#111: David Dusek: Tactics for Biblical Manhood
David Dusek is on a mission to impact the lives of men and their families. If you are a guy, or if you know a guy - you will want to listen in.
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EP. 111 David Dusek
Tony: Welcome to the reclamation podcast, where we're reclaiming good practices for faith and life. My name is Tony and I get to be the host of today's podcast. Today is episode one 11, and I get to sit down with the founder of rough cut men ministries, David Dusek just in time for father's day. I'm so excited about this conversation.
David has a heart for men and to encourage and equip them to live their lives for Christ. Now, if you're a female and you're listening, don't worry. This is still really important. We talk about his latest book, all about the men on the battlefield of life. I think this is going to be such a good dialogue for so many of us who need to get dialed in.
On what's next. So I, to learn more about David, check out his website, rough cut men.org, and to learn more about our podcast network, check out spirit in truth.life. That's right. The reclamation podcast is a ministry of spirit and truth, and that's a movement all about reclaiming a Wesleyan practices and the holy spirit in our everyday lives.
I'm so excited to be a part of this organization, check out their information@spiritandtruth.life. I could use one favor from you. If you have a little bit of time today, I would really appreciate it. If you could pause this and leave me a review on iTunes, I'm trying to get to a hundred views by the end of the year.
I'm at 50 something right now. I could really use your help. Six months, 50 reviews. I know we can do it. Reviews are super helpful because they kind of boost your search ability. So when someone's looking for a podcast about men or have biblical manhood they'll find this one because of your review in so many ways, you're helping others move a little bit closer in their relationship with Christ.
So have you got some time today and knock that out? I greatly appreciate it. And without any further ado, here's my conversation with the founder of rough cut men ministries, David Dusek. David. Thank you so much, so much for being on the podcast today. I'm so excited to talk about your new book, the battle.
So welcome. Thank you for being here.
David: Hey, Tony. Thanks for having me, man. I'm excited.
Tony: I was too. Apparently I jumped right in and I was like, what am I going to say next? I don't even know what's happening. That's fine. It's it's like, it's my first podcast.
David: It's getting, you know what, I just go with it. So just wherever the Lord leads and let's just hit the road.
Tony: Yeah. And so, you know, the, the title, your, the full title, your book is really interesting. The battle tactics for biblical manhood learned from the seventh Calvary in Vietnam, but now correct me if I'm wrong. Right. But you were never in the seventh Calvary in Vietnam. So how did we, how did we get to this place?
David: Well, I've had a couple of interviewers actually asked me what it was like to be in Vietnam. And then I have to break their heart and tell them that I was born a month after this battle. It's reflected as a book, even, even third place. I may have some gray hair, but not that much. No, it's Our whole ministry since its inception back in probably 2005, 2006 has been centered around movies.
Men are very visual and I, I love using movies and really just an abject level of transparency and authenticity about my failures in my life. To reach guys cause you know, there's just nothing better to, for example, reflect a father wound than a clip from walk the line with Johnny Cash or a clip from Rudy where Rudy's dad says, you know, Notre Dame is for rich kids, smart kids, great athletes.
It's not for us. You know? I mean, those are the things that
Tony: Rudy, by the way is one of my favorite movies.
David: Oh, it's one of mine too.
Tony: Remember the Titans are probably my favorite football movies.
David: Well, I don't mean to get totally off track, but the video series we created using eight different episodes from my first book.
And the live speaking, I use Rudy as a clip and we ended up traveling all over the world to Milt, to film wherever the movies were filmed. So I did the whole Rudy episode sitting on a little stool, right on top of the N D in the game day locker room at Notre Dame. It was. Unbelievable. I got the, I got the hit, the play, like a champion sign going down the stairs into the breeze, the end of the tunnel idols of the field.
And anyway, back to the original test, we were, soldiers is one of my all time favorite movies. It's by the way, probably the most accurate war movie ever made. It was made by Randall Wallace who did Braveheart, but the reason it's so true to its original content is because how Moore, who, who retired as Lieutenant general, but was a Lieutenant Colonel at the time of the, of the battle in 1965.
I was sitting in a director's chair with Joe Galloway, who was a UPI reporter who if you've seen the movie is portrayed by Barry pepper is also Jackson. The sniper from saving private Ryan. Those guys were right there filming it. So I was watching the movie one day and I said, man, this would be the coolest men's book to take the lessons that I'm seeing in the conversations that I'm hearing and, and put a biblical spin on it.
So I'm in the bathroom, which is where most of us guys do our best thinking. And I thought, okay, how am I going to write a book about a movie that's based on a book that isn't going to work? And I, I honestly, I promise you, I heard very clearly God say while I was in the bathroom, you need to get ahold of Joe Galloway.
And of course I laughed kinda like Sarah did, when God said you're going to have a kid when you're 99 years old and that how in the world am I going to get ahold of Joe Galloway? So I went out to my laptop and I Googled Joe Galloway, found his agent, sent an email to his agent, and I promise you not 15 minutes later, I got a I got his phone number and he'd love to talk to you response from, from his his agent.
So I reached out to him and long story tolerable ended up flying up to Concord, North Carolina, Charlotte area. And I sat down across the table at a barbecue joint with Joe Galloway. Of course, I'm at this point, swooning like a teenager at a Taylor swift concert, because the guy's awesome. And he's telling me all these stories that you don't read about in the book.
And, and I got so much out of it, then I thought, okay, I need to do I need to do something else. I need to. Talk to the company commanders, how am I going to talk to the company? Commanders will, since I've spoken at west point multiple times, and I had some ins at west point at all of the company, commanders were graduates from west point.
I got all their contact information. So I sent them a shotgun email and I started interviewing them one at a time when I got to alpha company commander, Tony, they'd all he said, you know, we have a reunion every year, so why don't you just come as my guest? And you can meet everybody all in the same room at the same time.
And so we did, we went back in 20 12, 20 13 to Branson, Missouri. And I was sitting in the room with all of the war fighters that were portrayed in this movie. We were soldiers.
Tony: Yeah. Let me ask you about that. Right? Like walking into that room with those heroes. Right. As a soldier, myself, like I like, I'm like, you know, like, I mean these guys, I mean like, and how old are they in 2012?
I mean, they gotta be.
David:
They're in their seventies by then.
Tony: But they're all, I mean, they're, I mean, they're. Like their life there. I would imagine it's a lively group. Right? You don't do what they've done and not be fairly you know, I mean, like I know soldiers, right. And that heart, that heartbeat is real.
So what was it like walking into that room?
David: Well, it was, it was all inspiring on one hand, but then again, you know, they spilled the same blood in the same mud, right? So these guys have a, battle-hardened a brotherhood that's been around since 1965 when they, you know, jumped off of these Hueys that were flaring out of the battlefield.
So their relationship and their families, you know, their kids or grandkids are all very tightly intertwined. So, I mean, I brought my hard copy. Of we were soldiers once and young with me to this, to this visit because I was just going to meet these guys. And if I'm going to meet them, I'm going to have them all sign my book.
So I have a signed copy of the hardcover of the original book from the guys that were there. So wherever there's an image, like if there's a picture they signed by their picture, anywhere their re their story is told in the book they signed next to it. I think I've gotten just about the entire just about the entire battalion kinda kind of all scattered around this copy of the book.
So here I am just, you know, fan girling out huge in this reunion and Somehow or another, we developed it wasn't us. It was my wife. Everybody loves my wife and my wife became really good friends with lots of the wives of the war fighters. And so now every year, since then we get invited to this reunion.
And so each time I sit down with these guys, I, I hear different, you know, their particular take Tony, I originally was kind of like deifying Helmore I wanted the whole book to be about the faith of, of. Lieutenant Colonel or Lieutenant general, ultimately how more, but the more I talked to these guys, some of them were drafted.
Didn't want to be there, but the more I talked to them, the more I realized that the same tactics, techniques, and procedures that they used on the battlefield outnumbered, by the way, five to one, it was 395 against 2000. The same tactics, techniques, and procedures they use to win there. They also used to win at home because they're all believers.
And so it was really cool to take little vignettes from this battle and put a spin on it, where a guy like you or me or anybody listening. Who's just a, a believer can take those same tactics against the enemy that it says in John 10 wants to steal, kill, and destroy, same exact tactics and techniques and procedures that are used to win.
And real-world downwards combat can be used against the lion that is looking for somebody to devour and that's really. Kind of the backstory to how we even got the content for the book in the first place.
Tony: So it's interesting to me, one of the things I hear in your story is this fierce pursuit of what you think God is calling you to write.
And I love that. I love that as a life lesson. And I love that for guys and girls who are, who are kind of in this weird place. W what motivates you to make the call? You know, what motivates you to make the call? What motivates you to kind of hunt down those things that you think God is calling you to, and in what wisdom or discernment do you have for somebody who, who might be looking at an opportunity that is, is something that they want to go after?
Like how, how do you know when the right time to move is maybe that's a more succinct way to say it?
David: Well, it's a great question. You always look for God's breadcrumbs. I mean, that's kind of, I've actually never said that before, but I'm going to write that down and keep it because, I mean, honestly, that's something that you, the process of discernment requires that you're circumstantially aware of open and closed doors.
When I first got into ministry, when I would send an email out, I was plugged into great dads, which was a fathering ministry. I originally cut my teeth as a men's a guy with man in the mirror which is an organization that no man in the mirror. Yeah, trains pastors and men's leaders on the elements of building a sustainable ministry to men in the church.
And so I had like, you know, I was doing a financial piece. So I had all of these different titles underneath my name. And I met with an elder of my church and he said, you know, I don't even know what you do because you've got like five different websites and five different titles. Who are you? It was a question that God really kept asking me.
And I was doing all these leadership trainings and when they were filling out the, the little post training survey, one of the questions was what did you like the most about the content or the presentation? And almost nearly every time the feedback form would say the authenticity of the speaker, or he used his own life as examples, because I was, instead of using the, I have a friend who idea I was actually using my own failures as a father and a husband to illustrate these principles that we had in this training.
And I thought, okay, I'm onto something. Authenticity is required and I'm. Transparent to a fault in a lot of respects. And as I was doing that, I realized God continued to kind of sharpen the tip of the spear and show me what lane I needed to be in. And now I've become far more selective. It's like, well, you know, I'm really, that's not my calling.
And so the first thing is if you take what you're really passionate about what God's equipped you to do and the doors that are open, then you know, that's a calling. You can call it anything you want, but if he, if he intersects your passion with your skillset, then that's your calling. And that's how you can kind of follow those breadcrumbs.
So to speak. I know I'm not a fathering trainer. I mean, I could do it because you know, it carried an honorarium and it was something that I could do, but was I passionate about it? No. Was I passionate about leadership training? Not really. Have I seen what God has done in my life as a spiritual leader?
Coming from 30 plus years of not being one and then leaving the back half the after salvation or being a totally new creation and seeing the value of that versus the guy that I used to be, that is where I realized, okay, this is my lane. And then God reinforces that by a favor follows calling. So if you're where you're supposed to be, the obstacles just kind of disappear.
We, I haven't, I have worked for a year. I mean, I'm a speaker, that's my number one job, not an author. I write books, but my passion is equipping guys to connect, to forge, battle, ready, bonds of brotherhood. I have not been able, I traveled typically a typical year is 120 days on the road, a quarter million miles in the air, Australia, New Zealand, everywhere.
And COVID hit and suddenly I'm like, I don't even know how we're going to eat. And, you know, March of 2020, I knew we had, I'm a ferocious saver. I knew we had money to get through. We, we should have been out of business at the end of may, but our, our partners came together and we have the same amount of money right now that we had in March.
We we've been able to do things that I never thought we'd be able to do. And then God, wow, God will confirm your calling by saying, see, you keep doing what I've called you to do and all handle the logistics. My wife always says, keep your vertical walk, right? And the horizontal stuff will handle itself.
And that's how you're really, that's how you're really know you're in your, in your lane is when the opposition does melt away. God's going before you, he's coming up behind you. He's surrounding you with his, his best guard, so to speak that even if you try and screw it up, he could, which you believe me, I've done a book.
I mean, I can trust me. I mean, I can screw anything up if I try hard enough. And even in spite of me, God used to say, look, you stay in the lane. I'll I'll, I'll make sure that you're covered. So really to answer your question, you know, you're where you're supposed to be when your passion and your skillset intersect, you love what you do and God meets your needs.
God's not gonna give you a Ferrari, you know but he's gonna meet your needs. It's going to sustain you as you go through that because you are you may be the only one doing something. When I was in real estate development, I read a book called a category of one, which is a sales book. And one statement.
I will never forget that I apply to ministry all the time. Don't try to be the best one in a category, create your own category and be the only one in it. And that's, that's what rough cut men ministries is, is it's a very unique Hybrid using movie clips is parables and a lot of churches are doing this.
Now they call it at the movies. It's like, all right. We were at the movies before. It was cool, bro. I mean, we were doing this. We were doing this years ago. So that's, you know, that's how, you know it, you just pray about it and if it sounds ridiculous, then God's behind it.
Tony: Oh, I, I, I mean, I do think that you should write down that saying always look, I wrote it down myself, always look for God's breadcrumbs.
That's that's super solid man. And I think, well, I think that there are probably a lot of people right now who, who are missing, who are missing the breadcrumb is because they're so worried about COVID or all the other things in the world. And so one of the questions I always love to ask leaders who are in a position like you are that your entire world shifted last year.
What did, what did not doing what you normally do, teach you about God heading into 2021 and 2022.
David: Well, I don't, I always said, I realize I that I've trusted God with our finances and to know the full backstory I, I, my background is accounting. Okay. So God's got us, God's got a sense of humor. He took a dude out of real estate in the Florida market at its absolute beak, and then threw me into ministry.
So I could actually watch the number turn, read over and over. So I learned that, I learned that I say a lot of really cool things but it missed it. It missed the mark. You know, they say out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks. That's what the word does. But a lot of what I was speaking was just what I figured everybody else wanted to hear.
And I was tested to the point of the ridiculous this last year, but so much, so much good came out of the whole 2020 thing I heard, I heard a preacher buddy of mine say, don't be so anxious. To get get into 2021 that you miss what God's doing in 2020. And being a guy who travels 120 days a year and gone all the time.
I developed a really good skillset of walking around the elephant in my living room to go to the airport. You know, there were a lot of things that I thought were okay that in our marriage, I knew that there were some things that were dreadful that I needed to deal with myself. But what I would do is Friday morning at six o'clock or five o'clock would come along and I'd streak off to the airport.
And as you know, over and over again, the problem would problem would go away. By the time I got home on Monday and I would regale my wife with, you know, all the great things God did at the event, but at the end of the day, as you know, men and women are very different. I really did forget she didn't. So each respect each time.
Each negative response as we would go through life was getting worse and worse because it was cumulative. She was harboring a whole lot of just flat man at me about things I'd said, things I'd done were very different. Very type a sarcastic edgy brash I think is what she's called me many times before.
But, you know, Braskem become bold when it knew when he started talking about your faith. But we're very different and you can't walk around the living rock around the elephant in the living room when you've got no airport to go to. So God. Forced me to really take a good, hard look at me. And I even wrote a blog on my website called mirrors.
And it was about the analogy was the fun house mirrors that you go into if you've ever been in. Oh yeah. One will distort you to look short one.
Tony: I always like to get the tall one because I'm not naturally tall.
David: Right. But not one of those reflections is accurate. And it was like, okay, I'm looking at my skinny fat self or my fat self.
And that was me hoarding money. And I looked at my My almost invisible self, and that was me and my marriage. And so God really started to show me a lot of things that I needed to do differently because I had no way out. We were stuck under the same roof for an entire year. And honestly, Tony, our marriage has never been better, but a lot of God had to do some serious work on me.
And I know there's a lot of people out there that prayer, if only my spouse would change here or there, but I knew going into it, it's like, okay, I'm about ready to deal with the gauntlet of issues that are a hundred percent me that need to be dealt with. And I let him do open heart surgery on me and a lot of cases.
And my wife was incredibly gracious and All the better for it. And I actually go to work this weekend. I'm on my way to Dallas to speak at an event. Those guys better buckle up, man. Cause I got a year, I got a year's worth of junk. Ready to come out.
Tony: Let me ask you this. Right. Cause about part of your your book is about getting super practical, which is one of the things I really appreciate it.
It's not like a, this is not a fluff book, right? Like this is designed to get into tactics to real tactics. So I imagine that there's somebody who's listening to you talk about your marriage and the elephant in the room and they're thinking, oh my gosh, that's me. Yup. Right. What, what is, what is the practical tactic that, that we can apply to starting the process of open heart surgery?
I mean, for men and for women?
David: Well, I can tell you that it begins. And, and with one word humility we get so caught up defending ourselves that we are just bounded determined to validate our position no matter what, and we're usually not right. So we have to let God to start ripping the layers off. I learned a lot in, I've got, you know, some very pronounced father wounding that, you know, we've reconciled, but I had a long stretch of product realism.
My dad's dad left him when he was about 12 years old. So he didn't really have a father model. He's still wounded by that at 85 years old. And my dad's military, you know so. I always felt like I couldn't do anything. Right. No matter how hard I tried. And it's interesting because a lot of the time, my filter, when my wife talks to me is I'm filtering it in the context of my story that I have built around me from my dad.
So when she's telling me, I need to be better at something instead of hearing, you know, Hey, you know, this is God talking. You might want to improve this. What I'm hearing is honey, no matter how hard you try to be a good husband, you keep failing right there. So you'll never be good enough. And that is my father talking.
And a lot of us, men and women will bring this story that we believe about ourselves, that we've gotten from an ex spouse or an ex boyfriend, girlfriend, or a parent, and the story gets written. And then we continue to go through life, validating it in various contexts with mine, you know, the I'm not good enough story.
My word, man, I've found it in ministry. I can find it in my marriage. I can find it just in the gym where, you know, there's always somebody bigger, better and faster, you know? And and so it's like, yeah, I'll never be that, or I'll never be this. Well, you know, the good news is we were exactly who God created us to be.
And once we let him show us where we are wrong that is the pivotal moment. For me because I'm a prideful idiot and I will be right until you put me in my grave. I'm going to be right. Even if I'm not. And I think that was where God really started to work on the marriage is when, you know, we're each responsible for our, we're a hundred percent responsible for our 50% of each relationship we're in, including our men.
And that doesn't, the marriage is not 50, 50, it's a hundred hundred. And I was overlooking some things that were at critical mass. You know, I mean, it's kind of like a meltdown in a nuclear power plant. I mean, that uranium was hot. There was no water on it. And the thing was about ready to melt down and the enemy would like nothing better than to take out the marriage of somebody in ministry because you take out the marriage, we've got five kids between the two of us.
We're a blended family that will radiate out into them. And that would be catastrophic. Not only that, you know, with. I mean, we have a reach of, I think, two and a half to 3 million people, every 28 day cycle on social media. I'm speaking, you know, I'm speaking a hundred days a year. Normally. Now the books, you know, the first book went number one on Amazon, back in 2016 and men's Christian living.
Now, this one is tracking to do somewhat the same thing. There's a huge influence that we have as specifically men. Cause that's my area of expertise as pastors, as ministers of the gospel. As, as business people running a Christian business, you've got the little, this fish on the back of all your vehicles and the enemy has figured out that if you can take out the man out of the business or out of a marriage, you can not only if you take a man out of the marriage, you can.
Destroy the marriage, you can destroy the kids and the generational legacy that comes after him. It's one shot, multiple kill. And that's one of the reasons why guys are always seems to be, we're always the target of spiritual attack because the enemy has been doing it since Adam, you know, and he's still doing it today.
So that's pride led to that fall. You know, Adam saying, Hey man, the woman that you gave me asked me to eat this fruit, you know what's the deal, you know, this woman that you made out of my rib, we're still doing the same thing. And that's all a pride, this woman that I'm living with never listens to me this woman, you know, I'm I'm right.
But she, she, she's not hearing me. And I had an old mentor used to say, look, dude, do you want to be right? Or do you want to be happy?
Tony: Yeah, no, that's good.
David: And that's, you know what? You got to shelve your pride and let God perform open-heart surgery on you. And then the marriage will get better. And that was where I finally had the breakthrough was when I realized dang man, it's all me.
Yeah, it hurts. It hurts to own it.
Tony: I bet it does that. It does. And it, well, I mean, the truth is, is I know that there's, I wrestle with, you know, my pride all the time and being a, a type, a kind of guy like I'm coming in hot almost all the time, right? Yeah, that's right. That's right. You know, if I, if you've ever done the Enneagram identify as an eight on the Enneagram.
And so when I'm in an unhealthy place, I most often look like a bull in the China shop and that's been many years of my marriage too. And and I I've done some things to help kind of practice that posture of humility. I'm curious. What, what are a couple of practices that you recommend or that you do to stay in that humble?
Because I, I mean, I, I think I'm about 24 hours away from ruining my entire life any given day.
David: Oh, you got, you got a few more hours than me, man. Well, I can tell you that, that. I have a very, I'm weird. I'm an I'm type. AAA, bro. I mean, I am just I'm right there with you. So I mean, I, I am regimented to a fault.
I'm up at five 30 in the morning. I've got a quiet time regimen. Then I go to the gym. I'm back home by eight o'clock. I mean, everything is it's like living in Groundhog day, man. I'm ha I live in the same day over and over again. But without that time in the word, first thing in the morning.
Tony: Do you do, do you do a chapter a day versus a day reading plan?
David: I had to go back and forth being, being that guy, you know, I had a number of years in a row where I'm like, I am going to read the whole ought to do the whole Bible 365. So I got a 365 reading plan and then God showed me about four or five years into this, you know, it's like the year I got done in October, I'm like, yeah, I got done two months early.
And God asked me, he's like, well, what, what are you gonna do with that? And so now I've actually gone into a reverse cycle. I stopped doing that because it became being type a, it became all right, man. I knocked out that 4.33 chapters today. It's time to get to the email and there was no heart connection at all.
So I have been very strategic about doing something that monks do lately which is called Lectio Divina prayer. Would you actually take love that, take a single verse and then you just meditate on it and God will continue to drill it down until there's this one word that you're focused on, but I think more than anything, just, it doesn't matter what the tactic is or what, you know, what the plan is.
It's the fact that I am so incredibly small and so incredibly reliant upon this creator of the universe. You know, when I surrendered my position as master of my own universe Then humility set in and I really learned you know, humility in the biggest sense of the word. You don't know what it's like to be a ministry where you're completely supported by other people.
I normally, 80%, 90% of our income is me. I'm selling books in the back of the room thinking, well, there was a day about July of this last year where I was balancing the checkbook. I'm one of those guys. I still write checks, accounting, sorry. I'm paying the bills. And I looked at the checkbook and I heard God say, look at the checkbook.
And I'm like, God, you know, you're here, I'm here, checkbook. I'm already looking at it. You know, what are you asking me to do? I said, I'm looking at it already. He said, look at it again. And I looked at it again and he said, look at the balance. And I did. And I'm like, wow, that's pretty cool. He said, you did not speak a single word.
For one dime of that money for the first time in ministry, you have not earned a single dime, not one book, not one speaking engagement, every single bit of that money came from other people in my kingdom supporting your mission because that's how I work. And that was the humility shot that I needed terms of finance finances, where it's like, wow, man.
I used to think I got hustle, man. I need two more speaking engagements in June, or we're not going to eat. You know, if I'm not speaking, we're not eating that's was my phrase forever. And I have not said it since March of 2020, because I eat what I eat because. God cares more about me than he does about the sparrows who eat every day.
You know, there's so much life that's been brought to the gospels by actually living in the middle of them. I mean, I am one step short of the blind guy, you know, sitting outside the gate saying, you know, son of David heal me. And when you set the day up like that, it means the world. And when my wife tells me, you know, honey, when you're up that early reading the word, it's almost like you're sitting on a Watchtower, making sure that our family is safe and you have no idea how it means to me.
Yeah.
Tony: That's a, that's an affirmation that I that's good.
David: For the guys listening, man. Our wives want us to lead in love, not the Bible says I'm the leader. So you're going to shut up and listen to me. We lead in love and my wife follows me even though she's way smarter than I am and way more tuned in to the Lord.
She follows me because she knows that my guidance comes from my time with God and I have. Another guy in my life to get, you know, there's wisdom in a multitude of counsel. I will never pull the trigger on any decision, ministry, finance, any of it without seeking his counsel first, because you know, isolation is a killer and the Bible says, you know, Solomon said in Ecclesiastes these four, that we should pity the man who falls and has no one to help him up.
So I make sure I don't set myself up to fail, but by getting counsel and I don't get counsel often, unless it directly involves my wife, I get counsel from other men because my wife is number one, a woman, and she's completely wired up differently than I am better, but different. And secondly, she's too intimately involved either financially or emotionally to, you know, she's invested in whatever the decision is.
So when you go outside and say, Hey, bro my wife needs a new car. I'm not sure whether or not I should get one. I have the credit for it. I also have the money to fix it. I'm kind of, I don't know what to do. Those are the kinds of, I mean, just, it may sound remedial and stupid everyday life kind of stuff, but that's, that's why my wife trusts me and the discipline to spend time in the word.
And it's not the quantity. It's the quality just, you know I think about Mary and Martha and I am like a straight up Martha when it comes to ministry, but God just wants us, you know, Jesus wants us hanging out at his feet and he'll read a stories. And one of the most pivotal things for me in terms of my walk lately has been the chosen that whole television series has rocked me.
If you haven't seen it, get the hap, I'm not getting renumerated for it. I'm telling you it was a game changer.
Tony: Lord, it's really well done, especially for when you think about how sometimes cheesy Jesus movies can be.
David: Cheesy anything Christian, you know, if it wasn't for the chosen and for the guys up at I say up because I'm in Florida up at Sherwood in Albany doing, you know, courageous and fireproof and facing the giants.
We've been just a super fail when it comes to Christian entertainment. Finally, things are starting to step up, but anyway, that was a long answer to your question. It's all humility and all spending time with God. And if you start the day with him, he'll set the tone for the rest of the day.
Tony: But I think you're probably reading a lot of people's mail right now, you know, so to speak because there's so many of us that are trying to figure out what that life of humility looks like, how do we lean into it?
I, I know in my private and my quiet time, one of the, one of my goals for this year, because I'm a movie guy, which is why I was really attractive to your ministry. I love movies. Like I I'm the guy that I can't mortal Kombat comes out this weekend. I can't wait to go see it. Not because I care a whole bunch about moral combat.
I'm sure it'll be fine, but because I just, I haven't been to the movies. I mean, I, listen, I don't mind HBO max for some of the movies that I want to watch, but about being in a theater and just the, you know, I'm here for. And so my goal in scripture is to get to a place where you can drop me in. Jesus is a life.
And I know what's coming before and after, because if you put me in any movie that I love, I know I could, I could quote a couple of lines. I know what's coming before and I know what's coming after a man, somebody convicted me. It was like, Hey, are you that passionate about Jesus? I'm like, well, I. I mean, I say I am, but I haven't, I haven't committed to that.
So I'm reading the gospels every month, this year. Oh, I'm reading, I'm reading. Yeah. And I'm doing it with a group of guys and girls from the church. And so it's been, it's been really good and, and it, it leads me to this.
David: Wow. That totally resonated with me, Tony, because I could probably, I have more lines from dumb and dumber memorize than I do from the word of God.
Tony: If you could put me in any part of remember the Titans and I can tell you what's going to happen next, like, of course, like you're over cooking. My grits coach disrupted my first team meeting in an acceptable way. Look, I love that movie. Right. But if you're like, well, where were you when Jesus got touched by the woman on the crowd, you know, w where were we in Jesus's ministry life?
David: Well, I think working in the gospels, gimme, gimme, give me a pericope P a chapter in averse where that happens. Well, I can't, but I can tell you what it's like to stand on the edge of the battle of Gettysburg and how many guys died now.
Tony: I do, I do wonder how much that is, is, you know, because I'm such a visual learner, right?
Like, and, you know, that's where the things like the chosen really come in. But but I think that humility starting humility with scriptures, probably a profound way to go. And, and so I was hoping that you could define the term biblical manhood for me. You use it, the book. And so I think, I think in this world that we live in it's, it's important to get really clear about language so that we can get really clear about movement.
David: Oh, I agree. And I mean, we've, we've watched the degeneration of the perception of manhood through, through media. You know, I mean, we've gone from father knows best, or, you know, Michael Landon a little house on the Prairie to the countless, the caliber of a Homer Simpson, you know, who's just, men have been portrayed as these bumbling buffoons, even commercials.
And, and this is not a a pride thing. It's just the fact that we are the biblically ordained, you know, head of the household. The problem is that when you start talking that way, people think you're a misogynist or chauvinistically, or, you know what men. Men women can do what men can do. And I mean, that, that kind of stuff.
So it's very, it's an uphill battle. I heard something said the other day that I just, then I just loved which is, you know, men and women are not equal. They're unique. Equal would be the same unique means same level, but. Different no stair-step but uniquely independent of one another.
And we each have our own callings. Mine is to be a godly husband and a father and a contributor and, and serve at my church and serve the kingdom because all of this is vapor. You and I are sitting on this screen. It's just a dress rehearsal for eternity. You know, we're a dot on the line. What we do now will impact the eternity for generations one way or the other biblical manhood is spelled out very clearly in Timothy and in a number of other places in the word of God, as far as what the requirements are for us to do.
And the first and most important one. And I've mentioned it already before is leading, leading. Lovingly leading. And I think there's been this gross misperception because we're interpreting things, all kinds of sideways that women can't teach women, shouldn't teach women, you know, need to shut up and the man needs to lead the house.
And I would be nothing without Joni my wife. I mean, nothing. I want to quit. I always joke. I want to quit ministry every Wednesday and she absolutely refuses to let me set it down because she and I are both previously married. I met the Lord when my marriage melted down and, and she's been walking with the Lord for a very long time.
And she's seen the difference between a spiritual leader and one that's not. And because she's seen the difference between the two she's so invested in other women through having godly biblically, ordained husbands at home that she has done without in ways that. I, you know, I want to give her everything and I can't, and that's, that's across.
I bear every day that I wish I could just give her everything because of everything that she's sacrificed for the ministry. Biblical manhood is just following the leading of the Lord. When the holy spirit speaks, you say, you know what, God, you're right. Not not, but you don't know what she said to me.
Of course he does. He's everywhere. And so he does what she said to you. He does know that it's been years of constant bickering about something or a lack of physical intimacy. He knows all this biblical manhood means that you overlook those things and you say, what can I do to love more first Corinthians 16, 13 talks about, you know Lost my mind, but I know that the last part of first Corinthians 16, 13 says do everything in love.
And we skip over that one, you know, be strong, be men of God, you know love the brotherhood, do everything in love. And I think it's very difficult speaking from personal experience whether you're a man or a woman, it's very difficult to love somebody that's unlovable. And we create these narratives in our head.
And then of course we get on social media and. Find someone that we dated 25 years ago. And then before you know it, and remember the enemy wants to take the marriage out because take out the marriage, take out the kids, take out the generational legacy. We start feeling entitled and our pride gets in the way it's like, well, maybe she, or he would love me more than my wife.
Maybe it's time for an upgrade. And then we let pride erode away at everything. Like we're entitled to something. If you want the perfect spouse, make the perfect spouse by loving your spouse. Like nobody else can in spite of their flaws and God will make that marriage rock solid. And when our kids see that that will become their benchmark, I've raised girls and boys.
We've got three boys and two girls all in their twenties. Now three out of five are married. I think one is kind of heading in that direction. Also the fourth. When the girls look for a potential husband. Which they're both married. Now. I want to be the benchmark. I want Jesus to be the benchmark, but I want them to see Jesus through me.
I want them to see through the, the stupid things that people would dismiss as being ridiculous. My wife has never opened the car door in all of our years of marriage. She's never pumped her own gas unless I'm like on a trip somewhere, because those are the things that I just do. And you know, when I'm out of town, even when the guys were, the kids were, the boys were little.
Eight years old, they would walk around and open her driver's door to get into the car before they would get in the back seat, because they'd seen me do it. And I realized that more is caught than taught. So biblical manhood is not a bunch of words or nailing scripture to your doorposts like they did in the old Testament.
It is modeling it for the next generation to see so that we, we replicate ourselves. We leave footprints that are worth walking in that's biblical manhood. It's it's, it's not our words. It's our actions. And it's forgiving quickly. It's loving hard and the rest will get picked up.
Tony: Oh, one of the things that you talk about in the book is this idea about spiritual warfare.
I think, I think a lot of north American Christians have relegated that to some sort of like thing that's not happening every day. So I'm curious if you could give us a couple of practical examples of what spiritual warfare looks like on a random Tuesday for most guys.
David: Spiritual warfare on a random Tuesday would be your absolute conviction that you are entitled to the promotion and you find out. That one of your less qualified colleagues has been given the promotion. And of course you begin to look for reasons why political or otherwise, and you've already been rejected at home because you've got teenage kids that really don't talk to you anymore.
Your marriage is strained at home and now you're being rejected at work. And that is right where the enemy always wants us to feel like we are nothing to feel like, because what he's, what he's trying to do in any circumstance is take our eyes off of the mission. Whatever that mission might be. But the mission first is to love, God honor.
The brotherhood love our families ferociously. I mean, that's, that's the mission serve the king. And if we're in an element of distraction, because that is tactic tending number one is isolation tactic. Number two is distraction. The surest way to take a guy off of his game in spiritual warfare is to take him away from everybody.
And I select when things go wrong, when I'm fighting with my wife or there's something wrong with the kids, or I'm just completely discontent with ministry or work which in my case is exactly the same thing. Then I just don't care anymore. And when I, you know, become apathetic and then I sit down, I start watching TV.
People are walking in front of me. I don't even acknowledge that they've walked into the room cause I'm so defeated. I don't have anybody to say, look, dude, you're going to make it. Even if life blows your legs off, I'm dragging you off the field to live, to fight another day. That is why in combat. You never kick a door without Overwatch.
You always got to have somebody. Around you. So the enemy's tactics will be to isolate or distract and distraction can be any number of things. It can be an inappropriate relationship with someone that you shouldn't be emailing. It could be things like texts that you have to delete off of your phone or an email address that no one else knows about, but you, those are real world spiritual warfare, because if you remember the number one goal is to fracture their family.
If you can get the man distracted now, distraction doesn't necessarily come in that manner either. If I, I fall prey to distraction all the time with my kids, when to go to Vietnam for a minute, when they were, if you were marching a column, a quarter mile long through a jungle, there are two ways to stop forward Mo movement on that column of troops going from one landing zone to a battlefield, you can either shoot the leader on point because when you shoot the leader, everything's got to get handed down to the next in line.
You know, the maps, the orders, all that have to go to the next highest ranking individual, or you shoot the lowest ranking. Been there for six weeks buck, private who got drafted. And he'll fall and the whole column will still stop. The enemy has figured out that if he can't take you and me out, if he starts targeting our kids, he can still stop.
Our forward movement has gotten because we'll stop. And that's one of the most successful tactics of the enemy in the world of spiritual warfare for me is I will be in the middle of an epic presentation. I'll never forget a day. I was at west point. I had just walked up to the podium in front of a bunch of cadets.
And I looked down at my phone and there was a two-word message from my son that said, I'm homeless. Now he'd been prodigal. We hadn't spoken. He'd been living in his car. I hadn't heard from him for months and he throws the I'm homeless down on me. Right? As I'm about ready to speak at one of the biggest opportunities I'd ever had.
And I knew right then and there, I recognize it for what it is. It's like not today, Satan. You're not taking me off of my game. Let's say my kid is the enemy, but my kid is a tool. And my kid is the, is the, is the young buck private at the end of the column, you want to stop me from going forward? Take out my wife, take out my kids.
You don't have to shoot me. You can take out somebody else in my platoon and it's still going to stop me from moving forward. And that can be in the form of your you're on your, a game at work. Somebody else gets that promotion. And then we ended up going home, carrying the burden of I'm not good enough because that's exactly what my dad told me 40 years ago.
Here I am. My boss has confirmed the same story that I'm not good enough, and I'm going to bring that home. And of course our wives are going to say what's wrong. And then of course, we're going to unload on them about how we were entitled to that job and it should have been ours. And I always tell the guys now, no matter what you do for a living, when you pull into the garage, when you, when you're pulling into the garage, after a long day of work, no matter how the day was, remember this, you are pulling into the most important meeting of the day, come on, because it is doesn't matter how things went at work.
So spiritual warfare can look any number like any, it can be painted, dressed up, made up whatever you want to call it in any number of different ways, but the enemy reads our mail. So he knows. We all take different bait. You know, I've got, I'm a bass fisherman. I got a tackle box full of all kinds of stuff, depending on cloud, cover, water, temperature, and pH, and all of that.
And where I am in the country with my fishing rod and they're all best, but they all bite at different bait. And we as men specifically, but men and women will all buy it at the same, a different bait, you know, and it's the same one. The enemy knows. The Bible says in second Corinthians 11 or second Corinthians, two 11, that we're not unfair.
We're not unfamiliar with his schemes. We already know our choke points, man. We already know where the enemy is going to hit us. We just have to proactively defend against that. And that's spiritual warfare. He studies us, he knows us. You got to remember the guy knows more scripture than anybody, but God.
He, he, he was right up there. He was throwing scripture at Jesus for 40 days, you know? Right, right. Dropping Jesus's words on him, trying to use it against him. So we would be awfully overconfident to think that the enemy doesn't have a way to, to crack the door in our no matter how strong our fortress might be.
And I say, if you let the enemy, get his foot in the door, he'll kick it down. So that's how, that's how warfare works. And we, I think we forget that going on over our head. If we could see it with supernatural vision, our angels defending us demons, attacking us. And every once in a while an arrow gets through and we know it does, and we respond to it accordingly.
Tony: Let me ask you this. I know that my listeners love to pray. They love to pray about a lot of things that are happening in in people's lives. And, and, and this book is going to really do some good for a lot of guys out there. How can they specifically be praying for rough cut ministries? How can they be praying for the battle?
How can they be praying for what what biblical man had looks like in the world today, specifically, what can, how can they pray for you and your ministry?
David: Well, you know, I, I used to be that guy and say, I'll pray for book sales and pray for this and pray for that. And Joanie and I were sitting around the other day and I was heartbroken.
You know, we have a video series that you can get on our website, which is an eight week super cool streaming video series, using movies, all filmed on location all over the world. I mean, we can even play, I'll give you seven guesses, you know, like saving private. Ryan is one of my favorite movies.
It's one of our episodes. Where did we film it? Where would you fill it?
Tony: France of course, no.
David: Yeah, we filmed, we filmed it on Omaha beach and we filmed it in the American cemetery. Notre Dame. I already kind of told you, we filmed that is the game day locker room at Notre Dame Armageddon. We filmed on the floor of mission control at Johnson space center in Houston, and then partly at Cape Canaveral out on pad 39.
Hey, where they launched Apollo 11 and the challenger and everything else. So God opened all these really cool doors for us to film their 25 minute episodes. We built them originally for the chaplain Corps for the army. Then in November of 2019, oddly enough we transitioned over to allow a church men's groups and you know, guys to use it that way.
It's on our website. But I was heartbroken because. We get five star reviews. The emails I get are ridiculous, and I just want everybody to, they have our stuff, you know, I want everybody to read. Now it's not for everybody. The guys call me and say, Hey, can you come and speak at my church? And I said, well, if you want me to come in and wax poetic about Paul's original epistles in Greek, I'm probably not the guy, but if you want a guy to point at a hill and say, Hey guys, let's go take that.
Then we're a good fit. So I stay in my lane again, I know where I'm going, but I just, if you could pray anything for our ministry, it's that the right hands, the books and the content and the messages and the speaking engagements fall into the right hands. I don't count troops. My name is David. It didn't work out too well for my name's sake in the Bible.
So I never, I never, I don't care how many people are there. How many people buy the book? It doesn't matter because I know that one, one, the downline of one man can be generational. I just want the right men. To get the content in their hands because that's, I've lived, it I've lived a life before the Lord.
I've lived a life after I've lived a life as a believer, destroying my marriage day in and day out and having God finally break me of that by breaking us almost ridiculously financially and everything else to get me to be fully reliant on his provision and his wisdom. So I just, I don't ever want to get ahead of God.
I want him to do whatever it is he's going to do. With our ministry, we're dealing with a huge spiritual attack now. And then I put up a meme. I don't ever post politics. We have a hundred thousand people that follow our Facebook page and I was restricted for 30 days. And I'm like, w what I mean? So our reach went from 3 million to 500,000 in the span of 30 days, and we can't seem to get it back.
So I don't know. And I've been this morning as a matter of fact, I was sitting around with my wife and I said, you know, I think it's time to I think we may have to be early adopters on something new, because I think that, that over time, we're going to see some changes to social media that are going to render it kind of impotent for for ministry.
And I think we've, you know, it's run its course and that's cool. You know just like coach McCartney said when, when he started promise keepers, he knew it was for a season and you know, maybe social media has been for a season. So right now we're praying for the next way to get the message out.
Maybe it's through this book. I don't know.
Tony: Through the video series, but it's obvious that God's, that God's doing something and he's doing something in you and through you. And I'm with you on that. I think, I think now's the time to start adjusting the fields of fire, so to speak and figuring out what God's called us to next.
If, if my listeners do want to connect with you online, where is the best place to start? Where, where can they get the most amount of information and learn more about the work that God has you doing around the world?
David: Every single bit of it is on our website at rough cut men dot O R G. You can obviously you can get the book, both of my books, rough cut men and the battle.
Everywhere you buy books. The battle is literally everywhere. Barnes and noble Books-A-Million Amazon. It's also, if you want signed copies of either one of them, they're on my website down at the bottom. If you want to know about live speaking there's an event tab. If you want to know about my schedule upcoming events tab, if you want to know about the video series as a video series tab, everything is right there on the website too, to lead you to my bio is on there as uninteresting as that is.
But everything. If you want to know if I'm coming through a place near you, great, if you want to bring me to a place near you to send me an email contact tab, it goes right to my phone. One of the things that my wife and I live by is Jesus would leave the 99 to go get the one and ministry is all about the one.
So if you're a guy right now struggling, or I read your mail, you know, around peeking through your windows on this conversation that Tony and I have had, then send me an email and we'll get on the phone. And we'll talk things through because ministry is, is one-on-one. And I believe that every guy who I intersect with, whether it's virtual or in a real event and a book we're blessed to meet each other on this side of the throne room.
And there's a reason for it. And if I can be that guy to walk you through a battle that you're in it ain't about money. God obviously I've eaten through the entirety of 2020. I am here to serve men as they battle this enemy that wants to knock us out.
Tony: Amen. Okay. Last question. I always love to ask people.
It's an advice question. Like I said, if I get to take you back, you give yourself one piece of advice. I'm going to take you back to a very specific time. I'm going to take you back right before your lunch with Joe. Right? You're getting ready to sit down with this living legend at a barbecue place. If you could go back and tell that younger version of David, as you're getting ready to start this entire journey with the seventh gab and everything else, if you could go back and give that young man one piece of advice, what would it be?
David: I thought that was it, man. I thought it was barbecue. You know, one and done. I would tell myself as I'm walk, as I'm grabbing the door handle of sticky fingers, barbecue in Concord, North Carolina. Hang on. Hmm. This ministry, since we started has been a roller coaster. And if you know anything about rollercoasters, they just go where they're going to go. Your job is to hold on and God set the tracks and he set the tracks into motion for the battle. And I had no idea that this was gonna, it was gonna become a book.
I thought it was just, it was a cool idea. And I got a chance to meet Joe Galloway and I was going to take a selfie and post it on Instagram. And that was the end of it. I would I would tell myself, this is, this is the beginning of something that you don't even know what's about to happen. So be open to anything.
Tony: I love it. I love it. David, thank you so much for being so generous with your time today. Thank you for your, your vulnerability and your authenticity and the way you're speaking to men. And I think I'm most excited about it for my two young men, the two young men that I'm raising. Cause I'm really praying that God does something in, in my generation and the generation that comes after me so that we can really make an impact on the next generation.
Right. And so I'm committed to biblical manhood for Connor and Caleb. And I'm thankful for you and your commitment.
David: Amen, man. I mean that's, when, no matter how hard you work at your job, when we're gone, we're gone. And our legacy is going to be the words that the people closest to us are, you know, the first Thanksgiving when we're not sitting at that table our legacy is not going to be what we provided or what we built or what we did at the office.
It's going to be. The words that they speak about us and the first word that's going to come out of their mouth is our name. And when they say, man, I sure miss dad, or I sure miss Tony that's going to elicit emotion. And in some cases I think about people that would mention my name, probably wouldn't want them speaking over my grave site just yet, because I haven't had a chance to introduce them to the new creation yet.
But as long as we're still alive, we have an opportunity to leave a revised legacy. So if you look at your life and you think, you know, they may not be real cool with talking about me at my funeral, then than listen to the holy spirit, go make it right. It starts under our roof. Sit your wife down and say, is there anything I've said in the last week that hurt you?
Hmm sit down with your kids and say, Hey kids, is there anything I've said that you can remember recently way that where I've hurt your feelings and then make it right, because our job number one job is to be the reconciler. I mean, Jesus is number one mission was to reconcile a fallen man with a holy God.
And if it's good enough for him, it's good enough for me. So we want to make sure that when we're standing at the end of our life, just like Samuel did before the, the elders of the nation of Israel, he said, who am I wrong? If I, if I borrowed a donkey and I didn't return it, let me know if I owe you money.
Let me know. I wish it had zero tolerance for broken relationships and our legacy is all about those relationships. It's not about what we've spent money on or what we do over where we lived. It's, it's what they're talking about when we're gone and if we're not happy with what we think we would hear, then.
God bless us. We're still breathing. We're still alive. And God's mercies are new every morning, so let's just make it right and live a life worth repeating.
Tony: Perfect place to end, bro. Thank you so much. I appreciate your generous,
David: Tony. Thank you for your service brother.
Tony: I love that conversation with David.
I love the way he talks about the enemy. Once to take our eyes off Jesus. I love his heart for putting men in community right on his website. He talks about how most men are isolated and that's exactly where the enemy wants us. I know there are seasons in my life where that resonates deeply. So thankful for David.
Be sure to check him out on social media, let them know that you heard him here on the podcasts support, what he's doing. I think it's a really worthwhile endeavor. Again. If you have some time today, please leave me a rating or review on iTunes. We'd love to get your feedback. I read every single one of them.
And it means the world to me, that so many of you continue to support this ministry. I am so thankful for the work that we get to do here. So until next week, I just want to encourage you. If you want to follow Jesus, you must be willing to move.
