Inspiring and Powering Lives: A Nuclear Operator and Minister

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another episode of Couple of Nukes. As always, I'm your host, Mr. Whiskey, but today I'm not wearing my shirt in honor of a special guest. I am wearing his merch. And as you can see, he, uh, he did the courtesy of the same Couple of Nukes, he's repping it. The first owner of Couple of Nukes merch, actually, uh, our guest is the first person to receive it. So, so lucky him. He actually got to be for all the people who co host my show with me just because I haven't seen them. So. Lucky him. I, I wanted to give it to him in Podfest, uh, to save expenses because, uh, shipping to where he lives,  it's a little expensive, you know, I didn't, I don't know why he's only a hop in a skip away, but you know how it is. So today I am here with Johnny T, a good friend of mine. I like this thing. So a brother in Christ. And as you can see. Refuge Freedom Stories. That's his podcast where you can find out about real lives changed by God. So, Johnny is here to share with us some amazing history. He actually has a family ring with a crest on it. You know, you don't see those nowadays. And he's So I asked him about it and I got, wow, I got educated. And so he's here to share some of that education with us, but that's not all. He is also a nuclear genius, though, not a Navy nuclear genius. You could tell by his reaction, uh, he kind of just shows up and does the job. He doesn't know what's going on. Right. Johnny. Yeah, yeah, that's right. I definitely wouldn't use the term genius. That's that's set aside for people like Elon Musk and, you know, other people like that. So, I remember 1 time I went to buy a TV. This was, I don't know, 10 years ago, went to buy this big 70 inch TV and, and, uh, when I first went to look at it, I was telling the guy, yeah, I worked in the, in the nuclear industry and stuff. And then when I went to pick up my TV the next day, he said to his buddy, standing there, Oh, this guy's like a nuclear. Genius. He's like a nuclear reactor guy. And I said, yeah,  no, let's not, let's get this, you know, nuclear physicist, I think you called me a nuclear physicist. No, I'm not,  but, uh, yeah, I've been, been in that industry for some time. So, uh, and thanks for the shirt. I really appreciate it. It's a cool shirt. And I was doing a little reading about the guy on the back that made the statement, couple of nukes. Yeah. I think if I'm, if I'm not mistaken, Stanfield Turner, that correct. No, that's Admiral Rickover. So. Oh, Admiral Rickover. Okay, I got that wrong. There you go. That just proves I'm not a genius. Yeah, yeah. Well, he's a strange guy, believe it or not. He would do interviews to hire people. So first off, he said he didn't find anyone with talent. He found worthless people and made them talented. I was like, all right, all right, buddy. Okay. Yeah. He had a bit of an ego, but during an interview, he would do something like saw off piece of the, uh, leg on your chair. So you only had, it was off balance and he wants to know, do you live with deficiencies? Or do you, you know, voice out and fix things, you know, stuff like that. He would take you to a restaurant and see if you put stuff on your salad or not. Are you satisfied with life or do you have to make it more? One time he said to this guy, if you can make me angry, I will hire you. And the guy smashed like a  thousands, thousands of dollars. He had, Admiral Rickover had this giant replica like this big of a submarine, like one of the submarines he designed. And the guy just smashed it right in front of him in the office. And he was so pissed. You're hired.  But Johnny, don't discredit yourself. I mean, if I'm not mistaken, 43 years in the nuclear industry. Yeah. Yeah.  Over 4 decades, yeah, and it's gone by pretty quick in all honesty. In the blink of an eye. I guess we might as well start a little bit with that then. Um, yeah, I started as an operator, um, I saw an ad in the newspaper. I went to, I went to university for a year for engineering and I realized when I was there. I'm not cut out to be an engineer. My mind just doesn't work that way. And so I started working, uh, just in a, in a daytime job. And I saw an ad in the paper looking for nuclear operators, and I'd taken sciences and mass, like, at honors levels and high school and stuff and didn't do too bad at them. And I thought, well, that'd be kind of interesting. And sure enough, I went for an interview and. And, uh, you know, I had my physical test and I had my, uh, medical exam and my IQ test and all that kind of stuff. And then I didn't hear anything for months. And then they, they called me up one day out of the blue. And it's funny how God works because you know, yeah, you, uh, Like I was in this job and I just got promoted to like a supervisory position. And like within two weeks, I got this call and said, Hey, are you still interested in being a nuclear operator? And I said, uh, yeah, they said, okay, be here in next Thursday. And I said, okay. And I hung up the phone and I looked at my buddy and I said, where is, you know, this place I'd never heard of it. And, uh, and I didn't drive at that time. I had to take a bus for like, uh, six and a half hours to get there. And it was, it was great. It was like, uh, I was up near a research facility. So we had our training up there and that kind of stuff. And then, you know, I, I got to work at, uh, 1 of the utilities here in Canada, and, uh, and they looking for people to transfer over to 1 of the other stations for commissioning experience. And I said, absolutely. I'm going because you're going to see stuff. You can walk into the reactor vault in your civvies, you know, and not see stuff like that again, as soon as they start up, right? You're going in a big plastic suit, like an air supply plastic suit, look like the Michelin man, right? And, uh, so like, it was great. I loved it. I did lots of commissioning there. Uh, did some manual fuel loading, like it's different in Canada. We, we fuel 24 seven. Whereas in the States you shut down after a year or so and you pull all the rods out and you put new ones in Yeah  Well, we have, we have fueling machines that are like, uh, if you think of like a, like a six barrel pistol, you know, and then the bridge, I pick them up and they'll, they'll clamp up on either side of, well, I'll get my fingers lined up here on the same channel because we have 480 channels, right? Yeah. With,  with, uh. 17 bundles, I believe, in each one. I'm going back a long way. And, uh, so the one fueling machine will push two old bundles out into the empty one. And then the, uh, and then the other fueling machine will push two new bundle, it will push two new bundles in as it pushes two old ones out. And then they rotate to all the different channels. The fuel run, and then dump it in the primary bay, and it sits there for 90 days, and then it gets transferred underwater to the secondary bay. And it sits there until I put it in dry storage. So, I really enjoyed, I worked in fuel handling for about 16 years and absolutely loved it because it was a, like, a small ecosystem, everything. You couldn't run the station without it. And, uh, and it was, it was cool. There's so much cool technology.  And, uh, you know, and then I moved over into a couple of other different roles, teaching radiation production training and health and safety and, and then into quality assurance. And I'm still in quality assurance today. And I have been since, uh, 2001.  So that's the board. I'm in the twilight in the twilight of my, my nuclear career. It's coming to a close  sometime.  Sometimes. Yeah. I mean, it is kind of the boring stuff. Quality assurance and radiation protection. I think what you were talking about before, that was way, way cooler. It's important, don't get me wrong, like we need safety, but  , you know, here's my thing, you know, I, I forgot that, you know, you're in a different country, so y'all do things a little differently. So what is your moderator? What? What's your moderator? Heavy water.  Okay. Yeah, we use it because we use natural uranium, right? We don't use enriched uranium like you guys do so we can make plutonium from our uranium  and we're heavy water moderated reactor.  Yeah, I'm trying to forgive me. I've met, you know, there was over 2000 people at podfest and I talked about religion, nuclear science, military stuff to a lot of people. So. Was it you or someone else, we started talking about the, the micro reactors, how they're compacted down to that was you. Yeah. Yeah. So  I didn't know if you wanted to get into that at all. Yeah. So,  so there's been some big advances in the, in the nuclear field and like, we don't typically build the big four unit generating stations anymore. You know, they have, uh, they have in Canada, they have these can do 600 and they've been around for a long time and they were sold overseas to, you know. To a lot of places and, and so you might have 1 or 2 of those at a site. Well, now they've got small modular reactors and they have those in the stage 2. Yeah. And they're typically around 300 megawatts, right? You know, and they're easier to install. And then you see a lot of interest in getting those in place. I don't actually know. There are any small modular reactors. Built yet, but I believe there are some, like, um, like, on the platform to build or are being signed up for. But the other thing that's really cool now is they're having these micro reactors and these micro reactors basically, um, fit inside a transport trailer. And then they'll, it's like a nuclear battery, right? So you'll, you'll tow it to a site. You hook it up to the, uh, the grid there, the little mini grid at the site, whether it's like an industrial site, like an oil and gas  place or somewhere like remotely located a community, something like that. And they hook this thing up and it runs for, you know, somewhere between 8 and 10 years. You never have to refuel it. It just does its thing. And when it's done, you take it away and you replace it. And, uh, you know, I was thinking about that just coming up for this interview. Um, the possibilities of using something like that for even space travel, right? You know, like, uh, Propulsion to get the Mars or something like that, like those micro factors, they're so small that you could easily put 1 of those in the back of a. A rocket, if you want to use that,  you know, and use that to to fuel a nuclear engine. Right? So, who knows? Like, it's an exciting time to be in nuclear and it's and it's got a real Renaissance because,  um, this whole. Global climate warring thing to Mars.  In nonsense, right? And, uh, you know, like people don't understand, like, I understand that people are emotional about it,  but they're being, they're being  pressed with information that isn't entirely factual. And so when they say, oh, we need to get rid of nuclear because it's dirty and it's all this other kind of stuff. Well, first, first off, typical baseload generation comes from nuclear.  I know in where I live, 30 percent of the base load generation is nuclear. I mean, if you wanted to shut that off, what are you going to replace it with? Wind turbines don't generate enough, and they only work when the wind's blowing. Solar panels don't generate enough. You know, they're not going to give you enough either the sun's not shining and they're not going to charge. So, I mean, there's,  you really need to take a good look at nuclear. It's not as dirty as people think it is and it's zero carbon, right? Zero carbon. So, um, you know, there's, there's a lot of spin out there and a lot of it's not true. Of course. Yeah. I was just going to say there's this mass.  this negative stigma that, and it has been for years that, you know, nuclear power is bad. It kills everything. And, you know, I mean, I am, I love green energy just because I love. Photovoltaic devices, I've always wanted to bring that to you, advanced graphene based, you know, solar powered, you know, solar panels. I think that's great stuff, but you know, it's, and I love keeping up with the newest, you know, green energy developments because they're making some water wave based inventions that are amazing, you know, and I think it's awesome. You brought up something so it's funny. A lot of, so people in the nuclear Navy aren't very happy, you know, that's a statistically proven, you know, unfortunately.  A lot of my buddies, what they started doing is, one of the ways, uh, to get out now is, um, they were trying to transfer to the Space Force. And so we had conversations like, you know, you know, nuclear spaceships and stuff. And the biggest concern was always, well, how do we moderate in space, right? We're not just going to use cold air, there's no water. But with these microgrids, you have the moderator  already there. So that's pretty interesting. And I think I've always wondered why we don't, you know, nuclear power rise, so to speak, uh, space travel, because that's the biggest issue with space travel is, is, is power and fuel as the biggest concern.  Yeah. There's no fueling stations out there. Yeah, and I, I think you're right, like, uh, and part of it would be also shielding, you know, the, the astronauts from the reactor. Well, it wouldn't be much different than in a sub, right? You know, you know, you've got shielding there don't  have shooting. So,  yeah. Yeah. And then, uh, um, the, the, what would these micro reactors though? Like, I mean, if they're plug and play and, and they have like, uh,  They have their own like, uh, built in cooling systems, like heat transfer type things, right? So yeah, it's, it's pretty cool. Like, um,  in reality though, space is a cold place. If they really wanted to  use that for like air cooling, if you want to call that, call it is there's no air, but I mean, right. Like the flow of moving through, I don't know if it would actually work or not. Who knows smarter people.  Space particles. Yeah. I was going to say, because  Here's something that, you know, we might have to think about. I don't know. Cause I'm not, I'm not a nuclear genius either. I'm just a new, but you know, there's other, there's phenomenon in space that don't, that doesn't happen on earth, like on bigger levels, like cosmic rays and solar rays and stuff like that. How would that affect, you know, these machines, the last thing you want is a reactor failure in space, not because of the. You know the outburst of contamination supposedly right but we don't want the ship to stop, you know,  come home. So  just a quick plug for myself in my episode civilians versus nukes. We actually had a whole discussion about electric vehicles as well as microgrids. And obviously the biggest concern Johnny is.  You know what happens when there's a, there's an issue, right? And obviously we're going to make them self automated, right? That's the end goal. And I think it's going to be a while until we're still going to need people to do maintenance on them and check on them maybe daily, then weekly, then monthly, eventually get to where they're self regulating. But even self regulating machines have unexpected issues, Johnny. So let's say I'm a civilian living in an apartment complex. And, you know, instead of a generator, we got this micro reactor grid. And now It fails. It goes super critical. There's thermal runaway or something like this. I mean, what are your thoughts on that? Your safeguards for that?  Are we going to make a civilian, you know, reactor rescue squad, so to speak?  It sounds goofy, but you understand what I'm trying to say. Like, yeah, part of the National Guard to, to respond to that, you know, who's going to respond to that. Yeah, I, I know, uh, just thinking about that, uh, civilian response thing, it just reminded me of something back in the day. And this was like, in the early 80s. And, uh, I was working in, uh, health and safety and we had this, uh, this machine. It was called the Moran 1B and it was like, for, um,  for testing air particles for, um,  I microcarbons, but it wasn't microcarbons, but it was like this molecular type, uh, air sample. But it was big and it was like, uh, uh, do you know what a Snoopy is?  No, not familiar. A Snoopy is like a neutron monitor and it's got a big, big tube barrel on the front. Right. And, and, but it looks like Snoopy because, yeah, cause the front end is. I never called it that. Yeah. Yeah. But we call it the Snoopy, right? Does it like the dog? Yeah. Yeah. Like the dog. Yeah. Cause he's got a big black nose on the front, you know, so. Okay. Okay. Yeah. And, uh, anyway, it looked, it looked like that. And, but it was this Moran 1B and so we had to take some samples in different places, you know, for testing for these different micro carbons or whatever they were. And, uh, you know, I said to my, my manager 1 day, I said, you know, these, these people, they see us out all the time with this thing. And, you know, they have no idea what we're doing. They have no idea what we're testing for. And I said, you know, and you talked about, like, a civilian response. So, like, the, the emergency response teams. You know, or like, uh, those guys, they'll always have a picture of firemen, for example, EMS, right? You know, it says EMS on the front and R on the back. Everybody knows exactly what they are because they're emergency management  service or whatever it stands for.  And, uh, I said, you know what? I said, we should get t shirts made just like our shirts here. I said, we should get t shirts made. And I said, uh, so people will know exactly who we are. And I think it should say, um,  the acronym for funny aroma response team.  What do you think that would spell?  I was trying to spell in my head, uh, the Foxtrot alpha Romeo tango. Yeah.  And he said, yeah, yeah, a fart team. Right. And he said, no, we can't do that. Funny enough, that was actually a curse word in my house. We weren't allowed to say it. We actually, my dad was very strict on that. He was like, you could say pass when we used to say cut cheese. And I never  thought anything of it to me. That always meant you were farting. You know, we weren't allowed to say to either. Um, but I guess thinking about it, I guess, Jesus smelling, I guess that's, that's what it is because. You, if you're cutting cheese, it smells like, I don't, I don't know where that came from, but yeah, I don't know. But some, some people are, some people are pros on it. Yeah. Are you, are you, um, speaking from experience, are you an expert? You're an expert in, um,  no, I've had, I've had my moments, but I'm not a pro. Yeah, yeah, it seems as maybe you can confirm as you get older, you have more moments,  not by choice, that depends on  my grandfather,  you know, um, yeah, but anyway, uh, so we had this watch at some point. So when our ship was turned on the reactors, you know, They hadn't been on for a while. So people were used to going down without certain devices to measure radiation exposure. We had to make sure they were wearing them. So they stationed me, especially in front of the door, just standing there for, for eight hours at a time. First off, they were like, you, you're not allowed to have a chair. It's watch standing, not watch sitting. That's right. I'm not standing in front of this door for eight hours. All right. I mean, I can, and it's in the, in the middle of a P way of a ship, right? So I'm like, I can't even like pace around.  Well, eventually some officer felt bad and he got his chairs. He's like, that's ridiculous. So who y'all for him? Thanks to him. But we called it plant access watch standard, AKA the paw patrol. And so for anyone who's ever seen that show, you know, it's about the dogs who are cops and construction workers. And  well, we took it in the next. Level. We got little stick, paw patrol stickers, and they were pink with the girl, dog and hearts and stuff. And my buddy got a hat. Because on Fridays you could wear, you know, fun cover, you know, we call it a hat, a cover in the military and we had ones for our ship and everything. But on Friday, it was like casual Friday. You could wear just like, like what you're wearing, just a regular old ball cap. And so my buddy came in with one with the whole picture of Paw Patrol and it said Paw Patrol, and it was kind of a made up watch, but I ended up getting a badge that said senior and rate Paw Patrol. Cause I stood so many hours of it. But yeah, we, we, and then, um, I, I didn't get to see it, but they came out with a Paw Patrol, like superhero movie. And so me and the boys were all joking. We got to go with the real, we're the real Paw Patrol. And so your story just reminded me of that, you know, the, the, uh, I keep forgetting the funny aroma recovery team, you know,  response team. Oh yeah. Yeah. Sorry. Respond. Yeah. You're not recovering it. Hopefully.  So it's just reminding me of that because we had plant access while standing, we would call Paul.  In, in the military, there's just a whole slew of, of funny acronyms, you know, that we would say not all of them appropriate , you know? Of course. Yeah. But, yeah, so I just wanted to share that story since you had, uh, mentioned it, you know, not as good as your story, but still it was pretty funny having all these, well, I don't know. It's, it's close. It's close for sure. Grown men in, grown men in uniform, you know, standing there and they got the little pink hearts on with, with the dog, and it says Paw Patrol , you know, so, yeah.  But  as far as, but as far. As far as, um, you know, I, I think that. The, the micro reactors would  obviously they'd have to be, um,  safe shutdown, right? You know, they, they wouldn't be allowed to be like, uh,  like your systems in the States, you know, because you use the rich fuel and things like that. You have to control how they run. I don't, I don't necessarily know that the older generation of nuclear U. S. nuclear plants are, are passive shutdown is a better way to put it. Right. Whereas in Canada, they are.  So I think that they would have to resolve that first. So if any failure happened, it would just have a passive shutdown and it would just stop. Right. And of course, then you are tracking for people who aren't tracking, you mean remote shutdown is another word for it. Like, no, you don't need anyone at the plant site. You don't, you don't need any human interaction. It's just got to shut down on its own. If, if one of the, the metric stops working, then it would just default to a shutdown state. Right. And then, so they'd have to get that all sorted out.  And, but I think the, the possibilities there, you know, are endless. It did, they've got, it's going to be lumpy, right? They got a few things to figure out before they would actually. They're going to have to demonstrate it 1st, you know, at a remote site or something, make sure the way it should once they get that all resolved. And I think they're pretty confident. They have that result and they can demonstrate that. It's providing the power consistently, you know, without any issues. Yeah, you have to get over that.  Excuse me. The, uh,  uh, the local. Population, civilian population, whatever, they have to get their mind  taken away from Chernobyl and Three Mile Island and, you know, all those, the different scenarios that they typically run straight towards when you mentioned the word nuclear, they got to get away from that. And once they've been educated about the safeguards and demonstrated properly that things work the way they should. I think it'll be a lot better, but you can't get back to EVs, right? Like, there's a lot of push to get EVs and things like that, but there is no, there's no, um, structure in place. There's no, there's no, um,  vastly wide national, uh, national, um, uh, charging grid, you know, like, there's not enough stations along the way. And I know that they tell you where you need to go to recharge, but then you're still recharging for an hour or something like, or whatever it is. I don't drive an EV, so I don't know. But, uh, but they've got a lot of infrastructure issues to start off first and the cost as well. Right?  Oh, yeah, I agree. And, you know,  the issue, Johnny, is that all it takes is one bad nuclear incident for people to be, you know, never again. And you're talking about they have to flush out, you know, all the.  Little errors and details and micro grids and you know, there's a book like this big of every nuclear change they've ever made. I remember a chief recommended it to me because, you know, it's so interesting reading about like, that's so stupid. How could they do that? But, you know, when it's in its infancy, you try out different things because, you know, they didn't have safeguards that we have nowadays. And it's like, I would, how would you ever operate like that? But, you know, it's got to grow and expand. And what I wanted to say, Johnny, is because I'm not too familiar with Canadian history. Do y'all have a clean record of zero nuclear incidents? Is that correct?  We definitely don't have any incidents like Three Mile Island or Chernobyl or anything like that. There's nothing like that. No. Okay.  So no, no big catastrophic. No, no, no, no, no, no. As you, as you said, every, and I can't speak to any specifics, uh, but every utility has issues when they start up, especially if they have a new design and things like that. But, but definitely no, uh, you know, nothing like a Chernobyl or Yeah. Johnny's had the occasion to overtime day, unexpected overtime.  Anybody that works in nuclear has an unexpected overtime day. Yeah. That's pretty much almost every day. It's um But yeah, it's great. And you know, it's funny because have you ever seen the Simpsons, Johnny? You know? Oh yeah. I've actually got a, I've actually got a Homer Simpson display of him wearing a plastic suit with tongs with a little green fuel rod. Oh yeah. Yeah. From the, from the intro. Yeah. Everyone always thinks, you know, anytime I say nuclear operator, nuclear, this or that, they're like, Oh, just like Homer Simpson. I'm like, that's not a prime example. What? What?  What we do, but yeah, no, no, certainly people who just are relaxing. Yeah, Johnny, would you like to see micro grids pushed to the point that every vehicle has 1? Or do you think they should be for, um, like building use only? Right? Because let's say you had 2 vehicles crashed. I have 3.  You know, these micro reactors, and then, I mean, you're looking at a pretty bad time.  I don't ever think they would get that small, to be honest. I think it's incredible that they've got it small enough to fit in the back of a transport truck trailer. But I don't think you're going to see them get any small, any smaller because, uh, like, I realize, you know, like, people think back to TVs and radios back in the 50s, and there were gigantic computers filled whole rooms, right? You know, and now, like, my watch has more computing power than Apollo, uh, but I, I don't know if they would ever,  uh, bring them down to that scale. Yeah. Just because of some of the physical limits. Yeah. Yeah, and power, right? I mean, and all those other things, I think they would need to find other solutions to that. And the history is full of great inventors who's. Inventions got squashed by corporate America, you know, yeah,  we'll see. We'll see what happens, but I think they'll be great for remote areas and things like that for sure. And, you know, I mean,  I don't know how this would work around. I'm not a, I'm not a geologist, but  we could build them deep underground and to the point that if there was an incident, you know,  The cities above would be safe, you know, we got plenty of room underground, but that brings into questions whether there's an earthquake, right? Obviously, we can't be playing underground reactors in California and anywhere like there. But. Yeah, you got the canyon out there,  right? Yeah. Oh, yeah. We've got plenty of desert where you could just have these places. But again, you know, the push from the civilian population, the population, the anti nukes, you know, as we call them. So  that's the issue. Yeah. Yeah, it's an issue. And there are some valid concerns about that. They do, like, there's all kinds of environmental studies that they do before they'll even build a plant anywhere. Anyway, they look at all those fault lines and they look at all those issues that could potentially come up. So, I mean, a lot of that is even Um,  put aside when they, like, they certainly wouldn't build 1 in an area that had an active fault line. New York City. Yeah. Right. In the middle of New York City. Yeah. Yeah. I've seen too many movies for that to happen. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. But there's, there's a lot of science and a lot of careful consideration and study before they even. Presented to, uh, the point of. Consideration for bill, you know, and and like to the, uh, like having them above ground is, is okay with all the containment structure and everything that's in place. Um, you know, there's, there's  so much, uh, safety built into the containment structure as well. You know, so it said there's a lot there that people really don't understand and it's I think that the industry is doing a better job of educating people. Like, I know you can go on YouTube and you can, you could type in a history of nuclear power. You could type in a safety analysis for blah, blah, you know, whatever. And, uh, it'll bring up, uh, sometimes even corporate, uh, videos of these kinds of issues to, to help people understand it.  You know, because public perception definitely is something that needs to needs to change for them to really embrace  more growth in the industry. But I, I really can't see how. With the growing.  Energy needs every day  that nuclear power can't be a part of that. It's not going to happen. It's got to be there. Look at what happened in Germany. They shut down all their nuclear plants. And now they're,  they're in destitute, you know, ways for power, right? They have to buy it from Russia.  So, yeah, you never want to just get, you just can't shut down all the nuclear plants and expect everything to be okay. It's just not going to help. Yeah. Yeah, you don't want to have to buy power from other people. That's, that's not how you want your country to be, but I understand, you know. So that being said, Johnny, you've been in nuclear power for a while, and obviously it's not the only thing you do. We're going to touch on your, your other life, you know, we're not going to call it your secret life, but your other life, your, your alter ego and, uh, basically in the ministry. But before all that. You know, you described it. I actually told the postman this. So when I was mailing your shirt, the postman was like, are you in the military? He thought that you and I were military buddies because I guess people don't mail out to Canada anymore, I guess.  And I was wearing my couple of nukes shirt, my tan one, so it looks even more military. Oh, yeah. I said, no, this is, yeah, and I, and I said, well, I was, but he's not, he's, he's in the ministry and the postman was, well, you can be in a ministry and be in the military. You're going to start praying when the bullets hit you. I said, yeah, yeah. I said, but this man specifically said.  Military or ministry? His family falls into one or two categories, I said. It's funny you said that. He can be both, because he specifically said it's one or the other. And so I had the mailman, you know, laughing about that. But yeah, so that's you. You're the man I was talking about. So you ended up on the ministry side. But going back generations, your family has always been either military or ministry. So can you tell us a little bit of your family history? I know when we were speaking, you mentioned some world war stuff. That was super awesome to hear about. Yeah.  So like I, and first and foremost, like, uh, you know, my, my complete respect for you and for every other veteran that served and is continuing to serve today because I have a special place in my heart, right. And you guys deserve credit for what you do and should never be, uh,  unrespected for it. You know, not everybody wants to devote their life to serving their country. And, uh, you know, it's important that people remember that, you know, that there are people like yourself and others that have taken up that call to do so. So full respect to my friend. Thank you. Um, yeah, so so largely my and it's it's funny because after I got back from from podcast after our chat.  I reached out to my, uh,  to, uh, one of my relatives and said, Hey, do you have a copy of the family tree that my dad had put together? You know, and, uh, they said, Oh, I haven't seen that for a couple of years, you know, and I'm not really sure what, what happened to it, but it does go back as far as the 1400s in England. And so as you were talking about her or yeah, I do have a family, I do have a family crest ring. And so what happened was back in the 1400s, uh, my family, Uh, ancestors were part of the British King's army, if you want to call it that. And so there was, there was a battle called the Battle of Agincourt. The Battle of Agincourt was where the British were largely outnumbered two or three times more by the French and they wanted to fight them. So they, they bring the two armies and, you know, back in that time, they bring the armies, they stand off, they all march towards each other and, and all that kind of stuff, whatever other weapons they used at that time. Right. And so the King,  King Henry, uh, he had the bright idea to open up the beer barrels on the morning of the battle and said, okay, boys, go have a few brews before we, uh, before we start this fight, because, you know, it would make him feel braver and, you know, all that kind of stuff. Liquid courage.  Yeah, liquid courage. Yeah, that's right. And, uh, he basically told everybody whoever survives, you're going to get title and land, you know, and so my ancestor was a guy that used like a 10 foot pike, you know, like a, like a big 10 foot stick with a sharp pointy end on it. And they would use that to, um, stab people. Well, not so much people, but more horses, right? Because  people would ride on horses, right? So they would jam the 1 end in the ground and they'd hold it and they had the horse ram up on it. Or I guess they could, you know, 10 foot long. It'd be hard to swing that around and try and stab somebody. But, but they were, they were part of that. And, um. That's as much as I know about what happened there, but my ancestors survived, and so we got title and we got land. And so that's where my family crest came from. And so going, you know, went much further ahead in generations. I had, uh,  my, uh, my grandfather fought in the eighth army in the second world war.  Against the Germans in East Africa.  And so he was, he was fighting with them and was largely responsible for driving, um, a recovery truck out into the field to pick up, uh, like the Matilda tanks is like a small British tank, right? 47, 47 millimeter gun. I think it had, but really hard to. to knock out because they had really thick armor. And so anyway, um, there were times when those tanks would get like a shell in the tread or something like that. Still usable, but they would have to be fixed. So part of his job was to go out on a flatbed truck and pick up these, uh, disabled tanks and bring them back so they could be fixed. Right and probably work on those tanks too. I would imagine.  Um, I didn't get to talk to him too much about that because we moved to Canada when I was young and, you know, got to talk to him a couple of times. Um, but I, I do have a picture of him skinny little guy, like you and I standing up beside this big guy. gigantic truck with this big flatbed on the back. So that's kind of cool.  And then, uh, also in the Second World War,  uh, my great uncle, I was telling you the story about the, uh, Dam Busters. And if you're not familiar with the Dam Busters, uh, there was  a guy named Barnes Wallace that, uh, devised a, or invented a  A bomb that would spin backwards. So it would skip on the water. And in Germany, they had three major industrial dams that supplied the power for their industrial, uh, war works, you know, their factories and all that kind of stuff.  So I'm talking about power, right. And so they, uh, these were guarded with two big flak towers and they had, uh, nets, torpedo nets in front of them. So you couldn't get a submarine torpedo the dam. Right.  So he developed this bomb that would spin backwards and they would drop it. They had to drop it from, now this is in 1943. Okay. So they had to They were flying a Lancaster bomber, which is a four engine heavy bomber, like a B 17. Okay. Twin tails at the back though. And, uh, they, they had to drop this bomb at, I believe it was 40 feet and they had to drop it at a specific distance from the dam. So it would Yeah, the calculation was it would spin backwards and skip over the torpedo nets and hit the dam wall and then drop down underneath and the water concussion would cause it to explode and burst the dam.  So, anyway, my, uh, my great uncle was a radio operator slash gunner on one of these Lancasters for this mission.  And so they, their flight, the second flight in. They, uh, dropped their, their bomb and they caused the first crack in the dam, a small very tiny breach at the top and then a subsequent plane came in and they breached the dam.  Sadly, when their plane was flying back over the Netherlands, they, uh, they got shot down and, uh, their, their Lancaster crashed in the ocean and they all died. So he's buried over in Bergen Cemetery in, uh, Germany. So I'd like to go over there sometime and pay my respects to him.  Yeah, and so, John, I don't know if you know the science behind it, but how did he make the pump spin backwards? I mean, so they had it. Yeah, so it looked like a 45 gallon drum, but bigger. Okay. And it had it was full of TNT and it had depth charge in there. Right? Because they calculated how much lower  below the surface. It had to explode for the sort of reach the dam. And so they had like a, uh,  They took out the Bombay doors, which were basically a huge length of the, the bottom leg. Yeah. And they put in a drive system and like a hook system. So like the hook system would, would, um, latch onto each side of the, of the, um, drum, if you wanna call it that. Yeah. And on one side it had a chain driven motor. Up in the Lancaster and a chain driven hog, so they would spin it backwards at a certain revolution and then when they got to the height and they got to the distance, they would open up the clamps and it would drop and then would spin on the water.  And the only way that they, the only way they knew they were at 40 feet was they. They had to put 2 lights, 1 at the front, 1 at the back, at the bottom of the plane. And they figured out the angles when the lights, when the navigator saw the lights come together on the water. And then when he looked through this little wooden Y thing with 2 posts with holes in it, when he saw the 2 the holes, he knew he was at the right distance at the right height, and that's when they released it. It's incredible, just incredible. You know, I mean, flying something that big at 40 feet. Is is incredible.  Okay. Yeah, I was, uh, I think I was a little too far ahead of that time. I was thinking, you know, they got the, the drum and then they had, um, like a little rocket outburst on 1 side and 1 on the other side. So the  counter opposing. Yeah. And I was like, that seems really advanced for 1940s.  No, no, no. They would just spin it in the, in the aircraft ahead of time and then throw it down and then it would bounce and skip that. That's still  genius though. Right. Because you think they've got this.  First of all, I think the torpedo net is genius, you know, to think that far ahead, like, Hey, they're going to target this dam. We got to set it up and then to make something to jump over it. I mean, I love that. You know, I always say this, you know, because we're both religious men, you know, God was a creator. We were made in his image. We are creators. And I think human creativity and the things we think of sometimes, it just always impresses me, you know, I, and some people can't appreciate it, but I'll look at like an airplane. Or even a bridge. Anytime I see a bridge, especially the Chesapeake Bay bridge tunnel. I mean, that's like 20 miles long costs like 14 to get across, but it's how in the middle of the ocean is just miles and miles of bridge. I'm like, who built this? You know? And then, and back then they used to build bridges overnight. Now I've got a bridge down the street for me. It's been like four years in the making.  It's crazy. Humans used to actually work now that it's easier to build stuff.  It's slow, but when people were doing it, you know, with their bare hands, they would build bridges overnight, but I just look at that. I just look at an airplane in the sky and compare it to what animals can make in nature and what plants do. I'm like, that is so amazing, you know, and people just take it for granted. You know, people were born now holding a cell phone when they come out of the womb. So, yeah, well, you know, it's funny you say that because, um, I was watching a video the other day of this, uh, new, uh, passenger Playing like an executive jet type of thing,  and  they're expensive to fly. They're expensive to own. And so what this company did was, and I can't remember the name of it, but they shaped it like, uh, this fish in the ocean. And because then the reason they shaped it, like the body looks like pointing the big and round and comes back  and like, almost like a cartoon fish, like a Jesus fish.  And, uh, it's kind of, kind of has got a propeller or pusher prop on the back.  And they say it's such an, uh, an aerodynamically effective shape that it reduces the cost to fly this thing. It's super efficient in the air. It's got much greater range. It's got fantastic handling capabilities. And as I said, like, yeah, yeah. Flying, fishing and like God, the creator, like he's put, I'm a big believer that he's put a lot of things around us. In nature and in his design, right, that we can learn from and these guys, it looks like they've learned from that. Just studying the shape of that, that fish that he created and go, wow, you know, that would, that goes through the water really slippery, you know, you do the same thing. And sure enough,  you're saying. God already made the perfect airplane. We just got to, we're just not on his level yet. So the sub, there you go. He's made the perfect sub you guys need to like those fish. He's got submarines that go way down to stuff. We don't even know about yet. Oh yeah, yeah, absolutely. It is. Yeah. It's funny. There's this like atheist handbook, you know, my dad told me about once because my dad was just browsing the internet and he came across some like Excerpts from it and one of them was like well God must really like beetles because there's so many different colored and sized beetles and bugs I guess God loves bugs and you couldn't make more of this or that I was like  that I don't know they were trying to use it to like Say why God wasn't real like there's too many bugs for God to be real It just blows my mind sometimes the things that That, um, atheists come up with. Right. You know, and one of the things was like, you know, oh, well God wouldn't have allowed, uh, water bottles to be made because babies can choke on, on, on the cap. And I was like, okay. There's just, there's just  sometimes atheist arguments just make no sense. Like, oh God must be a bug collector.  Well, I'm glad he made so many bugs. I think that's amazing. I think that's actually amazing that there's so many different variations. Yeah, it's pretty funny. And actually there, I read a good book a number of years ago about evolution  and the theory of evolution. It still is just a theory. It's never been proven. Like people get it wrong.  You know, but if you want to read a, an excellent book and you can find it online, it's called In the Minds of Men by Ian Taylor. And he takes all the quote unquote facts of evolution and puts them against the facts of creation. It's an incredible book and it's, it's so well done. If you, if you want an interesting read, check it out sometime.  Oh yeah. And I've, I've been.  You know, I've cut my Instagram time down to almost zero just because social media is so toxic and bad, but you know, the great thing about the algorithm is if you like something, it'll show you more of it, and you keep liking it, it'll show you more of it. And so, you know, our social media is really in our control, you know, so now my feed is full of religious quotes, and I've been liking a lot of scientific proof of God. And you know, it's so insane because I first saw it on, there's this pastor.  They call him like Skip. He runs a show called 30, 000 Feet. It's the Bible from 30, 000 Feet. So he kind of just flying over and getting a quick overview. Amazing, and he, he was talking about stuff, and then I saw a social media clip talking about the same stuff.  And there's like  course of scientific values in the world, right? These numbers are these numbers, and they said if any one of these numbers was as much as like 0. 00 something 10th to the 10th different than life could not be sustained, nothing would create. He talked about the size of the ocean, the size of the sky, how close we are to this and that, and just a small number. And he talks about all these different numbers, right, any one of these, basically everything is lined up perfectly on earth to sustain life, to have life. And it's insane, you know, I don't,  and we read about, I read a thing that was like, I love this. It was like, uh, uh, painting is proof of a painter, you know, building is proof of a builder. So creation is proof of a creator, you know, even like, I'm pretty sure I read, um, not too long ago that the big bang theory was disproven, right? Yeah, I read that too, yeah. You know, and it's insane to think that people believe that, well, everything just happened to line up to sustain life. How, what are the chances? I mean, you could look at the chances of everything lining up perfectly, and the chances of there being a creator, and it's a greater chance that there's a creator. But Johnny, this is going to tie into what I was going to ask you to kind of introduce yourself here in your show. I'm going to ask you, I'm going to hit you with your own question.  If you could tell everyone here one thing about God, you know, what would it be?  Yeah, yeah, for sure. Um, you know,  I asked, I do ask that question of every guest on the podcast. What's the one thing you would tell people about God?  And. When I, I look back on, on the last three years that we've had the podcast and there's been some incredible answers. You know, a lot of people say God is, you know, he loves us incredibly and a lot of people say he's there for, you know, to give us victory over any struggles, or he is, or he is a healer, or you know, like all these different aspects of God.  And I think,  I think the one thing I would say about God is just the reality of God. You know, we talked, we talked, we talked about that was my answer for when I go on your show. Oh, yeah.  My answer was going to be God is real. You can still use it. Yeah. I knew you were going to say the same thing as me. I knew this was going to happen. So go ahead though. Well, okay. Well, let me explain it from my point of view. It might be different from your Um, I, I just think that, you know, the fact that we can see him everywhere in our creation, in his creation, um, the fact that we can see lives changed in a number of like hundreds of thousands of different ways, miraculous ways. Everybody is unique and, and God uniquely speaks to each of us in a way that he knows so we're going to understand it. And he knows that that's going to help us build our relationship with him.  There's a scripture in John 17, 3, and it says, uh, this is eternal life, that we know him, and we are known by him. Right. And  just the reality of God really,  And sometimes it just, it,  I don't want to say it shocks me, but it definitely  reinforces the fact that he's right. We all go through what they call a dark night of the soul, you know, where  God seems like a billion miles away or he's doesn't seem like he's answering our prayers, you know, but it's all, it's all up here in our head. It's not, he never changes. He never moves. We're the ones that.  Um, either drift away, or we're the ones that go through things because he's helping to change us and he needs to kind of bring it to the surface so we can, we can see his hand of victory over that or his help in that situation. And those are the things that we go through, right, to get to know him better.  So, I'm, I'm, I'm very much consumed with,  with that, that he is. Real no matter what and and knowing him and being known by him that's consuming me right now So that that's what I would say about god is that he's real no matter where you are and what you're going through  Yeah, and you know  Just even even i'm a young man and just looking back on my life There's been so many things that line up a certain way, you know people want to say It was the universe, it was predestined, and all of this, it's God's hand at work, and you know, I think a lot of people  acknowledge God, but they just don't want to call it that, and you know, I think the issue is, there's a lot of negative stigmatisms with God, and I actually, I keep bringing this up on my show, so I talked about it with Brian Strubar. As well as, you know, on the new show, Generation of Bridge Builders, but  people want to, you know, look at God based on people they meet, you know, and I use this example. I'll use it again. I said, if you met someone who worked for SpaceX, you know, and they were stupid or rude, would you be like, well, Elon Musk must be, you know, stupid and rude because this employee for him is, you know, And we're not employees of God, but we are representatives of Him, but you know, it's not like, we still have free will, we still sin, and you know, and there are people who twist God's word, and speak on His behalf when they can't, no one can speak on God's behalf, no one except God. The son in Jesus Christ and even he said, you know, there are things that God knows that he doesn't know, you know, and so I think one of the issues with our society besides the fact that they're pushing all kinds of evil, wicked stuff into the world and enforcing it into our children's lives. I mean, that's a whole conversation on its own, but  the issue is  that religion has been weaponized, you know, all religions have been weaponized. Let me, let me put it out there. All religions have been twisted and weaponized.  You know, my biggest thing for all the non believers and atheists and people who strayed away from God, what I always tell them is, read the Bible. Because so many people I meet who are non believers or atheists or had a bad religious encounter, they've never read the Bible.  That's the only representation of God that you can trust, His Word. People  cannot, look, you ever play a game of telephone, Johnny? That's what it's like, right? God gives the message. You know, God and Jesus, the Holy Spirit, they give us the message. And then we pass it on, and hey, maybe I say it right, maybe preachers are closer to God, and you know, they say it right, but  as it passes along, you know, the message gets changed, it gets twisted, you know. I, I'll describe it like that. I gave him a telephone, you know, that's what it really is. And when you're all further down the receiving end, you have be like, what? So the best way to know what's actually true is to go to the, to the . You know, God,  he who made the message, he who made the word, you know, I think that's the issue. So many people are just  judging God based on what they see on social media, uh, what they hear in their communities.  You know, Johnny, what's your opinion on that? I can tell you, it looks like you agree 100%. So I do 100%. Yeah, you know, Bible tells us heaven and earth will pass away, but his word will never pass away. And actually, I was having a conversation with  someone just last week, because they're of a different faith. And, uh, you know, they said, well, you know, that person believes that Jesus was, you know, a great teacher and a prophet and, you know, um, you know, um, points they believed in one God, but they didn't believe that Jesus was the son of God. Right. And I asked him, I said, well, you tell me that you believed he was a prophet and your particular book of faith, um, says that you need to believe everything the prophets say. So why don't you believe what he says when he says that he is the son of God. I am him. I am.  Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Who do you say that? I am right and but no like there's  and and the thing that people don't understand about the Bible is like if I gave you a book and it was written in Japanese and what's going on with my background there? I don't know. It like read your hand signals at celebration. Oh, I don't know. Let's see. Let's see if that works again. They were. Zoom has confirmed god's existence. You said there's a bible and and zoom was like, oh, yeah. All right. Yeah, absolutely  I've never seen that. I've never seen that before ever Um, but you know if I gave you a book that was written in japanese, you wouldn't be able to understand it Unless you had to translate right now We know that the scriptures the bible is written through the inspiration of the holy spirit until the holy spirit is You Living in our hearts through accepting Christ into our hearts. We don't have that interpreter So the Bible could very well come across as being just a historical book or stories or things like that But you know when when God takes the scales off our eyes and we start reading and I'm sure you know this too when you First give you what you get your highlighter, right? And it's like everything you're highlighting everything because it's right  And, uh, you know, as we mature in our faith, like we, we, we start to see things, um, in a lot of different places that we've read before, but we may not have seen it before because it wasn't,  at that point in time, God wasn't ready to show us that. And like, for example, I'm, I'm in the Old Testament and I'm, I have an app on my phone called, um, YouVersion.  Yeah. Yeah. I think that's right.  Yeah, and, uh, you know, I was reading through the New Testament and stuff, and one day, it would, this was about a year and a half ago, it just would not go to the New Testament. I, I tried, I'd go, what's going on here, it would just not go. So, so I started back in the Old Testament, and I'll tell you, it's been such a blessing, such an incredible blessing. I'm in Isaiah right now, and, uh, it's, it's phenomenal, the things that, you know, That I remember a lot of it, but the thing, the insights, some of the insights that God has spoken to my heart about just incredible. So God, like God's word, the Bible is alive, a hundred percent. And people need to realize it's not just a book.  Yeah. Never, never read it just once, you know, and, and what I do me personally is I always pray before I read, you know, God may, may your spirit help guide me, you know, through the wisdom of this book to, to what I need, you know, because we can get different meanings in different messages from. You know, the Bible and even, you know, some people think is outdated. Like, for example, I went to mass just a few days ago on Sunday and now they're sharing stories about lepers and, you know, people are like, well, that's outdated. But, you know, I, and maybe it was just me who was listening, but, you know, it's really a story of outcasts, you know, and so stuff like that, stuff translates over,  and yeah, definitely reading through  the, the, the Old Testament, I, so I,  I want, last January, I was like, you know what, New Year's resolution, I'm going to read the whole Bible end to end, because I haven't done it yet, but I actually read it,  New Testament revelations Old Testament, you know, I kind of went out of order there But yeah, you know for for me that the New Testament is more exciting, you know, the Old Testament There's a lot of laws and rules But it's very interesting to read some of the old traditions in the law and be like well Why you know and there's there's great stuff in there great facts, and I'm still very much highlighting a lot of things You know, obviously I've got and you know, I'll just ask you because I've got mine ready But you know Johnny what's do you have a favorite? You Bible quote or I know I know it's hard. There's a lot of great ones, but you know, is there one that always comes to your heart  or one that you say quote more than any other?  I can go first if you need some inspiration. Yeah, no, I like there. There's just so much to chew on there. Like, I mean,  The whole, the whole word, like, at any single point in time, you know, God can give you a verse and you're going to hang on to it for, for months or, or weeks or whatever it might be, because he's, he's using it to minister to you. Yeah. Um,  I, um, I would probably save right now one that, that I mentioned earlier about to know him and to be known by him. That's got to be. That's got to be the one that's, uh, that the forefront in my heart right now, but there are like, I wouldn't really say that  I could give you a favorite verse because I'm, I'm just in love with the whole Bible. And so it's just, it's like, this one is the one that's at the very front of what I'm  praying about and working. With and so on right now. So, but I mean, I sure I could coach a bunch of them and say, Oh, yeah. Yeah. Lots of people use that. A lot of people use that. Right. Like, I have plans for you, like in Jeremiah or, you know, God so loved the world. He gave his only begotten son and John or, you know, whatever.  But I think for me, the 1 that about knowing him and being known by him, because that's eternal life. You know, and that's what's going to make the difference in this world. It's not just, it's not just, um, like we're not religious people where people have a relationship with Christ. You know, you're saying exactly what Jesus warned us. He said, people will come to heaven and say, Lord, we knew you. And he would say, but I did not know you. Be gone from me, you know, because there's a difference between knowing Jesus Christ and actually knowing him and following him, you know  So I love that, you know, that's kind of what you're saying here and For me  there there is a compilation. I found one So the seven promises of god and I did love that was you know, I have plans for you. I hear your prayers I will be your strength. I will fight for you. I will always love you I think that's an amazing one, but for me what got me through a lot of hard times Was  I'm forgetting I think it I forget the number the verse and number and all that I think it's like Psalm 38 verse 18 or something like that But it's the Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those crushed in spirit that has always been my favorite one I just because I've had some some very rough trials in my life from a very young age to even now and you know That one was always great, especially in in combination with You know the Lord counts All your tears and here's all your prayers. You know, he hears every tear as a prayer. And I think that is something so beautiful.  It's something so beautiful, but yeah, of course. There's, there's so many great ones. So, Johnny, why did you start this, this podcast, you know, to, to spread the word, obviously, but tell us a little bit about that process and, and I, I will, great success.  Yeah, I will. I just want to get back to, to what you just said there about, uh, there is one verse that, that God really, uh, used. Um,  just the other, just last year, uh, okay. We had some, some hardship and. And, uh, you know, the  Lord gave me this verse, uh, in Proverbs, and it says there's a friend that sticks closer than a brother, and we know who that is. It's Jesus. I believe it's in Proverbs 18. And I'm like you, like, I'm not one for worrying about the actual book and verse and things like that, because to me, that's not what's really important. What's important is having that word come alive in your heart. And then it becomes a part of your natural conversation, a part of your natural vocab, you know, like you and I are talking, I said, well, you know what, there is a friend that's closer than brother and his name is Jesus. That scripture verse is still directly from the Bible, but now it's just like a fact in my heart. And as you said, like, God gives you  things to hold on to. And  so I think consistency is important. You know, so many people, the only time they hear the word is in church and I love church. Don't get me wrong. Community is great. It is not the best place to learn though, right, because they're just reading this little excerpt. That's why it's so important to read on your own, you know, when you wake up before you go to bed, whenever it is, and consistently, you know, to always be learning the word more. Like we said, every time it might hit you different and So, you know, getting it to the point where you can quote it, I think being able to have those verses, you know, on standby can change another person's life. You know, I think it's so important. Like, Johnny, how you can just speak from your heart and the verses come out, the quotes come out. And I think that's so important when we're talking to non believers and other believers and trying Strengthen their faith and help guide them.  Absolutely. Yeah. And then, you know, that's part of the the reason why Uh, we started the podcast like it's not my podcast. I just host and produce it  and uh back in back in 2020 Um, I have a friend Who runs Refuge Ministries Canada and Refuge Ministries Canada was born out of  a situation where he had spent some time in penitentiary when he was young.  Salvation Army guys came in to talk to him and presented him with the gospel and he gave his heart to Jesus and then he got released and so he started sharing his story. His testimony, and he got invited out to a young, uh, a young offenders detention center. I believe it was out in Western Canada. And he, he shared his story there and a young man came up to him and said, well, my heroes are Jeffrey Dahmer and Charles Manson. And he said, Oh, he says, well, let me tell you about my hero. His name is Jesus. And so he, uh, he, um, you know, talked to this young man about, uh, Jesus and the young man gave his heart to the Lord. But when he was flying back home, Yeah, it was, it was awesome. But when he was flying back home, he realized that there wasn't anybody there to kind of mentor this young man and help him grow in his faith. So that's why he started Refuge Ministries Canada. So it's a, like a first point of contact for young offenders to help them transition back into society. That's beautiful.  Yeah, but, but away from their old circle of friends, away from those old influences that can pull you down, right, you know, and he's, he has a number of houses rented now and they put them up for six months and they, they, uh, um, give them Bible teaching and, you know, there's no drugs or alcohol or any of that stuff allowed and help them find work, get back on their feet. So, in 2020, he called me up and he says, Hey, Johnny, he says, uh, I heard a survey that 77 percent of Canadians believe in miracles.  And he said, we've seen a lot of miracles through the ministry. And he said, I think we should start a radio program. And I said, well, yeah, I can, I can help you with the technical side, just because I'm a geeky guy. I figured I could figure that out.  You're a genius. Yeah,  I'm going to get that on my head. Nuclear genius. Right?  Yeah, that'd be a great T shirt. Nuclear. If I get those made up, I'll send you a thank you. Yeah. Yeah. Um,  but, uh, so he said, okay, well, I'd like to start this radio program. I said, well, you're going to have to find a host.  So then a couple of days later, um, a guy called him up and he said, Hey, I really like what you're doing with this ministry. Is there anything that you need? And this guy, Dave, he has a God given radio voice. And he said, well, actually I need a radio show host. And that's kind of how we started.  And, uh, and Dave's Dave's brother was like a founding member of a nineties rock band who subsequently called cowboy junkies. And they subsequently, he subsequently, um, passed away from an overdose right after success and somehow gold albums and things like that. So that was kind of sad. So he, he had a big heart for helping. like these young offenders. Yeah. Yeah. So, so Dave was the host for like the first 50 shows and then another guy, Sean, came on to help us because Dave moved into full time ministry. Uh, Sean came and helped us for a number of shows and him and I split them. And then, uh, Sean moved into a full time ministry job. And so that left me. So I've been doing like all the hosting, producing and editing and all that stuff for the last, uh, Two years or so.  And, uh, yeah, it's been, it's been awesome. I absolutely love it, you know, because we don't, we don't, uh, have a script of questions. You know, we don't tell people what they need to say. I basically say, okay, tell us, tell us what your life was like before and how God changed it. And then always ask him one question. What's the one thing you would tell people about God? And, uh, for the first couple of years, Uh, we did like a year end show and we categorized all those one things about God and, you know, they fell into  a few categories. So it was, it was kind of cool, dude, I'm going to do that again at the end of this year. Uh, we'll see. Yeah. Yeah. But, uh, and, and it's just. Yeah. Everyday conversations with people just like you and I are having. We talk about God. We talk about what he's done. We talk about, uh, things that he's helped them overcome. Like, you know, we've interviewed vets like yourself. We've, uh, interviewed, uh, a couple of ladies there that lost their, their child, you know, and how God helped them overcome that. Uh, you know, we've, we've interviewed people that have come from abusive situations or human trafficking or, Uh, they're working on the other side of that to stop that, to prevent it. Uh, we've interviewed a lot of musicians. Um, you know, there's a wide variety of, of different people. And I'm  currently booked right till the middle of May right now, including you.  Yeah, I got, I got, I'm sometime in May. Yeah. I mean, but that's, that's amazing. I mean, the fact that you're booked out with all these people who, Want to share the word and talk about how God has changed your life rear lives changed by God I mean, that's that's amazing. And well, you know, I gotta thank you for hosting this Well, well, Jesus tells us that we can't hide our light, you know, we don't go and put it under a bucket, right? Yeah, I think we gotta let it shine. I mean, yeah. Yeah, I'd be sort of speak Yeah, and as you said earlier didn't say a bucket, but he definitely said you know You don't get the lamp on the hill to hide in and out. So yeah That's right. Yeah. And, uh, you know, like, as you said earlier, we don't want to, I don't want to go stand before Jesus and have him say,  who are you, you know, or, okay, I know who you are, but why didn't you do anything with the gifts and the callings and the, and the story that I gave you? Oh, yeah. Why didn't you do anything with that, right? You know, cause we're accountable, right? And I mean, why wouldn't we want to tell people about what God's done in our life? Oh, yeah. And, you know, it's, it's funny. I actually saw a thing on, on Instagram that kind of. Was a reality call. I saw that. I was like, wow, this, this was powerful. At least to me, it was powerful, Johnny. So it was.  You know, it told this little fictional story there, like this guy goes to heaven, and he's in the waiting room, you know, and he's sitting next to Paul. And Paul's like, what's that you're on? It's like, oh, it's a phone, you know, that everyone has them nowadays, and Paul's like, learning all about phones. He's like, this is amazing. He goes, when I was spreading the word, I had to travel. By foot and and by horse or donkey and you know I could only convert so many people you had this phone How many people have you saved and spread the Word of God to I mean you could reach out to so many people when a guy Was like  no when I never never did anything and so You know, it's just,  just think about it, you know, we, and so like you utilizing technology, this, this podcast technology to spread the word of God, you know, obviously it's great. I mean, definitely anytime you can in person spread the word, do it. But I think with how far and how many people we can reach to, to sit back and do nothing is, is wrong, you know.  So, I'm glad you're doing this. I'm glad that  you and your team are working on this. You know, I really, before you said you respect the veterans for their dedication and their sacrifice. And you know what? People in the ministry, I have respect for them because a lot of them, I mean, their life is given to God. And that's what we're called to do. Um, but y'all do it more than most people, you know, you give up your time and, you know, God always pays us back, you know, 10 times what we give up, but still, it's so amazing that you and your team and I love the fact, I didn't, I didn't, you know, we actually didn't speak about refuge freedom, you know, I didn't know that y'all were helping these young offenders. So, so that's beautiful to me because, you know, A lot of them have made mistakes. A lot of, you know, young people nowadays have broken homes and, you know, it pushes them into situations. So the fact that you can turn that around and give their life to the Lord, I mean, I really respect that. And I'm so thankful that y'all are doing that.  Yeah. Refuge Ministries Canada. Yeah. I'll send you a link and you can put it in your description so people can check it out. Yeah, of course. You know, it's, Like, I'm,  I'm just thankful and blessed to be part of what God's doing. Like, it's nothing of me and, and you know, like God doesn't share his glory with any man. Right. You know, and I'm, I'm just, I'm just thankful that he gave me the opportunity and I'm gonna, you know, we're all, we all have a set number of days. On this planet. You know, God knows what it is. We don't know what it is and I'm already past the midweek hump of my life. If you want to look at it that way. Yeah, ladies and gentlemen, you wouldn't believe it. See, Johnny is the reason I believe in God because if I can be his age, which I won't docs, but and look as good as he does, because y'all probably think he's only Yeah. You know, maybe 10, 15 years older than me. That's what I thought. And then I, he said 43 years of nuclear power. I said, Oh man,  he's, you know, it's, it's funny though. Johnny, I think it's just Canadians in general, every Canadian I met, they have just been young and full of energy. I think y'all got something in the food over there or something. I mean, y'all just had the most polite people I've met at podcast. I met, you know, Our buddy, Steve, the AI guy, and Yeah. Yeah. You know, he was young and, and looked great too, and I gotta, I gotta get over to Canada State's aging. Yeah, you do. Yeah, for sure. You do. Yeah. Well, I know Y all got your own mess going on over there too, so. Oh,  , that's a whole nother show. That's a whole, yeah, yeah, for sure. Continue on, continue on. Yeah, no, I, and I appreciate your kind words, but you know what, like, I mean, when God changes your life. And you step away from all the things that society tells you is going to make you feel,  you know, the drugs and the booze and all that other kind of stuff, right? Yeah. You know, when, when you start living your life for God, that he gives us joy, right? And he gives us, um. Peace. Not as the world gives us, but as he gives us. He gives us peace and he gives us health and wellness like, yeah, we all, you know, as we age, we get health issues and things like that. But  in spite of any of the issues that, that we may come across or deal with,  God still never changes. And he's like the, he's like the denominator of any blessing in our life, you know, and it's as simple as that.  You know, so,  um, yeah, it's, it's, uh, it's such a cool time to be alive right now because the world is literally going to hell in a handbasket,  you know, and, and Bible tells us when the enemy comes in like a flood, what does God do? He raises up a standard against it. And I believe that. Podcasting is a part of that. I believe that technology, because we know the technology that's in the world right now and all the stuff that goes on the phones and computers. Oh, yeah. There's a lot of evil out there, right? You know, that trying to snare people and drag them down. Yeah. But God can use any of those things, you know, to expand his kingdom. Uh, you know, a lot of concern about AI. Right. I love the AI generated Bible verses. I don't know if you've seen that Johnny. I hate to interrupt, but I have been there's a man who soul mission is he's generating the entire Bible as movies as videos as comics using AI. And, you know, for the first time bringing in life, amazing artwork of things that. You know, people nowadays, they can't read, they don't have an attention span. They just wanna look at pictures, . And I'll tell you That's right. Being what is in the Bible is, is so amazing. And, and you know, the revelation stuff, I mean, that's the, the artwork is, is, is insane what's going to come. And I, I believe Jesus Christ is coming before I passed away, or I believe that too, near that. So I believe he's coming back soon and  you know that, that's a whole nother discussion on his own Johnny, but you know. I'll just put my two cents on it. Something I saw, people were like, why hasn't Jesus Christ come back yet? And I love this explanation of it. They said, God is a merciful God. We know that. He loves us. He's merciful. And, you know, there is going to be a day of judgment. You know, when Jesus comes, you know, feet of bronze, eyes ablaze. Word of two sword, you know, two edged sword, and you know, there's gonna be a day of judgment. Jesus already came with love, you know. A lot of people were disappointed. They wanted Jesus to come and smite down all the enemies, you know.  That being said,  God is merciful because the longer he waits for Jesus Christ to return, the goal, the mission, is the more people we can save. And I think God is, is, has not sent Jesus Christ back because people were so evil and wicked and, and, and, you know, rebellious against the word, against Jesus Christ's existence. And so he's trying to let time unfold so as many people can be saved as possible. Um, and, and, you know, there's a lot of different theories about the return of Jesus Christ, but that's the one that really stuck with me just because I know that God is a loving and merciful God. And I think That's what he's trying to do is because we still have free free will and he's trying to let us do the right thing and unfortunately, a lot of people don't want to do that, but  yeah, 100 percent like, you know, it's not his will that any should perish, but all should come to repentance and he's he is a loving and patient God and you know that the days are are running faster and faster towards a close, you know, like there's  the things that are going on today are just so outrageous. And being presented in  as such a,  I don't know, it's just mind blowing the way things are being presented as what should be normal, you know? Well, they warned us against principalities, wicked principalities and morals and beliefs, not against physical enemies. And that's what we're fighting against, what they're pushing, what they're on our children and our generation, especially my generation and generations below us now. Those are wicked principalities. The destruction of standardized, normalized human behavior. What is and isn't acceptable. You know, they want to push for everything is acceptable. But I think at some point there is a standard for human behavior. What is expected of people. You know, so.  And you know, you're right. Like there's been many.  Prophetic words and for those who don't know what that means is that God will lay something on on someone's heart That he is going to do and that person will speak it Uh forward and present it. Okay. This is what God is saying And there's there's there's been abuse of that of course, and there's always You know, jesus warned us false prophets will come before he does  You know, but back in the mid 80s, there was a prophecy about a tidal wave of revival coming  and, you know, the enemy doesn't know when that's going to be, but he can certainly see the signs that people are starting to turn their lives over to God. You see a lot more celebrities starting to, you know. Come forward and say, Oh, I gave my life to Jesus, you know, and I'm thankful for it, right? I mean and so and but especially I think with your generation and the younger generation Yeah, there's such a wicked agenda  Specifically targeting your age group and those younger than you  And because  as they, as they tear away all of the  biblical side of life, you know, as they tear away Christianity, as they tear away history, as they tear away, um, you know, what's acceptable and things like that, and you raise young people in a generation where there's no standard to live by, then what's it going to be like? It's going to be almost like Noah's day.  Yeah. You know, Godless generation.  Yeah. A godless generation. And, and so we just got to keep praying for, for like, we've got to pray for a revival, but we also have to look at ourselves. Pray for one another. Yeah. Pray for one another. But we also have to look at ourselves and say, okay, Lord, time is short. What do you want me to do?  And not get distracted and doing a whole bunch of things. Just find out what it is he wants us to do specifically with the talents and the gifts that he's given us and then do it. Amen. Amen. You know, and just listen carefully to his voice and direction and just follow him and, and see what happens. Right.  Amen. Yeah. So Johnny, as we come to a close here, I mean, you kind of. Set it all right there. Is there anything else you want to leave our listeners with? Obviously, there's gonna be link in the description below to check out his podcast. Check it out. Johnny has amazing guests come on. I've been following the show and you know,  the biggest thing is community. You know what for me? You know, when we have those, like you said, those, you call them the dark night days, you know, where you have that, where God's feeling distant from, from us, and he's never distant. It's always us who are distant, but those, those, we, we go through doubt, you know, and doubt the enemy of faith, you know, the poison in our lives, you know.  And for me, what I have found to be the greatest is people like yourself, Johnny, you know, having these friendships in this community where people, you know, We boost each other up, you know, humans are our community and boosting each other up. And so listening to your show is an example of that, where, you know, I can hear other people's stories, people who have gone through things worse than me or things similar to me, and how they have found peace through Jesus Christ, and it's always great to learn.  You know, we're always learning, you know, and I don't think any person, Is, is ever fully developed in their faith to the point where they can't learn a new way to pray or to speak with God or To to study the word and so that's why I highly recommend everyone to go check out Johnny's show and not just his show but Online, I mean YouTube is such a great source of that's where I find a lot of preachers and you can find so much information There I've studied the Bible in Greek in Hebrew I mean go on there and if you're an unbeliever, you know atheist or you just You know, don't believe in anything.  Do the research, you know, actually discover God for yourself, not based on other people, not based on what you want to believe or people are telling you believe. Read the word yourself.  In fact, if you're skeptical, still do it. Pray for the Holy Spirit to enter you and to help guide you through it. And I promise you, you will learn something. But yeah, Johnny.  Uh, you pretty much, uh, captured it all very well there. That was very eloquent and well put. I, I don't think I can add much else to that. You've said it very well. And yeah, I agree a hundred percent. If, if somebody's watching today or listening and you have questions about God,  he's there. He is real and he's as close, you know, I, I tell people that God's as close as your next breath, but he's even closer at your last.  Think about that. Sailing through the ocean blue  nuclear reactors, my crew got in the  The Stars is our guide  through the waves we ride.  Jokes and laughter fill the air On this voyage we have to share Working together, side by side As one family we will abide  In the heart of the ship, we reside  Nuclear operators with pride Powering the vessel,  with every stride  Our mission, a source of great pride

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