Latest / Intentional Guy / Scars Prove You're Still Standing
Transcript
- Mark: I remember her looking at my father and saying, If I survive this, I'm going back to church. I don't care if you go with me or not, I would love for you to, but I'm going no matter what. I can't live this lifestyle anymore. My dad said, I'll come with you, but I'm not giving my life to Jesus. So we started going to church. there were a couple weeks that passed and my dad would go regularly. And I remember driving home from church and my dad talking about things that were said in the message. I don't remember my father ever talking about the Bible or God or anything before that moment. And I don't know how long it had been, how much time had passed, but I remember a server we're sitting in a service. People up front were singing, someone's feeling the call of the Lord to come and give their life to Jesus. Next thing I knew is my dad put on his jacket and started heading towards the door. What I do remember is my father ran towards the altar. He had his jacket still was still half on, fell on his knees, and from the position that I was sitting, I saw my father on his knees before God, and I saw water dripping from his eyes. Michael Chestnut: A lot of men listening right now didn't get to choose the pattern they were born into. Maybe it was your father's addiction, or maybe it's the one your own kids are watching you carry right now, even if you think you're hiding it well. My guest today used to wish his story looked cleaner than it does. Then he realized something. You never make it through a real battle without scars. Mark Osborne hosts his own podcast for Christian men, The Valiant Forge. And long before he built a platform teaching other men about faith and fatherhood, he watched his own father go from alcoholism to a faith that broke that pattern in their family. Mark, welcome to the show today. Mark: Michael, thanks for having me. Michael Chestnut: Man, it's really good to speak with you. I've got to look at your podcast a little bit, but today, you know, if you don't mind, I'd really like to jump in a little bit on your story and and with your father if you wouldn't mind kind of laying that out for us. Mark: Sure. So I don't remember a lot of my childhood before my father got saved. I r I remember pieces of it when I was ten, I remember being in Sunday school a lot, but my parents not being there. And what I had heard from my parents is that my mom went to church when we were really, really young. And my dad would go once in a while, but he was he wasn't about the life of being a Christian in any way. And eventually my mom ended up it was just too hard for her to try to keep my dad going and try to live a different lifestyle than him. And she ended up backsliding and started drinking and living the same kind of life that he did for a long time. And I remember w I was ten years old, I believe, somewhere around that age. We went to a Sunday school and they gave a salvation message. And this it wasn't a salvation message. It was a keep yourself from hell message. In in a Sunday school class, I remember this guy had a bucket that said Lake of Fire on it. And he was he was naming all these sins. And then he'd take a lighter and burn the sin and throw it in the bucket. And I remember specifically him saying, All liars have their part in the lake of fire. He'd light Michael Chestnut: Mm. Mark: hit that lighter and throw that in there. And I thought, I just lied about my brother just a couple hours ago. I'm going to hell. And he he gave a a message for, you know, it's people who want to become Christians. I raised my hand because I didn't want to go to hell. I didn't understand the message of the gospel, but I understood Michael Chestnut: Right. Mark: I didn't want to go to hell. I don't think that stuck because I don't remember living much like a Christian after that. From ten to fourteen I don't know, maybe this is a thing that happens, but a lot of that childhood has been blocked out because there were a lot of things going on. Do you remember there being parties even while we were kids and my dad every day when he came home from work, first thing he'd do, pop open a beer, complain about his day, and then drink into the night and and spend time with his friends or whatever. And, you know, you wanted to talk about the alcohol thing, 'cause my mom She went down that same life. And I remember a specific night. My mom got really sick from drinking too much. And I remember her looking at my father and saying, If I survive this, I'm going back to church. I don't care if you go with me or not, I would love for you to, but I'm going no matter what. I can't live this lifestyle anymore. My dad said, I'll come with you, but I'm not giving my life to Jesus. So we started going to church. I don't there were a couple weeks that passed and my dad would go regularly. And I remember driving home from church and my dad talking about things that were said in the message. I don't remember my father ever talking about the Bible or God or anything before that moment. And I I don't know how long it had been, how much time had passed, but I remember a server we're sitting in a service. People up front were singing, and people were starting to head towards the altar. And a guy got on the mic and said, someone's feeling the call of the Lord to come and give their life to Jesus. Next thing I knew is my dad put on his jacket and started heading towards the door. My dad's jacket was half on. This woman had met him at the door. We all called her granny. I I found out later that she was the pastor's mother. They all called her granny. She stopped him at the door and said, Twenty years ago, you were in a service and you felt the call of the Lord and you walked out and you didn't come back. If you walk out right now, you may never feel this call again. I didn't know I didn't hear any of that conversation, but that that is what I was told later. What I do remember is my father ran towards the altar. He had his jacket still was still half on, fell on his knees, and from the position that I was sitting, I saw my father on his knees before God, and I saw water dripping from his eyes. I don't Michael Chestnut: Mm-hmm. Mark: remember ever seeing my father cry. I don't remember ever seeing my dad get on his knees before. I don't remember driving home that night, don't remember a lot of it. I just remember those specific moments. I do remember the next morning I woke up. My father is sitting at the table with a Bible in front of him. My father was never a bad, abusive guy. He was always a good guy, but I don't ever remember him being a smiley, happy kind of guy. That morning I woke up and he's with a Bible in front of him, a huge smile on his face. Says good morning, son, and then calls me over and gives me a big hug and tells me he loves me. Michael Chestnut: Mm. Mark: And I knew at that moment for me, myself, that this Jesus thing that everybody's been talking about, this has to be real. And that's that's what led me to the Lord. another thing that morning, so I would wake up every morning and have cereal was the first thing I would do when I woke up. I went to the pantry. y the night before in the pantry, there were some alcohol bottles stored in the corner of the pantry where they always were. That corner of the pantry was empty. And I found out later that my father had thrown all all of his alcohol and everything out that night. Michael Chestnut: Wow. That's still that impact on you. I mean, I you can still sense it while you're telling the story of it, which for a lot of us, I mean, the image of our dad. Our dad is, you know, everybody wants that relationship with their father, no matter what, you know, situation it is. They want that relationship with their father. And when you see a dad turn his life around, the impact that can have on a young boy can't be measured by any means. And so moving forward into your story a little bit, how did how did that continue after that with your family? Mark: my my father ended up becoming a preacher, an evangelist. I was learning to play guitar at that time. Michael Chestnut: Mm-hmm. Mark: And I learned to play enough that he would have me go out on the streets with him. And I would be playing the guitar and singing a little bit while he would be preaching. And he would lead people to Jesus. Now he wasn't ordained or sanctioned by the church or anything. He just felt this call that I need to lead people to Jesus. And Eventually he started preaching in church and leading people to Jesus in church. Well, after I had my first daughter. That your daughters will marry the man that they see. So I knew I wanted my daughters to marry good men and become godly women and to marry godly men. I wanted them to have a good, godly relationship because of what I saw before my father got saved. I didn't want my daughters to have any part of that kind of a life. So I continued going to church. I continued playing guitar in a church. I served as a youth leader. I went on a couple of mission trips. I was going to church but didn't have a strong relationship with Jesus. Then when my daughters, my my youngest daughter moved out, so we were I was an empty nester. We got married young, started young. So I was forty-two when my youngest daughter moved out. And it it created a bit of a depression in me because my daughters were my purpose. Raising them well, leading them well, trying to lead them, you know, show them the way of the Lord without actually really having that relationship. I d I didn't know what to do next with my life and I got depressed. I had a mild heart attack just before my forty eighth birthday. The doctor talked to me about making some changes in my life. And I was like, Yeah, I need to make some changes. I had let my health completely go. I was not I was just working, raising my kids and going to church. Not paying attention to my health, my physical self at all, eating whatever I could get my hands on. I gained about sixty-five pounds. The morning of my forty eighth birthday, I woke up not knowing, not remembering that it was my birthday. I went and poured myself a bowl of Captain Crunch. I still ate cereal every morning, just like I had been doing since I was a kid. So I went and poured myself a bowl of Captain Crunch, turned on the news, and they mentioned the date. I remembered it was my birthday. And I was like, why? Why did I not know it's my birthday? It was something you'd be you're thinking about a couple days ahead of time or a week ahead of time or whatever. And I just in that moment I asked God, like what what is wrong with me? Why am I so disconnected and apathetic from life that I don't even know that it's my birthday until the date was mentioned? And I didn't really feel like I heard anything, but I I was like, okay, well, I finally prayed. I mean, I prayed a few times over those forty years. It just they were more religious, Christian daily push-ups kind of prayers. You know, I'm supposed Michael Chestnut: Right. Mark: to say this prayer. I'm supposed to read the Psalms every once in a while. I'm supposed to read Proverbs every once in a I was doing all these things because I was supposed to. You know, and that that was really the problem. I drove home from work that day and I saw a gym that had just opened up and they were doing this promotion for gym memberships. I went inside. I knew I needed to make some changes in my life because of the heart attack. I went inside and joined the gym. And then I posted it on social media, my my gym membership card. And all of a sudden, a guy who stayed in the background for a long time, even as a guitar player, I can play a l you know, I can play bass, I can play a little bit of lead, I can do solos and stuff, but I'd rather just play rhythm guitar because he's Michael Chestnut: Right. Mark: in the background. Yeah. So I put that gym membership on Facebook and my ego just ate that up. People were giving me comments and likes and like, this is amazing. I can't wait to see, you know, how you change. If you change, I would love to get some help from you. And I started posting everything. My entire fitness journey was posted online. After three years or so, I started chasing a personal trainer certification. And this whole time I was saying that God was behind all of this. God was the reason I started my fitness journey. But I was way more about me than I was God. Michael Chestnut: Hm. Mark: God was behind me. That was a problem. He should have been in front of me, leading me and guiding me, but he wasn't. I just had him as that's who I am as part of my life. I go to church. So after I started getting my personal trainer certification, I started getting DMs from people. I started a social media fitness business on Instagram, sort of helping people. One set of those DMs became really personal between me and another woman. We started talking about our discontentment in our marriages and that's somewhere I tell men now, don't ever talk to another Michael Chestnut: Mm-hmm. Mark: woman about how you're feeling about your marriage, 'cause that leads to a dark place. So that that turned into an emotional affair. One morning after having a conversation with this woman on the phone while my wife was in bed, I put my phone down on the couch, went to the bathroom. When I came back, my wife and this was the day after our thirty fifth anniversary. Michael Chestnut: Okay. Mark: My wife had discovered this conversation that I was having that's been going on for a couple of years at this point. She had tears in her eyes. And I I knew, I knew what happened. And she said, What are we doing? Thirty five years of marriage. Are we going to throw all of this away? You know, I've watched you basically disconnect from me and everyone else to build this fitness thing that, you know, on the surface seems so happy, but is are you really happy? 'Cause I haven't heard you talk about God very much. Michael Chestnut: Hmm. Mark: That moment I I got I got on my knees, I repented. To her. In my mind, I was repenting to God as well. But I repented to her and I said, no, I'm not not throwing all of this away for that. And I deleted everything, stopped chasing the personal trainer certification, gave her all of my information. There were no more secrets. We started seeking counseling. I sought a mentor, and a mentor started helping me with my spiritual life. That changed everything. The mentor is like, Where where are you at with God? Where's your relationship with God? Do you pray to Him every day? Do you read His Word? And it was like all of a sudden it just it just struck me. I don't really have a relationship with God. I just go to church. There's a difference in having a relationship with God and going to church. And the verse that used to always scare me. Still a little bit scary at this point, but you know, I I I'm I for sure make sure I understand what relationship means. The verse in Matthew where Jesus says, Did we not the people will say, Did we not do all these things in your name? And I'll say, Depart from me, I never knew you. Cause that word knew, that speaks of relationship. Michael Chestnut: Hmm. Yep. Mark: That's how you know Jesus. You talk to him every day. You listen to him every day. You seek his word to understand him. Same relationship with a marriage. If you don't know your wife, if you just talk to her once in a while and then walk away, that's not a true relationship. So I started applying a lot of the disciplines I had learned through fitness to my spiritual journey. Instead of feeding my body first, I fed my spirit first. I'd wake up in the morning, read the Bible. It started out with I'd read a few chapters and then I'd get up and go to the gym. I remember one specific morning I started reading something about David and I wanted to find out more because it this was interesting to me. Before I knew it, an hour had passed. I didn't have time to go to the gym, so I had to get up and get ready for work. And what I learned through doing a lot of that was I don't need to work out every single day. But what I did need was to spend time with God every day. And eventually that led to where I am now. Michael Chestnut: No, man, it's great 'cause you know, I told you before we started, stories are powerful, right? Our stories, and I like the part that I had learned about you about the scars, you know. y you don't you don't go through a battle, a real battle without gaining any Mark: Right. Michael Chestnut: s scars, you know, and and all of us we we've had our battle, whether or not, you know, we admit them. and that's that's the problem, you know, is a lot of times stuff stays in the dark and then what happens is it grows in the dark. And God's never called us to judge someone else. But what I love about stories and hearing someone else's story is when you can see where God ha comes into the picture and where he ta turns things around and changes a man, you know, like The beginning of your story with your dad, you know, how God can come into the middle of that picture, change that story completely around, you know, which is only something, you know, as a as a son, you know that's only something God could do, what what happened with your dad. Little do we know that we're gonna have those own moments in our lives where it defines us in our relationship with God. Yep. Well, and you know, a lot of guys, that's that's that's the fear. The fear of failure is what we live with. And so sometimes I think we purposely sabotage everything in our life because then make you can just give the excuse. And that's when I came up with the word intentional. Wasn't for a podcast. It was like one year our pastor was saying, you know, have you asked God this year to give you a word or a phrase or something to speak to you for this year? You know? And So I prayed over it. And God, I mean, it was funny, just this word intentional kept coming. And the truth was, I was not intentional in anything that I was doing. You know, I was living like I was 16, to be honest with you, because I wasn't, you know, I was doing everything by the fly of my pants. I didn't prepare for nothing. I just went out, did it. If I made it great. If I didn't, what, you know? And I started reading more, you know, and I and I was reading that when you write your goals out, you know, you get a forty five percent greater chance of success. And I started like that word intentional just kept coming up and I'm like, that's what God keeps telling me, you know. And I so I obeyed that nudge. And the important part of what I'm hearing you say too is it's the obedience that God honors. I I don't we don't do the obedience so that we get pray, you know, that God will lift us up right now and say, look how great you are, or anything like that. The obedience a lot of times comes out of uncomfortable things, you know, Mark: Yeah. Michael Chestnut: and like getting on a podcast and being vulnerable and sharing your story. Not everybody wants to do that, right? But that's where the obedience parts comes in for you. You'll never know who hears your messages and will one day you know, when we get to heaven, realize the impact that that step of obedience had, right? But what I can tell you is what the step of obedience and my mentors have done for me. And, you know, I know you you brought up having a mentor and God's got the men in in waiting for us, you know, that he wants us to build relationships with as well. who have been through a lot of the battle already or going through it alone and need need encouragement through it. But, you know, I think podcasts like this and books and but also men's groups at church and people just being able to share their testimony of who God is in their life can't be, you know, said enough. to what what power Mark: Right. Michael Chestnut: it actually has. Mark: Yeah. Yeah, if I it speak to the obedience thing for a little bit. Now, after doing this for about two and a half years, I can talk. I can talk to people that I don't know that I've never met before. I used to be scared to ask for extra napkins at a restaurant. You know, I was a very shy. That bullied kid, it Michael Chestnut: Mm-hmm. Mark: it was still there sometimes. My pastor in my church at the time. They were he was him and his wife were the only ones who knew about the problems that my wife and had my wife and I had with our marriage. And all of a sudden I men started coming to me and asking me questions. I was starting to wonder, like, did do they know? Because they were asking me questions about things that I had gone through that I had only Michael Chestnut: Mm-hmm. Mark: shared with my pastor. God was sending them to me and I I was starting to have a lot of the things that I was learning from the Bible, they just started automatically coming out. It's like I Michael Chestnut: Mm-hmm. Mark: gotta give them an answer and just scriptures would come out. I didn't know where they were coming from. I I I understand it a little bit now. But then my pastor asked me to be the men's director at church. And then as we were talking, I was like, I don't know, Pastor 'Cause when you're a men's director, sometimes you're asked to speak into these men's lives, you know, like maybe share a message or a devotional or something. Like I'll be happy to administrate and put together events, whatever you need, but I just don't know if I'm I'm the guy to to speak. 'Cause I I don't like to speak po public speaking is like one of the hardest things, even now. If I have to I'll do it. I I do it because I know The Lord is with me when I do it, and that's what helps me through it. It's you were you were talking about obedience. What I have seen through obedience in my own life, how God has moved in so many areas. I'm doing things that the man five years ago never thought he would do. Just coming on another podcast and sharing a story. A lot of people like to say sharing my story 'cause this but this isn't my story. This Michael Chestnut: Right. Mark: is God's story. This has never, never been about me. I th I it says I'm the host of the Valiant Forge, but really God and the Holy Spirit are the host of the Valiant Michael Chestnut: Mm-hmm. Mark: Forge. Every conversation that I have, every solo podcast that I do. I pray about it ahead of time. I pray with my guest ahead of time and I ask the Holy Spirit to lead us because I never want it to be about me. Michael Chestnut: Yeah. Mark: you mentioned celebrate recovery earlier. I don't have this this story of addiction to any kind of substances, but I did get addicted to validation. And you'd be surprised how powerful of a driver that is. I Michael Chestnut: There you go. Mark: I I recently did a podcast where I went back and talked to the man that I was five years ago. I I did this whole thing where just before he was getting ready to consider leaving his wife for all the validation and praise that he was receiving. Because it's it's addiction is is such a strong pull that if you're not connected to the Holy Spirit, I I don't know a lot about this, I don't want to speak too much into it, but I do know that the Holy Spirit can pull you out, because I've seen it in my dad's life, I've seen it in Others life throughout the years. Yeah, I would say to anybody, if you're feeling stuck on something, you don't know how to stop it, surrender it to God. And then speak to someone about your problem because you don't want to hide. You don't want to keep it in the shadows and and be alone with it. Michael Chestnut: Yeah, because I found out the enemy doesn't care what your addiction is. If you're addicted to drugs, alcohol, porn, pride, you know, codependency, whatever you want to call it, whatever. He doesn't care as long as what he's got you doing is keeping you from doing what God wants you to do. Mark: Right. Yeah. Michael Chestnut: And the only way, like you said, to get out of that is to walk into the light. And you know, that is simply done by sharing with one person. And if I can encourage men all the time, it's just like find that one person that you can connect with, that you can ask God. I mean I had I prayed for that man. I prayed for God. I was like, you know, I needed God. I needed him to bring someone to me. And I'll be honest with you, I say this a lot on my my podcast, but I was so far from God at one point when I was coming back to Him. The only prayer I could get out was Holy Spirit, please. And it's from that verse where God talks about the Holy Spirit makes intercession for us. And I remember I can't pray, but I was with with those three words, I was just asking the Holy Spirit to pray for me. And I got off the plane from Illinois to Florida, the last place I wanted to be, at the lowest part of my life. And Two, four hours later at the most, I was sitting across from this pastor I'd never met and regurgitated everything about my life to him. And he didn't sit there and judge me. He didn't sit there and comfort me. He sat there and listened. And then he walked with me. And then I didn't have to walk alone after that. And let me tell you, God used that man. To radic radically change me. And now I turn around and I'm like, God, I want you to make me Him. Help me to walk with you that closely that if someone comes, sits down across from me and tells me the worst thing, that I don't flinch and I just sit there and I listen, and I can be you with skin on for that man, and then walk with him when everybody else is not. Mark: Yeah. Michael Chestnut: that's where this podcast came from, actually, out of that. And it's been a joy to do. So tell us a little bit more about your podcast and what your ministry is right now. Mark: well the podcast is to to help Christian men level up in their faith. That's how I say it all the time. But it's really where you come to forge purpose and strength in Christ. There's a lot of men's podcasts out there, and a lot of them, you know, they're they're ex military, they're strong, they're they're fit. There's nothing wrong with that. But the real strength for a man is in surrender. People ask me about biblical masculinity a lot. Masculinity isn't necessarily physical strength. It's it's standing up for what's right, being responsible, acting like a responsible man, doing the right things. But it's also when you when you add the biblical aspect, you try to be like Jesus. In First Corinthians it says, Stand firm and act like men, and let all that you do be done in love. The act like men Verse gets quoted a lot, but they don't they don't mention the verse after that where it says, Let all that you do be done in love. Being a man isn't just demanding respect, and you should never demand respect, anyways. You should earn respect. You should be a man worthy of respect. I think it says that in Titus 2. Let older men be worthy of respect. It doesn't say to demand respect or anything like that. My my purpose on my podcast is to try to help men become the men that God has called them to be. And just to stop just hiding in the shadows, staying in the background, stop hiding behind your video games and whatever it is that you come home from work, you feel like you've had a hard day at work and you just escape into whatever. Step into something that has purpose. That's the the whole purpose of my podcast. My ministry is I'm I'm a I work a full time job, but my at church, I try to lead the men at church. I will speak into their lives. I I put together like barbecues and stuff like that just to create fellowship. So that's this is pretty much what's going on. Michael Chestnut: Man, I appreciate it and I I appreciate you being on here. I you know, I agree with you. In today's world masculinity is all janked up anyways and it's even you know, the world's view on masculinity, but then I argue with some of the Christian men about masculinity, you know. And the the truth is we need more men to stand on truth, stand on values, and do the tough things, you know, like being the kind of father that your child that God wants your child to have, being that man and saying Mark: Man, no. Michael Chestnut: saying, Yes, I'll surrender my will to do God's will to be that, to be that husband. You know, I'll put that video game down and I'll spend time with my wife and I'll do what I I need to do. We have so many selfish men in the w today's world. And, you know, and and that's where the what's going on with the family. And we're letting the wives lead the family instead of the the husband being the leader. And there's a lie that the enemy gives us that we're not worthy of that. I fight that a lot, but I have good men in my life who help me to to fight that battle and to listen to truth when the enemy's throwing lives at me. So listen, I want to thank you for being on here sharing your story today. your podcast we'll make sure all that is in the link below. And if this story hits you, if this is something that you know, maybe God's speaking to you about some of the things that you need to do in your life, that you need to surrender. And till next time, just keep growing your faith.