Prioritizing God: Finding Fulfillment Beyond Worldly Success

Like, what is happening to me? When you find yourself at a place like that, there's something wrong. You guys are making me a mess here today, man. This is audio only, right?

Yeah, right. Welcome back, everyone, to the podcast! We're so excited you guys are here. I've been looking forward to this particular episode even before this podcast became a thing. We were just reminiscing on how our special guest today, he was one of the few people, one of the first people who even I shared this idea with way back when. I think it was sometime last year, and he's been through the whole process from the inception to the dreaming to the, "Okay, we're getting started. We're holding everything with an open hand, seeing how God will lead," and now he's actually on the podcast. So we're so excited to have you on here, Alan.

Yeah, thanks for joining us.

Oh, thank you so much! I've been waiting for this day as well. And like you said, seeing the story unfold and now getting to be a part of receiving the emails, getting to watch the videos, hear the podcast—I love it! I'm so grateful and honored that I get to be here.

So for context for people, Alan and I used to be more like a coaching client relationship. He does leadership coaching, executive strategic coaching for both church leaders and corporate leaders. And so we worked for quite a while together, and in every conversation I had, I had such mind-blown moments. I would say Alan has been one of the most influential people in my journey these past few years because of these conversations we've been having—not just about leadership and ministry, but just life in general and how to lead out of a deep place with Jesus and walking with Jesus.

I was going to introduce you, Alan, but I thought it'd be actually probably more interesting to have you kind of describe a bit of your backstory and what has led you to where you are now.

I don't even know what to say after that intro because I'm already like halfway to the point of crying. And if we're starting this way, okay, here we go. More authentic, the better.

Yeah, let's see. I was originally from India, born and raised, and lived most of my life in the Middle East. I moved here to the US in 2004 because I fell in love with a girl and I wanted to marry her. And I was like, "Let's go!" This year, we'll be married 19 years. We have three kids, and you'll see little Pepper. She's not little, but she acts like she's little. But we have Pepper here as well. Both my wife and I were in corporate, but we were also involved in ministry.

It was in 2008 that I felt God just stirring in my heart this question. He said, "Do you trust me enough to quit your job and come work for me?" And here I was living the American dream, getting ready to buy our first home, and my knee-jerk reaction was like, "Uh, uh, no, God, because you don't pay that well." At least, that's what I heard. And so I didn't want to give all that stuff up. I said, "I'll still help," but we kept praying about it. We knew this was what God asked us to do, and so we took a step of faith.

Long story short, I started working at a church based here in Oklahoma City, which is where we still live, called Life Church. About six months after I joined, Meryl joined as well. So, I was on staff for 10 years, and then again, I felt God starting my heart saying, "Hey, do you trust me enough to quit your job again?" And I was like, "Why are you doing this to me? Like, I'm comfortable. This is great. We're doing ministry."

I ended up taking a step of faith because we knew this was God. Meryl is still on staff at Life Church, but that's when I stepped out, and that's kind of how you and I met, Grace, and got to then work with churches and leaders. We're still on that journey. It's been an exciting ride.

That's a really great summary of the last—what, how old are you? Like 21, Alan?

Yeah, yeah, right, right.

So for people who aren't familiar with Life Church, could you share a little bit about the work that you did at Life Church?

Sure! Life Church was established over 25 years ago by our senior pastor, who's still our lead pastor, Pastor Craig Groeschel. Some of the cool things that God did through our church were not the ones who started this, but God used the concept of multi-site, which is where one church in multiple locations. Our senior pastor preaches from one location, but it's broadcast to now, I think, 45 locations is what we have.

Through this process over the years, the idea for a Bible app also came about because we saw that people weren't engaging with scripture, and we thought, "How do we help get scripture into people's hands?" So the YouVersion Bible app was born. This was like all around 2006 when the YouVersion Bible app happened. Then Church Online came out of it as well because the idea was if we can reach people beyond our walls, what could we do? So that's kind of what Church Online was all about. It was taking our services, putting it online, and building a global community around that.

I got to lead Church Online for about 10 years. I joined the team after about four or five years of its existence, and so that's what I did for the majority of my time there. It's been cool to be a part of that story, part of the journey, and it's not done. God is continuing to use our church, and we're just honored that we get to be a part of it.

For those who don't know, Alan is like one of the, I would say, forerunners of digital ministry and what that looks like, especially through your influence through Life Church, but also now consulting with so many different churches and organizations. I love your tagline, Alan, for your online course that you have. I think, is it "Online as it is in Heaven"?

Yeah, and that came from, like, I mean, you and I have talked about this—the whole concept of the kingdom. We don't just give our lives to Christ so that we can someday go to heaven, but like he taught us to pray, "Let thy will be done on Earth as it is in heaven."

Many times when people think about online ministry, there's this tendency to go, "Oh no, that's not going to work. You know, relationships can't happen online, and you can't grow online." I'm not a digital native. For me, it was like, "Let's do anything we can to reach people who don't know Christ." When we think about online or digital and think, "Oh, there's no way that can work," we're actually limiting God, just like his word says, "Let your will be done on Earth." On Earth also includes the internet, and it also includes technology. So that's kind of where that came from—"Online as it is in Heaven."

That's so good! Yeah, whenever people have that argument of, "You know, relationships can't happen," or, "Life doesn't happen online," I just look at me and Alex, and I'm like, "We met online!" We met in a Facebook group, unintentionally. We have a lot of lifelong friends that we met online as well. I think more and more, as our world becomes more digitally integrated, it is such an important mission field for us to be present in and active in.

I want to transition into today's topic that we want to talk about, which is spiritual formation. I know that, you know, from our conversations, we have a lot of discussions around this. But I was wondering if you could kind of break down, first of all, for anybody who is not familiar with spiritual formation, what is that in your lens, and where did this come about? How did you get into it?

You know, spiritual formation—that whole concept, that topic was new for me. It's still fairly recent. By no means am I an expert in it. I would say my background and my interest for many years was mainly around leadership. This thought of, if we want to see change happen, you hear quotes like, "Everything rises and falls on leadership." There's just all of this energy around the word leadership and what it is and how do we become a better leader, how do we grow in our communication, how do we build better teams—all of the above.

I'm more of a learner, so I just automatically, if something catches my attention, I kind of dive all in. But while I was in that space, I also realized just in my own life there were some disconnects between my life and when I looked at the life of Jesus, for example. I've always been wired more to be like a workaholic, and for a workaholic to be in ministry, I mean, it's just like, it's the worst thing that can happen. Because when you're in corporate, you kind of look at workaholism as, "Man, I shouldn't be doing this. This is bad." I'm trying to, you know, I'm doing all this to pursue my career, and it's all about climbing the ladder and all that.

But in ministry, you almost feel like this is a holy thing. Like, "So what if I'm working extra hours? So what if I'm just, you know, doing everything I can, working 60, 80 hours? I'm doing it for the kingdom." And so it's easy to fall into that trap. But then when you read scripture, you read Jesus' words saying, "You know, come to me if you're burdened, and I will give you rest for your souls."

Those two things, like the leadership culture that I was trying to live up to and what I was teaching myself and what I was consuming—all of that content was around, "First one in, last one out. I'm going to outwork you." You know, it's just all of this "me, me, here's what I can do." And when I'm reading the gospels, Jesus is saying, "It's not about you. It's about the kingdom, and it's about the Father, and I want you to let go, and I want you to surrender."

Those, to me, were very contradictory, even the concept of rest. Because I thought, "Man, rest means I'm lazy." But rest actually means surrender—that I know I can't do this, but I know God can. I think I'm going to let him.

So I was in the middle of wrestling with all of that when I read the book "Soul Keeping" by John Ortberg. A mutual friend introduced us, and I got the opportunity to just talk to him. He was the one that actually opened my eyes to this whole spiritual formation term and what does that mean. I'd say over the past three years, it's transformed a lot of the areas in my life. When I look back, I can see kind of the journey God's been bringing me on because each of us, we have our own journey, and I can see how he's been layering teaching upon teaching upon teaching.

So that's kind of where that started and how I started diving into that concept of spiritual formation.

He said spiritual formation has transformed many areas of your life. Can you give us a bit of a glimpse into what it was like before and during the whole spiritual formation process?

I think a lot of—and I don't know if it's because of personality type, so this may not be true to all of your listeners—but for me, I'm an ESTJ from a Myers-Briggs personality type. I'm an Enneagram Eight. If you know anything about Eights, like we always have an enemy, and we're always like charging up some hill. For me, willpower and just, I'm like, "No one's got my back. I'm going to do this. I've got to figure this out on my own." Willpower is what I relied on for a lot of my life, and this idea of surrender meant giving up willpower.

In my conversations with John and reading "Soul Keeping," and even John Mark Comer was very influential. Both of these guys attribute a lot of their learnings to Dallas Willard. Transparent moment: I've tried to read Dallas Willard. It is so dense and thick. It's like I'm still, like, I'm in year two, and I'm still on one of his books, and it's like, "Okay, Holy Spirit, help me." But I'm just going through it. I'm trying.

But I'll be honest, I'm the same. But I think John Mark was the one. He did the series at his church when he was at Bridgetown, and he simplified it for me in a way that made sense. He said, "In order for us to reflect Jesus or be reformed into the image of Christ, we need to be with him. Because when you're with him, that's when you become like him. And when you become like him, that's when you do what he does or what he did. But you cannot do what he did if you don't become like him, and you cannot become like him unless you spend time with him."

It was just very simple. All of a sudden, this complex spiritual formation idea that was just very out there became simple. So all I am to do is spend time with Jesus, and over time, I'll become like him. My wife and I have been married 19 years, and we are, in many ways, very similar today just because of proximity and the amount of time we spend with each other.

So if I spend time with Jesus, I am going to become like him. And if I become like him, that's when I can do what he did. I have been, and many times frustrated that I haven't been able to do the things that he did. And no matter how much willpower I use, I realize that willpower alone does not form me into the image of Christ.

What's interesting is in the leadership space, I had read a lot of the books around habits and the power of habits and things like that, but I never, like for me, habits were all around, "If I eat healthy, I can stay healthy." You know, "What are the productive habits that I—" it was all around productivity and leadership. I didn't translate it into spiritual formation, where I can make the excuse, "Man, I just don't spend time in prayer."

Well, it starts by maybe spending one minute a day in prayer, and when you build that habit, then you become that person. And so this spiritual formation thing started becoming more simple in my mind. And when I started realizing that, I'm going, "Whoa, hold on. There's no way I can be an effective leader if my soul is not right with God."

So then those two worlds started connecting together, where it was spiritual formation and leadership. I know, Alex, I'm going like all over the place, so let's go. But that's kind of where this whole—where was I? What was I focused on? It was mainly willpower and then realizing willpower alone can't do it. So God, what are the habits that I need to bring about in my life which will help me spend time with Jesus? Because eventually, I want to become like him so that I can do the things that he did.

Yeah, I think that struggle also—it's not like I would say so many people sense that tension between, "Well, I want to use my life for God, but how do I stay healthy? What does that even mean?" Like, what is the soul? You know, there's so many questions.

And I was—we were talking about this the other day, how our world seems very focused on external results. Even it could bleed into the ministry, right? Like, "What fruit are you producing through your leadership? What multiplication is happening that you're seeing?" And although, yeah, that is really great and really, you know, quote-unquote productive, it can also be unhealthy if you're doing it from a place of striving, of like, "I need to work for God," and you forget to be with him.

Even that statement of success, right? I mean, am I successful in this season of my life? What does success look like? And that word is tricky because when you think of the word success—or at least when I think about it—I'm basically going down the list of what do other people, when they view me, what do they see? What is the perception of me? For if you're a data person, what metrics am I looking at that someone else would think is successful?

It was John and I and his wife, Nancy Ortberg, that actually kind of helped me rethink that and said, "Instead of saying, 'What does success look like?' am I being fruitful could be a better question." Because when I think about the question, at least when I think about the question, "Am I being fruitful?" then it's not necessarily scale, but it's like, for me, it's like, "Am I making an impact in someone's life?" It kind of narrows my focus down versus, "What does everyone else think about me?"

So, right, success—even the words we use, I think, will make an impact on how we think about where we are at the season.

So good! Oh my gosh, that's a whole other topic that we could unpack in a different episode. I feel like my own journey is very parallel to yours as you're recounting how God has led you. And yeah, just looking back, I'm so grateful because I really felt like God knew to put someone like you in my life because you're talking about John Ortberg's influence on you to help you understand all these things. I literally feel like I've been getting that from you as well, and like our conversations around spiritual formation, taking care of your soul, and making sure you're not just saying that you believe in Jesus or following him, but you're actually becoming more like him by spending time with him.

You know, we talk about how you become like the five closest friends you surround yourself with. Well, you also become like Jesus if you're surrounding yourself with his presence constantly.

And then also, the opposite effect. If someone were to ask, "What are some of the top lessons that you've been learning in your journey of spiritual formation?" What would those be?

Yeah, that's a really good question. I think one of the things that come to mind is a lot of times when we start our faith in Christ or we've been doing this for a while now, it's easy to make some progress and then you mess up, and then you feel like, you know, two steps forward, eight steps back. And it's just this constant struggle of having ups and downs.

I remember thinking about this, and I think I read this somewhere. I think I have to say this, though: anything you hear, if it's worth repeating, it's probably John Ortberg, Dallas Willard, or John Mark Comer—it's one of them. So this is a blanket, you know, just making sure that everyone knows.

So because if I keep—I’m going to find myself constantly saying, "Oh, I think John said this," and "I think John..." So just, I'm just giving you a question.

Yeah, correct.

Yeah, exactly. This just—it should cover all of it. Think of it almost like a musician. When I wanted to learn how to play the guitar, if someone gave me a guitar for the very first time and said, "Play some amazing classical piece," there's no way I could do it. But if I were to consistently practice every single day, I hope—if I have some kind of musical talent—I hope that in time I will be able to play that musical piece.

Practicing and training today will help me do one day what I cannot do today by direct effort. And so when we think about spiritual formation and we think about spiritual disciplines or spiritual practices, we're training so that one day we can do what we cannot do today by our direct effort.

And that was one of the revelations that helped me because we have this idea, "I want to be more generous," could be an example that maybe we're working towards. Well, we don't just automatically become generous one day. We have to start training towards that.

And so what are acts of generosity that we could do consistently that form us into the image of who we feel God's called us to be? This is what I believe Paul was talking about in Romans 12, where he says we need to rewire our thinking, you know, according to the word of God. I think part of what he was saying was, "How do we arrange our lives in a way that Jesus did so that we could do what he did?"

That, for me, unlocked many areas. It unlocked areas like in leadership, like we talked about, but as a husband, what type of husband do I want to be? What type of father do I want to be to my kids? What type of friend do I want to be? And so as we look at those areas, it's trying to figure out—and I'm a logical person, so it's like, "Okay, this is where I want to be, so what's the pathway to get there? What are the daily habits that I can do that'll help me get there?"

And as you're thinking about this, I know initially I was like, "Oh, I want to do this habit and this habit and this habit." You know, it's like, "Let's just go for it!" But I realize it's God just taking one day at a time.

And there's—I keep this journal with me here at my desk. It's the five-year journal. I have never been able to journal in my life, and my pastor talked about this. It's basically, it's got five lines for every year, and you just put down the date, and you can kind of see what you wrote the previous year or the years before that. I'm on my fifth year. I remember, I think it was like January of the first year that I started doing this, I wrote in the five lines, "Oh gosh, I hope this at least sticks."

And to see five years later and go, "It did!" Like, it just—now there are gaps, wow! But there's just this sense of accomplishment, and it's five lines every day. What I couldn't do earlier was these long journals of like three, four sheets of—and there are some people that can do that. I just couldn't.

But I knew it was important for me to keep a memory of things that God has done in our lives that we would just normally forget. And I'm so glad I did because there are days when things are hard, and at the end of that day when I'm writing in my journal, I kind of peek at the previous day or the next day, and I'll kind of just take a look at what's been happening over the past couple of years on the same day.

And sometimes you read something that you wrote, and it's like, "Hey, God did this thing today! Isn't he incredible? This is so good! I can't believe I experienced this today!" And those difficult days just become a little bit easier as you look back at the goodness of God.

That's through habit. It's through those disciplines. And so I believe that if we feel like we're falling short, don't give up. Just identify what's a small, more practice or discipline that you can incorporate into your life that will help you become the person that you want to be.

Wow, five years is a long time! Kudos to you, Alan! I kind of get that journal. I'm so inspired!

It's a great journal. It's called The Five-Year Levenger Journal.

Okay, we'll plug that in for a lot of our listeners. We—and this is just me generalizing—but from what I've observed and what I've listened to talking with other friends, people generally have a hard time spending time with Jesus and building spiritual habits and muscles. Could you walk through your struggles of building these spiritual habits in the beginning, and how did you overcome any challenges that you had?

Yeah, so this journaling was one of those things because part of my struggle was to just pause and pray at the end of the day. We do that as a family, but I realize that I need to do it for myself. When I did it, when I'm doing it as a family, for me, it's more of an opportunity to influence my kids, and it's really centered very much around them. And they're young. They're, you know, as we're recording this, they're 15, 13, and this weekend my youngest will turn nine.

So it's a lot around them and teaching them. And honestly, even that was an example because my wife and I, we would talk about just how embarrassing our family prayer time was because it's like we're half asleep, we're all tired. And what we didn't realize is we were training our kids to assume that this is the kind of family prayer that was okay.

And obviously, there are tough days, there are busy days, and things happen—that's totally fine—but we weren't being intentional. It was just more like, "Okay, all three of you pray. We'll try and read a Bible verse or something, and that's it." It took—I mean, my kids, my oldest is 15. I think in the past couple of years is when we've really gotten better at it.

We're right now going through a devotional with the kids. It's more for adults, but we kind of just pare down for their age, and we spend time talking about it. And it does take like at least half an hour. At first, we were tired, but it helped me when my wife and I partnered on it because there are some days where I just don't want to do it, and she's like, "Babe, we have to do it! Come on, let's do it!"

And some days she's tired, and some, you know, and we just—and then there are some days where the kids are like, "Daddy, we're going to read the rest of it today!" So it's not perfect, but it's taken a group effort. But I can see the change that's happening in my kids' lives.

So I think the big lesson from that is if something's not going the way that you wanted to and it hasn't worked, don't give up. I know that I can't outsource my kids' relationship with Christ to anybody else, and that includes my church, that includes the YouVersion Bible app. I can't, as a parent, it's my responsibility.

In the same way, if I'm not growing spiritually, I can't hold my church responsible for it. What am I doing about it? And Alex, to your example, like if praying is hard, well then what is one way that you can try and create a habit around it?

One thing that I've been doing recently that's helped me is I'll go for a walk because I need to be doing like a 30-minute walk every day. Instead of listening to a podcast or listening to music, I just leave my headphones at home, and I just use it as a time to pray and talk to God. Those moments have been more intimate and powerful for me compared to me by my bedside kneeling down before, you know.

So I'm not saying that's the solution for everybody, but it's by trial and error. It's just trying to find something that works and then sticking with it.

That's so good! It reminds me of how, like, even a marriage, right? Like a good practice to have is novel experiences or creating new memories together. Like, of course, you want to be consistent in your marriage and in your rhythms, but it's also really healthy and brings a lot of joy and freedom into your life when you explore new things—trying new foods, you know, and asking new questions.

It's like a lifelong adventure. And so as you were talking, Alan, I feel like that's something we don't really talk about when it comes to our relationship with God. We're always emphasizing that consistency, the discipline, which yes, it's very important, but also there's freedom too to explore and try different things.

Like, "Okay, maybe in this season, we're shipping it on your walk is more, you know, life-giving than just being in your room." Or maybe you want to draw pictures and journal through art versus just bullet-point writing.

So that was advice I got from a coach previously when I told her my own relationship with God. I was like, "It just feels a little dry. I don't know how to get out of this." And she actually recommended to me, "Well, Grace, you love being creative. Why don't you try different creative ways to engage with God?" And that really actually worked.

So yeah, I wanted to ask you on that topic: how do you think your relationship with God has changed maybe five years ago according to your bullet-point journal versus now?

When I was sharing kind of the summary of my life, I mentioned when God first told us, "Hey, you know, do you trust me enough to step out in faith and quit your job?" That first round was really hard. I was nervous, and I didn't know what was going to happen. The second time he asked me to do it, it's not that I wasn't nervous, but I had about 12 years of history with him where I saw him show up consistently.

And I knew without a shadow of a doubt that he would not let me go, he would not let me down, he wouldn't fail me. No matter what, I knew we would make it. Now, that didn't completely eradicate fear, and it wasn't like I was skipping through the streets and saying, "Oh, this is going to be easy." It was still tough. It was still gut-wrenching.

But it was a different kind of gut-wrenching because it was a difficult season, but there was no—it just felt different. And so I think that came as a result of time. You mentioned the word freedom, and I think what people sometimes don't realize—and what I didn't realize—is spiritual disciplines can feel like the opposite of freedom.

It could feel like, "Oh my gosh, I can't do this, I can't do that, and I'm like having to stick to the schedule," and it seems very constraining. But just like the learning an instrument example, when I'm learning an instrument for the first time, it could seem very monotonous. It could seem just boring. I have to run the same exercises all the time.

But over time, when I get better, now I have the freedom to go in between scales, and I can do things that I never could do before because I had taken the time to stay consistent and be disciplined. And so I think in our relationship with Christ—not that our relationship with Christ is like training for an instrument—but it is a relationship that you get to know him, and you get to know who he is, and you get to know his heart.

And I personally believe that God wants us to step into that kind of boldness in our relationship because if we don't know him, we can't step into a situation and speak on behalf of God. We're not saying we're God, but if we are called to bring Heaven down on Earth, then imagine the relationship we need with him in order to do that.

I think that comes over time. I think that comes over spending time with him in that kind of a relationship with him. I remember being frustrated with God because I felt like I couldn't hear him. And I was like, "God, I can't hear your voice! Why are you not speaking to me? And like, what is going on?"

And I think—I don't think God was frustrated with me, but I kind of heard it in a frustrating tone where he's like, "Open up your phone." And so I thought, "What is going on?" It just—to me, it wasn't like a voice voice. It was more like a thought.

And so I'm in the middle of me complaining to God, saying, "I can't hear from you! Why don't you speak to me? You used to speak to me back in the day! Now I don't hear! I don't want!" And just like, just on this complaining rant on the iPhone, I think you go to like settings. I felt him saying, "You know, go to settings."

So I went to settings, and then I think it's general or somewhere, there's like screen time—like your screen time. It gives you your—how much time you're spending on your phone. I said, "Click that." And I was like, "Uh, uh, oh, uh, no! Okay." And I click it, and I mean, I can go down the list of x amount of hours for this app, x amount of hours for this app, x amount of hours for this app.

And I just—it just hit me. It's like I am clouding my brain with every voice you could possibly think of, and the only time I spend with him is five minutes before I'm eating something and a quick prayer before I go to bed. And then I'm complaining that I can't hear his voice.

How does that make sense? The reason I can't hear his voice is because I have not prioritized his voice over every other voice in my life. And so that was a huge convicting moment for me, and I realized it's like, "Okay, if I want to hear him, I've got to make space for him, or else all I'm going to be hearing is from the show that I watched last night or whatever I saw on social media."

And so if we are not growing close to God or we feel God is distant, like someone once said, it's not because he's moved; it's because we haven't taken the time to get close to him.

I feel like that speaks to so many of us who are, you know, we're always on our different apps nowadays, and then we're like, "Oh, why is it so frustrating to hear God?" It's because we're not truly prioritizing. Actually, this goes back to our first episode on the podcast. We talked about this—how so many of us, we want more of God, but do we actually prioritize him? Because that makes all the difference.

So for me personally, I think it's a lot of it is part of your mindset—a flip of the switch that needs to happen where you're not just saying, "Oh yeah, I know I should do this because this is what it looks like to be a good Christian," but you actually, at a heart level, know nothing is more important than your relationship with God.

And so if that's true, I think it's like a daily choice of surrender, of knowing like, "Okay, yeah, there's my to-do list, there's these apps, there's text messages to check, but today I choose to show up for God and to be with him and die to those temptations to distract me."

Right? Even things like joy. If we find ourselves in a place where we're just increasingly irritated and frustrated, and we're living a life that's the opposite of joy, I think we have in our hands the power to turn that situation around by being intentional.

And maybe being intentional with joy is, "I'm going to start my day by thanking God for this day." Like, maybe it sounds so small, but for some of us, that might be the start of turning our attitudes around. Go through the list of any of those things.

"Oh Lord, I want more joy in my life! I want more friendships!" I know a lot of times we struggle with having meaningful relationships. I know you guys have covered it on the podcast as well. I think meaningful relationships don't just happen on accident. We have to be intentional about it, which means we have to be vulnerable, we have to be willing to let people in.

But all of that takes intentionality, consistency, and it's hard work. But if it was easy, everybody would be doing it. It's not. We've got to be intentional about it. It's a daily battle for our souls, right? Like, every day there is spiritual warfare for our attention, our time, our faith, and foundation.

And if we wake up not realizing that, and we just go about our day thoughtlessly, not really prioritizing God, it's so easy for the enemy's voice and influences everywhere to distract us and draw us away from God.

So yeah, I forgot if it was with you or maybe it's one of those things where it's from like a Dallas quote or John—one of the Johns. But I think I also remember learning when I learned that verse from the Bible about, "What does it profit a man to gain the whole world but forfeit his soul?"

And how that verse—oh, I think it was from "Soul Keeping," actually—that verse wasn't to non-believers like we'd often think. It's actually directed to believers and saying, "Hey, what does it matter if your ministry grows or you look so religious but your soul is lost?"

And I think that's so key. And I would encourage anybody who's listening who's like, "Where do I even start? Like, I want this kind of close relationship with God." "Soul Keeping" is a great start as a resource, but also just kind of like asking God to help you mold your heart and mold your priorities to really center him at the top of your priorities.

If someone's looking for—give me something more practical. Maybe it's taking the Romans 12 verse 2: "Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." Maybe it's taking that verse every morning for the next two weeks and just reading that verse and going, "God, help me be transformed by this."

This—just reading your word this morning, help me be transformed. Let that be the starting prayer for your day for the next two weeks and see what happens. I genuinely believe that there's power in the word of God, and transformation can happen as we spend time in his word.

I have a provocative question. So for a lot of our listeners, we do live in a very competing society with, you know, your phone. And I'm sure my phone is exactly like yours. It's just with a lot of apps and time spent on them. But what would you say to someone who doesn't believe in spending time with God, who chooses to do work or other things on their task list?

I'm reminded of, like I mentioned, I was originally from India. And not to stereotype all Asian cultures, but at least in our home, education was a big deal. It was very important, and if you don't study well, you'll never make anything out of your life. And it was, you know, all of that.

And I never really studied that well, and my relationship with my parents grew tense. Alex, you're probably wondering, like, where is the story going? I'm getting to the point.

Where is this going?

I remember that my relationship with—because my relationship with my parents began to be filled with tension, I viewed how they viewed me as the same way as I thought maybe if they viewed me like this, then that's probably how God viewed me.

And again, that Enneagram Eight, as a young kid, I was like, "I don't need anybody. I can figure this out on my own. I can make this happen." I made a lot of bad decisions, but on the outward, if you were to look at my life, I ended up dropping out of high school and just making a total mess in my life.

But through ways that were not—that I'm not proud of, we tend to start making a lot of money. And just from the outside, we looked really successful, but that led me to just—when I would come home at night after hanging out with friends or parties or whatever, for me personally, I just knew that this felt empty.

And I don't know if there's someone listening who's thinking, "I don't need God. I can do this on my own." Maybe you're not feeling empty, and so maybe this doesn't speak to you, but I know I felt empty. I had the cars, I had all that stuff, and it just did not—it just wasn't worth anything.

And it led me to a place where I had—I started thinking about taking my own life, and I've got the scars on my arms to prove it because I tried, and it didn't work. It didn't work. And I remember thinking to myself, "I can't live like this, but I'm now nervous to even die."

And I just felt like I was stuck. And it was in that moment where I didn't know what to do, and I just cried out to God, and he heard my prayer. And I don't know what you're going through, but I know in my life, just hearing in my heart his word saying, "You're my son, and I love you," changed my life.

And so if there's someone listening and they feel like, "Man, I don't need God. I'm fine where I'm at," it's hard for me to believe that that's actually true because sometimes you put a facade to make everyone else think we're okay, but inside we're not.

I think asking yourself the truth—the real question: "Am I really good inside, or what's at the core of who I am?" And part of it, I was like you said, we're so busy, and we're running a million miles an hour that we don't take the time to slow down to really ask those tough questions.

Because part of it is we're almost self-medicating with busyness. And if I can stay busy, then I can ignore those questions that I know I'll have to deal with in the silence.

I—it’s just that this was not pre-getting to know Christ. This was post-getting to know Christ. I was so addicted to just content and YouTube and anything I could listen to. I remember even when I would stop at a red light, I would turn on YouTube and just like watch like five seconds of a video to a point where I'm like, "What am I doing? Can I not sit still for five seconds? Like, what is happening to me?"

When you find yourself at a place like that, there's something wrong. If we are not able to get alone with ourselves and just sit in silence for a few minutes, there's something seriously wrong. And we can pretend like, "Oh no, you know, it's just that I'm bored."

Ask yourself the question, "What questions am I avoiding? What do I sense inside?" And I'll tell you what my friend told me because when I hit that just the bottom of the bottom, it was a friend that said to me, "Alan, why don't you give Jesus a chance?"

And it was on a park bench. Where I grew up, we had ocean, and it was a bench right by the ocean. I still remember it was late at night, and I just looked up because I thought that's where God was—he was up. And I said, "Okay, since he's bothering me, I'm just going to say, 'God, if you really care about me, I want to hear from you.'"

I don't want to hear from anyone else, and I believe I heard his voice in my heart that night. And so I challenge you, I would say ask him because he's not a God that's made out of wood or stone or marble. He's a living God that speaks, and if you call out to him, he will answer.

That's what the Bible says.

Thanks, Alan, for sharing that. Wow, that was so heartfelt. If you were to go back to and talk with little Alan, what would you say?

I think when I think back on my childhood, I think I was yearning for a role model. I was yearning for someone who would see a future in my life. And I think looking back, a lot of what I was surrounded by was, "Oh, you'll never amount to anything. You'll never make it."

You'll never—like, it was a lot of that. Mind you, I grew up in a good home. It's just culturally, my parents—nobody ever encouraged. My parents, no one ever taught them that. I mean, now we have all these books on how to raise your kids and how to have healthy marriages and all that stuff. Like, no one taught my dad that. No one taught my mom that.

They were just—they needed to make a living, and they left their home country and went to a different country to make a way for their families and kids, and they honestly were doing the best that they can. But as a young boy, a son, I knew I needed more.

And I wish there was somebody around that could just give me a word of encouragement or hope. And so I think that's why for me, I'm really passionate about encouraging people because sometimes you just never know what one word of encouragement could do in someone's life.

I know how it's impacted mine. I shouldn't be alive today. I still, like, I remember when I got my job at Life Church, and you update all the titles on social media. I would get messages from my old schoolmates going, "Wait, Alan, is this like the same? Like, you're a pastor?"

And it's like, after a while, I was like, "Oh gosh! Like, yes, I am! Yes, I am!" You know? And I still, like, I got buddies that are like, "Dude, I can't believe you're a pastor! Like, bro, it's been a while now! Like, just get over it!"

Right? So I think it was because over time there were people like John, for example. He’s a great example. He took the time to just pour into my life when he didn't need to, and it's made a world of a difference for me.

And so I think if I could go back, I would look at that kid and say, "Man, there's more in you." And it's not because you're awesome; it's because the God that lives in you is awesome. You know? And just—I would probably try and encourage him.

So good, Alan! Thank you. You guys are making me a mess here today, man. This is audio only, right?

Yeah, right!

No, you encourage so many people. I will say that Grace, after her sessions with you, always radiates. And she's always told me that you've made such a big difference in her life when she was working in ministry and even beyond that.

And I think your influence touches so many people indirectly.

Yeah, so I just wanted to say that.

Yeah, and I think all our listeners can tell, but one of the best things about you, Alan, one of my personal favorite things, is how genuine, authentic, and heartfelt you are. You're just so raw. Like, you don't sugarcoat things. You don't, you know, craft things in a way that's not real.

And I think, you know, that is such a strength, such a gift. I really appreciate you, Alan, for taking the time to come on here and just pour out your heart.

And start a baking pie!

Well, we didn't fall the Holy Spirit, though! So my dad was a preacher. While he would preach, he would cry. And my dad's like ex-Air Force, like big guy. I'm like, "Dad, what are you doing? You're embarrassing yourself! You're embarrassing everyone!"

I think this is like payback. He's in heaven now, but this is like payback for me. I can't say a word without like just the waterworks.

So, for years, I would pretend like it's allergies.

Yeah, I don't know. Allergies all the time!

So if anyone wants to connect with you, Alan, what's the best way they can do that?

Social media is probably the best way. Alan V—the initial V as in Victory—V George. I have a website as well, alanbgeorge.com.

That's probably easiest.

Yes, we'll link everything in the description. And yeah, thank you again, Alan. This really ministered to us. So selfishly, we're glad we got to do this just to receive.

But also, it's so important to continue reminding ourselves and centering ourselves on what is actually important in life, and that is your relationship with God, spending time with him, becoming more like him, and not just doing things for him.

Because if you do all the things in the world but you don't do it connected to him, you know, Jesus says to abide in him, to be connected to him like a vine.

Yeah, we just hope this really challenges you. And just like Alan said, like continue daily reading his word and meditating in scripture, just knowing that God is slowly transforming you over time.

So if you don't see results right away, that's normal. It's a lifelong journey, and that's kind of the point—to walk with God, not to get instant results right away.

Thank you guys so much for joining us, and we hope this helped you.

Thank you!

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Thank you!