I Don't Know You

DescriptionRod Fletcher’s grandmother took a job as the camp secretary at Campus by the Sea in 1953. His father grew up there. His parents met there — the lifeguard and the camper, breaking a rule the camp still enforces. Rod’s first summer was 1974, and he was five. Seventy years later, after InterVarsity decided to get out of the camping business and a group of former family campers formed a nonprofit to rescue the place, Rod found himself on the search committee for a new director — and got hired into the job himself. In this conversation, recorded live with a room full of Barnabas Associates, Rod and his wife Heather talk about what it’s actually like to live where you serve: 39 people sharing every meal, trash and groceries hauled in by boat twice a week, ten-cent water, worship happening outside your front door every night. They talk about the church in Avalon that shut down and what sprang up in its absence, the cove next door Rod thinks could be a second camp, and how they handle conflict in a community where nobody can go home at the end of the day. And Rod closes with three pieces of advice for people in their twenties that I’ve thought about every week since.Lessons1. A Widow, a Secretary Job, and Seventy Years of ConsequenceRod’s dad was born to a widow — his own father died while she was pregnant. She never remarried and never had more children. In 1953 she took a job as the camp secretary and spent her summers helping build the place alongside InterVarsity’s Southern California director. Rod’s dad’s first summer was at ten. Nobody in that story could have known they were starting something that would still be running three generations later.~04:152. The Original Rule BreakerRod’s dad was an eighteen-year-old lifeguard. His mom was a camper down from UCSB. Staff are not allowed to fraternize with campers — then or now. Rod calls his father “the original rule breaker,” and notes that it worked out. It’s the kind of family lore that tells you what a place means to the people who came up in it.~04:493. He Hired Him and He Hired MeWhen InterVarsity decided to stop owning camps after seventy years, a group of former family campers formed a nonprofit board and effectively rescued the property — subleasing for a year, then securing a lease. Rod was on that board. He was also on the search committee for the next director, since the sitting one was retiring. The line he uses: “I hired him and he hired me.”~07:264. The Miracle Isn’t That He’s ThereRod had spent twenty years as head of a school in Texas before that role wrapped up and they came out to camp three years ago. But he’s clear-eyed about the actual miracle: he already loved the place — the diving, the fishing, all of it. Heather is the one God had to move. His marriage advice on the subject is blunt: don’t try to convince your wife to move to a rustic, dirty island.~08:015. Messy, BeautifulNo roads. No phones. A house that’s tiny but sits on the cliff over the beach. Praise and worship happening outside the front door every single night — which Rod describes as awesome and really weird in the same breath. When someone in the room offers “messy, beautiful” as a description, he takes it immediately. There’s no line between his life and his work.~08:356. Fletcher Friday and Money MondayThirty-nine people currently live at camp, and they do everything together — every meal, every day. The rhythms have names: Fletcher Friday, Money Monday for talking about investing, Wednesday Bible study, Saturday movie night. Rod calls it massive discipleship, life on life. Heather notes she didn’t even go to movie night that week.~09:097. Everything Comes By BoatThe camp sits in a canyon with no road access — two miles straight up and five down to Avalon on foot. So trash goes out by boat twice a week and groceries come in by boat twice a week. Gas runs around eight dollars a gallon. Water is over ten cents a gallon, roughly thirty times what the mainland pays. Heather’s reaction on arrival: we have to do what?~15:268. The Church Closed and the Town Got HealthierAvalon had a church that stood for 150 years. Two years ago, after a season of genuinely hard things, it shut down. What Rod expected was a spiritual vacuum. What happened instead: a cowboy fellowship at the horse ranch, a Sunday morning fellowship, a Thursday night fellowship, YWAM moving in, another church planting. None of them are a church in a building. His read is that the town is doing better spiritually now than it was when it had one.~12:429. Venting Is VilifyingHeather’s contribution on managing conflict in a community where nobody gets to go home: they have an explicit anti-venting policy. The instinct people have is to check — am I crazy, or are you experiencing this too? — and she’s coached the staff hard against it. If you have a problem with someone, go to them. It’s accentuated in a place like this, but she says it’s the only way that ever works.~23:4610. Manners Are the New SuperpowerAsked what he’d tell a room full of people in their twenties, Rod gives three. Pay me now or pay me later — everything costs more later, so put in the work now. Manners are the new superpower — show up, do what you said, don’t whine, be on time, write handwritten notes, and you will stand out almost effortlessly because most people don’t do the basic stuff. And: people grow into the conversations around them, so choose the rooms you’re in on purpose.~24:28 Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionJeff Davis has spent forty-five years married to his high school sweetheart, twenty years in corporate tech, and twenty more in ministry and nonprofit work.This conversation went almost nowhere I planned. We started with a word he picked up in Uganda, Mazungu, which literally means “white man busily running around looking at his watch,” and spent the first half hour on what cross-cultural work does to a Westerner’s sense of superiority.From there Jeff walked me through the curriculum he’d design for Gen-Z if anyone let him, the moment he realized his corporate ladder was leaning against the wrong wall, and why he says the hardest thing he’s ever done isn’t raising two daughters, it’s staying married well.His wisdom on marriage, family, and leadership is something I really appreciate and I'm deeply grateful for the opportunity to speak with him.Lessons from Jeff1. Mazungu — The White Man Looking at His WatchJeff picked the word up in Uganda by hearing children shout it at his car and then asking what it meant. The literal translation is a white man busily running around looking at his watch — a piece of colonial residue baked into everyday speech. What makes it land is that Jeff doesn’t flinch from it. He treats it the way he’d treat gringo: self-deprecating, field-leveling, and true enough to be useful.~01:562. Fail in Their Language and the Barrier DropsThe fastest way into a relationship abroad, Jeff says, is to attempt a greeting badly. People laugh at how miserably you’re failing — and in that moment the hierarchy inverts. They become the expert, you become the student, and suddenly there’s a project the two of you are working on together. The project is you.~00:383. The English Camp That Wasn’t About VocabularyIn Cambodia, Jeff’s team ran an English camp and discovered students weren’t coming for vocabulary. They came to hear pronunciation from a native speaker. That single, narrow thing people actually wanted turned into the opening for everything else the trip was there to do.~07:034. You Arrive With Superiority Whether You’re Humble or NotJeff admits to feeling less superior for being monolingual, but the sharper observation follows: coming from the West, you show up with a sense of superiority regardless of your character, and it takes time to even notice it before you can set it down.~08:215. Sheer Randomness, Not MeritThe place he was born put resources in his hands. Jeff’s read on the person across from him who has none: they probably work harder than him and they’re probably smarter than him. Once that lands, the relationship stops being patron-and-client and becomes person-to-person — which is the only foundation worth building on.~08:516. The Curriculum He’d Build for Gen ZGiven the chance, Jeff would teach cross-cultural experience, language learning, history, literature, Bible — and other religious writings alongside it, specifically so students would have something to compare against. His logic mirrors his travel philosophy: you understand where you’re standing only by engaging something alien to it.~09:537. The Scottish Enlightenment Nobody Talks AboutJeff traces American ideas about equality not to the French Enlightenment but to the Scottish one, and to fifty years of preaching that preceded the founders — the Judeo-Christian ethic arriving through pulpits rather than being invented in a room. He notes it emerged out of four centuries of feudalism and injustice, which is what makes it remarkable rather than inevitable.~16:258. The Book That Didn’t Feel RightAs a high schooler just after the civil rights era, Jeff read The Light and the Glory — a widely accepted book in Christian circles arguing America’s westward conquest did indigenous nations a favor. He couldn’t articulate why at the time, but it didn’t sit right. Learning to trust that instinct against the consensus of his own community is the quiet skill underneath most of this conversation.~23:079. The Testimony He Used to EnvyJeff has no dramatic conversion story — no rescue from addiction or crime, just faith absorbed at home and taken for granted through adolescence. He used to envy people whose testimonies had teeth. At sixty-six, he understands the dramatic testimony comes at a great cost, and that he never had to pay it.~30:0510. Climbing a Ladder Leaning Against the Wrong WallTwenty years into a successful tech career, disillusioned, Jeff told the dean at Azusa Pacific that he couldn’t afford him. The dean didn’t blink: the money’s your problem, figure that out, I’ll give you a job. That answer reframed the whole thing, and Jeff took the job — eventually taking a 50% pay cut while Julie saw the security they’d lose and he saw only the opportunity.~33:3011. Raising Kids is Easy, Maintaining a Marriage is The Real WorkForty-five years in, Jeff says raising kids was easy — maintaining a harmonious marriage is the most thrilling and challenging thing he’s ever done. He describes needing someone five-foot-four who could stand toe to toe with him, and calls being broken on her the thing that finally made him dependent on God. ~35:00 Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionToday I’m joined by my brother Ian — one of my closest friends, an incredible poet, writer, and teacher of seven-plus years — for a conversation I’ve been looking forward to for a while and is really special as it is my twentieth episode (thanks for continuing to listen). We both read the Pope’s new encyclical on AI, technology, and human dignity.Our conversation ranges from what stuck with us, what it means for how Ian teaches, and how I parent, and build things with AI every day. Fair warning going in: I use AI constantly — this conversation isn’t anti-AI (at least from my point of view), it’s a “how do we use this well/can we use this well” conversation.Enjoy.Lessons1. Two building projects: Babel vs. Nehemiah00:00–19:45The Pope frames the whole encyclical around two images: the Tower of Babel — a unified, impressive project built without reference to God, that sacrifices human dignity for efficiency and ends in confusion — versus Nehemiah rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, a humbler, collaborative, dignified project. Ian reads the Pope’s own language on Babel (”sacrifices human dignity for efficiency, and aspires to reach heaven without God’s blessing”) and calls it the interpretive lens for the rest of the letter.* Ian’s overall take: multi-layered, doesn’t even get to AI directly until nearly halfway through — grounded first in Catholic social doctrine.* Ian self-describes as leaning “Luddite” (Matt pushes back — “cautious,” not Luddite) but says the letter surfaced dangers he hadn’t considered, especially effects on the global poor and lower-income workers, not just wealthy tech users.* Despite the warnings, both agree the letter’s overall tone is hopeful, not fatalistic — it appeals to leaders to steer AI deliberately rather than treating its trajectory as inevitable.* Tangent: the “self-fulfilling prophecy” logic of “we have to keep optimizing/innovating because that’s just what you do” (Instagram reel reference).2. The technocratic paradigm & “using power well”19:45–33:55Centered on the Romano Guardini quote from paragraph 95 — “Contemporary man has not been trained to use power well” — and Pope Francis’s earlier term “the technocratic paradigm” (¶92): the logic of efficiency, control, and profit shaping personal, social, and economic decisions.* Matt’s question: has any era actually used power well, or is this just the permanent human condition (the Fall)?* Rabbit trail: they Google Romano Guardini (1885–1968) — lived through both World Wars, which frames the quote historically.* Matt only half-jokingly stakes out a monarchist position; Ian counters with George Washington voluntarily relinquishing power after two terms as a counterexample of power used well.* Ian’s key read: the technocratic paradigm makes technology more than a tool — it becomes the standard by which everything is judged, reducing creation to something to exploit and people to “cogs in a system driven toward ever greater efficiency” (¶93).3. Does AI level the playing field, or concentrate power?33:55–47:46Matt’s question, tied to paragraph 108: is AI an amplifier for those who already have resources (design bias, business logic baked into models — e.g., the Google Gemini historical-image controversy) or a leveling force for the average person (e.g., Matt building his own half-Ironman training app in a couple hours with no coding background)?* Ian’s pushback: individual convenience isn’t the same as global equity — the Pope is thinking at the scale of nations and supply chains, not just individual hustle.* The “genie in a bottle” illusion: prompts feel weightless but sit on top of real infrastructure — data centers, water and power consumption for cooling, and (ties to later chapters) labor in the majority world extracting the materials and running the infrastructure that makes AI possible.* Shared conclusion: AI can lower the barrier to entry for individuals with ideas, but that doesn’t cancel out the larger pattern the Pope is naming — the people already holding capital, data, and expertise still benefit most.4. “Cultivated, not built”: AI in Ian’s classroom47:46–1:08:00The heart of the education conversation. Starting from paragraph 104’s point that AI is never morally neutral — every model embodies choices about what it measures, ignores, and optimizes — Matt asks whether Ian distinguishes between “cultivating” and “building” a student.* Ian prefers “cultivation” as the education metaphor: ongoing, slow, never a one-time finished product — closer to tending land than assembling a thing.* Real policy detail: Ian’s school moved to fully handwritten, in-class work once ChatGPT went free ~2 years ago, because there’s no reliable way to verify authorship of anything typed at home. Matt calls it a hard line; Ian says he doesn’t know a more effective alternative if the goal is guaranteeing kids actually think for themselves.* Direct question: has Ian seen students lose the ability to sit with hard questions or tolerate difficulty because of AI/instant-answer culture? Ian: yes, sees it constantly — the “fill out the worksheet as fast as possible, then check out” mindset. Learning that comes fast doesn’t get valued or retained; things that took a year (like finally speaking up in a seminar) stick.* Riff on paragraph 100 — AI’s simulated care and the risk of losing “the very desire to form genuine human connections.” Extended into a broader point: TikTok/social media isn’t a neutral tool either — “tools don’t use you back,” but attention-economy products do. “You are the product.”* That Hideous Strength (C.S. Lewis) comes up as a parallel — the disembodied, reanimated head that the human characters believe they control but is actually being animated by an outside force — as a picture of the spiritual dimension behind powerful technology, regardless of whether its builders believe in the spiritual world.5. Two loves, limitation, and the fruit of patience1:08:00–1:18:07Drawing on paragraphs 118, 120, and 130 — the “two cities/two loves” framing (love of self vs. love of God and neighbor) and the idea that humanity flourishes through its limitations, not despite them.* Ian reads paragraph 120 in full as one of his favorite passages in the whole document — the point that eliminating suffering would also extinguish love and desire, and that “the wonders of the soul” only occur through the interplay of freedom, failure, dreams, and disappointment.* Matt connects this to efficiency as an idol: wanting to get through pain quickly and “learn everything about it as fast as possible” is never actually how growth happens. Patience, like the fruit of the Spirit, is cultivated, not built.* Concrete example: information you look up instantly (Matt’s margarita-history example) doesn’t stick the way information earned slowly does — ties directly back to what Ian sees in students.6. Closing reflections: slowness, parenthood, and craftsmanship1:18:07–1:27:00* Matt reflects on the paradox of his current season as a new dad — life feels fast, but he wants to be more intentional about slowing down and being deliberate about what he’s “cultivating” in his family, since “so much of how we do life is how we’re taught.”* Ian’s personal takeaway from the encyclical: conviction to prioritize interruptions from real people (e.g., a student who wants to talk) over routine/efficiency, and more awareness of how AI’s costs land hardest on the poor and the majority world — a blind spot he named in himself.* Malcolm Guite’s Arthurian narrative poems (Ian corrects Matt on-air: it’s a quartet, not trilogy — first is Galahad) come up as a picture of the “sweat equity” and cultivation baked into real craftsmanship, contrasted with what a single AI prompt can generate. Extends into a short reflection on the beauty of expertise and craft generally (coding included) as part of how God wired creativity into the world.Connector QuestionsQuestion from our last guest: What is one habit you know you need but haven’t started yet?Ian’s question for the next guest: What is something that’s making your life more disembodied or less human — and how could you rehumanize your life more?Guest Background NotesGuest: Ian Heisler, Matt’s brotherReference material discussed on the episode:- The Pope’s 2026 encyclical (full text/audio, ~3 hrs at normal speed)- C.S. Lewis’s That Hideous Strength- Malcolm Guite’s Arthurian poetry quartet (starting with Galahad) Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionToday, I’m joined by my friend Josh Henry. He’s been part of my story for over a decade. We met working together at Apple, and I got to watch him go from there into A21, an anti-trafficking organization where he eventually became my boss as I contracted with them through college.He’s a husband, a father, and a pastor, and lives out in Nashville. This was a really special conversation for me as it pulls on some of the biggest questions I’m wrestling with in this season: what it actually looks like to be faithful and wholehearted in a season where you can’t yet see what God’s doing.Enjoy.Lessons From Josh1. The Trifecta That Confirmed a Calling - Josh didn’t move continents on a whim. He moved on the collision of three separate certainties: a woman he was in awe of, a cause he’d fallen in love with, and a whispered inner impression from the Holy Spirit about a city — Newport Beach — he hadn’t even lived in yet. When all three lined up, the decision stopped feeling like a risk and started feeling like obedience. ~14:302. Nick and Chris “Charge Hell With a Water Pistol” - Josh’s early leaders at A21 modeled a specific kind of faith — aware of darkness, unwilling to hide from it. Being immersed in that visionary, socially engaged leadership didn’t just teach him a leadership style. It became a mirror that showed him who he already wanted to be. ~19:023. Chris Caine Found Her Calling at 40 - One of the freeing moments in the conversation: Josh’s leader didn’t discover the cause that would define her ministry until midlife. Her example taught him never to put God’s leading into a box of preferences or a fixed identity — obedience doesn’t have an age limit. ~23:164. Identity Received, Not Achieved - Leaning on Tim Keller, Josh names the trap almost every driven person falls into — tying worth to output. The gospel flips it: you’re already a son or daughter, so the work becomes something you’re free to do well, not something you need to succeed at to be somebody. ~25:315. “My Hour Has Not Yet Come” - Josh points to Jesus’s own repeated acknowledgment of timing that wasn’t his to control. Living in “the space between” the promise and its fulfillment — what Josh calls hope deferred — is where trust actually gets built, not around it. ~27:026. Wholehearted Even Without an Outlet - While waiting years for a platform to preach, Josh wrote sermons with no audience — simply because faithfulness in the wait looked like doing the work before anyone gave him permission to. He calls it enrolling in “the school of timing.” ~29:497. The Painting Is Still Being Made - Trusting a process you can’t see the end of, Josh compares it to paint hitting a canvas — you don’t know yet if it’s a Jackson Pollock or a Picasso, but it’s still going to be beautiful in its own right once it’s finished. ~37:318. Content Dreamers, Not a Contradiction - Being satisfied with today and still dreaming toward tomorrow aren’t opposites. Josh preached an entire message on this to his students, insisting contentment and ambition can live in the same heart at the same time. ~41:569. Convictions You Don’t Set Get Set For You - On raising two young kids in a hyperconnected culture, Josh’s most quotable line of the conversation: if you don’t decide your family’s priorities on purpose, the culture will decide them for you by default. ~53:1010. A Great Conversation Is What Makes His Heart Say Yes - Asked what makes him feel most alive, Josh didn’t point to ministry wins or metrics. He pointed to the table — to shared meals and honest conversation — calling it a preview of what heaven itself might mostly be like. ~58:33 Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionToday I’m joined by Peter Varberg. He grew up a missionary kid in Tacloban, Philippines — the kind of upbringing where his dad’s name opened doors before he ever said a word himself, and being blonde and blue-eyed in a country where that stood out meant he never really got to be anonymous. He studied film almost by accident, won “Film of the Year” as a freshman with a borrowed camera, and eventually found his way into sales and coaching.We talk about the real difference between managing people and leading them, what nearly two decades of missionary-family duty taught him about doing work , and how becoming a father less than a year into marriage cracked open everything he thought he understood about provision. We talk about how knowing when to pause something is important and that most of what shapes us doesn’t look like a plan while we’re living it — usually you only see the hand that was guiding you once you look back.If you enjoyed this podcast and want to hear more like this, please consider subscribing. This is a passion project for me and the more I can fund this, the more time I can invest in it.Lessons from Peter1. Coaching and therapy solve different problems, and knowing the line matters. Peter went through ICF (International Coaching Federation) training that drew a clear distinction: therapy looks backward, processing where a pattern started and unlearning it; coaching looks forward, setting goals and taking action. He’s upfront that the line gets blurry in practice, and that part of coaching well is knowing when to point someone toward a therapist instead of trying to be one. (13:00–15:00)2. Growing up in a “fishbowl” taught him to carry expectations before he ever chose his own. As a missionary kid in Tacloban, Peter couldn’t go anywhere without people already knowing his father — a six-foot-three American pastor who spoke five languages and knew everybody in the city. That visibility came with a quiet pressure: his actions reflected on his parents’ reputation, and he absorbed a heightened sense of duty and responsibility long before he understood he was absorbing it. All three siblings, he notes, ended up in therapy working through some version of the same thing — a reminder that even a genuinely good upbringing can wire in patterns worth examining as an adult. (18:00–21:00)3. “Nobody ends up doing what they studied” — so he picked his major out of curiosity, not certainty. As kids, Peter’s dad walked him and his brother around Tacloban to interview successful people in different fields about how they’d chosen their careers — his own version of a podcast, years before podcasts existed. The lesson Peter actually walked away with was almost a joke: since so few people end up in the field they studied, he decided to study what was simply interesting to him. That’s how a video-editing hobby became a double major in graphic design and film. (27:00–30:00)4. He built his early film career on effort, not innate talent. As a freshman intro-to-film student, Peter borrowed a friend’s Canon 5D Mark II — brand new technology at the time — while everyone else was still shooting on mini-DV tape. The film wasn’t exceptional, he admits, but it looked like a movie next to everyone else’s student work, and he won Film of the Year as a freshman. From there he went all-in: building his own camera dollies out of PVC pipe and skateboard wheels, welding jibs with a friend, chasing every new technique he could find on YouTube. (36:00–40:00)5. His daughter’s inability to self-soothe became his sharpest leadership lesson yet. Peter went down a rabbit hole on “assisted naps” and newborn brain development — kids under a certain age physically cannot calm themselves down, so a crying baby isn’t being difficult, it’s in genuine fight-or-flight. That reframe from “why won’t you just settle” to “this is medically incapable of self-soothing yet” produced compassion instead of frustration. He maps the same insight directly onto coaching: leaders who are “unconsciously competent” at their own jobs often can’t see that a new hire’s mistakes aren’t laziness — it’s literally their first time doing this. (52:00–58:00)6. “Work is not the enemy” — and he wants to build something around that conviction. Peter is sitting on one recorded episode of a podcast he hasn’t finished launching, built around the idea (inspired by Tim Keller’s Every Good Endeavor) that culture treats work as something to escape rather than as part of our design. Coming from a family of missionaries on both sides, he’s wrestled directly with the sacred-versus-secular question — pastor or missionary vs. a “regular” job — and landed on the conviction that work itself is good, not a necessary evil to be minimized. (58:00–1:03:00)7. Pausing a good idea can be the healthiest decision, not a failure of nerve. One of Peter’s own coaches pushed him to book a recording date for his podcast on the spot — and he did, and it worked. But he’s just as quick to push back on hustle-culture coaching that treats every unfulfilled dream as fear in disguise. His actual framework: look honestly at your current capacity and priorities, and if there’s nothing left to give something, pausing it is a healthy call — not a leap of faith you’re too scared to take. (58:00–1:03:00)8. Marriage and a baby eight months later pushed him into a season of “I don’t have enough” — until it wasn’t.Peter got married about a year and a half before this conversation, then found out they were expecting just eight months in. He describes months of feeling like he lacked the capacity, in his own strength, to meet the need he thought he needed to meet — a kind of slow-motion Gideon story. Once the baby arrived, he could finally see that the provision he needed had been there all along; he just couldn’t access it by force of will. (1:05:00–1:08:00)9. You can only see God’s faithfulness by looking backward, never forward. Closing the conversation, Peter lands on the image of rowing a boat — facing backward toward where you’ve been, with no way to see what’s ahead. He connects it to “your word is a lamp unto my feet”: in the ancient world, a lamp only lit the very next step, not the whole road. The takeaway isn’t to demand more clarity before moving — it’s to trust that the next step is the only one you’re owed right now. (1:10:00–1:12:00) Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionToday I’m joined by Arian Ghiacy. He grew up in a single-parent home in a rough part of Anaheim, and from a young age he clung to the idea that even though his earthly father had failed him, he had a Heavenly Father who never would. That conviction ends up threading through almost every decision in his life — a part-time bookstore job at Insight for Living, a season writing thank-you letters at Orange County Rescue Mission, an unplanned four-year run at an investment firm through the 2008 crash, and — almost by accident — becoming the interim pastor of a small Afghan Christian church in LA while working full-time in the corporate world.We talk about what it actually looks like to hear God’s voice at every turn of a career that never really had a five-year plan attached to it. Arian walks through building a development department and volunteer program from the ground up at Friendly Center over 13 years, why he believes relationships — not tactics — are what actually move fundraising, and what it cost him to keep saying yes to open doors while also building a marriage and raising kids. He also gets honest about the season he got caught up chasing certifications and credentials, and the question from his pastor that reframed his whole relationship to ambition. We close on his new role as Director of Advancement at a classical school, and what it means to finally stop trying to plan his own life.Most of the doors that shape your life don’t look like much when you’re standing in front of them — looking back is often the only way you ever really see how God was driving the whole time.Enjoy.10 Lessons from Arian1. A failed earthly father doesn’t disqualify you from a faithful Heavenly one.Arian’s story starts with a wound that could have become a lifelong excuse: a dad who wasn’t there in the way a father is meant to be. But instead of letting that absence define him, he let it drive him toward God — not as a concept, but as Father. That single shift becomes a thread through everything else in his life: the courage to step into responsibility early, the ability to keep showing up without needing perfect conditions, and the steady belief that he isn’t ultimately orphaned in the world. A lot of people spend years trying to “outwork” a father wound. Arian did something rarer: he let it become the place where trust in God got forged. (2:00–6:00)2. God’s leading is usually only visible in hindsight.Over and over, Arian describes a life that didn’t feel like a master plan while it was happening. It felt like doors opening, seasons changing, and him doing the next faithful thing without knowing what it would add up to. Only later could he see the through-line — how one strange job, one unexpected relationship, one “this will be temporary” season became the training ground for what came next. The lesson isn’t “you should be more strategic.” It’s almost the opposite: don’t demand clarity as the price of obedience. God rarely gives you the full map — but He does give enough light for the next step. (19:00–24:00, 1:08:00)3. Say yes to the small, unglamorous door in front of you.Arian’s defining opportunities didn’t arrive with a spotlight. They looked like filing cabinets, entry-level tasks, weird scheduling breaks, and roles that sounded unimpressive on paper. But he treated the “small” thing in front of him as meaningful, and that posture kept positioning him for bigger responsibility. There’s a quiet challenge here for anyone waiting for their calling to feel epic: sometimes God hides the next chapter inside a task you’d be tempted to dismiss. Humility and faithfulness with the small door is often the only way you ever get to the bigger one. (6:00–14:00)4. Discernment grows out of relationship with God, not a formula.When you listen to Arian talk about guidance, he isn’t describing a technique — he’s describing a life with God. “The more you pray and lean into Him, the easier it becomes to recognize those moments.” That’s not a hack; it’s a long obedience. What makes his decisions compelling isn’t that he always knew the perfect answer. It’s that he kept returning to prayer, wise counsel, and a willingness to be led — even when it meant changing direction. If you want clarity, the most practical thing you can do isn’t build a decision spreadsheet. It’s deepen the relationship that produces discernment in the first place. (24:00–35:00)5. Relationships outperform tactics in fundraising — and in life.Arian has been close enough to development work to see the temptation: lean on tactics because they’re measurable and repeatable. But his conviction is simple: donors don’t give because you found the perfect angle — they give because they trust you, they trust the mission, and they feel personally connected to the story. Strategy matters, but it can’t substitute for credibility and care. That’s true in fundraising, and it’s true in almost every arena: the long-term wins usually come from trust built slowly, not cleverness deployed quickly. (50:00–54:00)6. Servant leadership means being willing to stay in the background.Arian keeps circling back to a kind of leadership that doesn’t need attention to feel valuable. He talks about serving, supporting, and building — doing work that’s essential but not flashy. In a world that trains us to measure leadership by visibility, his posture is a rebuke: you can carry real influence without the stage. Servant leadership doesn’t mean you have no conviction or direction — it means you’re more committed to the mission than to being seen. And in development and ministry work especially, the person who can lead from the background is often the person who can sustain the work for the long haul. (54:00–1:00:00)7. Knowing when a season is over matters as much as knowing when to say yes.Most people can relate to the fear of starting something new. Fewer people have the courage to admit when a season has done its work and it’s time to release it. Arian’s story includes several closures that weren’t driven by burnout or disaster — just an internal sense that the assignment was complete. That’s wisdom: being faithful to a season without turning it into an identity. Sometimes staying too long is its own form of disobedience. The holy work is learning to recognize not only the doors God opens, but the doors He’s quietly asking you to walk away from. (13:00–19:00, 24:00–35:00)8. Credentials and career-climbing can crowd out contentment.One of the sharpest moments in the conversation is that pastor’s question: “Have you needed those things for God to lead you through all of your previous doors?” It’s a gentle but devastating dismantling of the assumption that the next step requires a new badge. Arian isn’t anti-learning; he’s anti-striving. The point is that ambition can disguise itself as stewardship — and suddenly you’re collecting credentials to quiet insecurity, not to serve people better. The reframe is freeing: if God has been faithful to lead you so far, you don’t need to manufacture legitimacy. You need to keep listening and keep showing up. (1:04:00)9. Trust has to be paired with patience.Arian’s life is a slow story. Not because nothing happened — but because growth, clarity, and answered prayers often took years to come into focus. He keeps pointing out that God’s timing rarely matches our urgency, and that the fruit of a season is often invisible while you’re in it. Patience isn’t passive; it’s active endurance — continuing to do the next right thing while you wait for God to make sense of it. Trust without patience turns into anxiety. Patience without trust turns into resignation. Together, they form a kind of steady faith that can survive long seasons of “not yet.” (1:08:00)10. Parenting becomes a mirror for your own relationship with God.That pants story is funny because it’s so human — and it lands because it’s so true. Parenting puts you face to face with your own limits: how quickly you get frustrated, how hard it is to release control, how often love gets tested by repetition. And in that pressure, you start seeing yourself in your child — and then seeing God with you in the same frame. Matt’s point isn’t that parenting makes you holy overnight. It’s that it reveals what’s already in you, and it gives you constant opportunities to practice patience, gentleness, and surrender. If you want a daily discipleship lab, you don’t have to go looking for one — it’s already in your house. (1:13:00) Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionWill Tober is a Jesus follower, husband, and father whose faith shapes the way he works. His experience spans things like producing the documentary The Drop Box, board member at the Pregnancy Resource Center, and co-founder of 100 Companies That Care.In this conversation, we get into how a random LA Times article led a college kid to South Korea to film a story that ended up changing his life, how that film planted a seed for everything he’s built since in the nonprofit world, and what it actually looks like to be a driven man trying to hold family, faith, career, and calling all at once.Enjoy.Lessons From Will1. Draw Hard Lines Around What Matters Will is home by 5:30pm. Non-negotiable. He’s learned to maximize the hours he gives to work so he can be fully present for everything else. He acknowledges that in commercial real estate, more hours usually means more money — and he’s made peace with leaving something on the table. Faith makes that easier. The practical boundary is just the output of a deeper conviction about what actually matters. (10:08)2. Community Isn’t About Having Answers — It’s About Not Being Alone One of the most honest moments in the conversation is when Will talks about how community doesn’t usually hand you solutions. It just reminds you that you’re not the only one who doesn’t have this figured out. We know rationally that parenting and marriage and career and faith have challenged every generation before us — and yet it still feels uniquely impossible when it’s yours. The right people around you don’t fix that. They just make it bearable enough to keep going. (13:56)3. The Achiever’s Real Enemy Is Fear of Failure Will describes himself as someone who’s always had an achiever mentality — doing every sport, setting long-term goals earlier than most of his peers, carrying a sense of family legacy from grandparents who immigrated from Mexico and a dad who was the first in the family to go to college. But underneath all of it was a pretty intense fear of failure that prevented him from trying things where there was a real risk of not succeeding. He’s been working to break that his whole life. High ambition and deep fear of failure are not opposites — they often travel together. (19:18)4. Less About What You’re Doing, More About Who You’re Becoming Will talks about work not primarily as a vehicle for income or even impact, but as a classroom. He’s passionate about commercial real estate, believes there’s good in it, and sees opportunities to build relationships and invest in the kingdom through it. But more than any of that, he believes a big piece of why God puts us in the work we’re in is to teach us things we couldn’t learn any other way. That framing changes everything about how you show up when the work is hard. (25:24)5. Saying Yes Before You Know What It Costs Is the Whole Point When Brian pitched Will on flying to South Korea to make a documentary about a pastor who built a box to receive abandoned babies, Will had no film background and no idea what a producer even did. He said yes anyway. That yes eventually generated $10 million, led to a Netflix deal, and planted seeds for everything he’s built since in the nonprofit world. You don’t need to know what you’re doing. You just need to give your yes. (31:00)6. God Redefines the Success Metrics The Drop Box got rejected by Sundance, Cannes, and every major film festival they submitted to. The only ones that accepted it were the Christian ones — which was ironic, because they’d set out to make something that would reach beyond the church. They ended up winning $150,000 at a San Antonio Christian film festival that doesn’t even exist anymore, which funded the rest of the film. Will says in its success, God was still refining them by stripping away all the cool factors. Sometimes the door you wanted to walk through isn’t the one that opens. (35:55)7. The Real Impact Is Usually Hidden 100 Companies That Care has generated unexpected outcomes Will and his co-founder never planned for — nonprofits collaborating with each other, board members joining from the business community, volunteer events, and donations beyond what the format requires. One nonprofit donated their entire literacy curriculum to an orphanage they’d never heard of before meeting them at a quarterly meeting. Will says most of the results from saying yes to God are hidden — seeds you plant and never see sprout. You build anyway. (48:53)8. On the Other Side of Every No Is a Yes Will’s not naturally good at saying no. But the reframe that’s helped him most is this: every no is a yes to something else. He’s not declining because he doesn’t believe in what he’s being asked to do — he’s saying yes to something that ranks higher. And in this season, that something is almost always family. That turns no from a refusal into a redirection. (52:35)9. Fatherhood Is the Best Theology Class You’ll Ever Take Will says he lives his faith more than he could ever read it. Becoming a dad has given him a window into who God is that no amount of Bible study could fully open. When he’s frustrated with his son, he catches himself thinking about how God is equally patient with him. When he feels completely unequipped as a parent, he reminds himself that God is his son’s real Father. Fatherhood doesn’t just teach you about love — it teaches you what it feels like to be loved the way God loves you. (57:40)10. Parenting Is the Biggest Obstacle and the Clearest Calling When asked what’s occupying the most headspace and keeping him up at night, Will doesn’t say business development or nonprofit growth. He says parenting. The tension between feeling utterly unequipped and desperately wanting to get it right. The fear of messing his kids up. The daily work of being comfortable in the uncomfortable. He’s not performing like he has it together — he’s just trying to show up and trust that presence counts for something. (58:36) Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionBruce Bartolomeo is an entrepreneur, husband, father, and grandfather who spent over 30 years building a construction company before stepping away to devote himself fully to mentorship and service. He serves on the board of The Barnabas Group and several other non profitsI loved getting to chat with Bruce and talk about the power of early mentorship, the cost of being more married to your business than your wife, the paradigm shift from owner to steward, and what it looks like to be an intentional father of daughters. I’m really excited to look at this conversation throughout the years and continue to glean from his wisdom. Enjoy!Lessons from Bruce1. You can be starving for a mentor without knowing it. (00:43) Bruce opens with a line that landed hard: “I didn’t even know I needed a mentor when I was your age. I think I was internally starving for one.” A lot of men are running hard and empty at the same time, proving something to no one in particular. Naming the hunger is the first step to doing something about it.2. Grit is an asset and a liability — it depends on what you’re married to. (01:02) Bruce was so driven to succeed that he was, in his words, “more married to his business than his wife.” The grit that built the company also cost his family. He’s honest about the resentment it created and the healing that had to follow. High capacity without self-awareness is just high-speed damage.3. When your identity shifts from achievement to Christ, everything changes. (01:58) The turning point for Bruce wasn’t a program or a sermon — it was understanding, at a deep level, that his identity was in Christ and not in what he did or what others associated with him. Until that settled, nothing else could. Identity is the foundation. Everything else is built on top of it.4. The right kind of leader doesn’t drive people — they follow. (05:54) Bruce references the image of Middle Eastern shepherds, where sheep follow the shepherd rather than being driven. Leadership built on trust, shared mission, and genuine care creates followership you don’t have to force. People move with leaders they believe in. That’s not management. That’s discipleship.5. Some of the most formative mentors teach by contrast. (07:10) Bruce learned how not to lead from a difficult boss early in his career. He made a promise to himself: if I ever have employees, I will never treat them this way. Negative models are still models. The question is whether we let bad experiences make us bitter or better.6. Trust extended to you builds confidence that lasts decades. (14:16) At 14, a gas station owner handed Bruce the keys and told him to close the place. He’d only been working there a few months. That act of trust — unexpected, unearned, extended freely — built something in Bruce that shaped how he led people for the rest of his life. When someone older trusts you and you don’t betray it, it frames how life works.7. The best mentors love you back into line. (19:44) Lou Spinelli, Bruce’s cousin’s husband and the man he spent summers with on the farm, never got harsh when Bruce was heading in the wrong direction. He would have “loved him back into line” — honest conversation, relational warmth, no withdrawal of affection. That kind of correction is more powerful than punishment because the relationship is the accountability.8. Stewardship changes everything. (28:54) In a Convene meeting, something clicked for Bruce. He heard men talking about “my business, my business, my business” — and then realized: we’re not owners. We’re temporary stewards who have to give an account. When you hold your work that way, you’re responsible not just to yourself and your employees, but to the One who gave you every tool, every talent, every opportunity.9. He doesn’t always call the equipped — and that’s intentional. (31:07) Bruce says he believes God intentionally does not call the equipped, because equipped people tend to rely on their own capacity. The call that comes to someone with nothing is the one where God gets to say, “Watch me.” That’s where the excitement is. That’s the tip of the spear.10. Your career is what you’re paid for. Your calling is what you’re made for. (34:02) Bruce did Bob Shank’s Priority Living Master’s Program from 2003–2006, still running his business at the time. That three-year journey broke something open. The distinction between career and calling wasn’t just semantic — it fundamentally reoriented how he thought about the years ahead of him.11. The fruit of fatherhood shows up later than you plant it. (39:02) Bruce’s daughter in Virginia calls him nearly every day. His grandkids sleep over once a week. His daughters are the same hospitable, community-building people he and Becky modeled for years. None of that happens without the seeds planted quietly over decades. Presence compounds.12. What you allow, you encourage. (01:10:30) Asked about a lesson from his greatest failures, Bruce’s answer was this: what you allow, you encourage. In business, in parenting, in relationships — avoidance of necessary confrontation isn’t kindness. It’s permission. Addressing what needs to be addressed, respectfully and early, is one of the most loving things a leader can do.13. Your daughters need a father, not another friend. (01:07:28) Bruce is clear: they have enough friends. They need a father. That means meeting the boys, having the garage talk, setting expectations high, and being willing to be the bad guy so she doesn’t have to fight that battle alone. The goal isn’t their approval. It’s their safety and formation.14. Apologize on your knees. (01:02:15) When Bruce was too harsh with one of his daughters, he didn’t let it pass. He went to her room, got down to her level, looked her in the eye, and said: “I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve that. Will you forgive me?” That teaches children that trust can be restored — and it models the kind of humility and ownership that forms the next generation.15. Check your wake. (01:20:18) Bruce closes with a metaphor from water skiing: the condition of your wake depends on how you’re driving the boat. When you interact with someone, what’s the condition of your wake? Did you leave them better for having been with you — or did you make the water rough for them? It’s a simple question worth asking after every significant interaction. Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionToday I'm joined by one of my mentors, Russ Cline — pastor, family man, and entrepreneur who has started multiple global organizations and currently leads The Barnabas Group and Leader Mundial, a global leadership movement that's spent nearly 20 years training and coaching leaders across the world.We get into one of the biggest questions in my life right now: how to build a sustainable, fruitful career while also being a present father — two things that can feel like they're constantly pulling against each other. Incredibly thankful that he's poured into me so much. Love getting to do life alongside him.Lessons From Russ(5:37) Know what you're great at — and let the rest be good enough. Russ learned early that chasing his weaknesses just pulled his strengths down into mediocrity. The hardest part wasn't identifying his strengths. It was admitting where he was weakest, and getting his ego out of the way long enough to ask for help there instead of pretending he didn't need it.(7:04) Exposure to a bigger world changes how small your own world looks. Moving to Ecuador at 11 gave Russ a posture he's carried his whole life — less critical of any one culture, more aware that no place has it all figured out. He later made the same choice for his own kids, moving the family back to Ecuador so they'd grow up understanding the world is bigger than Southern California.(12:43) Someone has to call out the leader in you before you can see it yourself. Russ didn't set out to be a leader. A high school mentor named Randy, and later a college mentor named Guy, both pushed him into formal leadership roles he wouldn't have chosen on his own. The pattern: someone sees it, names it, and stays close enough to walk through it with you.(17:48) The best mentorship gives freedom with an expectation attached. At 20, a mentor named Carolyn handed Russ a vehicle, a budget, and zero instructions for a summer of partnership-building in Mexico. The freedom wasn't a lack of expectation — it was trust. And because she trusted him, Russ held himself to a standard nobody had to enforce.(20:00) Leader Mundial wasn't built because Russ had the answers. It started in 2007 with 13 leaders from seven or eight countries, paired with coaches from North America. Russ built the community because he wanted a seat at the table himself — and what he learned fast was that the coaches needed the leaders just as much as the leaders needed the coaches. Nobody in the room had it all figured out, including him.(27:02) Leaders quit for one of two reasons: they don't know what to do, or they burn out. A mentor told Russ this decades ago, and he's watched it prove true in every community he's been part of since — including his own life. The fix isn't choosing one or the other to guard against. It's staying a learner and finding rhythm at the same time.(30:00) Confidence is a strength right up until it becomes ego. Russ named confidence as the leadership trait most likely to flip into a liability. Knowing what you're capable of is essential — but the moment you think you can do it all, you've lost the thing that made you effective in the first place.(31:42) Convergence is the moment your past stops feeling random. Russ uses a life-planning process built on two questions: how did I end up here, and where do I want to go. The light comes on when someone realizes something from their childhood is showing up directly in their work today — and that recognition changes how they see their whole story.(35:54) The tension between career and family never resolves. You just learn to live inside it. This is the center of the conversation. Russ's advice wasn't a framework for balancing the two — it was permission to stop expecting the tension to disappear. "You can't sell out to one or the other. You have to live in the tension. And that tension will not go away."(43:23) Looking back, the regret wasn't ambition — it was identity wrapped up in conquering new ground. Russ named travel and the pursuit of growing influence as the one thing he'd change. Not because the work wasn't valuable, but because some of it was driven by ego — by needing to be the guy who goes and conquers — rather than by what his family actually needed from him in that season.(44:20) Wealth isn't what you think it is until you're old enough to measure it correctly. Russ doesn't measure his life in financial terms. He measures it in the depth of relationship with his kids, his grandkids, and his wife Gina — and by that measure, he says he's the wealthiest man you'll find. That reframe came with age, not before it.(46:50) Chase the relationship, not the check. Bob Shank, a Barnabas co-founder, put it bluntly: if you treat donors like a personal checkbook, that's all you'll ever get from them. Russ has lived both sides of that mistake — taking the quick gift and missing the relationship that would have been worth far more.(51:29) God doesn't show up in the balance. He shows up in the extremes. Russ used to teach balance as the goal. He's since landed somewhere different: life is a series of extremes, and trying to stay safely in the middle means missing what God actually has for you on the edges. The goal isn't to live there permanently — it's to find the edge, learn from it, and recenter.(55:55) Joy multiplies when it's not about you. Watching his almost-four-year-old grandson at an art show. Watching a leader finally walk into what God made them for. Russ said it plainly: he used to think joy had to come from something he did. Now he knows he can experience joy just as fully through other people's breakthroughs — whether that's a grandson, a nonprofit leader, or someone in his coaching community. Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionKatie Kelly is the founder and president of Through It All Foundation, a nonprofit that equips churches and individuals to walk alongside people grieving the loss of a loved one. At 27 years old, Katie's husband Ben was killed in a shark attack while surfing off the coast of California. What followed was one of the most profound journeys of grief, faith, and calling I've heard — and what emerged on the other side is an organization born not from ambition, but from obedience. I encourage you to lean into the wisdom she has to share around how to care for those who are grieving… a topic that our culture is not great at. Lessons from Katie(00:14:59) The vertical and horizontal gospel. Katie describes healing as having two dimensions — a vertical one (God meeting us directly) and a horizontal one (God meeting us through people). She’s found the horizontal to be the most tangible expression of God’s love in her darkest season.(00:17:56) Ben’s lesson: don’t rush out of it. When Ben was going through something hard, he’d resist Katie’s urge to fix it and say, “God has something to teach me in this — why would I want to jump out too quick?” That posture of staying in the difficulty became foundational to who Katie is now.(00:28:27) Grief comes in waves — forever. Katie no longer believes she’ll ever be finished grieving. The love for Ben didn’t stop, so why would the grief? What changes is your ability to carry it. The waves don’t disappear; you just learn to swim a little better.(00:30:03) Validating emotion makes it smaller, not bigger. Before Ben died, Katie used to try to dampen people’s hard emotions, thinking validation would amplify them. She learned the opposite is true — when someone sits with you in your pain, the pain becomes more bearable, not more overwhelming.(00:38:58) C.S. Lewis gave her permission to question. Reading A Grief Observed — and seeing a revered man of faith struggle openly with God — gave Katie the freedom to wrestle with her own faith without shame. She’s convinced that kind of honest lament is something the church desperately needs more of.(00:41:14) “Can God be trusted?” is a different question than “Does God exist?” Katie could never say God didn’t exist — she’d seen him show up too clearly. But in years two and three, the harder question surfaced: do I want to serve you? That distinction is one of the most honest things I’ve heard someone say about faith after suffering.(00:45:44) God is in the details — before you even know you need them. Two years before Through It All had a logo or a name, a coroner collected sea glass from the beach where Ben died and gave it to Katie. She had no idea what it would become. That kind of providence, she says, is what rebuilt her trust in God — small gifts she couldn’t explain away.(00:57:58) God redeems terrible things — but He doesn’t cause them so we’ll have something to do. Katie was very clear on this distinction. She battled the fear that starting a nonprofit would feel like making Ben’s death useful. Her theology: God is in the business of redemption, not orchestrated tragedy.(01:03:28) Bring your bucket — but don’t take theirs home. One of the most useful images from this conversation: everyone brings their own bucket into a hard conversation. It’s not your job to carry their bucket out with yours. A grieving person needs someone healthy walking beside them, not someone equally weighed down.(01:08:04) Job’s friends were great — until they opened their mouths. The Jewish practice of sitting shiva — where no one speaks until the grieving person does — was exactly what Job needed. Katie believes the church has lost this practice of presence. The most loving thing you can do in the wake of loss is often just to be there, silent, without trying to make yourself more comfortable. Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionSteven Lindenfelser is a graphic designer, musician, voracious reader, and father of two who joined me in his beautifully curated home studio — a space as eclectic and intentional as the man himself. We talked about the origins of his creativity, what it actually means to make something original, how fatherhood is forcing him to rediscover his own childhood, and why AI doesn't scare him at all. Steven also shared one of the most striking spiritual experiences I've ever heard.Lessons1. Your earliest creative memory matters more than you think. (00:38:38) Steven didn't have a tidy answer about when creativity started — until the question unlocked something: a dinosaur book he made in kindergarten. The pride and wonder he felt after finishing it became a kind of blueprint for what creativity would mean to him for the rest of his life. First memories of making something aren't small — they're seeds.2. There's a difference between mimicry and original creativity. (00:44:01) Steven and Matt wrestled with what actually makes something "creative." The conversation landed on a meaningful distinction: mimicry is learning the language; original creativity is when you synthesize your influences into something distinctly yours. As Steven put it, we're all branching off the same creative tree — but the branch you grow is your own.3. Creative process matters more than creative output. (00:55:40) Inspired by the artist CJ Hendry, who spends a week or more on each hyper-realistic colored pencil piece despite the existence of AI that could replicate it in seconds, Steven made the case that the process of creating is the point. The satisfaction doesn't live in the final product — it lives in the hours you put in to get there.4. Your creative space is a physical map of your inner world. (00:03:55) Steven's studio — stacked with typography books, vintage records, car artifacts, and mid-century design objects — isn't just aesthetic. It's a curated environment built to sustain and prompt creative thought. He noted that even when he ends up on Pinterest anyway, the physical space holds a kind of backup energy he can reach for when he's really stuck.5. Parenting is a second childhood — with all your baggage. (00:30:51) Both Matt and Steven reflected on how having young kids puts you back in the middle of the very emotional and developmental experiences you lived through yourself — except now you're carrying every lesson, wound, and habit from your own upbringing. The challenge is staying self-aware enough to give your kids something better without overcorrecting.6. Structure and creativity aren't opposites — but the line is personal. (01:11:46) Steven's mom was a homeschool drill sergeant who pushed piano lessons hard. The result? He plays today. But his friend Levi got the same treatment with tennis — and now won't touch a racket. The takeaway isn't a formula. It's that fostering creativity in your kids requires knowing that specific kid — how much to push, how much to let them wander, and what they'll hold against you later.7. Sometimes God shows up in the most unexpected vessels. (01:27:18) The most powerful moment of the conversation came at the end: Steven's sister has a seizure disorder that wipes her short-term memory. On two separate occasions, she woke from a seizure and — with complete clarity — looked at Steven and said, "Jesus loves you. He wants you to pursue your passions." Then she'd slip back into disorientation with zero recollection of what she'd said. It became the cornerstone of his faith. Some messages find their way through in ways that defy easy explanation. Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

Today I’m joined by Cassie Furnari, founder and president of Milele Home — a rescue and recovery home for homeless young men in Kenya. This is a Barnabas Q&A episode, so it’s a bit different in format: Cassie shared her story with a group of young leaders, and we got to hear some really great questions from the audience. What struck me most is how Cassie didn’t set out to start a nonprofit. She was wrapping up an internship in Kenya when she met twelve boys living on the streets, tried to hand them off to existing organizations, and was told no. So she did something about it herself. That accidental obedience, over fifteen years, has become something extraordinary.If you want to learn more about Milele or Barnabas Group, links are in the show notes below.Links:* Cassie on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/cassie-furnari-60b503102* Milele Home: milelehome.org* Barnabas Group OC: barnabasgroupoc.orgWe discuss:* The origin story of Milele and how Cassie stumbled into founding it (0:43)* Growing up in a missions-minded family and how it shaped her heart (5:13)* How Cassie protects herself from burnout leading a demanding nonprofit (5:59)* Addressing root causes — why Milele works with families, not just the boys (8:40)* The “Restore” step: physical, spiritual, and emotional rehabilitation on-site (11:55)* Building and succession planning around key local leaders Joel and Margaret (13:29)* A tour of the new campus: farm, chapel, courts, counseling center, and more (14:34)* Her advice for young professionals wanting to get involved in grassroots work (16:35)* The vision for Milele as a training hub — not just replication (19:14)* The spiritual warfare Cassie felt the moment the campus opened (21:46)10 lessons from my conversation with Cassie Furnari:* (0:43) The best organizations are often built by accident. Cassie wasn’t trying to start a nonprofit. She was finishing an internship, met twelve boys on the streets, tried to hand them off to other organizations, and was told no. That gap — and her refusal to accept it — is where Milele began.* (2:01) “I can’t leave without doing something” is a calling in disguise. That phrase is one of the most honest descriptions of vocation I’ve heard. Cassie didn’t have a vision statement or a five-year plan. She had a conviction she couldn’t ignore.* (3:17) Locally-led is not just a strategy — it’s a value. From the beginning, Cassie wanted what she was building to be owned by Kenyans. She found Joel and Margaret — a pastor and a trained social worker — who became the true architects of Milele’s culture and impact. That humility has made the work sustainable.* (5:13) The seeds of calling are planted early. Cassie grew up going to Mexico and Kenya with her family through their church. She didn’t manufacture her passion — it was cultivated in her over years of early exposure to global need. Pay attention to where your heart was opened young.* (5:59) Burnout doesn’t announce itself — it accumulates. Cassie shared honestly that this last season has been the closest to burnout she’s felt. It took outside community — not just her own willpower — to recognize it and respond. The people around us often see what we can’t.* (7:42) Empowering your team is the best anti-burnout strategy. Because Cassie trusts her team in Kenya, she can actually step away. Permission to rest only works if you’ve built people who are empowered to run without you.* (9:50) Per one boy served, eight people in his family are impacted. That’s not a statistic — that’s a philosophy. Milele doesn’t just help boys get off the streets. They go into homes, work with mothers, run addiction recovery courses, and partner with local churches. The ripple effect is the point.* (12:21) You can’t go straight from the streets into school. The “Restore” phase exists because there’s a gap — not in resources, but in readiness. Trauma-informed care, physical detox, discipleship, life skills: these create the bridge between where someone is and where they can go.* (17:36) “Your vocation is where the world’s deepest need and your greatest gladness meet.” This quote from Cassie’s college days has stayed with her ever since — and it shows. The advice she gives young people isn’t about résumés or roles. It’s about finding where your specific fire meets a specific need.* (21:46) Big breakthroughs invite spiritual opposition. After four years of planning, designing, and fundraising, the Milele campus finally opened. And almost immediately, Cassie said it felt like everything was coming against them. She framed it simply: “I don’t think we’re making the enemy happy right now.” There’s something worth sitting with in that.About Cassie Furnari: Cassie Furnari is the founder and president of Milele Home, a rescue and recovery nonprofit serving homeless young men in Kenya. What started as an act of stubborn compassion at the end of a college internship has grown into a fully-staffed residential campus offering physical restoration, trauma-informed counseling, faith-based discipleship, vocational training, and family intervention. Cassie is also a member of the Barnabas Group OC’s Emerging Leaders cohort, where she continues to develop alongside other young leaders in ministry and business. She lives in Southern California with her husband and kids. Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionNoah is a pastor, husband, father, and thoughtful friend who spends his mornings making espresso and being present with his daughter before the busyness of the day begins. We begin with a quote from Pierre Teilhard de Chardin about trusting the slow work of God, then discuss how deep thinking comes from reading the ancients, why Jesuits produce such contemplative writers, and Noah's love for early church fathers like Justin Martyr and C.S. Lewis. Noah shares his conviction that character development is the slowest work—looking back and realizing he wasn't nearly as mature as he thought—and opens up about a pivotal youth ministry season when everything seemed to be failing until one girl encountered God in a nearly empty room, teaching him that focusing only on outcomes makes you miss the beauty of the moment. We discuss the humility required to listen to those who've gone before us, why we don't grow alone, how reading ancient writers reveals we're rarely as novel as we think, and Noah's wrestling with atonement theories and the anxiety of wondering where the world is going as a father. I hope this conversation challenges you to trust the slow work of God in your character, read broadly and humbly from those who've come before, and remember that your small daily actions matter even when the problems feel too big to solve.Lessons from NoahSocial pressure can be a tool for productivity. (4:40) When asked if social pressure motivates him, Noah responds immediately: “Thousand percent.” He loves coffee shops but has discovered libraries are the most underrated places—free, quiet, and full of social accountability. The presence of others working keeps him from falling into YouTube rabbit holes. Sometimes the constraint of knowing someone might see your screen is exactly what you need to stay focused. Productivity isn’t always about willpower—sometimes it’s about engineering the right environment.Character development is the slowest work you’ll ever do. (19:03) Noah reflects on what he thought would be faster in life: “I think the slowest thing that’s taken a lot of work that I thought would be faster is my character.” At every stage—teenage years, young adult, mid-twenties, now approaching thirties—he thought he was farther along than he really was. “I underestimated the amount of work in discipline and honestly partnership with the Spirit of God to move me into a person replicating the kingdom of God.” Looking back, he sees he wasn’t nearly as patient, loving, or kind as he thought. Character is built slowly, and you only realize how much work remains with time.Busyness is the Americanized metric for success—and it’s backwards. (20:54) Noah critiques the cultural reflex: when you ask someone how they’re doing, the answer is “busy.” Being busy has become a status symbol in Orange County—if you’re busy, you must be doing well. But the actual ideal? “Not doing anything. It’s like chilling and having so much money that you can just do whatever you want.” Both extremes are wrong. Somewhere between hustle culture and idle wealth is the real answer—work as gift, not curse or identity. The Genesis story shows Adam and Eve given work to tend the garden before the fall. Work isn’t evil, and it’s not everything. It’s something God designed us for.Work your youth away, and your character won’t change on a dime. (23:22) Noah observes the modern trap: “I will work and it will be my identity. And it will be my everything. And then after I work my youth away, make enough money, and then in my old age, somehow my character is going to change on a dime.” He points to multi-billionaires who never retire despite having more money and power than they could ever want. There’s an illusion there—of success, of satisfaction. If you build your life around work now, retirement won’t magically fix you. The person you’re becoming in the grind is the person you’ll be at the end. Character doesn’t reset.The days are long, the years are short—and parenting is a practice in patience. (25:45) Every parent knows the saying, but Noah unpacks what it actually means: “Parenting is a tension of patience in multiple ways. It’s the patience of being with your child as they’re throwing a tantrum while also being patient and knowing that you’re present with a child while having to do a hundred other things.” You can’t just drag your kids through life like luggage. They’re more like a garden—stationary, needing tending, requiring you to slow down and put down roots. People who moved around constantly as kids rarely speak of it positively. Deep-rooted, long-term stability matters for children.When everything seems to be failing, you might be missing what God is actually doing. (36:47) Six to eight months into rebuilding a post-COVID youth ministry, Noah and his team were doing everything right—but the numbers kept shrinking. His coordinator said, “We’re doing everything right and it just seems to not be working.” That same week, the ministry was the smallest it had ever been. But that night, a girl and her dad showed up late, encountered God, and she found the friend she’d been praying for. Noah learned: “If I was only focused on the end, I would have missed that.” The 170 kids who eventually came took two years of grinding, gardening, and trusting God does the growth. But the real fruit was in the small, seemingly insignificant moments along the way.You don’t grow alone—there’s no such thing as spiritual formation in isolation. (41:17) Youth ministry taught Noah a fundamental truth: “We do not grow alone. There’s no such thing as growing alone.” As a youth pastor, you realize you’re limited—you need leaders who take time out of their lives to pour into the next generation. Formation happens in community. The African proverb holds: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” Noah rejects the myth of the self-made man. Somewhere along the way, someone helped you—whether it was someone cleaning bathrooms so you could focus elsewhere or a business partner investing alongside you. Both had equal benefit. Formation is done together.Reading the ancients reveals you’re rarely as novel as you think. (51:26) Noah’s love for Jesus has made him curious about the church across thousands of years. What he’s found: “There’s very rarely something new under the sun that I’m thinking about, and that I’m not novel.” When he reads ancient writers, they critique him—and they’re dead, which makes it both hard and lovely. Americans think they’re progressive, pushing the timeline forward. But when you read history, you realize: “There are things that they did do wrong and have done wrong, and there are things that we are doing wrong currently, and things that they were actually more enlightened in than we are today.” Humility comes from reading people and realizing you’re not the smartest person who’s ever existed.Humility means listening to those who’ve gone somewhere you haven’t. (31:11) Noah describes his current season: “I’m having to humble myself and learn humility well, and listen to those who have gone before me and to trust that they may actually have gone somewhere that I haven’t gone yet.” There’s something in him that doesn’t always want to listen to someone older—that’s pride. The work is stopping, considering, and taking correction or guidance from an older person who says, “Hey, I’ve been here a little bit longer than you. Press the brakes in your early career.” Not passive, always pouring back in—but humble enough to receive wisdom from those ahead on the path.Children teach you humility—they have nothing to offer but dependence. (34:01) In Jesus’ time, children weren’t elevated like today—they were looked down on because they couldn’t offer society anything. But Jesus says we must come to Him like children. Noah sees it in his daughter: “She’ll stop and she’ll look at something and she’s like amused by it and she’s enjoying it and she’ll like so present.” The humility is stopping with her, sitting in the grass, not rushing her along. “There’s a humility to stop with her and just to sit in the grass and like yeah this is good.” Children model total dependence, openness, presence—exactly what Jesus calls us to.The hard question: where is the world going as a dad? (56:50) Noah wrestles with an existential anxiety that’s intensified since becoming a father: “Where is the world going?” It’s a question that gives him anxiety, burning in the background all the time. He doesn’t have an answer to the future except this: “Jesus will return and Jesus will be victorious and all the things that I’m worrying about right now there will be a coming age of the kingdom of God.” How much control does he have over big tech, governments, wars—or even his own life? He has to run to Jesus multiple times a week, sometimes multiple times a night lying in bed. The only anchor is trusting the one who holds the future.* You’re not apathetic just because you can’t change everything. (1:00:39) Matt shares his struggle with indifference in the face of massive problems—if he can’t solve world-scale issues, why try? Noah pushes back: “You do have an ability to make change through your individual life.” There’s a desire in our culture—fueled by social media and overwhelming information—to become apathetic. “I can’t change, so why even try.” But there’s something deeply Christian about saying: “The kingdom of heaven is now. So I should take action. I should be moving as a father, as a brother, as a sister, as somebody in this world who needs to bring righteousness and justice into the world.” Even small individual action matters. Apathy isn’t faithfulness.* Your small daily decisions shape where the world is going. (1:00:13) Matt connects the big question to the small one: “It’s all related to the same—where is the world going? Oh, it is going in the direction of the decisions that I make today about my family.” When he pulls the scope out, he realizes: if he wants to see change in the world, it starts with being the example of that change. We learn by the habits of people around us. If you want your kids to embody something, you have to live it. The Holy Spirit does the work, but your daily choices create the soil where growth happens. The world’s trajectory is shaped by millions of small, faithful decisions.* Suffering can produce great beauty—but that doesn’t make the suffering good. (1:04:31) Noah reflects on Dietrich Bonhoeffer—would we have his books without the Nazis? It’s a hard question. History shows that sometimes suffering produces something profound. “Not to say by the way the genocide is good suffering—like no, evil, wrong—but in the midst of a great tragedy something can be made.” He’s careful to hold the tension: suffering isn’t good, but God can bring beauty out of it. “I have found and history tells that sometimes suffering produces a great thing and the benefit on the other end of it is beautiful.” The pruning is painful, but it produces fruit you wouldn’t have otherwise.* His wedding day taught him to enjoy fleeting moments. (1:08:49) When asked about a top-of-the-world moment, Noah chooses his wedding day. What it taught him: “Enjoy the moment. Enjoy every moment of it because I would hear all the time it’s fleeting.” Now, years into marriage, he looks back at pictures trying to remember what it felt like. The sweetness of that day is gone in one sense—but the lesson remains. Pay attention. Be present. The moment won’t come back. And for the valley moments? “It will pass. You just have to walk through it. And probably will be painful, but it will pass.” Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionJake Hartson is a husband, father, veteran, and entrepreneur who recently transitioned into full-time ministry with Search Ministries, an organization that helps Christians and their friends give space to work through life’s biggest questionsHe shares the tension of “mission first, people always”—a military value he watched fail in ministry contexts where mission became an excuse to forsake loving people well. He opens up about fatherhood as his greatest challenge, the question “what does love require?” that guides his parenting, and why he wants his kids to inherit his curiosity and his wife Kinsey’s empathy. We discuss navigating transitions by starting with why, the hard work of setting boundaries after the military handed them to him for years, and how he’s learning that submission in marriage starts with leading well, not demanding compliance.Enjoy.Lessons from Jake Hartson“I’m willing to go, so why not me?” (9:18)The military gave him the discipline his chaotic mind needed. (13:29)Lead by influence when you can’t lead by authority. (14:17)Collaboration builds better plans—and better teams. (16:36)Training to think like the enemy makes you better at your mission. (21:16)“Mission first, people always” only works if people actually come first. (27:48)In most contexts, it should be “people first, mission always.” (31:05)Fatherhood is his greatest challenge because there’s no playbook. (32:13)“What does love require?” cuts through the complexity. (35:03)The early years are more formational than we realize. (35:52)Your parenting reveals itself in your kids—but you can’t always tell what’s you and what’s them. (37:12)The goal is a relationship that lasts beyond childhood. (38:48)Eye contact is the most important thing you can give young kids. (42:44)He wants his kids to have his curiosity and Kinsey’s empathy. (45:17)Start with why, then say no to everything else. (50:29) Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionThis is a Q&A session following the main conversation with Hyatt and Anne Moore. The group asks questions about marriage, art, finding God in everyday life, managing creative pursuits alongside other responsibilities, and Anne’s role as a creative partner. Hyatt shares stories about God’s creativity and provision, including the miraculous job offer at Surfer Magazine that came on the same day he was fasting and praying about money. Anne opens up about adaptability as her core strength and her role in supporting Hyatt’s work while pursuing her own art.Questions Asked and Summary of Responses1. Tell us about marriage. (1:11)Hyatt shares that he got married on four days’ notice and it’s been 60 years—”the best thing I ever did” except for accepting the Lord. A job offer came across the country, and he had to decide immediately. He and Anne were best friends and lovers but hadn’t been talking about marriage. When he realized he was leaving, they decided to get married that week, and the next day they moved to Georgia. “Five children, great life. It’s not been all great for her, but it’s been all great for me.”2. Can you identify one piece of art in this room that means something special to you and share about it? (2:58)Hyatt says there isn’t one piece that stands out over others—”They’re like my children.” He mentions a few he likes: a wide painting of Africans being baptized going to Ethiopia for missions, and a worshiper on the wall that was a commission. His art shows diverse interests—dancers (because he likes figures in motion), flowers (because they’re “God’s color”), and abstract mixed with realism. He gave up trying to be “the artist of such and such” and just explores what interests him.3. What’s the most interesting thing that the Lord has done with you or that you’ve learned about God? (5:04)Hyatt shares the story of fasting and praying about money when he and Anne were barely making it financially. He went to the hills, got rained out, ended up at the old Surfer Magazine office, and was unexpectedly offered his old art director job back—part-time hours for a full-time salary. The publisher said, “What have you been asking for?” Hyatt said he was asking for money but not a job. God responded, “Well, how do you get money? Usually that’s where it comes from.” The lesson: “God became more open-minded and more creative than I was giving him credit for. I had him in my little religious [box]... God’s bigger than all that. And let him be that way in your life.”4. How do you practically seek the Lord—like deciding to take a whole week to walk with God? (9:56)Hyatt reflects that while he’s had powerful experiences, he wonders why he doesn’t have them every day—he gets busy with normal life. He thinks “the Lord enjoys what we would call normal life. We want the miracle; he says, you know, the miracles—your body, for example, it’s all working.” He compares it to Jesus healing the maimed—when they’re healed, they’re back to normal, which everyone else has been experiencing all along without thinking about it. “I think normal is pretty special. We just don’t remember it.”As for finding God in special moments: “All of a sudden, we’ve got some stress. That’s when we’ll think, okay, I got it. Then we do it. We start zeroing in on them, and we find the answers one way or another.” He asks for wisdom constantly—even mid-sentence when writing or painting. “Creativity I’ve decided is nothing but problem solving.” Wisdom is promised, so when he asks and God says go ahead, it comes. “When he says seek God and you find it, he never says how to seek God. It’s more of an attitude.”5. What do you think about pursuing creative endeavors when you don’t have time, when you’re bogged down with other things but have something on your heart you wish you had more time to be creative with? (14:25)Anne responds: She gives herself permission for creative blocks of time only when everything else is taken care of. She tries to set things on a calendar—”OK, I can’t do it today, but if I can put it on a calendar, I’m going to do these days.” She encourages people to take a class where they’re forced to commit. She was impressed by a couple going into missions who determined each would have a hobby and permission to spend time developing it. “I struggle with that all the time. I try to get a block of art ready for a show and it’s hard to give myself permission to do it.”Hyatt adds that twice a year they go away for at least two weeks to an uninterrupted art-making retreat—they drive, bring easels, paints, supplies, a press. “Absolutely love it.” But he acknowledges you can’t always do that in earlier life stages.6. Anne, how do you manage someone like Hyatt who has such rampant creativity? How do you focus that energy, or work through all his different vast interests and projects? Are you collaborating or a sounding board? (17:28)Anne shares that her main strength (from Clifton StrengthsFinder) is adaptability. “I can change my plans, so that’s a big part of it.” She’s always felt her role was to support Hyatt. Having her own art is harder for her to put at an equal level—not that their art is equal, but giving it equal value in her life. “Keeping things in order so he can work is a big part of my life, which I’m happy [about]—I am a servant. I love that, and he has given me an interesting life for sure.” She feels blessed with kids, grandkids, and all those things. “Art is one area for me, but it’s not my whole life.”Hyatt adds: “It’s easier being a man. You women know what I’m talking about.”Bonus mention: Hyatt shares he’s currently writing a book called Snippets: How to Get Anything Done—one-page pieces of wit and advice about the mind, where “the clutter is and the opposition is.” He writes a little bit every day, whatever comes to mind. It’ll end up being about 31 ways or something similar. Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionHyatt Moore is an artist, former missions leader, and art director navigating the mystery of what it means to be faithful to your gifts. He's been married to Anne for over five decades and has lived three distinct careers—each one marked by surrender.We begin with Hyatt's conversion in a cheap hotel room in Mexico, the moment he decided to become "a man of God" without knowing what that meant, and the terrifying week of walking in empty fields wrestling with what it would cost to dedicate his life to God. Hyatt shares the story of giving it all up—the Porsche, the sailboat, the creative career—to serve in missions in Guatemala, and how sitting in the print shop doing menial work became the test he had to pass.We discuss the difference between chasing opportunities and following a calling, why your gifts are seeds that must be cultivated, and his conviction that "being faithful to your gift" is being faithful to God. We also explore his transition to becoming a painter and the moment God told him "I thought that was one of the good ones" when Hyatt said "it's only art." And Hyatt leaves us with the question he's wrestling with at 77: How do you build a big mansion in heaven?I hope this conversation challenges you to die to your claim on an interesting life, run with the gifts you've been given without demeaning them, and trust that God gives back a hundredfold what you surrender to Him.Links- https://www.hyattmoore.com- https://www.barnabasgroupoc.org- https://mattheisler.substack.comTimestamps(00:01:03) - Welcome and introduction of Hyatt Moore(00:03:05) - Opening question about bringing Anne to the Surfer Magazine interview(00:05:08) - "You hire a whole person, not just capabilities"(00:06:17) - The story begins: Hyatt's path from technical illustrator to art director(00:11:51) - Taking the risk to join Surfer Magazine(00:14:12) - Transition to Mexico and the search for meaning(00:15:24) - The emptiness despite having everything—Porsche, sailboat, great job(00:16:56) - "Life's not as fun as it's supposed to be. How come?"(00:18:27) - The book from his dad about prophecy(00:19:26) - Reading in Mexico: "I wasn't happy-able"(00:20:40) - Taking the invitation on the last page(00:21:41) - The walk in Mazatlan: "This is the first right thing I've done in 10 years"(00:23:13) - Deciding to become "a man of God" without knowing what it meant(00:24:59) - The desire to serve God with his life(00:25:32) - The terrifying week of walking in empty fields(00:26:34) - "I'm afraid of what it'll cost me"(00:27:10) - Giving up the claim to an interesting life(00:28:07) - Saying yes with resolution, not joy(00:28:48) - The missionary slides and discovering Wycliffe(00:30:25) - Moving to Guatemala: the Porsche, boat, house went; the wife stayed(00:31:07) - Menial work in the print shop: "I wonder if this is a test"(00:31:50) - "My life in terms of interest is going like this"(00:32:32) - The difference between chasing opportunities and following a calling(00:34:09) - Being transferred back to the home office(00:35:36) - What Hyatt wishes someone had named for him at our age(00:35:49) - "Give yourself to God and then do what you want"(00:37:22) - Gifts are seeds—water them, sun them, nurture them(00:38:12) - The particular mix of talents makes you unique(00:38:32) - "Don't overstress it too much"(00:39:21) - "Just run with your talent. But do run with your talent."(00:39:38) - Becoming a painter: wrestling with "it's only art"(00:40:35) - God's response: "I thought that was one of the good ones"(00:41:17) - "Don't demean it. Run with it."(00:42:00) - Being faithful to your gift is being faithful to God(00:42:28) - Matt's closing question: What question do you have for us?(00:43:19) - The podcast about getting old at 77(00:44:36) - What the podcast missed: what's next after this life(00:45:33) - Degrees in heaven and less time to augment as you age(00:46:40) - Hyatt's question: "How do you build a big mansion?" Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionJon Wells is a writer and filmmaker following Jesus. From church tech volunteer to filmmaker, shaped by watching over 100 films with a mentor: We talk about his daily writing practice, the challenge of showing up when the work feels mediocre, and his philosophy that guardrails only matter if they get you to "do the dance."Jon shares about his current season of creative pruning—where outcomes disappoint but showing up brings unexpected peace. He opens up about how God provided before revealing the pregnancy, preparing him to trust through uncertainty. We explore the entrepreneurial tension between ambition and presence as a father, why mysteries are fun rather than threatening, and his powerful insight about letting dreams die so they can be resurrected into something bigger.Timestamps(00:00:04) - Podcast introduction(00:01:07) - Opening banter about nonprofits and bivocational pastors(00:03:06) - Why Jon and Matt's conversations always go longer than planned(00:05:52) - Jon's origin story: from tech team volunteer to filmmaker(00:14:49) - Watching 100+ movies during COVID with a mentor(00:16:48) - How movies make the intangible tangible(00:19:17) - The decision to become a writer-director, not just a director(00:22:36) - Jon's daily writing practice: six days a week, staying in the gym(00:26:32) - Guardrails only work if they get you to do the dance(00:28:19) - Creative decisions that surprised him: pruning season(00:32:29) - "I am not enough alone"—learning reliance through exhaustion(00:36:17) - What fills Jon up during seasons of pruning(00:37:23) - The three-day fast that began a new season(00:39:01) - God's provision before the pregnancy announcement(00:42:59) - The open-handed life: giving up to gain more(00:44:34) - Matt's season of transition and budget discipline(00:48:05) - The hazy window: mysteries are fun and force you to live present(00:49:37) - Movies about fatherhood: The Iron Claw and wrestling with provision vs. presence(00:52:35) - The entrepreneurial bent and the struggle to be present(00:54:44) - Ambition vs. contentment: the lifelong tension(00:58:54) - Making friends with the questions you can't answer(01:01:41) - Question from last guest Jordan: What belief did you hold confidently but now think is wrong?(01:02:37) - Jon's answer: Religion doesn't have to be so structured; God is radically interested in humanity(01:05:25) - Jon's question for the next guest: What would come from letting your dream completely die?(01:06:42) - Resurrection vs. resuscitation: death that leads to new life Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

DescriptionJordan Avni is a husband, father, and one of the sharpest product minds I know. We worked together for years, and I watched him navigate complexity with clarity, discipline, and a thoughtful approach to technology and leadership. This is a conversation about being present in a busy season, finding fundamentals in the noise, and building an identity rather than chasing goals.TimestampsWhy this busy season is one men wish they could return to (3:06)Choosing identity-driven living over goal-driven achievement (5:19)The analytical framework for de-risking ideas (13:09)Bad ideas you talked yourself into (17:06)Productive vs. unproductive rumination (28:02)Building boundaries between work and home (25:35)The fight to be present when you're home (25:08)Searching for fundamentals in the noise (22:48)Differentiating signal from noise (23:15)The video games that shaped a product mind (38:05) Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

Today, I'm joined by my friend Seth Kayser. He is a husband, father, music educator, and entrepreneur who runs Kayser Arts and Global Creation Foundation—bringing music education to places like Uganda and Nepal. We dive into deep capacity, intentional relationships, and the creative stirrings that keep pulling us forward.We discuss:- Why juggling is actually a form of entertainment (5:22)- The procrastination-productivity paradox of entrepreneurship (6:34)- Being married to another entrepreneur and protecting each other's dreams (30:07)- How answering "yes" too many times becomes a lifestyle (4:35)- The non-urgent important things we keep pushing off (7:25)- Consistency over time and small, well-placed chops (1:20:18)- The creative wrestling of wanting to write a book someday (1:19:19)- What we freely created as children and why we should return there (1:22:09) Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

Kyle Rutkin is a writer, marketer, husband, and father who takes creativity seriously—not just as output, but as a responsibility. In this conversation, we explore the tension between creative ambition and everyday life, the patience required to build something meaningful, and why the people who outlast the dip are the ones who would be doing the work anyway.We discuss:- Why journaling for hundreds of hours reveals patterns you can't see otherwise- The difference between creating for an audience and creating because you can't help it- Navigating the dip: why most creative endeavors fail before the breakthrough- Being faithful with small things when no one is watching- Wrestling with the timeline of success while raising kids- Why the people who make it are the ones who'd do it anyway- How to hold your creative work lightly while taking it seriously- The graveyard of people who tried to do it fast versus those who outlasted themTimestamps:(0:00) - Opening: Journaling, Time Capsules, and Reflection(8:00) - Creative Cohorts, Parenting, and Finding Your People(19:00) - The Dip and Creative Persistence (32:00) - Being Faithful with Small Things (45:00) - Wrestling with Timelines and Success (58:00) - The Long Game: Outlasting the Quitters (1:03:00) - The CEO Who'd Do It All Again Tomorrow (1:05:00) - Doing the Work When No One's Watching (1:06:00) - Closing Question: Creative Wrestling You Haven't AnsweredKey Moments:On the patience game: "The people that are really in it for the right reasons outlast all the people that are in it for the 'I thought if I did this consistently, I'd get a million followers.' No, the people doing it consistently have been doing it for 10+ years and they're just starting to get some success."On creative persistence: "I would be doing this anyway. If you find it painful and most people find it painful, but you're like 'I would do this anyway even though it's painful'—you have something."On the long game: "It's a very frustrating thing for me to hear all the time that you have to be faithful with the small things. But that's exactly what my dad is saying. That's not the answer I want, but that's the answer."On doing the work: "Would you still be doing all the same things you're doing creatively even if no one was watching? The answer is yes. That's the thing about writing—for a year I'm doing it when zero people are reading."Detailed DescriptionKyle Rutkin (X, Website) is a writer and marketer navigating the intersection of creative ambition and fatherhood. He's part of a creative cohort where people wrestle with the questions that matter: How do you build something meaningful while raising kids? How do you stay faithful to the work when the timeline is unclear? How do you resist the quick-fix promises of the internet and commit to the long game?We begin with Kyle's journaling practice—hundreds of hours captured in time capsules that reveal patterns and growth he couldn't see in the moment. We talk about the difference between documenting life and living it, and why reflection has become his unlock for staying grounded while pursuing creative work.The conversation turns to the dip—that valley every creative person enters where doubt creeps in and most people quit. Kyle shares his wrestling with the timeline of success, the frustration of being told to "be faithful with small things," and why the CEO who sold 20% of his company for $250 million said he'd do it all again the next day anyway. We explore why the reward comes to those with the patience and persistence to outlast the quitters.We also discuss the tension of being a Christian creative in the 21st century—how to pursue excellence and ambition without losing sight of what matters most. Kyle reflects on learning from his dad's wisdom (even when it's not the answer he wants), holding his work lightly while taking it seriously, and the freedom that comes from doing it whether anyone's watching or not.I hope this conversation reminds you that the work is worth doing for its own sake, that the dip is where most people quit but where the real work begins, and that showing up faithfully—even when no one's watching—is how you build something that lasts. Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

Thank you for listening. If you enjoyed our conversation, please rate and review the podcast on the platform of your choosing.DescriptionIn this episode, Brenden and Matt delve into the importance of starting despite imperfection, cultivating curiosity, balancing work and family, and leveraging tools like AI to enhance creativity and productivity. They explore how consistent effort, intentional planning, showing your work, and asking the right questions can lead to meaningful progress and personal fulfillment.Segments00:00 - The challenge of starting and embracing imperfection in content creation02:23 - The mindset of “start terrible, improve daily” for growth04:12 - Prioritizing family, faith, and life adjustments over time05:27 - Balancing content goals: follower growth, relatable content, and personal happiness06:17 - Analyzing the virality of videos and the importance of shareability08:51 - How platforms optimize for time spent and their implications for creators09:57 - The significance of watch time and engagement metrics in content success10:30 - Friendship and respect rooted in entrepreneurship and discipline11:22 - Managing work, curiosity, and building legacy as a full-stack developer and content creator12:05 - Cultivating curiosity through childhood influences and deliberate skill-building13:35 - The importance of humility, conversations with kids, and modeling behaviors16:22 - Teaching and simplifying complex ideas through engagement with children16:49 - Reflecting on legacy, purpose, and leaving an investment in your family17:14 - The value of embracing failure and learning in electronics projects and content creation18:34 - The relationship between teaching and mastery, and the meta level of teaching others to teach19:13 - The inspiration behind the “I don’t know you” podcast concept and self-discovery20:19 - Overcoming perfectionism: starting with basic setup, tinkering, and iteration22:31 - Creating ambiance with DIY lighting and tech hacks for better content25:01 - The current season of life’s uphill climb and the importance of perseverance26:45 - Investment in family and discipline as a long-term orchestration27:53 - Managing responsibilities and optimizing life with dependency mapping and planning30:28 - The paradox of responsibility versus freedom in life choices33:39 - The long race: pacing, endurance, and the importance of pushing through discomfort37:23 - The role of AI in brainstorming, note-taking, and expanding creative capacity40:50 - The leverage and risks of powerful tools like AI and power tools42:31 - The urgency of understanding and testing AI responsibly amid societal pressures44:52 - Practical systems for balancing marriage, family, and entrepreneurial pursuits45:13 - The power of dependency mapping and disciplined planning47:21 - Setting input and output goals to measure progress effectively48:09 - Anticipating the arrival of new family members and managing the ebbs and flows of family life49:45 - The long-term perspective on providing, sacrifice, and legacy building51:33 - The impact of AI-driven economic shifts and the importance of responsible development54:11 - The motivation for content creation: trust, transparency, and future-proofing skills56:07 - Increasing creative “temperature” to unlock new opportunities and networks58:17 - Reflecting on continual growth, curiosity, and evolving priorities in life and work59:36 - The likelihood of future collaborations driven by shared values and ambitions64:19 - The challenge of aligning actions with core values and doing what feels meaningful66:47 - The power of discipline: doing what you dread and managing sacrifice for long-term goals67:47 - Final thoughts: gratitude, friendship, and the lifelong journey of growth Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode of I Don’t Know You, Matt sits down with filmmaker, father, and longtime friend David Orgill (Story11.tv) in Dana Point, California.Together, they explore what it means to wrestle with identity, faith, and vocation in a world full of distraction. David reflects on fatherhood, creativity, and how his understanding of God’s will has shifted—from looking for a single “correct” path to embracing freedom, responsibility, and presence.They also unpack the difference between consuming “candy” content versus sitting down for a slow, nourishing, home-cooked meal—and what that metaphor reveals about art, media, and the lives we’re shaping.This conversation isn’t about having all the answers. It’s about learning how to live well while still asking the questions. Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

In this conversation, Matt and Alvin explore the intricacies of parenting, cultural influences, and personal growth. They discuss the importance of intentional parenting, the impact of cultural backgrounds on family values, and the balance between ambition and a quiet life. The dialogue also touches on the significance of gratitude, the challenges of modern life, and the desire to create meaningful connections. Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe