Does Godly Ambition Exist? | Ruslan KD

Alright, man. We're we're going. I'm not a big fan of big long introductions. I'll do all that in the beginning, all of your links, and, of course, we're gonna talk about your book. But Ruslan, thank you for being on the Provoke and Inspire podcast.

And thanks for having me. Pumped. Yeah, dude. So, anyway, as I was saying before, I woke you up a little bit early. Sorry about that.

We're, we're operating in time zones here, but thank you for doing this. Like I said, I I wanna briefly touch on your story. I think most people will be familiar, but I think it sets up a lot of the context for this conversation. But then, man, I wanna I wanna talk about the Internet and influence and your book that you got coming out. I'm just excited to see where this goes.

So can you just hit us with your story and then we'll just we'll just go from there? Yeah. Armenian, raised in Azerbaijan, Baku, experienced a massive ethnic cleansing as a kid called the pilgrims of Baku in the late eighties. Ethnically, Armenians didn't do well in Baku. They got us all out of there.

And so we came to The United States as refugees in the early nineties. My mother and my dad split. I grew up in a single parent home, struggled a lot, got arrested at the age of 11. And then late nineties, early '2 thousands, started going to church and, yeah, had an encounter with Jesus. Kind of went through the door of apologetics initially.

Got plugged into a church, started serving, been married for seventeen years now. We got two kids. And, yeah, I transitioned initially into doing some full time ministry from 2013 to 2015, then pivoted over to doing full time music from 2015 to 2020. And then, like, 2021 ish is when the YouTube the the end of twenty twenty, the beginning of twenty twenty one is when YouTube really took off, and I've been doing that, full time ever since. Awesome.

So there's a lot going on there. And and, obviously, the music thing and the YouTube thing, what what attracted you to that? I know that COVID tended to be this pivotal moment for a lot of online creators, but why YouTube? What what pulled you into that world, and how have you gotten to where you are now? I think YouTube was interesting because my initial approach to it was quite simply a very pragmatic one.

I needed to make some music videos for the music I was releasing and so that was kind of the initial entry point was like, oh, if I can learn to edit my own music videos, I can save money, at a time where music videos were very expensive. I mean, we're talking 02/2010, '2 thousand '11, '2 thousand '12. And so that was how I initially just got my chops of just editing. And then, as we just kept uploading more to YouTube, music videos primarily, I was like, oh, there's something else here. We can release little documentaries.

We can release behind the scenes. We can do our own podcast. And so, that's kind of how I started dabbling initially and simultaneously kind of building up that skill set while I'm using it for my local church, as the media director. I was kind of overseeing the broadcast. I was overseeing the live stream.

I was overseeing the Sunday morning virtual experience, if you will. And, yeah, it just kind of all culminated while simultaneously I was doing a lot of local ministry stuff. So stuff like teaching the junior high, the high school, the young adults, that ability to communicate with the overlap of understanding the technology and being, I guess, a relatively early adapter. Like, I wasn't super consistent on YouTube until about 2019 and then the end of twenty twenty is when it when it took off until it's kind of early on YouTube, I guess you would say. Mhmm.

And so yeah. Like, the overlap of all those different skill sets and the timing of that is what, I guess, made it all click. Yeah. So I've I've been talking to a lot of, you know, Internet influencers and YouTubers, and I've been really wrestling with this whole world myself because it's this you have this dichotomy. Right?

On one end, there's so much access and there's so much potential, and you're reaching an audience that would have taken an entire, you know, production company and an an incredible budget to be able to do. And now, you know, you are reaching huge audiences in a way that would have been inconceivable ten, fifteen, twenty years ago. Mhmm. And so the the impact potential seems limitless and incredible. And yet at the same time, we're drowning in the Internet, and we're drowning in content, and people are being destroyed by it all.

And so help me, like, wrestle through the the dilemma there. How what kind of fruit are you experiencing? How how do you feel compelled to be different in that space? And and just that whole conversation around both the limits, but also the potential of this incredible medium that we have today. Yeah.

I mean, YouTube is the new TV. Right? And so now, what we once consumed on TV and then Netflix and Amazon, Hulu, and obviously those things still have a place if you wanna watch something more higher production. You're probably gonna go to Amazon or Hulu Right. Or Netflix.

But YouTube is now a pretty pretty fierce competitor and as the Internet increases, more and more people are arriving on the platform. And so, I think considering that, considering that, to your point, yes, it requires way less startup capital, way less production to get active on YouTube. It's an incredible opportunity. I mean, this is, in my opinion, the new printing press. Right?

Like, except everyone can have one in their garage. I mean, we literally just converted my 300 square foot garage into a studio office space, and, it's been amazing. So the the flip side to that is, yes, there's going to be an oversaturation of material and of content, which I think may make it somewhat competitive unless you have a unique value proposition, a unique perspective, a unique life experience. Mhmm. And I think the audience is intelligent enough to decipher.

At least in the Christian space, in the, you know, even I extend it to the fitness space, the self improvement space. Like, I think people are sophisticated enough to understand what's slop, and what's like, oh, this is entertaining, but there's value in education in it. I'm being trained up to do something. Right. And in that, people are going to have to make decisions and set boundaries and figure out how to navigate all that.

What we're experiencing is a lot of people discovering what we do and the win for us is getting people into a local church. Right. So it's not necessarily more views. It's not necessarily more AdSense. Like, all those things are fine.

But the goal for us is like when we celebrate is when we hear, hey, so and so checked out a pastor on your channel and this pastor mentioned a church they're connected to in the area and this person got plugged in, got baptized, is now serving and is in a local church and has been there for six months. Like, that's the win for us and that's the reports that we get excited about and that's what we're hearing about and we're seeing about is people are discovering either pastors or churches connected to maybe a pastor we had or just a pastor we recommended in their area getting connected, getting plugged in. And that, to me, is where discipleship happens. I think a lot of people talk about like digital discipleship and all that sort of stuff. And listen, I don't know how one can disciple people over the internet.

I'm not anyone's pastor. I've never claimed to be anyone's pastor, But I think we exist as a supplement for people that are looking for something to keep them company, encourage them, make their days a little bit more upbeat Yeah. And at the same time, give them some some value and some hope with with within the messaging that we're putting out there. Yeah. I remember hearing Matt Chandler talk about or he was asked rather what he sees as the the biggest challenge for young leaders today, and he was describing this reality.

And this was kind of pre Internet or at least pre Internet as we have it now where, you know, he saw young leaders wanting to kind of rise up the ranks through a big church only to disconnect, become itinerant, write their book, and and then in so doing kind of become detached. And he's like, man, I am I'm accountable to this church. I am part of a local church. And so I I love what you're saying. Right?

Because that, I think, is maybe the temptation or the risk is that for young guys coming up, girls coming up, seeing what you do or wanting to do similar things is that you can do that disconnected from that physical body, that accountability. Right? And that is, I think as you're saying, such a huge part of this, isn't it? Yeah. And I would say this opens up opportunities for people who are maybe not local church pastors.

Sure. Right? Where they can communicate and write that book or get that messaging out there. But yes, it should be anchored from a local church. You should be connected to a local church.

You should be plugged in. And from a local church, you can create videos and write the book and do the thing. That really didn't exist ten years ago, right? Like to Matt's point, you're trying to rise up through a local church context to then go and be an itinerant or a preacher and write a book. And, that feels, a little a little iffy.

Now, again, I think the audience is smart enough to say, hey. There's a difference, and I'll and I'll mention someone that's a friend so so that people don't think I'm, like, dunking on someone. Hey, there's a difference between, like, what Bryce Crawford does Sure. Who's a who's a dear friend of mine. I just had him on the podcast.

But Bryce Crawford is 21. He'll tell you guys, I'm 21. Like, I'm still figuring things out Right. Versus, like, what I do as a 40 year old man who's been married for seventeen years, who's been connected to the local church for almost twenty five years, right, and writing a book. Like, there's a chasm of a difference.

And so, I think people are sophisticated to understand that. Sure. Then it doesn't mean that people don't bring out Bryce to speak at their churches and Right. Bryce isn't doing amazing things for the Lord, but the positioning of said things is different. And I think the audience is sophisticated and smart enough to understand what the difference is there.

Yeah. Yeah. And that's the challenge, though. Right? Because I'm I'm right with you.

I mean, I've been same age, married for fifteen years, and, like, we kinda grew up in this weird half not Internet and then other half Internet. And so we had, I think, in a lot of ways, the benefit of not being able to sort of bypass the process and and kind of inherit these tools at a time where we are able to kind of go the more conventional path. Whereas a guy like Bryce or guys like him, they can bypass that process more easily. And, again, he sounds like he has a lot of self awareness, which is awesome. But I think of myself in that stage, if I could have been given a platform his size, it'd be tough.

Mhmm. You know? I don't know. I think that's part of this. And I I'd imagine you're in a position where a lot of guys look to you or ask you, like, I wanna do what you're doing.

What what are you saying to them? How are you sort of counseling them as they're attempting to go down this road of of the Internet in this way? I primarily ask, like, why why do you wanna do what I'm doing? And trying to kinda get to to to the root of it. Like, if they're younger, I'm saying, hey, you you may want to find someone to work with and help someone build a YouTube channel.

That's gonna be some of the best training for yourself down the road when and if you wanna build a YouTube channel. And I think I kinda tend to redirect them in that direction, because, yeah, having known Bryce and knowing the challenges that comes along with what he does, is hard. It's hard on the younger believer, and I don't think people fully understand everything that goes with this. So I tend to kind of redirect them. Now, if they're a bit more mature, if they're older, like, let me give you an example.

Nate Sala, the Wise Disciple YouTube channel. I just had him on a few weeks ago. He's awesome. Like, the dude's been amazing behind the scenes. He's been a teacher.

He's been a pastor. Very grounded. You're hearing from someone that has decades of life experience. Someone like that, I'm gonna be way more direct and like, hey. Look, this is working, lean into this.

Right. Hey, check out your thumbnails, adjust those. Hey, consider playing with different formats, consider going live or consider collaborations, consider flying and doing podcasts. And so someone like that, I'm gonna be way more tactical because, believe it or not, the the Nate Salas, the Gavin Ortlands, those are the people that I actually want to be successful in this Christian YouTube space. The Glenn Scriveners, the Wes Huffs, like, these are the people we want to have hundreds of thousands, millions of subscribers, because they, one, have a level of expertise, two, have a life experience, and three, have the maturity and the character to handle what comes along with thousands of people blasting you in the comments section a day.

Right? Hundreds of videos getting made about you weekly. They have the capacity to handle that. And, and again, I'm not saying Bryce or someone like Bryce can't. I'm just saying That's great.

I don't think that when you're younger, you fully grasp everything. And, also, I don't know where you're at with with your maturity in the Lord. Now, again, Bryce has been walking with Jesus since he was 17. He's four years in the faith. He's still relatively new, and he's doing, I think, the very best that anyone can navigating this space.

And so, yeah, I often am looking for the folks that are a bit mature, the folks that have some expertise in a different area, they've built something, they've done something, they've contributed something, beyond just being an influencer. And as those people rising up, that's the stuff I'm I'm super excited about. Yeah. That's awesome. One thing I've been wrestling with in this whole space is on one level you are and you mentioned this a little bit with thumbnails and and tactics and approaches to take and formats to use.

And on one level, right, you're grinding and you're and you're trying to make it work and and you're trying to understand how it works and to leverage that. But then there's another part of me as an artist, as someone who, you know, wants to take my cues from Jesus where I I struggle what horse is pulling the cart. Like, I don't know if you listen I'm assuming you listen to the the Rhett, McLaughlin interview, on Alex O'Connor. And he said something very early on that kinda I don't know if the word I don't know if convicted is the right word necessarily, but it certainly made me, like it put me in this spiral of thought where he said, you know, I know very beginning of the interview says, well and I'm basically giving all of the Christian YouTubers what they want. Mhmm.

And I hit that hit me, and I was just like, obviously, there's value in that for sure. But but how how do we pioneer in a way? You know, we have access to the creator of the universe. Where's the balance between doing what works and finding finding what what hits the algorithm versus leading the way and saying, no, Jesus. I I wanted to take my cues from you.

I I don't know. I'm struggling with this myself. So I'm just curious as someone who's, you know, a lot further down the line with this. How have you wrestled with that whole tension? Well, I think you you get again, you get to count the cost.

Do I want to build something that sustains me, or do I want to build something that is more of a hobby? Do I want to build something that is going to grow and scale, or do I want to do something as a passion project or as a ministry project and completely not care about the analytics or how any of it makes sense. I think someone has to first take inventory of that. I think in that, you can build something that's pure to you and just be an early adapter to a growing niche. But the issue with that is sometimes people build something and there is no niche or they're late to it and then they're wondering why they're creating hundreds of videos and they're just going into the the ether of the Internet and no one's watching.

Well, it's like, have you considered the thumbnails? Have you considered the topics? And so I think, one, you have to kind of take inventory. Right? Like, what is what is the objective of what I'm trying to do?

And I don't think there has to be a false binary between the two. I don't think it has to be a, well, I'm making this to chase clicks or I'm I'm doing what I really feel like God's telling me to do. Right? Like, I think that's a bit of a the framing of that to me is is, in my opinion, not the healthiest. Now Sure.

What we do is we have been implementing something called a one for one. I know what sorts of videos will work. I know what sorts of topics will work, but I also know what I wanna talk about. Sure. And I know that if I can prioritize making one video for the audience that they're going to care about, right, because, again, I actually get this from scripture, believe it or not, like Philippians talks about caring for others before yourself.

So I actually care about what people care about, and that shouldn't be a foreign concept for Christians. So I care about what's gonna get people into a video. I care about the topics they care about. I care about the problems they have and what are they wrestling with. I actually care about these things.

So I say, okay, let me make one for the audience that I think is going to perform well, and then let me make one for me and what I would like to make and what I feel like God is also encouraging me and inspiring me to make. So, yeah, like this week, we've had several videos that performed really well, and we had several videos that didn't perform very well. And I'm okay with that. I'm okay with letting the the chips fall. Now, in a perfect world, you find that that topic that you care about that the audience cares about, and you find an interesting overlap.

But, again, if that's all you wanna make, then you could do that for five years and not crack a thousand views, and then end up in a random debate situation on a few minutes notice, and then debate Billy Carson, and then crush that, and then the Streisand effect, And then Sure. A couple months later, it finally comes out. And then a couple months later, you're on Joe Rogan, and then you're Wes Huff. Yeah. Right?

Right. Like, the the that there's the providential head of god. The the the difference, though, is that Wes Huff was working for Apologetics Canada. Sure. He was sustaining himself in other ways.

He had an expertise, and then God breathed on it and it all took off. Right? And so I think, again, people have to, count the cost and figure out who they are and what they are and are you closer to a Wes Huff, or do you wanna build a media business? Like, I think all those things factor in, and, and I think people just gotta gotta consider these things. Yeah.

Yeah. No. And I I see no conflict between the pursuit of excellence and hard work and looking at what works and being obedient to God at at all in in music, in art, in in creating content at all. I think it's just it it's a it's an important question to ask. And I what I love in the Westhoff story and what I love in your story is it's ultimately about what is God calling me to be and do.

Mhmm. Right? And it's an obedience to that. And it's the the vine and the branch. It's like, as long as I'm recognizing who I am in this process, I'm I'm not the author of this story nor am I the power that makes it work, and I just faithfully do as excellently as possible what's in front of me, then it's up to God.

Right? He he can he can do with it what he wants, and there's different routes for different people. So I totally hear what you're saying. I I think that's really, really encouraging. Last kind of thought on this, and now I transition to your book because I think I think it all kinda overlaps to be honest.

But one one thing I've been really wrestling with is is as you look at content creators or artists in general, from what I can tell, and I'd love you to challenge this if you think so, is is that there are a couple of different categories. You have the first category would be, I'd say, Christians who are making, Christian content for Christians. And and really this was the same in music. Right? So it's the artists that were performing or creating for a Christian audience.

Then you have the second category which is they're Christians, but they don't see their faith as being something that's gonna make its way out into their content. It's for a secular audience. Where I'm really passionate about is exploring the possibility of this third category, which is it it's applied to the band world as well, but I think now to the content world, which is Christians who are wanting to create for a secular audience for the purposes of expressing gospel truth in in the full range of what that means. Mhmm. I don't know if that's like, I've had, you know, back and forth on whether that's even possible in an algorithm world.

And and I just love your thoughts on that. Do you do you think that's something that we need more of? Do you think that's already happening and I just don't see it? And how do we get there, if that would be the goal? Well, again, I think we have to define our terms.

So what do we mean by Christian? What do you mean by Christian? Well, I mean just someone who's following Jesus. Right? As they're Okay.

Yeah. So someone that is already a follower of Correct. Correct. And I would say in both categories, it would be it'd be followers of Jesus. Yeah.

Okay. So this is a recent study that just came out. It says the majority of younger Gen z adults, age 18 to 21, reported being curious about Jesus and or the Bible. Right on. Okay.

Yeah. Okay. So that's fifty six percent of eighteen to twenty one year olds who are not followers of Jesus, this is general Gen Z, 50 six percent said they are curious about Jesus and or the Bible. So, and forty five percent of all Gen Z, okay? Man, the harvest is plentiful right now.

We have never seen a time like this in history where the majority of a specific and a lot of these are young men, for the record, and YouTube tends to sway more young, right? Mhmm. So we're seeing the majority of young men, 18 to 21, aren't Christians, this is just Gen Z, are curious about Jesus and the Bible, and 45% of all of Gen Z are Jesus curious about, Jesus curious or curious about the Bible. So to me, what that says is that if, again, if we can understand the things they care about, the things the problems they have, the concerns they have, the topics they're talking about, the news that they want a perspective on. We can consider those things.

We can speak to people who are not Christians, not followers of Jesus, right, and potentially be a part of that process to have them go further towards Jesus. Yeah. I think that's incredible. So I think that I think it actually is, the best of both worlds. Like, I don't have to, like, okay, so in my music background, there was a window of time where the primary, source of revenue for me was secular college shows.

We were a part of this thing called NACA. NACA was the National Association for Campus Activities. We do these regional conferences, perform, and then colleges would book us and we would kinda we would kinda go under the guise of, like, we're positive hip hop. We're positive hip hop in spoken word. When we would get there, we would then have to be very careful about how we talked about our faith.

Right. Right? Because they're bringing us in to do a concert, they're bringing us in to do an activity for their campus, and we're not there to preach Jesus to them. But we would also be clear that we are Christians. We're We're not gonna give an altar call at at the at the at a concert at a Christian call I mean, at a secular college that paid us a lot of money to perform.

That does not I don't have to do that anymore. Like, I don't have to walk on eggshells. I don't have to be afraid about people saying, oh, we paid you this much and you came here and plaster proselytize. Like, that that for me is a freedom and a weight lifted on me that I could just be myself. I could talk about Jesus.

I could be as preachy as I wanna be. I could I could relate to them. I could talk about secular stuff. I could talk about the movie Sinners and upset my Christian audience that I want to see the movie Sinners while at the same time pulling in a non Christian audience or Jesus curious audience. That's how I kinda refer to them.

Yeah. And and have them engage with the ideas that we're discussing in that video, and I think that's the opportunity. And so, I actually think for the person that's a Christian that wants to make music or art from the church, I think it's a great time to be alive because, like, punchline, Forrest Frank is one of the biggest artists in the world right now. Yeah. Right?

And and you could scoff at his music and you could say it's too simple or whatever critique you have of Forrest Frank, but at the end of the day, he's doing arenas. Yeah. 10,000 people a night, Phil Wickham and Brandon Lake are doing stadiums for this next tour. Yeah. Okay?

With a s. That we've never seen this before. Right? And so is everyone there a follower of Jesus plugged into a local church? No, I don't think so.

I think they're bringing their non Christian friends along, and so this is the era that we live in is like things like The Chosen, things like House of David. There's a massive opportunity right now, And I think, again, if we're willing to humble ourselves because I actually think this is an issue of humility. Am I willing to humble myself and say, what is everyone talking about? Oh, they're talking about the pope. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's interesting. Okay. I'm not mad at all Catholics, but I do have some insight on Sure.

Catholicism. Let me make a video about the new pope, and then all of a sudden, the curious Gen Z ers will pull in, they'll check out some of my other videos, they'll see that I got this resource and we're talking about Logos Bible study and all these different things, and then they they they're slowly being pulled into the the the broader community of what we're building and, again, ultimately hoping that they land in a local church. That's awesome. You know, and I think that the core part of what you touched on is being willing to know and understand and communicate to their language. And to me, that's just Paul before the Athenians.

Right? Like, it's just it's not that new. Right? He he comes. He observes.

He looks around. He recognizes. And then in their the language of their poets and their authors and their thinkers, he communicates the power of Jesus in that context. And it's that combination of relevance and boldness that I think you're you're talking about. And you're you're absolutely right, man.

I'm in my I'm in my car. I'm driving my son and his little hockey buddy who's very secular family, no nonbeliever at all. And he's like, man, play that Forrest Fring song. Like, he's you know, it's like it's having an influence. And I'm sitting there going, man, I gotta this is cool.

This is cool. This moment, this cultural moment that you're talking about is is awesome. So you're completely right. Alright. Transitioning to this book that you've got coming out, Godly Ambition, unlocking the full potential of your time, talent, and treasure.

I love this topic. I like to think of myself as an ambitious guy, and yet there's tensions in that. So so talk to me. What led you to write this? And talk to me about that tension between the world world's idea of ambition and godly ambition and how to make sense of it all.

Yeah. I I I think what led me to write this is that I found so many people wrestling with the with the idea of, hey, I I I feel like I wanna build something, but I'm nervous that I'm just gonna build my own castle instead of trying to build and contribute to God's kingdom. Hey, I I I have these visions and these ideas and these dreams, but, man, I have this tension within me on how to navigate that and how do I know it's about me versus about God? And I kept seeing this and especially amongst young men, I think this is a brutal cognitive dissonance to exist in, right? Where like we all have desires and aspirations, yet we also know that we are followers of Jesus and that ultimately we're to lay down our life, pick up our cross, and follow him.

And so I was hoping to bridge and piece together some of these tensions in a way that's biblical and oddly enough, I was reading the scriptures and I was reading one Thessalonians four eleven, make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, so that working with your own hands so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and you may not be dependent on anyone, right? And I was like, man, that's such an interesting passage. So, I started going deeper and I found out that the word ambition in one Thessalonians four, right, make you have a good life, working with your own hands, minding your own business, so your daily life may win the respect of outsiders. I looked up that word ambition and I discovered that there's three times that that word ambition is used and that word ambition is a different word. It's, here, I'll tell you, it's, fellow I can't pronounce it.

Fellow to me I don't blame you, bro. Yeah. Anyway, I should be able to pronounce this word. So, so that word is used three times in the New Testament. It's used in Romans fifteen twelve, where Paul says, it has always been my ambition to preach the gospel.

It is used in two Corinthians five nine, So we make it our goal or our ambition to please him, to do what please him. Right? Live a consecrated life. And then the third one is making your ambition through the quiet life in in first Thessalonians chapter four verse 11. And there's a different word for selfish ambition in the Greek and it's only used two times, right, which is interesting, right?

James three sixteen is one of the times it talks about selfish ambition. And so, in the scriptures, there's a distinguishment between the word ambition. There's two versions. And I was like, oh, that's so fascinating to me. And so, as people are wrestling with, should I start this thing?

Should I build this thing? Should I care about my finances? Should I care about being healthy and sculpting my body? Should I care about these, all these various things? The world will tell us these things become your gods.

These are your gods. Your body, your fitness becomes your god. Your finances becomes your god. Your your your business becomes your god. And then the church is scoffing at anyone that wants to make an impact on this side, not the church, but generally, some churches that's like, hey, I wanna start that business.

I wanna build that business. I wanna get in shape. I wanna get shredded. I wanna look like a superhero for my kids, right, so that I could be around longer. And the world and the church is, like, scoffing at these things and he's missing these things, and it's like it's interesting because the scriptures do neither.

Jesus takes our desire for greatness when the apostles at the Last Supper, the disciples at the Last Supper are arguing who's going to be the greatest in the heaven, in the Kingdom of Heaven, and he doesn't reject or rebuke their desire for greatness. He redirects it towards service. And so the framing of all this is like, I believe godly ambition is ultimately about stewarding the time, talent, and treasure that we have on this side of eternity. You pull back and say, now consider the context that we're living in, right? It's the best of times.

It's the worst of times. There's access to stuff like the internet, yet people are more distracted than ever. People are struggling more than ever. And so it's this really interesting time that we find ourselves in. And so I'm going back to the scriptures and we're covering some of these tough topics about finances and how much money is too much money and how do we manage the money that we've been given, right?

We're covering some of these things like, what is your purpose? What is your identity? What is God's purpose for you? What's your calling? How do you figure that out?

And I think, I hope, that it's speaking to some felt needs. I remember, Rick Warren releasing Purpose Driven Life, and I remember thinking, oh, this is a great book, it's a forty day devotional, but it didn't really give me any insight on, like, what is my calling? Like, what am I actually trying to work out that God has worked in, and what does that look like? It was it was just more general generalized. And I was like, that's cool, but no one's speaking to these things unless they're the Christian author in the self development world.

Right? And so, like, my buddy John Acuff, who gave us an amazing endorsement for the book, he was responsible for books like Soundtracks and All It Takes Is a Goal. He endorsed the book, loved the book, but he's speaking to these things, but not necessarily from a faith perspective, even though he's a Christian. Right? And so I'm like, okay, we have to figure out a way to bridge this gap.

And this could be a terrible idea and it totally doesn't hit because Christian people are too pious and they don't care about, you know, things like ambition and calling and or, and it and it could totally flop. Or hopefully, God willing, there's there's people that that that need this book and it speaks to them and encourages them and, inspires them and gives them also some practical things to consider. Yeah. Well, for what it's worth, I've been thinking about this intersection for a long time. I think it's perfectly suited and timed, and I think God is gonna use it powerfully.

I was just having conversation recently about the the challenges specifically of young men and how, you know, they're mired in pornography and video games and Internet distraction. And I think what's so sad is that what you're seeing unlocked in guys like through guys like Jordan Peterson and others is that this call to the quest, this call to ambition and stewardship and how the remedy from you know, the remedy against some of these vices is not necessarily just, oh, you're, you know, shame and avoid and and and run away from. It's it's you need to have a life to run towards. You need a a battle to fight. Right?

So some of this is not only is this about unlocking your potential, but it's also, it's a I think in many ways a powerful antidote against some of the things that are robbing young men of the life they're supposed to live. Yeah. I I think there's a there's a apathetic version of ourselves and every single one of ourselves that that we have to wage war on. Yeah. Right?

Not at the expense of our soul, not at the expense of our faith, but at the betterment of our societies and our communities. And the more we allow that apathetic version to say, Ah, it's all right, man. You're fine. It's like, oh, bro. Like, imagine as a dad or as a husband, that's how you cruise through your marriage and your parenting.

Like, that's a brutal and there'll be consequences to that, right, down the road. But so many allow themselves to cruise that way, and the issue that oftentimes we run into, and you know this, is that when we have the practical motivating factors to build in our life, kids and wife, we often don't have the time. Right. So you gotta do a lot with a little. Yes.

Right? When you have the time Yeah. You don't have the practical motivating factors. Oh, man. Right?

Right? You don't have a wife. You don't have a you don't have kids that are depending on you. And so my my heart for people is to say, look, man. There's a version of you from ten years in the future.

Yeah. You're 21. You're 22. At you right now. And they're like, get your junk together, man.

Like, figure this out because we have less time. And and and if you goof around, we're gonna have to deal with the consequences of your bad decisions and your lack of planning and your lack of wisdom and your lack of godly ambition. And so that that that's the tension that that many people don't know they're living in, but they're really living in, and and if I could just get through to that to that demographic, that twenty to thirty. And, again, I'm not saying the book is just for folks twenty to thirty, but that demographic that's not married yet, or or maybe they're dating, but they're not serious, they're not engaged yet, they don't have kids yet, man, and they can spark that desire, I think it could change things. You know, by the grace of God, like, we were able to, as a married couple, we were able to get out of debt and have six months of living expenses prior to having my first son, Levi, in 2014.

And so that, just that foundation set us up to be able to transition into doing music full time in 2015, and it was my wife that after years and years of praying and planning that I called her when I was coming back from South by Southwest and we were doing this tour and I was working at my church and I could tell that it was getting too much in terms of being gone so much. And I remember calling her after years and years of praying, asking her like, hey, it's getting kind of tense, should we pray about potentially transitioning from the church and going full time into what we're doing and what we're trying to build? And I remember her response, she said, there's nothing to pray about, you need to come home and put in your two week notice, right? So, this is my stay at home wife with a seven month old who says, Hey, it's time to go out and start that thing. And that was ten years ago, almost to the date, that that happened.

And that wouldn't have happened had we not thought about, hey, you know, in 2011, '20 '12, hey, we need to clean up our finances because we're gonna wanna have kids, and when we have kids, we're gonna want my wife to stay home for a season, and that's really important to us. That's a value of ours, and, let let let's figure these things out. Let's lock in. Let's clean up our fight. Like, I think people aren't thinking like this about how they're building their life when they're in their twenties and thirties, and it's gonna it's gonna set them up to to to really have to go through some growing pains later in life.

And I Listen, some people have to go through things to learn, but a friend of mine, Pastor Benny Perez, said that experience is the lowest form of learning. You don't need to put your hand on the stove every time to discover the stove is hot. Sometimes, by the grace of God, please learn from other people's mistakes. Please learn from my scars. Please learn from your scars.

And get wisdom by listening to folks that are a season ahead of you that are going to do can be that version of you in the future, twenty years in the future, ten years in the future that are saying, hey, man, these things you're doing, you really need to consider the mundane things that no one wants to talk about, like cleaning up your finances, cleaning up your diet, cleaning up your career trajectory, cleaning up your porn addiction, cleaning up these things so that you're now still dealing with them in your thirties and forties. Yeah. Yeah. I know. I I sometimes think about, man, if I can continue and grow these muscles in the context of the life I'm living, man, I can't wait to kick these these kids out of the house.

I'm gonna be so productive when I don't have to get up at 04:55 just to be able to read a book. I can't wait for that day. But so talk to me about for me, as I as I wrestle with trying to put my life together or continue to be ambitious, there's still an even deeper layer to this. Because one of the things that's really been resonating in my mind is that if I begin to try to live this way as you're describing for wholeness, not from it, it it can become very toxic very quick where I just never feel like I can relax. I never I wanna leverage every single minute, every single moment.

Mhmm. And and this is kinda how I'm wired already. And so my question for you is is how what is the the deepest level foundation of an ambitious life? Because I think if we don't get that part right, we can sometimes jump to the the habit hacks and the the all the different little gimmicks and tricks, which are good. But I think they're if they're not built on the proper foundation, it can lead towards the world's vision of ambition.

%. Yeah. I would say the the the foundation at the very least, like, the bare bones is, like, get your butt in church every week. Yeah. Like get your butt in church every week.

And then I would say the next layer beneath that is read your Bible and document your prayers every day or as many days a week as you can. And the reason why I say document is because we pray for stuff all the time, and we forget when God answers the prayers. Yeah. And we see this, especially in the Old Testament, I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. I am the God that took you from Egypt to the promised land.

I am the God, right? God has to constantly remind his people of who he is and what he's done for them. And so getting into a some sort of routine where you're writing out your prayers, prayer requests, things you're praying for, will allow you, one, to retain it and remember it, and then, two, will document it so when God does answer those prayers, all of a sudden, it's building that faith up because you start discovering, oh, God really is a good father and God does want to give me the sustenance that I need. And if I can document those things, man, that's a good position to be in. And so, yeah, I would say local church attendance, bare minimal, every week, this whole bedside baptist, pastor pillow, ain't cutting it, get your butt to church every week.

The average, I think, Christian goes to church like 2.5 times a month or something like that. Like, no, every week, non negotiable. Then I would say get into the scriptures and document your prayers several times a week, preferably every day a week. And I think when you have that foundation and people are going to say, well, where do I start? Man, listen, you can start in the gospel of John and just keep reading through the New Testament.

You can do a chapter of Proverbs a day based on what day it is. Yeah. There's so many resources now. I would say anything where you're doing a chapter a day, get that going, and I think that'll help reorient yourself into the things that matter. And then from there, you go out and you start building out the other aspects.

But I think that's just a great anchor, and a lot of folks don't don't prioritize that. Yeah. How much does environment matter? Like, the people you're around. Man.

I think it matters when I think it matters a lot when you have a cruddy environment. Right. You know? Like, a negative environment is really brutal on you. I would say, in terms of a healthy local church, I think that that that matters a lot.

I'd say in terms of people who are season ahead of you, so I have kids that are about you know, my son's about to be a teenager. My pastor, my pastor's son, Israel, who's great, he is in his late teens. I can gleam so much wisdom from just watching their interaction, having known Israel since he was about, you know, 13, 14. I get so much wisdom in that sense of watching someone that's a season ahead. So I think that's huge.

And, I think the, like, the people you keep around you will help you, and call you to who you're supposed to be, who God has already called you to be, and keep you accountable to that. And so, yeah, I would say it matters a lot. We have a whole chapter, in the book on community and how important community is, local church community, and, yeah, I think I think it's wildly important. But I I I will add this caveat, they can't hold you accountable to the things you've said you're going to do. Like, my my church community, my my buddies that are great into fitness, my business friends, like, they can't make me eat the chicken and not the not the In N Out.

Like, they can't make me show up to the gym every day. They can't make me make videos every day and make good videos every day. They can't do the thing for me, but they can encourage me and they can hold me accountable and they can ask me the tough questions. Right. So, yeah, I think it's it's wildly important, but at the old at the end of the day, you keep yourself accountable.

Right? Like, you keep yourself accountable to whatever, hey, I'm gonna work at wake up at 04:50 to read that book. No one else can do that for you but you. Right. Right.

Yeah. You know, what struck me as you were talking about the foundation before is I'm I think a lot about Augustine's ordering your loves. And I think part of the problems that we have is that we create these false dichotomies. Like, there's worldly ambition and then there's spiritual ambition. And spiritual ambition is, you know, the spiritual disciplines, but these other things are kinda worldly enough to be guarded against.

And to me, it's like it's just about it's like going to the chiropractor. It's about getting things in line. It's like, yeah. Your your fitness is not more important than your relationship with your wife and your your relationship with your wife is not more important than your relationship with Jesus. But when you get first things first, I actually think God unlocks the rest.

Right? He's like, now now go be fit because I gave you one body. Now go be a better, more self sacrificial husband because that's what I want for you. So a lot of this is about getting the order right, don't you think? Yeah.

Absolutely. The order right is huge. Right? And this is why I I tend to say pretty frequently that, like, your first ministry is your house. Right?

Your home. And and I, like, I refuse to sacrifice my marriage or my family at the altar of ministry or at the altar of anything. Right? So I think that yes. Absolutely.

Order that properly. Now, here's the flip side to everything you just described is incremental investments lead to monumental advancements. Yes. Atomic habits. So you make little small investments every day.

I'll give you a very practical one. I'm going through a fitness transformation right now. I traveled a lot, got pretty ballooned up, and within the last month, I am investing maybe an hour a week of meal prepping and maybe three hours a week of training, probably less than that. Mhmm. And a four hour investment for a month can yield Yeah.

Really incredible results to your fitness. Three hours of strength training a week, an hour of meal prep a week. Right? And, yes, it's not gonna be gourmet food that you love. I'm I'm I'm I'm completely fine with getting my chicken breast meal prepped and my sweet potatoes meal prepped, and that is enough for me to go through that when I don't want to eat the same stuff that my wife and kids are eating and or my other meals, I have enough there ready to go at all times.

And an hour investing in that plus three hours of training and within a month, I mean, you start looking your body starts looking very different when you're eating the right amount of protein and you're hitting the right lips. Here's the great news. Everything is like this. Yeah. Right?

Everything is like this. So you you spend four hours, three hours a week investing into your body. You carve out some of that. You cut out some of that Netflix time. You carve in some of that reading time.

You carve out some of the, hey. I'm gonna just aimlessly doom scroll on TikTok. You incorporate. Hey. I'm going to create before I consume.

I'm gonna write something. I'm gonna ideate. I'm going to create a video before I consume a video. And you just make these little adjustments, five hours a week, ten hours a week, and you're shocked at how much the needle moves. Now granted, some things will take longer than other things.

Right? But, you know, for me, like fitness was one of those things that, man, I'd say about three to four months of really focused consistency. I'm talking I'm hitting the right amount of chicken every week. I'm not, binging and eating stuff I shouldn't be eating, and I'm and I'm properly training. Within three or four months in 2018, I saw my body transform and I and I was like, oh my gosh.

And what that did for me was it went, well, if I could do that with fitness Right. What if I could do that on YouTube? Right. Right? And and and if I could do that on YouTube, what if I could actually build out a business with employees that we can provide for and get them health insurance and take care of them and pay them a a a a fair wage?

And so those little investments, man, compound. And before you know it, you're like, wow, this is crazy. And so, you know, unfortunately, some things we have to go back to. Right? I gotta I'm going back to the fitness right now.

But the but the the building blocks are exactly the same. It's a little a little bit of investing every week, a little little micro habit of logging the food, and then before you know it, you fast forward a month and you're like, my goodness, I look better. And then two or three months and like, my abs are showing. And then all of a sudden, six months and you're like, I look like a superhero with my shirt off. Right?

Like, that's how fast these things can happen, and I think people underestimate how much things can change when you properly order the things and you properly do set things. Yeah. Yeah. And I I just just for me, I think the emphasis is is that all of that feels like it finds its proper place when I know that is not where I'm getting my transcendent sense of satisfaction from. And I often put my mind in the space of someone who is pursuing all those things.

But as Solomon said, these are things done under the sun. Right? And and that dude was shredded no doubt. He had every advantage, every pleasure and power. And he's looking at it going, it's meaningless.

Right? And so for me, I don't underestimate the the, untethering or the freedom that I'm able I'm able to pursue those things with ambition and freedom oddly because I know they aren't the thing that provides me with ultimate life and value. That's right. You know what I mean? And so Yes.

And sometimes, I think when you're in this so long, you can take for granted the kind of treadmill people are on because, man, they're trying to get fit. They're trying to build the business, but they're doing it with this overhanging existential dread. Like, but but does this matter? Right? So I don't know.

That's why that emphasis on order is so huge for me. I I love that because what you're getting at is, like, from and not for. Correct. Like from the fact that I'm a child of God, that Jesus loves me, that I'm no longer a sinner, I'm now a saint, I'm a part of the priesthood of royal believers. From that, I then do.

Yeah. It's not I'm doing to validate myself. Correct. Right? I'm already validated because of who I am as a follower of Jesus, and I think, yeah, I think that I agree with you that that's the foundation and that's the shortcomings of some of the self development stuff.

And I engage with James Clear and Atomic Habits in my book in terms of this idea of like change your identity, you'll change your processes, change your processes, you'll change your outcomes. The issue is how do you change your identity? His definition of identity is this subjective, well, I'm just not gonna identify as a smoker anymore. And it's like, cool, bro. You just sub so then I can I can identify as an astronaut?

Right? Like, that's that identity can't be subjective, and it also can't be just something that's outward based, meaning, like, whatever utility you have for the GDP of America, that's your identity, right? That's a very like capitalistic way to approach someone's identity. And Jay Warner Wallace, who just did a talk at our Bloodscott Summit, did a great talk on identity and he said identity can't be inside out, it can't be outside in, it has to be top down. Correct.

It has to be something that God is declaring and is outside of us, and that's where I'm at and I think that's where a lot of the self help stuff kinda falls apart is it just becomes either woo woo, new agey, new thought, or it's just, it's subjective. Like, how can you just say I'm no longer a smoker? If you're a smoker, how does that work? No, I understand. I understand.

But, like, even the stuff he's pulling from, the whole, like, 12 step stuff, like, that stuff's still rooted in church. Like, it it started in church, you know? Yeah. And that's where I think they borrow well, it's either sort of this floating in midair, ungrounded thing as you were describing, or they're borrowing from Judeo Christianity without even recognizing it. Right?

That this That's right. They're assuming we have this transcendent value or direction when on their world view we don't, but it it it's kinda how we have conditioned ourselves to believe and live. So, hey, this to me is why I'm glad you've written this because this is exactly what we lack is that proper foundation. So I really appreciate you so much. How can we be praying for you?

Obviously, the book, we're gonna put it everywhere on the, you know, in the show notes. I do a whole intro before this. How can they find and preorder the book? And then what's what's next for you and how can we those that listen to this join in praying for you for this next season? Yeah.

Thank you. Yeah. I would say preorder the book. Those help a ton because they all kinda culminate towards the first week sales. And so, yeah, mygodlyambition.com will take you to all the stores, but you can just open up Amazon, Barnes and Noble, wherever you get your books, preorder it, and that really helps out a ton.

And then I would say we got we're working on Bless God Summit two. We just had our first one, so we're gonna do another conference in person here in Southern California, probably March 2026. Cool. So we're kinda getting the balls rolling on that and and trying to kinda confirm a lineup so we can get that announced within the coming months hopefully. And then, yeah, I'll be traveling, pretty much all September.

I'll be out your way, I think, what is it, September 6. I'll be at quite a few conferences in September as the book is coming out, September 9. I'll be traveling, doing stuff like that. So just pray that we get some rest at the July. I think we're gonna try to take two weeks off in July from any YouTube stuff and then that we hit that I could hit it hard in August and September.

Hopefully take my family along with me on some of these trips and some of the speaking engagements I have. And, yeah, and just just be praying for the book. Alright. Can I pray for you now? Yeah, please.

Jesus, thank you for Ruslan. I pray you would give him that rest that he's looking for, not just when he's resting, but all the time because there's nothing he can do to add or there's nothing that can take away from his value. You love him. When I look at my boy and my girls, the way I know he looks at his kids, there is nothing that they could do to change the way I feel about them and you are perfect. So I pray for rest.

I pray for anointing. I pray that the days ahead would make the days that have been look like nothing. Not not for the sake of big and in the world's eyes, but because of the needs of the world and the spiritual curiosity that he was describing, Lord. Let him meet those felt needs with the power of the cross, Lord Jesus. Thank you for this brother.

I pray that you would give him an an incredible summer. Let the book have every bit of impact that you desire for it to have. And I pray that you would just, yeah, just bless the days ahead for him and his family. In Jesus name. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen. Hey. Thank you, man.

I really appreciate it. I just, need you to chill for about ten seconds after I hit end here to make sure the file uploads. But thank you, Ruslan. I really, really appreciate you, man. Appreciate you, brother.

Alright. Well, dude, thank you.

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