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In My Element: Reshaping a Life for Eternal Impact – Episode 013

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Sattler College PodcastAlumniAcademicsBiblical & Religious Studies

In My Element: Reshaping a Life for Eternal Impact – Episode 013

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A Sattler alumnus tells how God took him from his comfort zone to start a business in India. After a personal tragedy revived his passion for eternal things, he replanned his life which eventually led him to prepare at Sattler College. While finishing his studies, he and his team started a business and prepared to move to India. He explains his risky decision to move abroad with his family while relying on the startup for finances. They also discuss following our passions to fulfill God’s desires, how disciplines help us become more like Jesus, and building a habit of meeting strangers. He concludes with advice about how God uses our most painful moments.

Learn more about studying Biblical and Religious Studies at Sattler College.

 

Mentioned:

Prosynergy – Their Marketing and Bookkeeping businesses
Practicing the Way – by John Mark Comer

Chapters:

0:04 Transitioning From Vision to Impact
14:52 Startup Companies in India
18:51 Faith, Life Paths, and Disciplines
29:10 Developing Spiritual Disciplines and Masculinity
41:40 Inspiring Vision and Networking in Boston

Transcript

This transcript has been auto generated and likely contains errors. Also, note that the name of our Sattler alumnus has been removed from the transcript at his request.

Zack Johnson: 0:04
It is April 10th 2024. I’m here with [removed] and this is our first ever distance recording, so I’m really excited about this. [removed], where are you?

[removed]: 0:19
Right now I am in Greater Noida, india, which is in the capital region near Delhi, india.

Zack Johnson: 0:27
So, [removed], you’re also one of our first alumni on the podcast. That doesn’t work. At Sattler I’ve interviewed a couple of alumni who sort of stayed in the Boston area, and so it’s been easy to interview them. Can you just tell me a little bit about yourself, your story, what you’re about and some of your passions?

[removed]: 0:48
Sure I can do that. Yeah, so I am married to beautiful wife [removed] and we have four amazing children. My oldest, [removed], is eight years old, and I have three daughters that come after that eight years old, and I have three daughters that come after that. So I was born in Virginia and then my family spent 10 years in Kenya, africa, during my growing up years, came back when I was 15 and so got to know the US mainly after I was 15 years old. But anyways, yeah, after getting married, we continued living in Virginia for a couple of years and then came to Sadler College and had two children. At the time Two of my children were born in Boston. It’s just a really, really awesome time period of our lives. Then, after graduating, um moved to india here to do business as ministry.

Zack Johnson: 1:51
So it’s kind of us in a nutshell that’s yeah, and our lives for our lives kind of interconnected a ton while you were here.

Zack Johnson: 2:02
Um, in weird ways I think our wives are related through I won’t try to quote the exact relationships think second cousins. And then [removed] and I were involved in where you lived at. You lived in this big place called malden towers and we we met there and and did a lot of interesting things together. So I I feel like you’re a distant friend, so I just get a love having the chance to hear more about what you’re doing. And I’d love to hear [removed] I know you’re one of the few people I’ve met that showed up to Sattler, probably with a pretty intense vision for what you wanted to see happen afterwards, and I’d love to just hear you talk about a little bit of the arc of your story, about having this vision showing up to Boston for four years. And then I know that there were other opportunities, other doors open in your life, but really choosing to pursue what you had in mind going to India and I’d love to hear you talk about that experience and how it how it all came came to fruition.

[removed]: 3:14
Yeah, sure, absolutely. So. When I was 19 years old, my life changed drastically. My mother passed away from cancer and it really shattered my world completely and all the things at that point in my life that were really important to me like my social image and cars and racing and fixing up cars all of a sudden all these things just kind of lost their glory and I was trying to figure out what’s important in life, what do I really want? And so over that time, yeah, god really got a hold of my life and brought a lot of revival. I decided that the things that really matter are the things that are going to last into eternity. So that’s when I started really feeling a call to share my faith, to share Jesus, to evangelism. We’d go out on the streets and just talk to people and spend a lot of time doing that with friends, and that became kind of the overarching calling that I felt God had given on my life. And so, yeah, during my teen years and everything, I was fairly radical in that.

[removed]: 4:31
And then, after I got married actually it was still pretty radical I told [removed] on one of our dates that she has to be willing to live in a trailer park with me. She wants to marry me, willing to live in a trailer park with me. She wants to marry me. Um, I didn’t. I didn’t know why, but I just needed that level of commitment to the hard life. Um, we never actually lived in a trailer park. Um, it would have been fine if it would have, but uh, anyways.

[removed]: 4:57
Yeah, after we got married though, um, I got a little bit sidetracked, I, I would say, where I started a company an automotive repair shop it’s really interesting trying to make a lot of money. I had a lot of fun Again, started getting more into cars and fixing them up, and I’m just kind of settling in and building up my house and property. And I felt myself, I knew I was kind of lapsing into lukewarmness again in my Christian life and materialism, which is exactly the things that I’ve been running away from since I was 19. And so there came a point in life and I was like I need to make a break with this somehow. I need to make some sort of big change. I need to make some sort of big change. I need to sell some things. And so that’s when I heard about Sadler College.

[removed]: 5:50
And, yeah, I had been looking into some other things as well, like going into some training, some other places, but nothing very serious. But I heard about Sadler College and it sounded really exciting because the mission of Sattler College to prepare people for impact in the kingdom and what I saw going on with the churches there in Boston, I was like this looks exactly like the leap that I want to take. So that’s why we decided to start thinking about this and, coming to Sadler College, I knew exactly what I wanted to do afterwards. I knew that the most important thing in life was making disciples, planting new church fellowships, and that’s what my life was all about.

[removed]: 6:40
So I basically came to Sadler just to become better equipped for kingdom impact in those ways, and since you guys were making the promises that this is what you’re going to do, I took you up on that and that’s yeah. That’s why we moved to Boston and, yeah, dove into college and it yeah, I could say more about my experience at sattler, but, um, I’ll just say that my experience was that he delivered on that promise and for me, um, keeping that focus the whole way through college and then it you know, becoming more specific to india is an interesting story too. I, I hadn’t really have a specific place in mind. Um, I don’t know if you want me to keep talking on that.

Zack Johnson: 7:31
Yeah, I was going to. I actually was going to ask about when did when did the specific uh like geographic location sort of become a reality? And I think I actually think a lot, of, a lot of people here have could learn from you, because I think people have a general desire, but to operationalize the desire, I think there’s a lot of red herrings that can show up and things like that in your story. So I’d love to love to hear sort of the the desire meets, the team meets the people and all of that. The desire meets, the team meets the people and all of that.

[removed]: 8:05
Yeah, yeah, so there were a couple different things that I consider all Uganda or city in the US or something like that. But my younger brother, [removed] he’s a year and a half younger than I. He’s here with us. He had been wanting to move to india for about eight years, or at least, um, he had been, yeah, back and forth to india visiting, and so, yeah, he was a pretty big influencer for me and we met at an airbnb in baltimore one time this is, yeah, maybe halfway through my time in college and, um, he really, uh, tried convincingly to show me why india is one of the because it’s one of the most, um, unreached parts of the world, why it makes sense that it’s the most urgent, and I really did believe that too, and so, um, we prayed about it and so, remember, it was like on the rooftop of this Airbnb in Baltimore and then the next day, someone called up [removed]. It was someone who worked at Google in California. He said Shil’s called to go back to India. He heard that [removed] is interested in India, so he would put a team together, and so just that happening the next day made it feel like it was a pointer from God, but it was also, yeah, very much in line with my convictions of what was most urgent, and you know where the greatest needs are in the world, so I decided to pursue it from there.

[removed]: 9:42
So I decided to pursue it from there and then, you know, trying to find these little pointers along the way to confirm that was something that I did as well. And there weren’t not everything was easy and there were even some people who questioned whether it was a good idea, but there was just a settledness in my heart. And then, yeah, [removed] family from Boston. He were really good friends with [removed] and I, same fellowship together, working together. They were like, you know, how can we support [removed]? Oh, maybe we could just come along with them, and so they did. And so, yeah, maybe we could just come along with them, and so they did. And so, yeah, the three of us families became the core team then, and we did. You know, I focused my half stone and everything on team building and preparing the team for moving to India, which was really helpful.

Zack Johnson: 11:06
Yeah, I’d love to chat a little bit about that, because, which is really helpful, value the value of four years of college or education in general. And I’m always trying to navigate these conversations with a young person and really I kind of have this internal deal with myself and I, when I, if I hear what someone wants to do, I wouldn’t want to invite them to be like hey, come to come to Boston, it’s perfect for you, cause it’s it’s definitely not perfect for everyone. Um right decision, I would say. But would you say that I don’t want to like sell the Sattler product here too hard? But doing academic work before embarking on your journey, have you found that to be generally helpful at this point? I know you haven’t been over there tons of time, but there’s sort of a mismatch between the academics and then the field work, so to speak. Have you been able to see any ties between the two?

[removed]: 11:51
there and living in the context we did made it even easier to start putting into practice things I was learning even while I was in college. There was no need to wait until after college and start using the knowledge I was gaining. And, yes, my major was biblical and religious studies, and so I learned a ton about the Bible, a ton about history, and you know how these movements and things have happened in the past. All of it has been really valuable knowledge, I would say, but also a big part of it was just learning how to be a disciplined person.

[removed]: 12:49
I would say a lot of the small successes that I’ve had in business and in life since starting at Sadler College have been due to just being forced to become a very disciplined person. Being forced to become a very disciplined person and, um, and being in the right environment where it was really encouraged, where there was accountability, where there’s other people who are outpacing me, um, was a really it was a really good environment, just till I developed my own self, and so learning how to manage your own self is actually it’s probably one of the most valuable things I learned, along with the, the knowledge, but yeah, I would say even in business, a lot of things that I learned. Just managing time and getting projects done was hugely valuable for business, and getting things done in business I did take some business classes as well were helpful, but yeah, so I would say that yeah, it’s very much has been helpful.

Zack Johnson: 13:53
Yeah, and I’d love to hear a little bit about your day-to-day in in India. From what I you know, I don’t I’m not spying on you or anything so you guys are running a business and I think that’s a big part of your life and I’d love to hear a little bit about what you do throughout the day and things like that.

[removed]: 14:13
Yeah, yeah. So I get up in the morning and, after a couple of other things language classes included I head to the office, which is actually ended up being just up the street. We live in what’s called a society, um, where there’s a bunch of villas or houses and there’s an apartment, big tower, um out by the end of society with office buildings. So I get to just walk down the street to the office and there’s where we we’re pro synergy set up and, yeah, we’re. We have two companies actually. One is a digital marketing company, the other is a bookkeeping company, and I’m basically solely involved in the bookkeeping company, at this point at least, in operation, operationally. So, yeah, I’ll go there and work.

[removed]: 15:12
We have two indian employees, um, so we get to, they get to teach us how to eat good indian food and, um, they’re really, really smart people as well. So, yeah, we have, we have some good camaraderie in the office. I work online and we’re doing work for American companies long American companies to source their work here and go back. So, basically, I have a full five day work week and we started the business immediately after arriving and it’s pretty much been sustaining us and the different ministry things we want to do here.

Zack Johnson: 15:52
That’s amazing. Can you spell the name? I think I know how to spell it, but what’s the name of the company?

[removed]: 15:57
again, it’s called ProSynergy. It’s the main brand, pro and Synergy.

Zack Johnson: 16:09
Can you just find it online? If you look it up, I’m assuming.

[removed]: 16:14
Yeah, so you can look up ProSynergy. You can look at ProSynergy bookkeeping and see our website.

Zack Johnson: 16:23
Are you guys looking for new clients, just in case somebody’s, somebody’s soliciting out there?

[removed]: 16:28
that’s actually the main um. Most of my time is spent in trying to get new clients, um, so we’re very much in the startup growth phase and there’s so much good talent here that, um we could scale it um up big. Yeah, if there’s anybody looking for bookkeeping work or digital marketing focus up and, yeah, I think that’s ProSynergy.

Zack Johnson: 16:56
Well, hopefully we can help spread the word about that. And I actually just I want to give you guys a shout out. I just I won’t mention the person or the company, but I know somebody who is working with you guys and they were singing your praises. The other morning I had a meeting, so I just want to give you a good shout out there. You can probably guess who it was, but we won’t get into it. And then, yeah, the other piece that I’d love to just chat about with you is the finances behind it all.

Zack Johnson: 17:31
I know that when I look at your story, I really want to make it possible to make more people make the decisions that you made. I think there is a really big like how is this ever going to happen? How am I going to finance this and sustain it? And you know I, we, we took initiative this year called entrustment, where we basically told students hey, we’re not going to bill you in tuition right now, we’re still. We still are charging like room and board and we say, if you can figure out housing for yourself, you can get here.

Zack Johnson: 18:07
And then afterwards we want you guys to make some really radical, radical life’s decisions and we’re praying that some people, you know, maybe won’t maybe take less lucrative career decisions and and and make that feasible. But has god, has god, been faithful in the finances? And is it scary? Is it? Do people? Is that part of like the how do you look at the decision making there and how you think about all that? I know it’s that’s kind of a big question, but I know a lot. I know that’s actually, I think, a main threat as to what keeps people back and keeps them from taking some of the more the riskier moves in life yeah, yeah, it’s a good question.

[removed]: 18:51
Um, so for my family, because we were able to sell some things in virginia, um wasn’t quite as tight for us. Um, as we ended college and I also did have some help and some scholarships, I really appreciate that it was very affordable. Coming to India, you know, it was definitely a leap of faith when we were looking at, okay, so we’re going to start a business and move to India at the same time and that business needs to provide for us. It just doesn’t usually work out that amazing, but God did come through on that and there was a big contract we were able to get with the company. It was sourcing work to us where we got to India and we were able to have plenty of work right away and actually provide for ourselves.

[removed]: 19:45
So there was, yeah, god definitely provided. Another family got into a tight financial situation a couple times and just God came through every time. So, yeah, if you I do believe God provides His work, you have a vision. If someone has a vision from God or something, he’s not just going to let them sit, and so that’s the faith that I have and so far been taken care of.

Zack Johnson: 20:22
Yeah, and then I’d love to hear you talk, and you don’t. You don’t have to be an expert in this, but we I know a lot of people sort of face this uh, what are what’s your thoughts on? Like going somewhere, like the like your life path, going back to where you came from, like establishing yourself in Virginia, choosing somewhere where you your passport somewhere domest, stay in the us, or go back to what I’m familiar with, or go somewhere new, and I think we were even chatting the other day about your time horizon, on how long you want to stay. Like, is your plan to to be buried there? Is your plan to to develop leadership there and then hightail it out once it’s developed? I know that’s kind of a negative way to put it, but I’d love to hear you talk a little bit about all this thought into how to think about where to go and how long to stay or to stay permanently and all those. I don’t think there’s a right answer. So you can ramble as much as you want.

[removed]: 21:43
Yeah, you can ramble as much as you want, yeah, yeah, I mean, for us we don’t really know, life is pretty uncertain here.

[removed]: 21:52
We don’t know how long we can be here, but, um, we’ve, we’re here indefinitely, as long as we can be, and god wants us here, so that that was actually fairly freeing decision to make, because then we don’t need to store anything in the us and we just, you know, this is our home and with our full team having that attitude, it, yeah, I think it was a strength that we had and I would recommend, if you feel like God might be calling you somewhere, just to take that step and not be too quick to like put a time boundary on it, just go and find where God wants you next.

[removed]: 22:38
But as far as, like, making the decision on whether to stay, you know, go back home or something else or go abroad I don’t have a lot of wisdom on that. I do think that if we are really aligned with God’s heart, seeking to do His will, if that’s the one thing in our life that we care about, then we can often go after the desires of our heart, the things that we want that are exciting. If we’re excited about doing God’s will then go after what you’re excited about, and I think you’ll continue in God’s will. So if you’re excited about going somewhere, a foreign country, you’re trying something new, you like adventure. It’s great. If you have a real vision for your home area, it’s great too. That’s my thoughts on the matter.

Zack Johnson: 23:36
No, I’m laughing because it’s like well, and if you don’t like adventure, then just stay put.

[removed]: 23:41
No, I’m just kidding adventure, then just stay put. No, I’m just, I’m just kidding. There is a little thing of like. We should think, you know, logically, about the needs in the world and you know that should be foremost on our heart. How do we solve the big problems in the world? And so where are those needs? And you know, if there’s? There’s this analogy where you know there’s a log you have to pick up and if there’s like 100 people on one side and only one on the other, then why don’t you go join the person that’s by himself to lift that side? I think it’s probably good to factor that in as well.

[removed]: 24:43
We were coming back from a small group meeting and we were just talking about it. How this feels like home. Definitely feels like home. Now there’s something that shifts with time. We’ve been here seven, eight months now and it takes some time for it to feel like home. But I would say for myself it felt like home pretty quickly. I, growing up in kenya for 10 years, I sort of feel at home when I’m in a foreign place. It’s weird um, not the same for my wife exactly but I feel in my element when I’m out of jail or something, something odd like that.

Zack Johnson: 25:30
My wife and I talk about that a lot, where I think she would describe herself as a homebody, and I’m like a homebody for maybe three weeks and then, after week three, I’m like let’s go, let’s find something new. And I get it. I want to revisit something you mentioned just because I think it’s interesting and we think about it a lot. Here is the two words you know discipline and discipleship. You know related words, um, at least in the dictionary, and you know one of the one of the things that I am always need to be careful of is I came from, you know my background. I came from like a military where discipline is like almost almost an idol. You could put it up there with like the, the levels of disciplines that they they require of you and then and then the idea is that those will propel you through any situation. It’s like if you can establish disciplines in the small things and and in hard environments, then no environment, every environment, becomes feasible to endure and persevere through. So I think there’s totally something about that.

Zack Johnson: 26:49
Um, and then, in terms of how to map that on to a large swath of people is something I still haven’t quite nailed down as to like how much discipline to prescribe on every kind of person.

Zack Johnson: 27:03
I’ll even prescribing different disciplines for men and women, for people who come from or like to wake up in the morning, versus who who don’t like to wake up in the morning, and then just thinking about that in terms of church life and things like that, are there any? Are there any disciplines, either spiritual ones or other disciplines, that you think are worth continuing to cultivate? Just not it doesn’t have to be at a in the college environment, but just in general in life. Are there disciplines that you think are really worth investing in and into yourself and a lot, of, a lot of times? That’s why I make the. I make the case like hey, if you struggle with self, with cultivating these in your environment, then choose an environment that’s more likely to cultivate it for you, which is a pitch for the college environment in general. But I’d love to hear you talk about some of those disciplines and maybe how you think about it personally right now.

[removed]: 28:02
Maybe how you think about it personally right now. Yeah, yeah, I think about the disciplines in terms of like be one of the primary things that he would get away, and even with solitude he would get away from everything, from the noise and the hustle, and just spend long amounts of time in the mountain or during the night in prayer and, you know, communicating with the Father. And so I think that those you know that Jesus did are especially important. But then, like, for different people, I think different things are just going to resonate more and sometimes for one person something might work really well. Sometimes for one person something might work really well Getting up really early and reading and journaling.

[removed]: 29:10
Reading the Bible and journaling I mean journaling works really good for somebody. Someone else just likes to quiet and meditate cross-legged on the floor. There’s so many different ways that you can keep it kind of exciting if you’re interested in, like, what are the ways that you know, the things that I can do in times of the day or different rhythms I can build in my life to help me keep my mind on God and become more like Jesus. I think it was good for me to be pushed in those at college just to have someone say, well, these are really good disciplines and we’re going to try to do these, was really good for me. So I’m the type of person that I think responded where it worked for me to basically have these set of disciplines that we’re trying to do and trying to track. That was good for me and, honestly, after college it’s hard to keep that going because I didn’t have the structure anymore and I kind of miss it. So that’s just my experience, but I know that’s not everybody’s experience.

Zack Johnson: 30:23
Yeah, yeah, so and then. So one of the things maybe I’ll ask about trying to think exactly how to frame this question, one of the things that I think is relevant a discipline that maybe a lot of people don’t think about as a discipline is or maybe it’s a habit regularly forcing yourself to interact with people who you wouldn’t necessarily be interacting with. Some people call it you know it could be evangelism, or it’s just forming friendships outside your typical circles, like learning how to, how to spend your time, especially with other people that you, that it’s not normal for me to go approach this person in life and have them over for dinner or, you know, do a, do a study with them or something like that. How does that, uh, come out in your life? Because [removed] was part of the, a club here called the m29 Club. We don’t have to get into exactly what that was, but I viewed you here as really forming that discipline of interacting with people a lot more beyond your typical school circles that are in the city and things like that.

[removed]: 31:43
Yeah, yeah, that’s a good one. Yeah, that’s a good one. It’s interesting you ask me because I’m an introvert and actually have a lot of social anxiety, especially when I first came to Sattler College. It was difficult for me and I’m guessing you saw some changes in the way that I related in my confidence with people.

[removed]: 32:06
I was a very fearful person and actually, just yeah, being in that environment and, you know, organizing some of those things with people, working with people, were just because that was my passion and you can’t do anything in life alone. You have to learn how to do it with people alone. You have to learn how to do it with people, um, so it just it. You know, I had to kind of force myself to be honest and get into scary situations and places where I’m really nervous and and that sort of thing, but I knew that that’s what I wanted and so I’m willing to to do it. I do think it’s good like learning, learning people, learning people’s skills and how to really listen to other people and care about them and understand other people’s emotions. It’s emotional intelligence, what you call it, um is like a really important skill that I’m still trying to learn, still have a long ways to go in that one.

Zack Johnson: 33:11
but yeah, and then so I’ll just. I just think that I this is more of something I’m thinking about, so I love your feedback on it. We I was having a conversation the other day about you’re gonna get a kick out of this cities and masculinity, and there’s there’s someone that was concerned about raising boys in a city that was basically saying, hey, is it even possible to do, to be, to develop like the, the correct form of masculinity and femininity in cities and their? Their hypothesis was that cities are now becoming less masculine and more feminine. I won’t get into the details about all that, but I’d love to hear you talk about cities and urban environments. Is it possible to develop a godly view of masculinity and femininity with with all that? And then the?

Zack Johnson: 34:15
The side conversation to that is that I think that there’s sort of an idea that, in order to be living out what sort of god’s intended order for creation, you should be working in the field with your hands getting dirty, cutting down trees, being a mechanic having grease all over your hands, and I was just we were sitting there talking that somehow it feels like it’s possible to be, to be developing God’s proper order in cities and in the country. But there’s also a tendency to run away from some of the hard things that Christ has called us to and pursue comforts, and so there’s this balance of trying to make sure your life isn’t too comfortable. Where you’re running away from the very thing that Christ has called us to is to be fishers of men. So I’d love to hear you any thoughts you have on that, to develop my own way to way to respond to cities and masculinity. It was a completely new question but it was intriguing to me.

[removed]: 35:20
Yeah, that is an intriguing question. I’m not quite sure. I’m not quite sure how to respond to that. To be honest, I don’t really know. I’m not quite sure how to respond to that. To be honest, I don’t really know I’m not sure if I really understand where that question comes from. I mean, I think the view of masculinity and femininity I said it right there it’s cultivated in your family, parents, um, and your, your friends and your community, I think, influenced that a lot.

[removed]: 35:56
Um, as far as, like, city versus country, I don’t think there’s any, you know, push either way to like a good understanding or a bad one of it. Um, I, there was definitely a shift for me from, like, working with my hands. I’ve done construction and landscaping and mechanic work, repairing cars um, there was a shift, you know, coming to sattler working on my computer. Now I work on ears all day long, um, but I, I would like to think that I haven’t become less of a man through the process. Um, yeah, I, yeah, I, I do think you know, sometimes it is good we need to go ground ourselves, like we’ve got a little backyard out here, really digging the dirt, children and plants and plants and flowers, and that’s a good thing, um, get your hands dirty sometimes, and too much technology and man-made inventions can be disorienting too. So it’s good to get out into nature and everything but yeah, yeah, so I’m.

Zack Johnson: 37:19
Maybe we’re approaching the around, the time where people usually yeah, audience or the general people. Is there anything that you’d you’d like to leave? Leave here another way, you know. Is there a pearl of wisdom that that you remind yourself often, that you want to share with, with anyone listening, but yeah, I, I think so.

[removed]: 37:44
I started off um in the podcast talking a little bit about what changed for me when I was 19. And I really do think that that moment set the trajectory of my life, what I did with that really painful moment in my life and you know I’ve had a lot of other painful moments since then but I think everyone’s going to come across something that is devastating in their life, and it’s actually many times. I think it’s a time when God wants to take in and clarify your vision and what matters in life and what matters for eternity in life and what matters for eternity. And having that really settle in your mind that you know I’m not going to go after material things or worldly gain or anything like that, but I’m going to totally devote my life completely to doing the Father’s will and trying to be like Jesus.

[removed]: 38:49
Having that settle before you go to college is a really good thing, as people get afraid of young people going to college and they get disoriented and everything, and I think you could find that at college too. It’s not like you have to have that beforehand, but I do think it was really good for me to have some of those experiences behind me and thinking of going to college or moving across the world or anything like that. That’s a pretty poor thing to settle. There’s nothing more exciting than trying to build God’s kingdom, and there’s nothing more valuable than laying up treasure in heaven, and so why not have a very exciting life and build the greatest values? Cool, teach your kingdom work values cool.

Zack Johnson: 39:55
Teach your kingdom work. Seek first the kingdom. Yeah, amen. And then are there any you know? Just, I love listening to people, what they, what they read, what they follow. Is there anything that you that you read or follow or listen to, that you you like to talk about or recommend to other people?

[removed]: 40:07
that doesn’t have to be a yes yes, I read a book um recently by john mark comer. There was a new book that came out and he talked about I think it was called practicing the way and how. The title is I think that’s the right title, highly recommend that book and it was just a really he has a really great way of talking about spiritual disciplines and just about a life of discipleship in general in terms that, like you know, people our age get and like resonate with. So that’s a book that I would recommend. I was pretty influential I it gave me like this boost to like um, get back to a great um schedule spiritual disciplines again he has a.

Zack Johnson: 41:04
He has another book that got passed around in our my circles called the ruthless and elimination of hurry, and it’s I, yeah, I recommend that book to to some people. Yeah, it’s, it’s a good book, he’s a, he’s a. His, uh, his writing’s really easy to to consume and from my, from my perspective, yeah, any any other anything else I don’t think so, and great and yeah. So again, if you want to keep up with [removed], I think pro synergy just find that on the interwebs, you can look that up. And yeah, [removed], I’m praying that a lot more people that come through Boston have the. I just think the scope of your vision has been really inspiring to see you operationalize that and and live it out, and I I hope that we can figure out how to, how some students can show up here to make similar moves as you did.

Zack Johnson: 42:06
I know, I know it’s an impressive template from my, from my impressive. It’s an inspirational template for for some people. So I hope more people start thinking a lot more like you. And thanks so much for taking the time to be with us. Uh, we don’t yet have a podcast title, but someday we might. It’s more just the Sattler podcast right now where we talk about people in our networks and what they’re doing and what’s on on their minds. So, thanks, thanks for being here and send, uh send my regards to, to everyone in India that I know your, your family and [removed], and and beyond, will do.

[removed]: 42:43
Yep, it’s been great talking with you again yeah, you too.

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