately, though, there are some people who who do try to take the logical approach and and, you know, they don't.
[00:47:34] Unknown:
Yeah. You you you definitely have to you definitely have to have an honest and open and contrary heart before God because that's what he looks for. Right? He tells us that in Psalm Psalm 51. See, I can tell you that's in Psalm 51, but I struggle with the Ephesians verse. But don't hold that against me. I'm not I'm not, like, a chapter or verse kind of guy. I'm more of, like, I'm I'm the kind of guy where I read something that kinda sticks in my heart, and I know Jesus said it. I know when the apostle said it, but ask me to look it up. Yeah. I can find it, but it may Oh, I know. Be right then and there.
[00:48:03] Unknown:
I get you. I had a friend I had a friend of mine text me, I think it was yesterday or the day before, and said, can you give me an example from scripture where God has a sense of humor?
[00:48:17] Unknown:
I can give you a perfect example. I'll give you an example right now. God says that he knows the number of hairs on our head, and he's subtracting from mine every day, so I know he's a mathematician.
[00:48:29] Unknown:
There you go. Well, what Noah came to mind for me was a passage from, was a passage from, from Proverbs. And he said, oh, it just flipped out of my head. The the the ringing of the nose bringeth forth blood. Yeah. You know, that's kinda funny, you know, when you think about it. But my my response was, I was like, oh, wow. I I have so many in my head. I just can't tell you where to find it. I can tell you stories like like like the one story where, where the it was I think it's in Acts where, you know, that prophet trying to cast out the demons, but the demons, you know, beat him up, stripped him naked, and, you know, chased him out of town. Sons of sons of Siva. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, it's so there's tons of stories like that in the scripture. I mean, you know, and you have to read the scripture too. Like, like, a lot of people tend to read the scripture and they they they put that air on, you know, that that Mhmm. Harder than thou air. No. Read it like a person, you know. Yeah. The the disciples, the apostles, they had personalities.
Yeah. Don't you don't you think Absolutely. Don't you think for a minute that that Peter never heard the end of it after he stepped out of the boat and sank after a few steps? I'm sure I'm sure he didn't live that down. We still read about it today, so there you go. Exactly. Exactly. That's that's a good example of God having a sense of humor. He's saying, hey. You know what? Look what this dummy did.
[00:49:53] Unknown:
You know? And, you know, getting getting back to, the sons of Skiva, there were seven of them. Right? And, I just wrote an article about that on Substack, and it it's called to be known. And what struck me about that like, I I'm a complete believer in the word of God and believe that God speaks to us. One of the primary ways that he speaks to us, and he gives us revelation and things like that. And we get to know God's character and and the way that he does things and and and helps us along our journey. And one of the things that struck me about that story was these guys were going around, and they were casting out demons in the name that Jesus or in the in the name of Jesus that Paul talks about. Right? So that sentence in itself, and I'm paraphrasing it, but but what it tells you about it is that they recognized the authority that Paul had in Christ, but they didn't know that authority.
That's right. And that demon said, god and Jesus said, no. Paul, I know. But who are you? So it it's so important to understand when we understand the authority of Christ and what he actually empowers us with his life to do, I think the church is missing that in a huge manner. It's it's something that we need to we need to grow into and understand and walk in faith in. And I believe in these days and times as they continue to get worse and worse and worse, we're gonna see people in the body of Christ really start to engage with that knowledge of that authority that they have in Christ to stand up against the wiles and the attacks of the enemy. And you'll see I honestly believe you'll see people healed. Well, I we are seeing people healed and delivered and set free and even raised from the dead. Like, the Bible says Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. So that means all the things that he said that he did and we can do, we will continue to do until he comes back.
[00:51:41] Unknown:
Yeah. Amen. Amen. So I wanted to ask you before, because I noticed I'm just looking at the clock here. We got twenty minutes to go. Mhmm. So I know you you you you produce a podcast, you host a podcast, you cohost a podcast. So tell me about the tell where first of all, where where can they find them? And, just tell me a little bit about what what they're all about. Tell the folks about it. Sure. Okay. So, the first podcast is Refuge Freedom Stories.
[00:52:08] Unknown:
And in 2020, a friend of mine who runs Refuge Ministries Canada called me up on the phone. He said, hey, Johnny. He says, I heard that, 77% of Canadians believe in miracles, and we've seen a lot of miracles through the ministry. And I think we should do a radio show. I said, oh, okay. I said, well, I'm a techie, geeky kind of guy. I can do the the software kinda. I get sure I could figure that out. And I said, but I don't have a radio show host voice like like yours. His perfect radio show host voice. I said, I don't have that. You're gonna have to find somebody else. And then the next day, another guy called him up and said, hey. I really like what your ministry is doing. Is there anything you need? And he said, yeah. I need a radio show host, and that's how we got started. And a couple of months later, my pastor came to me and said, hey. Do you guys have a podcast? And I had this big gigantic light bulb moment over my head, and I said, no. But we're going to. And off we went. And so we've been at it for this is our sixth season. And basically, it's talking about how real people's lives are changed by the power of God. It's their story. And, you know, we've interviewed everybody from crack addicts to Major League Baseball managers who won the World Series, lots of veterans, musicians, a lady that came out of human trafficking, a guy who made 100,000,000 by the time he was 31, a Top Gun, an actual Top Gun pilot.
So it's been super interesting group of people. Like, I'm just amazed and so blessed to be part of that. And it's, it's really, really encouraging, you know, to hear those stories because it shows all the different facets of God's character. And as we were talking earlier about how he ministers to people individually to bring them to him. That's right. The Exchange Life podcast just newly launched at the March, and I co host that with doctor Steven Finney from Institute of Ministry America. And we're talking about how Christ exchanges his life for ours. When we accept him into our heart as our Lord and Saviour, our old Adamic nature is actually nailed to the cross with Christ and dies with him. And his new life is birthed in us. And it talks about all the different aspects and the differences between the old nature of Adam and the new nature in Christ. So we we're into our fourth episode right now, and so we've talked about things like behavior and obedience, and we just did one on authority and so on.
And then, so those are the two podcasts.
[00:54:24] Unknown:
And you also you also, right. You you have a you now for folks who don't know what Substack is, tell them about that. So Substack, I came across Substack,
[00:54:33] Unknown:
I was at, Podfest in 2024 and they were talking about, investing in your podcast. And one of the one of the individuals there talked about you can post podcasts on Substack. And I said, well, that's a perfect other medium to, put the podcast out there so people can hear it. So we started doing that and then as we talked earlier about how the bible gives us revelation of what god's talking about and speaking to us about, I just started writing those things down. And as I started writing more and more of them, I thought, you know what? I really need to put these on the Substack, not for any kind of recognition or anything, but just because if if god's saying it to me, I'm sure that there are others hearing the same thing or couldn't be encouraged by it. So there's a number of articles on there, and the podcasts are on there as well.
[00:55:22] Unknown:
Well, that would you're a busy man. I am a busy man. You really are. You really do you work at all, or or you just No. Not anymore. No? Okay.
[00:55:31] Unknown:
That's good. I'm, I'm I'm working But I was working when we I was working when we started the podcast, and I was doing there was there was a time I'll tell you a story about that because there was a time in, 2021, I had a 50 interviews booked between January and June. Oh, wow. And I was working I was working a forty hour job and family and commitments and all that other kind of stuff. And I I I I was overwhelmed because I was hosting, producing, editing, publishing, doing all of it. And I said to the lord, what what am I gonna do about this? And clearly, he said to me, you gotta lay it down. So I emailed everybody, and I said, I'm canceling your interview. This is what god told me to do. And I said, we'll see where it goes from here. And then a few weeks later, I had the impression that I could, open up two interviews a month. So I did that, and and the calendar filled right back up again. And the same so I had to lay it down a second time. And then eventually, it came to a a groove of, the right kind of interview scheduling.
Mhmm. And I I I think God just wants us to make sure that nothing becomes an idol. Nothing takes place of him, you know, because it's not like it's it's it's not me. It's him. He's put me in a position right now to host and cohost and and write these things. But if he took it all away tomorrow,
[00:56:43] Unknown:
that's okay. Like, because it's not about me. It's about him. Right? Yeah. Amen. Amen. When I was doing the, the bible study podcast, I was doing that, as a live show, twice a week. I was doing a Thursday night bible study, and then I was doing a Sunday, sermon Sunday. And, it it, that was challenging. It it really was because and you know this. You you can't just you can't just, like like, pull up a bunch of articles and and make comments and express opinion. Mhmm. You're teaching the bible. You have to study. You have to know what you're teaching. You have to, you know, be able to explain it. And, I would spend because I'm not the sharpest tool in the text sometimes. You know? I'm you know, see, I I seem to said that wrong.
The, it would take me about eight hours of study to do for one show. Mhmm. And when I say eight hours of study, people say, oh, that's okay. It's just it's just a good day. You know? Just spending a day doing it. No. It's not that. I also have a forty hour a week job. You know? I had just I just purchased the house that I'm in right now, and, you know, I was renovating that, and I had a a million and one things going on. Plus, at the same time, I had, I I lost I lost my dad. Six months later, I lost my grandmother. And then I'm sorry to hear that. And then about eight months later, I lost my mom. I'm sorry to hear that. And then in between all of that, I lost my wife. Oh, I'm sorry to hear that too. I think, you know, we got divorced.
But, so, yeah, I need to make sure I say it like that. We got divorced. She didn't die. But, you know, it so but in the middle of all that, I'm also doing the podcast, and it it's not easy. It's really not easy. I wasn't doing guests. I didn't have interviews or anything scheduled, but it was the amount of study that I was putting in. And then, of course, you know, I put that I put that down for a little bit. I needed to take a break. I was burning out. And I said, well, I'm gonna do this podcast. I'm I'm only gonna do this once a week, you know, if once a week, you know, and it's only gonna be recorded. I'm not gonna do live. I'm just gonna take my time and do it whenever I feel like I needed to do it, you know. Well, that changed.
Now it's a it's a live show three to five nights a week. Yeah. It's funny how God does that. Yeah. It is. And it is. And then, every every now and then I get to preaching on the show, you know, which, you know, I've noticed that my my viewership drops when I start doing that, but, you know, it's okay. It's it's it's not about it's not about the metrics, man. No. Of course.
[00:59:17] Unknown:
I've I've I've said it so many times like that. The only thing that that I hope for out of podcasting is that when I cross through the veil to our life with Christ, one person comes up to me and says, you know what? I heard you on a podcast what you talked about, and I gave my life to Jesus. That's all that matters. Yeah. No. Absolutely. And I I totally agree with you on that one.
[00:59:41] Unknown:
You know, doing doing the type of podcasts that you're doing right now and type of podcasts that I was doing previously, that's your mission field. You know? You're a you're basically a missionary. You're out there. You're serving the Lord. You're presenting the gospel. The the, the Internet waves is your mission field. You know? And wherever wherever your podcast is being heard, like you said, even if it's just one person comes to Christ from that, when you you know that when you stand before the Lord at the judgment seat of Christ, you're gonna hear well done, thou good and faithful servant, even if it's only one. I hope so. And that's all that matters. You know? It's that it's it's it's like, it's like my old my old pastor used to say.
He used to say, it's it's the worth of a soul outweighs anything else. The worth of the soul. And he would he would oftentimes say, you know, every every person you see walking down the street is an eternal soul, and they're either gonna go to heaven or hell. And it's our responsibility to talk to them about it and make them aware of it. %. And, you know, we could do a whole other show talking about that. Oh, yeah. And and I I would love to do that. Actually, we Yeah. Oh, for sure. Probably do something again. And I just wanna say this too for for to the folks that are that are watching or listening on the audio channels. Johnny and I, we just met today.
And because we share the Holy Spirit, this to me at least feels like I've known him my whole life. Amen. You know? And that's because we have fellowship in the Holy Spirit. You know? Believers know believers, you know? And it's it's it's just something that that only God can put together. And, you know, so it's it's it's a blessing to to have these kind of conversations. You know? And, and I hope that my audience appreciates the conversation that we had tonight. And if they didn't, oh, well. Go watch something else. We sure enjoyed it. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I I I think the Lord probably enjoyed it too, you know. So so I'm I'm sure we made him laugh a little bit there. But, before before I let you go, though, I just wanna, ask you a quick question. One one very, very important question.
So who is your team for hockey?
[01:01:59] Unknown:
You know what? I just retired from playing hockey last year, and I've pretty much lost all interest in watching hockey, honestly. Well, because I I used to play a net and and, so I'd always watch the games to to see if I could learn how to play better. Right? But now I'm not playing anymore, like injuries and stuff. Mhmm. It just, I've lost my interest in that, but I do watch my grandkids play hockey, and I absolutely love it. So they're my favorite teams. Very favorite team. Okay. Well, I'm a I'm a New York Rangers fan.
[01:02:27] Unknown:
Oh, you're from New York? Yeah. Well well, you have other I know there's two teams there. Yeah. I have other teams, but, you know, they're not important. So we got I'm a I'm a Rangers fan, and, I've been a Rangers fan since, so I wanna say I'm about eight years old. I saw my first my first hockey match, and I was just wrapped up into it right away. And I act I actually played hockey, also for a little bit. I didn't play ice hockey. Wasn't very didn't play hockey. Wasn't very wasn't very many opportunities, where I lived in New York to play ice hockey, but Yeah.
But we played, we played roller hockey.
[01:03:03] Unknown:
Yeah. Ball hockey. Yeah. Well, no. Actually, we used pucks. Yep. Yep. Actual pucks. Roller hockey. I know what roller hockey is. Yeah. So,
[01:03:12] Unknown:
and I was a I was a defensive I was a right wing defense.
[01:03:17] Unknown:
Yeah,
[01:03:18] Unknown:
of course. And I I I love to hit and I wasn't I wasn't an instigator you know but I never backed down. Yeah. And and we play we played hard. We played really hard. And, private leagues mostly. And,
[01:03:33] Unknown:
and, you know, just like or sometimes we'll just do a pickup game. Yeah. But, you know, there there are yeah. There are times, like, you know, being a goalie, you know, I mean, I've had three knee surgeries and ankle surgery and a broken finger and four concussions and hurt my back and hurt my elbows. So pretty good career in net. Right? Yeah. But after after a while, it takes its toll on you. And, you know, so after forty years of playing a net, and I'm having trouble getting my pads on because my back's so sore. I and I I had and you know what? I had just I had just watched, and I've forgotten his name now. The Boston guy that retired used to play with Marshawn all the time. I can't remember his name. But, anyway, he said, you know, like, the your body lets you know when it's time to retire. And I thought, yeah. That's exactly how I feel. Although I don't have any Stanley Cups, I don't have his money, and I don't have his fame. But, yeah, I know exactly what he's talking about. So There's a kinship.
Yeah. Well, yeah. Yeah. There yeah. There's a recognition of its time. And, you know, ever since that, it's like, my god has got me busy enough with all these other things that that are far more important than, making an epic glove save. Right? There you go. There you go. But I used to have I used to have a sticker on the back of my card, and it had, like, a goalie sticker, and it says, Jesus saves, bro.
[01:04:51] Unknown:
I like that. That's good. That's really good. But listen, brother, before I let you go, you gotta you gotta send me, your contact information, outside of the pod match. I have a one of our ex one of our executive producers, and and I, we have, we have tiers, for the show. So for donations, like, so if, somebody donates a monthly recurring donation of $17.76, they get, an associate producer credit. Somebody donates $18.36, regular monthly. They get, the regular producer's credit. And then for $25 or more a month, they get executive producer credit. And and all that comes with shout outs on the show and inclusion notes and all that stuff. And the executive producer actually gets a segment on the podcast with me. So, I have two executive producers right now. It's a husband and wife team. It's Wayne and Rosanna Rankin.
Great people. I've known Wayne for over twenty years. We recently reconnected. I I honestly, I thought he I thought he was gone. I thought he passed away because he had last time I heard from him and his family that he had cancer and wasn't doing well and, you know, and then we lost contact. So I just I just thought he was gone. But, right, when you when you talk about a faithful believer, he's he's one. And right now, he's in Alaska, he and his wife, with Samaritan's Purse, with Franklin Graham's ministry. And I'd like to get you guys in touch with each other because he's actually starting a podcast too. And I think you guys I think you guys will get along really well.
[01:06:25] Unknown:
Yeah. I can definitely, send you some contact names too for some interesting people. Awesome. A buddy of mine a buddy of mine ministers to the, native reserves in Canada. Okay. And he's actually at the, the one reserve right now called Grassy Narrows, and they have a forty five point five percent suicide rate with the youth. Wow. And it's the it's the it's the worst in the world because the land, the water, the people are all poisoned by mercury. But God's moved in. One lady got healed, and she was in a wheelchair, and she said, I'm gonna have to learn to walk again because I could feel my feet for the first time in ten years. Wow. And he went back, and he's up there now, and she's up and about. She's gone on a mission trip. She's preaching the gospel like god is moving. That's fantastic, man. That that's a great story. That's a great testimony. Yeah. He's got a book. We got a book about it too. I don't have it here to show you. Oh, I don't think I did.
Yeah. Here. Get a copy of this book. Sacred Fire. Got it. By the McGill family. Sacred Fire Northern Testimonies. It's available on Amazon.
[01:07:30] Unknown:
Okay. I got it. Yep. Perfect. Alright. Johnny t, thank you so much for tonight. This was a great conversation. Really enjoyed having you here. Before you go, why don't you just tell us where we could find all of your podcast, your Substack, and and every way we can get in touch with you?
[01:07:46] Unknown:
Yeah. So, Refuge Freedom Stories and the Exchange Life Podcast, they're both on Apple and Spotify and all the other major platforms. We're heard currently in around, 85 countries around the world. So that's a real blessing. The Substack, you can find the Substack.com. It's called From Glory to Glory. And if anybody wants to reach out about the podcast, they can send me an email to [email protected].
[01:08:11] Unknown:
Well, that's great. Thank you, Johnny. Again, thank you so much for spending your time with us tonight. God bless you. We're gonna pray for you, and, I'll see. Hopefully, we get the chance to, do this again. Yeah. Absolutely. God bless you too. Thanks so much for the opportunity to talk about God. It's my favorite thing to do. Amen. Amen. Alright. If you can, just stick around. Just flip your camera off really quick. Alright, folks. This has been Johnny t. We thank, again, Johnny, for spending his time with us here tonight. So now, folks, what we're gonna do is gonna take a quick break. And when we come back from this break, we'll wrap up the rest of the show, and, hopefully, you got a blessing out of this. Don't forget to check him out on Apple and Spotify, his podcast. We'll put all of the information in the show notes, so you can track him down with links, and, we'll be back right after this. Stay with us.
[01:08:57] Unknown:
This podcast is hosted on PodHome.fm, an intelligent podcasting platform that you can use to host unlimited shows and episodes and have unlimited downloads. Pod home comes with many intelligent features like Pod home AI, which automatically creates transcripts, chapters, suggests titles, show notes, detects people, and creates clips. You can use Pothome AI unlimited for all your episodes and all your shows. Go check it out and start your free seven day trial at pothome.fm.
[01:09:36] Unknown:
Do you blame all your problems on Trump? Do you have blue hair and a bunch of metal in your face? Do you not know what a woman is and confused about your gender? Good news. You have TDS, and it's a very treatable condition. Please take the time to find a mental health professional near you and prepare yourself for all the lies you've been told. When you finally recover, the rest of reality would love to welcome you back. Warning, severe TDS can cause rampant Karen and Kevin outbursts. Being cucked by your partner and brain damage from too much hair dye may also cause severe butthurt and nonsensical outbursts that make everyone around you know you're stupid.
[01:10:15] Unknown:
Well, alright. I hope you guys enjoyed that, conversation we had with, Johnny Tavener. And don't forget, you'll be able to get all of his information in the show notes, and, hopefully, you'll be able to, reach out to him at some point and, you know, send him a comment. Let him know what you thought of the interview, and, we look forward to having him on here again. Alright, folks. Well, I think that is going to just about do it for us for tonight. So as usually, we wanna give our our shout outs to our executive producers, Wayne and Rosanna Rankin. Thank you so much for your support. Also, we wanna say thank you to all the folks that are listening on the modern podcast apps, like, Podcast Guru and Fountain.fm.
And, we also wanna say thank you to all the folks that are streaming sets to us through the modern podcast app. So thank you so very much for that. We really do appreciate it. Now, folks, also, we didn't get a chance to talk about Texas tonight because we stay away from politics. But if you wanna get involved with shaping the future of a free and independent Texas, just head over to our website, joerussello.com/tandm, or head over to texitnow.org. Scan the QR codes, register your support, become a member, make a donation, let your voice be heard for free in independent Texas. Also, don't forget to set head over to the, contact form on our website. Send us over any questions, comments, cares, concerns you have. Don't forget to click that support button. Help us out with a donation. Any amount you can possibly do, we would really appreciate it, or check out one of our monthly recurring, donation tiers. Also, don't forget the alexjonesstore.com/joe.
And remember that every purchase you make, 10% comes right back here to the podcast to help us out in managing our funds. Alright. Also, just wanna say, not to forget to find us on our socials at x joe roos Instagram, joe roos TikTok, joe.roos truth social, joe roos minds, joe ruse, Facebook, the podcast with joe rusiello. And, just go back to Instagram. It's not joe ruse. Alright? Well, I guess that's it. Right? I think, I think we pretty much covered everything. Alright, folks. I just wanna say thank you again for spending your night with us here on the podcast. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and share it with your friends, your fan, your family, and your followers. And, folks, let's make Texas independent again.
Go podcasting, keep a steady stride, and happy trails. Well, that's about it really. The film ends mainly visually.
This podcast is hosted on Podhome.fm, an intelligent podcasting platform that you can use to host unlimited shows and episodes and have unlimited downloads. Pothome comes with many intelligent features like Pothome AI, which automatically creates transcripts, chapters, suggests titles, show notes, detects people, and creates clips. You can use Pothome AI unlimited for all your episodes and all your shows. Go check it out and start your free seven day trial at pothome.fm.
[00:00:46] Unknown:
Welcome to the podcast where every episode promises an unfiltered dive into the eclectic, the profound, and sometimes the absurd. No topic is off limits. Nothing is sacred, and political correctness takes a back seat.
[00:01:20] Unknown:
Well, hey, folks. This is Joe Rusciello, and it is great to be with you tonight. And we are coming to you live from the Asylum Studios, broadcasting from the pimple on the backside of Texas, the beautiful city of Eagle Pass. And we are going to endeavor to bring you the best quality talk radio we could muster without all the bluster. Welcome to the podcast. Hey, folks. It really is great to be with you. It it truly is. I look forward to this every single night. And, when I say every single night, I'm talking about every single night. We have been broadcasting every night since Sunday.
Haven't missed a day. And we're here tonight on a Thursday night. I don't know what that was, but we're here with you again on a Thursday night. This is just not working tonight. I'm telling you. Everything you can possibly imagine is is is just not working right. But what we're here, we're trying anyway. We are again, of course, live. So, there's no stopping, no no cutting, no editing. There's nothing we're gonna do. If we're struggling here a little bit, we're struggling. There's nothing I can do about it. But, we are here again. And, gonna take a break tonight though from the usual, political talk because, we need a break every now and then. You know, it's a lot of stuff going on in the news, a lot of stuff going on in the world. And, you know, it can kinda wear you out a little bit if you keep focusing on it too much. You keep talking about it too much. And, so you know, what we're gonna do tonight is, like I mentioned last night, we are going to be sitting down with, with, Johnny Taverner and, just having a just a a good conversation.
Now in, in full disclosure here, we did record this, this segment earlier today because, Johnny wasn't able to come on a live show tonight. So, we, we recorded the show earlier, and we pieced it all together into one to one show. And, I really think you're gonna enjoy the conversation. We covered a lot of ground, and, we talked a lot about faith. We talked a lot about the scripture. We talked about a lot about the Lord Jesus Christ. And again, like I said, it's a lot different than the usual conversations that we have here on the podcast. So, I hope you like it, and I hope it's something that you find beneficial. And and I I hope it answers some questions that you might have, about your faith. And, again, if you have any questions about it, you could always reach out to me, at [email protected], or you'd be able to reach out to John at, at at, his well, he's gonna give the he's gonna give the email address, and his website in the interview, and we'll have it in the show notes as well.
Alright. But, of course, before we do any of that, I'm gonna ask you to do just a couple of quick things for me, if you would. Would you please head over to our website and, look for that contact form, open up that web form, send us over any questions, comments, cares, or concerns that you have. Let us know what you're thinking. Let us know any cons anything that that that's bothering you, anything that you could suggest to us that we maybe could do better, or perhaps, maybe there's somebody there's a guest that you'd like us to try to get. So you can leave all that information for us in the contact form. Now if you don't wanna use the contact form, fine. You can always email us at [email protected]. Also, while you're on the page, look for the support, page as well. And remember, this is a value for value podcast. So all that means is that if there's if you've received anything of value from what we're doing here, from any of the conversations that we've had, any of the any of the political discussions that we've had, we're all we're asking is that you return that value to us in the form of a donation, and you could do that in any amount. You could do it in one of the three t's. You could do your time, your talent, or your treasure.
And, it's pretty self explanatory. I've I've mentioned it several times already, your your time and talent, you know, maybe you could do some work for us here as far as, like, maybe research or maybe you could do some, maybe you're good at working on a board or, doing website design or maybe you're good at editing, doing sound, anything like that, perhaps that's something that you would like to donate to the show or your treasure. And you can donate your treasure in several different ways. You can donate it to us through, cryptocurrencies. We have our crypto wallet that's set up on our website, and, you could very easily I hear something.
Getting some feedback. There we go. You could you could do that through cryptocurrencies. Our wallets is on our website. You can donate Satoshis, and Satoshis are basically micropayments of Bitcoin. It's really not a lot of money unless you're using unless you send us a lot of satoshis. But basically, a hundred satoshis is like 8¢, 10 cents, something like that. I'm sorry. A hundred satoshis is about 8¢ or 10¢ or something like that. So it's it's, it's it's really not a lot of money, and, it it does help us out, though. So if you could donate Satoshis, that's great. If you can't if you don't wanna do cryptos, you could always hit that, donate button, and, you could donate through PayPal, Venmo, Cash App, whatever it is that we have up on the website. I really don't even check, to be honest with you. I don't I don't know what we put up there. But, you could very easily do that as well. And we also have membership tiers. I don't wanna say membership, really, but we have donation tiers. Okay? Donation tiers.
Now donation tiers go like this, for a monthly recurring donation, which are key for us, we depend on the monthly recurring donations. Alright? So, for a monthly recurring donation of $17.76, you get the associate producer's credit. And basically, what that is is you get a shout out on every show, you get included in all the show notes, you get included in all the emails that go out about the show. For for $18.36 a month, you can get the producer's tier. Okay? Now that, same thing, you get all of the, shout outs, you get all the note the notations in the show notes, emails, and whatnot, but you get a a little bit of a higher title because you're donating more.
Alright? And then we have the executive producer tier. Now that's for a donation, a monthly recurring donation of $25 a month or more. And with that, you get all of the perks of the other two. You get the shout outs, the inclusion, the show notes, the emails, and so on and so forth. But we also give you an opportunity to come on the show for a segment with us during the course of a live broadcast. So that's pretty cool, I think, anyway. And, we're looking forward to more folks getting involved, especially with that tier. So it'll be a lot of fun, and and I hope that you jump on in on that one. Alright. Now, you could also help us out by, by heading over to our affiliate site with the Alex Jones store. Now you can go to the the alexjonesstore.com/joe, and you can load yourself up with all of these great vitamins and supplements that we have, on the site. You can even get some patriotic apparel.
Like I've told you before, I take, regularly, I take the ultimate Irish sea moss, which is fantastic, loaded with iodine, which your body needs. It this stuff helps your immune support, it gives you energy, it gives you, bone strength, it it, it helps promote heart health, it it provides gut support, and it's vegan friendly, non GMO, and, gluten free. So this stuff is amazing. You need to be taking this. I've been taking it now for about three months, and, man, you can really feel a difference. You can get it in the gummy form or you can get it in the capsule form. I prefer the capsules because they're stronger. So you only take two of those a day, but with the gummies, you might have to take four a day. And we also have the ultimate turmeric gummies with ginger root and black pepper. Right here, this stuff is amazing.
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It it doesn't taste bad, to be honest with you. I you know, you look at it, it looks like liquid grass, but it doesn't taste like liquid grass. It actually it's it's pretty good. So and and it does wonders in your body. So check that out. And, also, there's two more days left to the, the truck giveaway and the $20,000 cash giveaway. So every purchase you make, you earn tickets for the giveaway. So that's a pretty good incentive. So head over to the alexjonesstore.com/joe, and get yourself in on all of this. Now for the folks that are listening on the audio, just wanna invite you to to head over to, your app store, download the Rumble app.
Get Rumble. Rumble is a free speech platform, infinitely better than, YouBoob. And, you know what? You you're not gonna be disappointed with it. Rumble is growing, constantly growing. More and more creators are coming over to Rumble every day. We just recently had, Tim Pool, came on board. You have Steven Crowder. You have Dan Bongino from almost almost another couple of days. And then, you you know, you have Alex Jones. You have so many people that you you wanna be following on Rumble that you're not gonna get on YouTube because YouTube censors. So check out Rumble. The app is free. Download it.
When you do download it, make sure you look for us. Look for us at, at Joe Ruse. I was gonna give you the whole web address at rumble.com/JoeRuse. Click that like button, subscribe, share the show with all of your friends, your family, and your followers. And, make sure you hit the notification bell as well because when you hit the notification bell, you will be you will get notifications whenever we have a show available for you. Alright? So rumble.com or download the Rumble app free. Also, with Rumble, they do run ads on the, on the free download. Okay? So you get mid roll ads throughout the throughout the, the show, whatever it is that you're watching, but they also have Rumble Premium. Rumble Premium, you can get it for as little as $10 a month, no ads.
It's a great, great incentive, for it, and you're helping out a company that's fighting for free speech and no censorship. Alright. So check them out. We look forward to seeing you there. Alright. So what we're gonna do here right now is we're gonna switch over, to the, the pre recorded video with, Johnny Taverner, and I hope you like it, and we'll see you in just a moment. From our short short break, this is Joe Rossello, and you are listening and watching the podcast. And, one of the one of the things that I really enjoy about our show is the fact that while we'll sit and we'll talk about politics and we'll get into all kinds of crazy, things with that and stories and conspiracies and and and all that fun stuff, sometimes we do take a break from all of that heavy lifting, and, we like to kinda branch on out into, other types of conversations that are equally interesting, equally important to us. And, probably one of the most important parts of my life is my spiritual walk.
As I've told you folks before, you know, I am a I am a born again Christian. I've been saved for about twenty five years. I've done other podcasts with bible studies. And, recently, I came across a profile on a on a PodMatch, site that that I use. And, I don't know. The the the guy's profile kinda jumped out at me. I like the fact that, that he's living up there in, in in in the great state of Canada. And, so I wanted to bring him on here. Now he's a speaker. He's a trainer. He's a budding author. He's also the host and producer of Refuge for Freedom Stories podcast. He's also the cohost of the Exchange Life podcast and author from Glory to Glory substack.
And more importantly than all of that, he is incredibly passionate about the Lord Jesus Christ. So, folks, I would really like to welcome Johnny Tavener to the podcast. Johnny, are you there with us? Yeah. I'm here. Great to be here, Joe. Thanks very much for having me. There you go. Hey. It's great it's great to have you here, brother. And, I just wanna thank you again for taking the time out of your day. I know we were talking earlier. You said you had the grandkids around. So, you know, getting to spend time with the grandkids is great. I have I have three of my own, and, I don't get to see them as often because I live down here in Texas, and they're up there in in, in New York City. So, but, you know, we get to talk every now and then. But, this is great. I'm I'm really glad that we were able to connect up on a PodMatch, and, I'm looking forward to, seeing where we're gonna go with the conversation today.
I was looking over your profile, and, I really wanted well, actually, you know what? Before I even get into that stuff, I wanna ask you the most important question. Sure. The burning question. How are things in the fifty first state?
[00:15:53] Unknown:
Yeah. Well, they're they're, they're awesome. You know, our our recent alignment of our political leader is very similar to how the Democrats replaced Joe Biden with Kamala Harris. Yeah. During an election, you know? So, like, there's a lot of parallels there. There's a there's a ton of parallels in the, the previous liberal government and, you know, their ideologies and the things they support, mostly against the will of the Canadian people. And so it's gonna be interesting. Like, they do have to have an election sometime this year. Not quite sure when that's gonna be. There's a lot of discussion that it's gonna be immediately because the polls, believe them or not, look like the, the Liberals have a advantage right now because of the change in leadership. But it's really not a change in leadership. It's just a name and a face.
And so it'll be interesting to see what happens. You know, I've seen some conversations of people discussing, you know, mister Trump's president Trump, excuse me, his idea of creating a fifty first state. And you guys have a lot of advantages financially and resource wise and protection wise, all that kind of stuff that, you know, our country has been suffering under the the situation that we have now for a long, long time. So there are definitely some advantages to that. But, of course, being Canadians, we have pride in our country, and we are a proud people. We've fought many wars together with the Americans. And, you can look in the history books if they haven't changed them yet, and it still talks about the bravery and the courage of the Canadians in war. So, it wouldn't be an easy thing to do, but, I don't know. We'll see what happens. It it's it's greater than out out of my hands anyway. Oh, yeah. For sure. For sure. I I don't I don't know because,
[00:17:41] Unknown:
it you know, I've been to Canada a few times, when I was living up in New York, and, it was just so easy to get there. So, you know, I've I've been there a few times, and, Canada's a beautiful place. I I I like going up there. The my only concern is I you know, I'm I'm a I'm a conservatarian, you know, conservative libertarian in a lot of ways. My concern would be that the fact that the the Liberal party in Canada has such control over the country itself that it would tip the balance here. And, you know, we would have more opportunities for radical left leftism to enter into our political system.
So, you know, it's it's it's, you know, six of one, half a dozen of another.
[00:18:29] Unknown:
You know? Yeah. But you only have two parties. We have, like, four or five.
[00:18:33] Unknown:
Yeah. Oh, true. Well, that would change, though. Well, may maybe not. Yeah. They might. They they might they might just merge all into, you know well, no. We actually do have more than just two parties. We have actually several parties. We have some really far, far left socialist workers parties and communist party, you know, and all that. We also have the far right parties as well and the libertarians and you know? So we have a few I wanna say we probably have about on paper 10 or 12, but Mhmm. They pretty much all align with the two major parties. So but, you know, it it's it's what it is. It's just what it is. But time around.
But absolutely more important than all of that nonsense. And like I said, we were talking we we always talk politics. We wanna get away from politics for a little while today. I wanna ask you about your relationship with with God. I wanna ask you, how did you come to know Jesus Christ as your savior?
[00:19:28] Unknown:
Yeah. So back like, I guess I go way back to, to when I was growing up. Like, I came from a broken family. My dad left when I was 11, and so my brother and I live with our mom. And, you know, I can remember standing in the court of law when they were going through their divorce and the judge saying to me, who do you wanna live with? And, I mean, I'm 11 years old. How would I know? Right? But I saw, you know, things that were going on. I I heard the one side all the time, and I said, well, no. I'm gonna stay with my mom. So my brother and I stayed with our mom, and we had some really tough times. Like, we were on welfare, social assistance for three years. And it was it was brutal, you know, really hard to make ends meet.
And when I was, 19, I started going to a church. I thought it was I thought it was a Baptist church, but it was actually a Brethren church, but I didn't know that till years later because I didn't know anything about it. And, one one Sunday, the, the guy at the front who was preaching gave a message, and I just thought to myself, you know what? Like, I really need to go up there and talk to this guy about about God and getting to know him. And and so I I gave my heart to Jesus that day. It was in the summer. I know I can't give you an exact day. A lot of people can, but I can't. And, I remember just this the weight kinda lifting off me, and and I had this Cheshire green cat smile on my face for hours you couldn't wipe off.
And so, you know, when I went home and I explained to my mom what I had done, like, she wasn't real happy about that because, you know, she was involved, like, in the occult and astrology and, like, all that kind of stuff. And so, of course, you've got those those spirits fighting against each other. Right? And then, the bible talks about, you know, seed falling into good ground, falling into rocky ground, and and so on. And so I really didn't have a a deep, rooted faith at that point in my life. I was still very young in my faith and and, and the relationship I had with this girl at that particular church at the time, we broke up and and it made it hard to go to church, you know, and and and see that person there.
So I I kinda drifted away from going to church. I never really thought about going somewhere else because that was the only church I'd ever really known. And, so I fell back in with the old crowd and, you know, just got into, you know, a stupid life and doing stupid things like we all do when we don't know God. But when I was in my early twenties, God started to draw me back. And, you know, he the bible talks about how he takes the scales off our eyes, and we start to really see the world for what it is. And I can remember, you know, standing in a bar one night, and I looked around, and I thought, like, what am I doing here? Like, I don't belong here. Like, the like, this revelation of I was in the wrong place, and I just shouldn't be there and that kind of thing.
And then there was a couple of times when I I can remember looking in the mirror, like, after, you know, a night of partying or whatever. And and I just I looked at my face, and I I just saw, like like, this morbid kinda, like, death type look on my face, and it still sticks with me now. And and all these different kinds of things like that, god was drawing me. So then there was a point when I was, in my mid twenties where, a friend of mine I had grown up with, a really sad story, his younger brother, died when he was 12. He got electrocuted.
And then, my friend, I used used to ride bikes and and, so I got rid of my bike and and I gave him my bike jacket because he didn't have one and he bought himself a bike. Well, he ended up getting t boned by a car, t boned a car, pulled out in front of him and he got killed instantly. And, my my other friend called me up and said, hey. You know, he's had this accident and he's died. And at that point in time, even though I was being drawn by god, it didn't kinda wake me up immediately. You know, it didn't make me think, oh, man. Like, there's life and death and that kind of thing. But it was just one of the many different ways that God was kind of reaching out to me, you know, through this process.
And then not long after that, I I met a girl who's now my wife, and she had just become a born again Christian. And that spirit of life that was in her, that, you know, that effervescence that we have when we first get saved, that joy, like, it was it was right there in front of me again. And it wasn't long before or it wasn't long after, I mean, when, you know, I started going to church again. And then, of course, I gave my heart back to the lord. So life doesn't come without its challenges. You know? Everybody has them even after we give our hearts to the lord. And so he's helped me work through a bunch of different things and and and that. And I remember, like, my my dad and I, like I said, he left when I was very young, so I didn't really didn't really have a lot of interaction with him for a lot of years.
And, you know, because I grew up in an environment that had a lot of bitterness and anger and and unforgiveness, you know, from my mother's side, A lot of people would think that that would stay with me and have an impact on not wanting to see my dad. But in actual fact, I remember being at work one day, and, it was back in the middle nineties. I I was just diagnosed with, type one diabetes. So I'm I'm insulin dependent now for, you know, quite a long time. And, I remember standing in the shower at the end of the workday, and I I was praying to God. And I said, God, like, what am I gonna tell people about being a Christian? I said, I can't promise them health because I just got diabetes.
I can't promise them wealth because at this point, I'm married. I've got a house and a mortgage and all that, you know, debts and stuff like that going on. And I said, you know, I can't promise them happiness because we all have struggles that we have to work through, and those are emotional times. Right. And as clear as as clear as your voice is to me today, I heard God say to me, but I put love in your heart and you can forgive your dad. And I'll tell you, it's it from that point on, like, there was absolutely no anger in my heart towards my dad. There was nothing, you know? Now I didn't have a close relationship with him, but he did end up coming back into our lives later on before he passed away. And, but there was still no bitterness or anger or anything there, and, you know, we tried our best to present the gospel to him whether he accepted the Lord or not. I don't know.
But, you know, God's been very, very real in a lot of ways.
[00:26:03] Unknown:
Oh, amen. Amen. Yeah. That's that's a that's an amazing testimony, brother. It really is. Mine isn't as, what's the word I'm looking for? Exciting, I guess? I wouldn't call it exciting. Yes. Well, the up and downs. Well, let's put it this way. I I I I I had a very strong I was very influenced by an uncle of mine, and he was the first person in my fam. My family is a staunch Roman Catholic family. As but as I got older, you know, they they kinda drifted away from it. And part of my testimony is and I'll tell you why that in a second. But, my uncle was the first person in my family to step away from the Catholic tradition and, embrace, Christianity.
I didn't realize at the time that the denominational choice that he made what you know, is really not very Christian, not really, you know, Bible Christianity. But, nonetheless, he, he gave me my first Bible when I was eight years old. I still have it. It's in my bookshelf in the other room. Nice. And, you know, I I I love that book, and I I used to sleep with it under my pillow. You know, it was it was one of those things. It was my cherished gift. And, when he would go to school, he would go to he he ended up going to seminary. He went to bible school, then he went to seminary for this denominational, that Dominochim became part of.
And, when he would come home on his breaks, he would bring all of his books, from from the from that semester, and he would leave them behind. And I was, again, very young, and I'm flipping through these things, and I'm reading these things, and I'm kind of absorbing it all. As a matter of fact, I had a a friend of mine tell me that, a couple years ago, he was like, he goes, hey. Do you still you still you still into into the Lord? And I was like, yeah. Of course. Why? He was like, oh, do you remember when we were back in school, you used to carry around a Bible everywhere you went? And I was like, I did? Really? He was like, yeah. You don't remember during gym class, we would sit in the bleachers and you would you would teach us the Bible? I was like, no. I remember that. And he was like, yeah. I remember that. I remember that. I was like, alright. I'll praise the Lord. You know? It's just our started. Yeah. But, but what my uncle would do is when he also would come home on these breaks, he would take all my Catholic catechism books, and then he would he would rewrite them. He would cross out pages with a big red marker, and he would say, this is not what happened, and he would staple something to it. And I wouldn't know until I got to catechism class, and I'd open up the book, and and there it is. And then I would get in trouble and, you know, but it was planting a seed at a very, very young age.
And, I I would get into arguments or debates rather with, with the with the nuns and the priests and and and whatnot. And and I I remember the last time I set foot in the Catholic church for many, many, many, many years was, it was right before you had to make your first communion. The priest came into our class, and he was like, okay. Well, what we're gonna do is you have you have to go to confession, and you have to confess your sins. This way you could be forgiven of them, and then, and then you you're able to receive communion. So he goes, does anybody have any questions? So I put my hand up, and I said, well, where does it say that I have to tell you what I did wrong?
He's like, excuse me? And I was like, what does it say I have to tell you what I did wrong? You're you're you're just a man like I am. Didn't go over very well. After a bit of a back and forth, I'm trying to shorten it up, bit of a back and forth, he took me by the hand outside to my mom who was waiting for me, and he was like, we don't need his kind here. And my mom said, really? Well, then you don't need us here either. And that was the last time my mom and my family attended church regularly. They would only now, at this point, well, they weren't going on, like, holidays, occasions, like that. So fast forward, you know, many, many years, I just there was this one day I just, I don't know. I I just was felt very uncomfortable with my life. I just felt there was something missing.
There was just something just very empty. And, I started looking around for my Bibles. And, you know, I found them, and I I found these old Bible studies that I was that I I would do with my uncle, and I was just rereading those things and studying on my own, reading on my own. And, I was working for New York I was working in New York City at the time, and I was, I was in law enforcement. And, I had gotten transferred to a new command on on, in in Manhattan. It's West Street and Houston Street, just a few blocks away from where the World Trade Center was. And, I got transferred there. I knew the commanding officer because when I went in the academy, he was one of the academy instructors.
So, he knew who I was. I knew who he was, and, we had a good, working relationship. And, he was like, I'm I'm glad you're here. We need good people in in in the house here. He goes, the only problem is is I gotta put you on the overnights. I'm like, yeah. That's fine. I'm I'm fine with that. And he was like, alright. Great. He goes, and he goes, it's your turn. My turn? For what? He goes, you have to ride with Gail. I was like, okay. Who's Gail? And he told me her full name, and I was like, okay. What's the problem? And he goes, well, she's one of those born again Christian types. She's gonna talk to you here all night long. It's your turn. And I was like, alright. Well, I I can handle that. You know? I I I studied enough on my own, and I used to refer to myself as the pope of the Worldwide Church of Joe, and I can do you know, I I know my stuff. So, we started working together, and, my first night on the on the tour when she came out of the locker room, she looked at me. She goes, are you saved?
And I was like, here we go. You know? So I said, can we get some coffee first? So I said, alright. You driving, though. So she so we get in the we get in the patrol vehicle. We we take off, and we're doing our thing. So she goes, you still haven't answered my question. Are you saved? I said, well, what do you define as being saved? And that started a debate. And we went back every night. Eight hour shift. All we did was debate, debate, debate. But friendly. It wasn't like we were hostile to each other. I expressed my views. She expressed hers.
So one day she said to me, it was a Sunday morning. She was like, hey. You know what? There's this I forgot to tell you about this Christian radio station you might wanna check out. Sure. What is it? She told me what it was. It was, an one of the AM stations up in New York. And so I started listening to it. I I drove home. I listened to it, and I heard, I heard Jay Vernon McGee, for the first time ever. I don't know if you're familiar with Jay Vernon. Yep. Great. He's a Presbyterian, so I'm not gonna hold him at fault for that. But he's, a great he's a great teacher, and I I had no idea that he had already been with the Lord for many years because everything that he was talking about seems so relevant and pertinent to my life at that particular moment.
So, I would listen to him every morning on the drive home, and I would purposely drive home slower just so I could hear the rest of the story. And, and that just kinda wore on me. And I just listened. The more I listened, the more I wanted to. And the the the more I wanted to listen, the more I wanted to read, and I started just, again, just throwing myself back into it. One night in February, that was July 17, I think, or something like that. I got in my car and I was like, oh, I'm gonna listen to the traffic reports, you know, it's a Sunday night. I'm like, well, yeah, the traffic's always the same. You know, it never changes. So what's the what's the point? Let's see what's on that Christian radio station. So I I I put it on, I'm driving to work, and I hear this this radio preacher and he he's he's preaching a message on hell and who's going there.
Alright. And then what he would do, it was like a call in show. He would do, he would preach a little bit and then he would stop and take phone calls, answer questions, you know, and it didn't have to be on the subject. It could be on on whatever. And, just listen to him, and I'm like, okay. This guy knows what he's talking about. He's, you know, he's pretty good. And, not that I was in a great authority at the time, but, you know, but from what I understood. So, he gets back to preaching again, and he's he was just hitting these points on hell. And it just seemed like at the end of every sentence, like you said, like, you know, it's as clear as day, heard it. It just it was just this this this voice in the back of my head that said, I'm talking to you, Joe.
This is for you. Are you paying attention, Joe? Are you listening, Joe? And you're going to hell, Joe. You know? And when I tell you that, it literally scared the hell out of me. It it literally did. I wrote down the name of the show, and I wrote down the phone number. I was like, well, when I get to work I didn't have cell phones at the time. When when I got, I got to work, I was like, I'm gonna call. If the show's still on, I'm gonna call. And, of course, the show wasn't on when I got there, and that was fine because I had already chickened out by the time I got there. The, but I I looked up the the name of the church that was sponsoring the show, and it turned out to be the church that he was pastoring.
So, I read up on them a little bit, and I was like, okay. Well, you know, yeah, okay. I agree with that. Well, that makes it that makes a lot of sense, You know? Well, I never heard it put that way before. That that yeah. That okay. You know? Like, I'm getting goosebumps talking about it. So, I said, alright. I'm gonna call this guy. I'm gonna call this church. And I called the church, the phone number for the church, and I was like, hey. You know, I got his voice mail. I was like, hey. You know, I heard you on the radio. Must sound like an idiot. You're on the radio. You're the you know? But, he, but he called me back in, like, ten minutes.
And, we sat on the phone for about an hour. And, man, I love talking to him. It was it was amazing. And he was like, hey. Why don't you come to church someday? I was like, oh, no. No. No. No. Not come to church. You crazy. Building will fall down. I walk in there. And he was like, no. No. Come. Come. I was was like, how about this? How about I come and meet you at your office? And we'll talk first, and then go from there. He was like, well, you know, we we rent space. We don't have a church building of our own. We we rent space in a community school in Lower Manhattan. Oh, really? Where? And he told me where it was. And I was like, you're kidding me. That's a block away from where I work. So he was like, oh, yeah. Yeah. That's great. Yeah. So how about this? Let's let's because you work overnights? I said, yeah. I said, let's let's meet he goes, let's meet for dinner.
Okay. Sure. So, bro, I I took I had this big red duffle bag. I stuffed every book you can possibly imagine that I had and what I was studying. And I carried that thing with me into the into the city that night. I met up with him. We went to this restaurant. We sat down. We started going, you know, talking about just mundane things. Had the meal, and he goes, well, look. He goes, this is not you know, it's great that we're getting to know each other, but we're not here for that. I was like, yeah, you're right. No problem. So I reached down and picked up the bag, dumped it all out in the table. He looked at he looked it all over as and he goes, what's this? I said, this is what I've been reading and studying on my own.
So he looked it over. He was like, okay. And then he just pushed it all to the side. He goes, you don't need any of that. And he took his Bible out, put it down on the table, and he goes, this is what you need. And, he opened up that Bible, and he started he started showing me scriptures after scripture after scripture. And the more scripture the more I the more he was showing me, the more I was like, oh, I need more more more more. Tell me how rotten I am. Tell me what a sinner I am. Tell me how bad I am. Tell me tell me, please. And, I know it sounds crazy to somebody who's not a Christian to understand that, but, yes, I, yeah, I need to hear that.
You know. That's why that's why, you know, that's why the Bible calls, that that's why the word of God calls the word of God a two edged sword. It has the ability to cut you down to pieces and has the ability to heal you at the same time. It's two edged. So listening to that, I was I just I was just sucking it up. And before I knew it, I was like, oh, man. I gotta get to work. You know, I have roll call in, like, like, like, thirty minutes. I gotta I gotta be ready. So we left, and as he he walked with me back to the command, and, as we're walking, he was like, I just need ten more minutes.
He goes, I don't wanna let this pass. Alright? He goes, I I just need ten minutes. Let's can we go some place and sit down? So I said, yeah. Okay. We walked out onto Pier 34, which is on the corner of of, Canal Street and West Street in in Lower Manhattan, just down the street from my office. And, we went to the second bench on off of off of the gate. And he opened up the word of God, and he started taking me down what's called the Romans Road. Now, are you familiar with the Romans Road? Okay. Yeah. So he started taking me down the Romans Road. Now, for those of you who are listening who might not know what the Romans Road is, it's it's, it's it's a lot of scripture out of the book of Romans. You know, it starts off with Romans three twenty three, Romans six twenty three, and and and so on. And, it all culminates with, Ephesians two eight and nine, which is.
[00:39:11] Unknown:
Oh, you got me there.
[00:39:14] Unknown:
Yeah. You're gonna have to look it up. Alright? For by I will. For by grace are
[00:39:20] Unknown:
Are you saved through faith and not of works? Because it's not of yourselves, but of the Lord.
[00:39:26] Unknown:
For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.
[00:39:32] Unknown:
Correct.
[00:39:35] Unknown:
So while he was taking me down the Romans Road, though, this is this is this is interesting. Mhmm. There was some guy on a bike. Don't know where he came from. Don't know you know, I'm not saying some I'm not saying there's something spirit, like, mystical or anything like that. I'm just saying he was there. He was riding around. He starts riding in circles around us while we're sitting on the bench. And as he's riding around in circles, he's just yelling at us, and he's cursing at us, and all kinds of stuff. And, you know, all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I mean, he must have looped around us about six or seven times.
He hits something on the pier that made him flip over the handlebars of his bike and crack his head open on the on the, on the deck of the pier. So I I'm law enforcement, you know, I I I I gotta help the guy. So I'm trying to coordinate everything. I'm trying to reach my command and, you know, trying to get everybody down there and calling an ambulance and all that stuff. And, ambulance finally comes, and I'm I'm of course, I'm coordinating the scene here. I'm directing everything. Well, this is what happened. This is what's going on. While I'm doing that, the pastor walks over, and he takes me by the arm. Like, he just taps my elbow, and he was like, what we're doing is more important with their than what they're doing. He was they're trying to save his life. I'm trying to save your soul.
And I was like, okay. You know? And I just kinda I followed along, and I went with him, and, you know, we prayed for the guy, and, you know, and then he, you know, he finished up through the through the Romans road, and he asked me he asked me, do do you wanna ask Jesus Christ to be your savior? And I was like, absolutely. And I dropped down right there on that deck on that deck, cried my eyes out, asked the Lord to save me, confessed him as my savior, got up just like you, the Cheshire cat grin, I felt like every weight had been lifted off of me. It was the most incredible feeling, that first moment. Now people ask, well, well, do you did you know Jesus Christ at that point? Well, no. Not really. I just met him.
You know? Yeah. You know, it's gonna take time to build that relationship, but I knew that I was saved. I knew that I knew and I understood what he did for me, the sacrifice that he made for me. So, after that happened, we I went up to my command, and, I I go walking in into the muster room, and Gail comes out of the locker room. And I never I did not tell her anything about the night. I had not told her a thing about me calling the pastor and meeting with them. Nothing. She comes walking out of the locker room. She looks at me. She goes, you got saved. Yep. And I was like I was like, what are you talking about? So she goes, don't you let the devil get in here now. You go, no. No. No. Don't you play with me. She goes, you got saved.
And it was it was an most incredible experience in my life, so I'll never forget it.
[00:42:21] Unknown:
Yeah. You know, there's there's a lot of points in your in your, testimony there that kinda stuck out to me was God orchestrates our lives, you know, and he will have these divine connections where we cross paths with people through a conversation or a meeting or we read something or we hear something, and it's all orchestrated to bring us to him. And, you know, the devil in the world will lie to us all day long. You know, there's there's the voice of God, and there's our own voice, and then there's the the devil in his minion's voice. And God puts all these things in our path to help us discern the difference. So when you said, you know, he's reading, you know, you're listening, you're saying, that's for you, Joe. Like, all those kind of things. Right? Yes, Joe. It's this I want you to hear. Like, God does that. And and I I think the people who don't know God, sometimes they fail to recognize God's voice in that, like, gut feeling or that kind of thing, but but they should really be sensitive to that because, you know, we all make mistakes, and there's times when God wants to speak to us whether we're a believer or not to prevent what he knows could happen in our lives. Right? So I think that people should be encouraged to kinda pay attention to that. And if they have a sense that, you know, I'm gonna call Bill today because I just have a feeling I need to call Bill.
Mhmm. And, you know, I've seen that over and over and over again. And then when you talked about the guy riding on the bike, again, these divine connections and divine circumstances and so on, the guy wipes out, bangs his head on the ground, and splits it open. Well, what happens when you split your head open? It bleeds. You shed blood. So God God God gives you a visual right then and there. That's right. The blood that you need, right, that shedding of blood to get saved. Like, there's there's just so many things that that God was doing in your walk with him. And I've talked to a lot of people as well about their experience of getting saved.
Everybody's created uniquely different. God knows us before he even creates us in our mother's womb. Right? He gives us all gifts and talents and abilities and purpose and plan and assignments and so on and so on and so on. And not all of us are empaths. Not all of us are emotional type of people. Right? There's a lot of that are type a people. There's a lot of type b people and so on. Not everybody experiences that emotional upwelling of tears flooding and things like that. I've talked to a number of people where it's been like a logical intellectual decision. Like they looked at the evidence and said I can't argue with this anymore. Like yes, Jesus is Lord. He I need him as a saviour. And they make a logical decision, but they don't have that experience of that emotional side. Right?
So it it's interesting just how how God works in in everybody's unique way to to touch their life, to to give them the opportunity to give their heart to him. Exactly. Exactly. And and just I I know a lot of people,
[00:45:21] Unknown:
that that came to Christ by trying to dispute Christ Mhmm. Or or disprove the scriptures. You know? I I great guy. I I met, at the first church I started going to after I got saved, that that the church that the pastor was was was the pastor of, he told me that he was a a a devout atheist when, he started sitting down and started going through the Bible because he wanted to prove that it's a myth, it's a fairy tale. And he tried to go back and say, well, you know, every every culture on on the Earth has, or every civilization on Earth has a flood story.
And Mhmm. I'm like, yeah. And I'm listening to him, and he he was like, and then one of the things that stuck out at me is how how similar they all are in detail. And he started exploring that, and then doing studies like that, not being able to disprove it led him to come to realize, you know what? If I was a betting man, I wouldn't take the chance with the odds that this book is right. Yeah. You know? Yeah. And, and he he came to Christ. And and when I tell you that he came to Christ, I mean, I he told me his whole testimony, and I'm I'm not gonna repeat it. You know, it's not my job to do that. But, you know, based on what he had told me, man, if there was anybody that that was gonna be the gatekeeper to to to to hell, he was one of them, you know.
And, you know, and and then knowing that about his background, to hear him pray. Oh my gosh. It he Yeah. When he would pray, you actually felt like you were standing in the throne room of God before the throne of grace. I mean, this guy was just unbelievable. And, and just to see that kind of a turnaround in somebody's life because of trying to disprove who Christ is. So, yeah, the logical approach sometimes, you know, fails. But, yeah, unfortunately, though, there are some people who who do try to take the logical approach and and, you know, they don't.
[00:47:34] Unknown:
Yeah. You you you definitely have to you definitely have to have an honest and open and contrary heart before God because that's what he looks for. Right? He tells us that in Psalm Psalm 51. See, I can tell you that's in Psalm 51, but I struggle with the Ephesians verse. But don't hold that against me. I'm not I'm not, like, a chapter or verse kind of guy. I'm more of, like, I'm I'm the kind of guy where I read something that kinda sticks in my heart, and I know Jesus said it. I know when the apostle said it, but ask me to look it up. Yeah. I can find it, but it may Oh, I know. Be right then and there.
[00:48:03] Unknown:
I get you. I had a friend I had a friend of mine text me, I think it was yesterday or the day before, and said, can you give me an example from scripture where God has a sense of humor?
[00:48:17] Unknown:
I can give you a perfect example. I'll give you an example right now. God says that he knows the number of hairs on our head, and he's subtracting from mine every day, so I know he's a mathematician.
[00:48:29] Unknown:
There you go. Well, what Noah came to mind for me was a passage from, was a passage from, from Proverbs. And he said, oh, it just flipped out of my head. The the the ringing of the nose bringeth forth blood. Yeah. You know, that's kinda funny, you know, when you think about it. But my my response was, I was like, oh, wow. I I have so many in my head. I just can't tell you where to find it. I can tell you stories like like like the one story where, where the it was I think it's in Acts where, you know, that prophet trying to cast out the demons, but the demons, you know, beat him up, stripped him naked, and, you know, chased him out of town. Sons of sons of Siva. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, it's so there's tons of stories like that in the scripture. I mean, you know, and you have to read the scripture too. Like, like, a lot of people tend to read the scripture and they they they put that air on, you know, that that Mhmm. Harder than thou air. No. Read it like a person, you know. Yeah. The the disciples, the apostles, they had personalities.
Yeah. Don't you don't you think Absolutely. Don't you think for a minute that that Peter never heard the end of it after he stepped out of the boat and sank after a few steps? I'm sure I'm sure he didn't live that down. We still read about it today, so there you go. Exactly. Exactly. That's that's a good example of God having a sense of humor. He's saying, hey. You know what? Look what this dummy did.
[00:49:53] Unknown:
You know? And, you know, getting getting back to, the sons of Skiva, there were seven of them. Right? And, I just wrote an article about that on Substack, and it it's called to be known. And what struck me about that like, I I'm a complete believer in the word of God and believe that God speaks to us. One of the primary ways that he speaks to us, and he gives us revelation and things like that. And we get to know God's character and and the way that he does things and and and helps us along our journey. And one of the things that struck me about that story was these guys were going around, and they were casting out demons in the name that Jesus or in the in the name of Jesus that Paul talks about. Right? So that sentence in itself, and I'm paraphrasing it, but but what it tells you about it is that they recognized the authority that Paul had in Christ, but they didn't know that authority.
That's right. And that demon said, god and Jesus said, no. Paul, I know. But who are you? So it it's so important to understand when we understand the authority of Christ and what he actually empowers us with his life to do, I think the church is missing that in a huge manner. It's it's something that we need to we need to grow into and understand and walk in faith in. And I believe in these days and times as they continue to get worse and worse and worse, we're gonna see people in the body of Christ really start to engage with that knowledge of that authority that they have in Christ to stand up against the wiles and the attacks of the enemy. And you'll see I honestly believe you'll see people healed. Well, I we are seeing people healed and delivered and set free and even raised from the dead. Like, the Bible says Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. So that means all the things that he said that he did and we can do, we will continue to do until he comes back.
[00:51:41] Unknown:
Yeah. Amen. Amen. So I wanted to ask you before, because I noticed I'm just looking at the clock here. We got twenty minutes to go. Mhmm. So I know you you you you produce a podcast, you host a podcast, you cohost a podcast. So tell me about the tell where first of all, where where can they find them? And, just tell me a little bit about what what they're all about. Tell the folks about it. Sure. Okay. So, the first podcast is Refuge Freedom Stories.
[00:52:08] Unknown:
And in 2020, a friend of mine who runs Refuge Ministries Canada called me up on the phone. He said, hey, Johnny. He says, I heard that, 77% of Canadians believe in miracles, and we've seen a lot of miracles through the ministry. And I think we should do a radio show. I said, oh, okay. I said, well, I'm a techie, geeky kind of guy. I can do the the software kinda. I get sure I could figure that out. And I said, but I don't have a radio show host voice like like yours. His perfect radio show host voice. I said, I don't have that. You're gonna have to find somebody else. And then the next day, another guy called him up and said, hey. I really like what your ministry is doing. Is there anything you need? And he said, yeah. I need a radio show host, and that's how we got started. And a couple of months later, my pastor came to me and said, hey. Do you guys have a podcast? And I had this big gigantic light bulb moment over my head, and I said, no. But we're going to. And off we went. And so we've been at it for this is our sixth season. And basically, it's talking about how real people's lives are changed by the power of God. It's their story. And, you know, we've interviewed everybody from crack addicts to Major League Baseball managers who won the World Series, lots of veterans, musicians, a lady that came out of human trafficking, a guy who made 100,000,000 by the time he was 31, a Top Gun, an actual Top Gun pilot.
So it's been super interesting group of people. Like, I'm just amazed and so blessed to be part of that. And it's, it's really, really encouraging, you know, to hear those stories because it shows all the different facets of God's character. And as we were talking earlier about how he ministers to people individually to bring them to him. That's right. The Exchange Life podcast just newly launched at the March, and I co host that with doctor Steven Finney from Institute of Ministry America. And we're talking about how Christ exchanges his life for ours. When we accept him into our heart as our Lord and Saviour, our old Adamic nature is actually nailed to the cross with Christ and dies with him. And his new life is birthed in us. And it talks about all the different aspects and the differences between the old nature of Adam and the new nature in Christ. So we we're into our fourth episode right now, and so we've talked about things like behavior and obedience, and we just did one on authority and so on.
And then, so those are the two podcasts.
[00:54:24] Unknown:
And you also you also, right. You you have a you now for folks who don't know what Substack is, tell them about that. So Substack, I came across Substack,
[00:54:33] Unknown:
I was at, Podfest in 2024 and they were talking about, investing in your podcast. And one of the one of the individuals there talked about you can post podcasts on Substack. And I said, well, that's a perfect other medium to, put the podcast out there so people can hear it. So we started doing that and then as we talked earlier about how the bible gives us revelation of what god's talking about and speaking to us about, I just started writing those things down. And as I started writing more and more of them, I thought, you know what? I really need to put these on the Substack, not for any kind of recognition or anything, but just because if if god's saying it to me, I'm sure that there are others hearing the same thing or couldn't be encouraged by it. So there's a number of articles on there, and the podcasts are on there as well.
[00:55:22] Unknown:
Well, that would you're a busy man. I am a busy man. You really are. You really do you work at all, or or you just No. Not anymore. No? Okay.
[00:55:31] Unknown:
That's good. I'm, I'm I'm working But I was working when we I was working when we started the podcast, and I was doing there was there was a time I'll tell you a story about that because there was a time in, 2021, I had a 50 interviews booked between January and June. Oh, wow. And I was working I was working a forty hour job and family and commitments and all that other kind of stuff. And I I I I was overwhelmed because I was hosting, producing, editing, publishing, doing all of it. And I said to the lord, what what am I gonna do about this? And clearly, he said to me, you gotta lay it down. So I emailed everybody, and I said, I'm canceling your interview. This is what god told me to do. And I said, we'll see where it goes from here. And then a few weeks later, I had the impression that I could, open up two interviews a month. So I did that, and and the calendar filled right back up again. And the same so I had to lay it down a second time. And then eventually, it came to a a groove of, the right kind of interview scheduling.
Mhmm. And I I I think God just wants us to make sure that nothing becomes an idol. Nothing takes place of him, you know, because it's not like it's it's it's not me. It's him. He's put me in a position right now to host and cohost and and write these things. But if he took it all away tomorrow,
[00:56:43] Unknown:
that's okay. Like, because it's not about me. It's about him. Right? Yeah. Amen. Amen. When I was doing the, the bible study podcast, I was doing that, as a live show, twice a week. I was doing a Thursday night bible study, and then I was doing a Sunday, sermon Sunday. And, it it, that was challenging. It it really was because and you know this. You you can't just you can't just, like like, pull up a bunch of articles and and make comments and express opinion. Mhmm. You're teaching the bible. You have to study. You have to know what you're teaching. You have to, you know, be able to explain it. And, I would spend because I'm not the sharpest tool in the text sometimes. You know? I'm you know, see, I I seem to said that wrong.
The, it would take me about eight hours of study to do for one show. Mhmm. And when I say eight hours of study, people say, oh, that's okay. It's just it's just a good day. You know? Just spending a day doing it. No. It's not that. I also have a forty hour a week job. You know? I had just I just purchased the house that I'm in right now, and, you know, I was renovating that, and I had a a million and one things going on. Plus, at the same time, I had, I I lost I lost my dad. Six months later, I lost my grandmother. And then I'm sorry to hear that. And then about eight months later, I lost my mom. I'm sorry to hear that. And then in between all of that, I lost my wife. Oh, I'm sorry to hear that too. I think, you know, we got divorced.
But, so, yeah, I need to make sure I say it like that. We got divorced. She didn't die. But, you know, it so but in the middle of all that, I'm also doing the podcast, and it it's not easy. It's really not easy. I wasn't doing guests. I didn't have interviews or anything scheduled, but it was the amount of study that I was putting in. And then, of course, you know, I put that I put that down for a little bit. I needed to take a break. I was burning out. And I said, well, I'm gonna do this podcast. I'm I'm only gonna do this once a week, you know, if once a week, you know, and it's only gonna be recorded. I'm not gonna do live. I'm just gonna take my time and do it whenever I feel like I needed to do it, you know. Well, that changed.
Now it's a it's a live show three to five nights a week. Yeah. It's funny how God does that. Yeah. It is. And it is. And then, every every now and then I get to preaching on the show, you know, which, you know, I've noticed that my my viewership drops when I start doing that, but, you know, it's okay. It's it's it's not about it's not about the metrics, man. No. Of course.
[00:59:17] Unknown:
I've I've I've said it so many times like that. The only thing that that I hope for out of podcasting is that when I cross through the veil to our life with Christ, one person comes up to me and says, you know what? I heard you on a podcast what you talked about, and I gave my life to Jesus. That's all that matters. Yeah. No. Absolutely. And I I totally agree with you on that one.
[00:59:41] Unknown:
You know, doing doing the type of podcasts that you're doing right now and type of podcasts that I was doing previously, that's your mission field. You know? You're a you're basically a missionary. You're out there. You're serving the Lord. You're presenting the gospel. The the, the Internet waves is your mission field. You know? And wherever wherever your podcast is being heard, like you said, even if it's just one person comes to Christ from that, when you you know that when you stand before the Lord at the judgment seat of Christ, you're gonna hear well done, thou good and faithful servant, even if it's only one. I hope so. And that's all that matters. You know? It's that it's it's it's like, it's like my old my old pastor used to say.
He used to say, it's it's the worth of a soul outweighs anything else. The worth of the soul. And he would he would oftentimes say, you know, every every person you see walking down the street is an eternal soul, and they're either gonna go to heaven or hell. And it's our responsibility to talk to them about it and make them aware of it. %. And, you know, we could do a whole other show talking about that. Oh, yeah. And and I I would love to do that. Actually, we Yeah. Oh, for sure. Probably do something again. And I just wanna say this too for for to the folks that are that are watching or listening on the audio channels. Johnny and I, we just met today.
And because we share the Holy Spirit, this to me at least feels like I've known him my whole life. Amen. You know? And that's because we have fellowship in the Holy Spirit. You know? Believers know believers, you know? And it's it's it's just something that that only God can put together. And, you know, so it's it's it's a blessing to to have these kind of conversations. You know? And, and I hope that my audience appreciates the conversation that we had tonight. And if they didn't, oh, well. Go watch something else. We sure enjoyed it. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I I I think the Lord probably enjoyed it too, you know. So so I'm I'm sure we made him laugh a little bit there. But, before before I let you go, though, I just wanna, ask you a quick question. One one very, very important question.
So who is your team for hockey?
[01:01:59] Unknown:
You know what? I just retired from playing hockey last year, and I've pretty much lost all interest in watching hockey, honestly. Well, because I I used to play a net and and, so I'd always watch the games to to see if I could learn how to play better. Right? But now I'm not playing anymore, like injuries and stuff. Mhmm. It just, I've lost my interest in that, but I do watch my grandkids play hockey, and I absolutely love it. So they're my favorite teams. Very favorite team. Okay. Well, I'm a I'm a New York Rangers fan.
[01:02:27] Unknown:
Oh, you're from New York? Yeah. Well well, you have other I know there's two teams there. Yeah. I have other teams, but, you know, they're not important. So we got I'm a I'm a Rangers fan, and, I've been a Rangers fan since, so I wanna say I'm about eight years old. I saw my first my first hockey match, and I was just wrapped up into it right away. And I act I actually played hockey, also for a little bit. I didn't play ice hockey. Wasn't very didn't play hockey. Wasn't very wasn't very many opportunities, where I lived in New York to play ice hockey, but Yeah.
But we played, we played roller hockey.
[01:03:03] Unknown:
Yeah. Ball hockey. Yeah. Well, no. Actually, we used pucks. Yep. Yep. Actual pucks. Roller hockey. I know what roller hockey is. Yeah. So,
[01:03:12] Unknown:
and I was a I was a defensive I was a right wing defense.
[01:03:17] Unknown:
Yeah,
[01:03:18] Unknown:
of course. And I I I love to hit and I wasn't I wasn't an instigator you know but I never backed down. Yeah. And and we play we played hard. We played really hard. And, private leagues mostly. And,
[01:03:33] Unknown:
and, you know, just like or sometimes we'll just do a pickup game. Yeah. But, you know, there there are yeah. There are times, like, you know, being a goalie, you know, I mean, I've had three knee surgeries and ankle surgery and a broken finger and four concussions and hurt my back and hurt my elbows. So pretty good career in net. Right? Yeah. But after after a while, it takes its toll on you. And, you know, so after forty years of playing a net, and I'm having trouble getting my pads on because my back's so sore. I and I I had and you know what? I had just I had just watched, and I've forgotten his name now. The Boston guy that retired used to play with Marshawn all the time. I can't remember his name. But, anyway, he said, you know, like, the your body lets you know when it's time to retire. And I thought, yeah. That's exactly how I feel. Although I don't have any Stanley Cups, I don't have his money, and I don't have his fame. But, yeah, I know exactly what he's talking about. So There's a kinship.
Yeah. Well, yeah. Yeah. There yeah. There's a recognition of its time. And, you know, ever since that, it's like, my god has got me busy enough with all these other things that that are far more important than, making an epic glove save. Right? There you go. There you go. But I used to have I used to have a sticker on the back of my card, and it had, like, a goalie sticker, and it says, Jesus saves, bro.
[01:04:51] Unknown:
I like that. That's good. That's really good. But listen, brother, before I let you go, you gotta you gotta send me, your contact information, outside of the pod match. I have a one of our ex one of our executive producers, and and I, we have, we have tiers, for the show. So for donations, like, so if, somebody donates a monthly recurring donation of $17.76, they get, an associate producer credit. Somebody donates $18.36, regular monthly. They get, the regular producer's credit. And then for $25 or more a month, they get executive producer credit. And and all that comes with shout outs on the show and inclusion notes and all that stuff. And the executive producer actually gets a segment on the podcast with me. So, I have two executive producers right now. It's a husband and wife team. It's Wayne and Rosanna Rankin.
Great people. I've known Wayne for over twenty years. We recently reconnected. I I honestly, I thought he I thought he was gone. I thought he passed away because he had last time I heard from him and his family that he had cancer and wasn't doing well and, you know, and then we lost contact. So I just I just thought he was gone. But, right, when you when you talk about a faithful believer, he's he's one. And right now, he's in Alaska, he and his wife, with Samaritan's Purse, with Franklin Graham's ministry. And I'd like to get you guys in touch with each other because he's actually starting a podcast too. And I think you guys I think you guys will get along really well.
[01:06:25] Unknown:
Yeah. I can definitely, send you some contact names too for some interesting people. Awesome. A buddy of mine a buddy of mine ministers to the, native reserves in Canada. Okay. And he's actually at the, the one reserve right now called Grassy Narrows, and they have a forty five point five percent suicide rate with the youth. Wow. And it's the it's the it's the worst in the world because the land, the water, the people are all poisoned by mercury. But God's moved in. One lady got healed, and she was in a wheelchair, and she said, I'm gonna have to learn to walk again because I could feel my feet for the first time in ten years. Wow. And he went back, and he's up there now, and she's up and about. She's gone on a mission trip. She's preaching the gospel like god is moving. That's fantastic, man. That that's a great story. That's a great testimony. Yeah. He's got a book. We got a book about it too. I don't have it here to show you. Oh, I don't think I did.
Yeah. Here. Get a copy of this book. Sacred Fire. Got it. By the McGill family. Sacred Fire Northern Testimonies. It's available on Amazon.
[01:07:30] Unknown:
Okay. I got it. Yep. Perfect. Alright. Johnny t, thank you so much for tonight. This was a great conversation. Really enjoyed having you here. Before you go, why don't you just tell us where we could find all of your podcast, your Substack, and and every way we can get in touch with you?
[01:07:46] Unknown:
Yeah. So, Refuge Freedom Stories and the Exchange Life Podcast, they're both on Apple and Spotify and all the other major platforms. We're heard currently in around, 85 countries around the world. So that's a real blessing. The Substack, you can find the Substack.com. It's called From Glory to Glory. And if anybody wants to reach out about the podcast, they can send me an email to [email protected].
[01:08:11] Unknown:
Well, that's great. Thank you, Johnny. Again, thank you so much for spending your time with us tonight. God bless you. We're gonna pray for you, and, I'll see. Hopefully, we get the chance to, do this again. Yeah. Absolutely. God bless you too. Thanks so much for the opportunity to talk about God. It's my favorite thing to do. Amen. Amen. Alright. If you can, just stick around. Just flip your camera off really quick. Alright, folks. This has been Johnny t. We thank, again, Johnny, for spending his time with us here tonight. So now, folks, what we're gonna do is gonna take a quick break. And when we come back from this break, we'll wrap up the rest of the show, and, hopefully, you got a blessing out of this. Don't forget to check him out on Apple and Spotify, his podcast. We'll put all of the information in the show notes, so you can track him down with links, and, we'll be back right after this. Stay with us.
[01:08:57] Unknown:
This podcast is hosted on PodHome.fm, an intelligent podcasting platform that you can use to host unlimited shows and episodes and have unlimited downloads. Pod home comes with many intelligent features like Pod home AI, which automatically creates transcripts, chapters, suggests titles, show notes, detects people, and creates clips. You can use Pothome AI unlimited for all your episodes and all your shows. Go check it out and start your free seven day trial at pothome.fm.
[01:09:36] Unknown:
Do you blame all your problems on Trump? Do you have blue hair and a bunch of metal in your face? Do you not know what a woman is and confused about your gender? Good news. You have TDS, and it's a very treatable condition. Please take the time to find a mental health professional near you and prepare yourself for all the lies you've been told. When you finally recover, the rest of reality would love to welcome you back. Warning, severe TDS can cause rampant Karen and Kevin outbursts. Being cucked by your partner and brain damage from too much hair dye may also cause severe butthurt and nonsensical outbursts that make everyone around you know you're stupid.
[01:10:15] Unknown:
Well, alright. I hope you guys enjoyed that, conversation we had with, Johnny Tavener. And don't forget, you'll be able to get all of his information in the show notes, and, hopefully, you'll be able to, reach out to him at some point and, you know, send him a comment. Let him know what you thought of the interview, and, we look forward to having him on here again. Alright, folks. Well, I think that is going to just about do it for us for tonight. So as usually, we wanna give our our shout outs to our executive producers, Wayne and Rosanna Rankin. Thank you so much for your support. Also, we wanna say thank you to all the folks that are listening on the modern podcast apps, like, Podcast Guru and Fountain.fm.
And, we also wanna say thank you to all the folks that are streaming sets to us through the modern podcast app. So thank you so very much for that. We really do appreciate it. Now, folks, also, we didn't get a chance to talk about Texas tonight because we stay away from politics. But if you wanna get involved with shaping the future of a free and independent Texas, just head over to our website, joerussello.com/tandm, or head over to texitnow.org. Scan the QR codes, register your support, become a member, make a donation, let your voice be heard for free in independent Texas. Also, don't forget to set head over to the, contact form on our website. Send us over any questions, comments, cares, concerns you have. Don't forget to click that support button. Help us out with a donation. Any amount you can possibly do, we would really appreciate it, or check out one of our monthly recurring, donation tiers. Also, don't forget the alexjonesstore.com/joe.
And remember that every purchase you make, 10% comes right back here to the podcast to help us out in managing our funds. Alright. Also, just wanna say, not to forget to find us on our socials at x joe roos Instagram, joe roos TikTok, joe.roos truth social, joe roos minds, joe ruse, Facebook, the podcast with joe rusiello. And, just go back to Instagram. It's not joe ruse. Alright? Well, I guess that's it. Right? I think, I think we pretty much covered everything. Alright, folks. I just wanna say thank you again for spending your night with us here on the podcast. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and share it with your friends, your fan, your family, and your followers. And, folks, let's make Texas independent again.
Go podcasting, keep a steady stride, and happy trails. Well, that's about it really. The film ends mainly visually.
Introduction and Welcome
Technical Difficulties and Live Broadcasting
Tonight's Special Guest: Johnny Taverner
A Conversation on Faith and Spiritual Journeys
Johnny Taverner's Podcasts and Writing
The Worth of a Soul and Podcasting as a Mission
Closing Remarks and Contact Information
