Stay On Mission: From Daily Texts to Lifelong Mission

Host: Dr. Isaac Crockett

Guest: Rod Reasen

Note: This transcript is taken from a Stand in the Gap Today program aired on 2/13/26. To listen to the podcast, click HERE.

Disclaimer: While reasonable efforts have been made to provide an accurate transcription, the following is a representation of a mechanical transcription and as such, may not be a word for word transcript. Please listen to the audio version for any questions concerning the following dialogue.

Isaac Crockett:

Well, happy Friday to you and welcome to our program. I’m Pastor Isaac Crockett and today we’re excited to have a friend returning. I’m always excited when I have friends who come on and they’re willing to come on again, and our friend today has a super busy schedule, but I’m so thankful that he’s been able to make time to be on with us. It’s Rod Reasen. If you’ve listened to us regularly, you’ve probably remember hearing him before. Rod is back, he’s the CEO of Daniel Defense, and he’s what I consider a longtime encourager in the faith. I’ve known Rod. I looked up to him since I was just a little kid and remember him being an encourager even when I was a child, he has started something called Stay on Mission. It’s just as simple as just morning devotional text that he started sharing with a few friends, giving insights from his own time and scripture.

And what started as just this small little group to a couple of friends, a handful there. It’s now a thriving devotional blog, a resource, and you can go if you’re not driving, if you’re driving this, wait until you get home. But if you’re not driving, you can go online right now. Stay on mission.com, no spaces, stay on mission.com. It’s this practical devotional resource with kind of like I say, short, punchy, encouragement. Nothing that will be very long, but they’re all applicable and deeply thought through. They proclaim the gospel clearly. They stay rooted in God’s word with a biblical worldview, handling truth reverently and just stirring us up towards obedience. So Rod, thank you so much for being back and being on the program with us today.

Rod Reasen:

Well, thank you Isaac. And yeah, a bit of awesome kind of seeing what God’s doing and really excited just to share how God’s leading me and using his word to transform lives.

Isaac Crockett:

Rod, it is so neat to see how God’s providence works out through us when we are willing to be obedient. You and I have known each other for a few decades and going way back to when we were in other places in life and in ministries. But could you take us back to the beginning of what is now, stay on mission.com and the text and just kind of what prompted you to say, you know what, I’m going to text some devotional thoughts to other guys I know, and also how small was it? How many guys did this start with because it’s a pretty big thing now and I’m just curious how this started.

Rod Reasen:

Sure. Well, this started actually in December the following year or the earlier year and which have been 25. And my brother was saying, Hey, I journaled this year and you might think about journaling, just slight comment in conversation over the holidays. And so throughout the calendar year of 25, I guess it had been 24 calendar year of 25, I said, I’m going to just methodically walk through the New Testament and my goal is a chapter a day and I’m going to land on a piece of scripture and just dwell on it and use commentary, understand the context of the scripture and just through it with intentionality, but without having a deadline, I didn’t say I need to read through the New Testament. I didn’t have it as a check the box. It was really just letting the absorb scripture. So started that process through the year and got to June and I was meeting with a friend and he said, Hey, we were just talking about a friend of his that used to send out a Bible text and he said, Hey, have you ever thought about doing it?

I said, well, I do actually to a small group of guys as God’s using his word in my life. I’m just a fellow traveler here as he’s using God’s word of my life. I’ll shoot a text. It was nothing huge. It was just like, Hey, a couple meaningful thoughts from mainly from five guys in my office. And he said, well, add me to that. And I said, okay. So I added it, and that was June 27th, 2025. And over the course of the next several weeks, he starts sending it out and then the guy starts sending it out and it started to grow by a person a day. And this was never intended to be a blog or a website or devotional book, anything. It was just like me doing my devotions. And so it started with five guys, but then what it started to do is create this accountability of, okay, well as I’m going through scripture and I’m reading it on my own, there’s a whole different level of accountability when you start to put God’s word and your thoughts on God’s word into the form of a text because now you’re starting to teach and we’ll talk about that a little bit, but just start with five guys, just kind of happenstance and kind of cool to see where it’s going.

Isaac Crockett:

Well, you have experience in entrepreneurship and business and things, but you also have experience in the church and in missions and in teaching and preaching and things. And so it’s neat how God’s gifts grow out of us. And again, in something as simple as just a text message thread. Real quickly before we go to a break, I’m going to try to squeeze in another question or two and then get into some of what you were talking about and how you make this and how it affects your life as you’re putting this out. But what is the significance of the name Stay on Mission?

Rod Reasen:

Oh man, I Peter 2:11 talks about, beloved, I urge you to be sojourners and exiles as you read through the New Testament. You hear various analogies, whoever the author is, but the epistles are very clear that this is not our home. We’re supposed to be on mission, we’re going to be in battle every day and we need to be ready for that battle arming ourself. And it’s this approach of I’m heading to heaven that this earth is not my destination. So stay on Mission is reminding us as Christians that this earth isn’t our home. Heaven’s our home, storing up treasures in heaven. So it kind of happenstance again just that I just started putting on Stay on Mission and then you and I talked in the prerecord that I Googled one day was the website available and surprisingly was able to buy the website, stay on mission.com, but that’s the impetus is that we should be thinking about our lives on battle and staying on mission every single day.

Isaac Crockett:

And it’s so neat because again, if somebody wants to go there, stay on mission.com, you can see this, but it’s this text that started and you can kind of see your heart. It’s just the small group kind of idea, but it’s become a big group, which is I think usually how the best of these things happen. And you have an interesting group of guys because you have a number of Christian businessmen, but you have a number of guys in the ministry and different things. That group I just find exciting that you have. But I’d be curious, what kind of reaction have you gotten from these guys as this text thread has continued to compile and get bigger?

Rod Reasen:

One thing I learned years ago in men’s ministry is women naturally want to have community men. Often we also want to have community, but we’re a little bit more, we put up a guard. So to have an invitation to join a community, and that’s simply as simple as I make it. I’m meeting with a guy, I’m out in the marketplace and we begin to talk and I say, Hey, I started this thing. It’s a group text. I send it out about five times a week depending on my schedule. It’s coming from my devotions. I’m not a pastor, I’m not a theologian. So it’s just like you do you want to join? And I’ll text them and I require them to text me back. And they joined. I was, at first I was like, why do you want to hear from me? But they joined and I think part of it’s just being invited to be part of something that isn’t you. And I think that’s the cool part.

Isaac Crockett:

Wow. I wonder how many times we would be surprised if we just put the first foot out, first foot forward and invite somebody to something that God is doing in our lives. Well stay with us. We’re about to take our first time out, hear from some of our partners. We’re going to be right back on Standing the Gap today. When we come back, we want to go deeper into God’s word, asking Rod Riesen how it can fuel us to stay on mission every day in our lives and in our families. Welcome back to our program today. I’m Pastor Isaac Crockett and talking with a longtime friend of mine and somebody who many people know him from his business work and he’s a CEO at Daniel Defense and an entrepreneur, but he’s also somebody who is passionate about the word of God, loves the Lord and loves teaching the word of God.

It’s my good friend Rod Reasen. And Rod, we’re talking about this devotional time that you’ve developed Stay on Mission. It’s just started as a text thread to a small handful of friends, five friends, and it’s grown now. Now it’s the website Stay on mission.com. And if you’re just tuning in right now and you’re not driving, you could turn to that website and look through some of what we’re talking about. But Rod, when we talk about prioritizing the word of God, reading it as you said, absorbing it, not worrying about checking it off or how fast or how far we’re reading, but saying, I’m going to read and fill myself for what I need today. That’s this daily discipleship part of it. It reminds me, we had a conversation not too long ago with your friend Dr. Thomas White, who’s the president at Cedarville University, and he was talking about devotions and he was saying one of the things in his life he tries to live by is no Bible, no breakfast. In other words, first thing in the morning, even before he eats, he gets his daily bread from the word of God. And I’m just curious, this idea of a daily format, why is it important for us to take time every day? And it’s not easy for you to take time not only for yourself, but then sharing it to others, but this idea of daily being grounded in God’s word, why is that so important?

Rod Reasen:

I just want your listeners to hear that one more time. No bible, no breakfast. I love that quote by Dr. White, and I wish I could say was every day, sometimes life and travels take you out of the every day, but when you think of the simplicity of I get up and have coffee and breakfast and then creating a pattern in your life that if your coffee and breakfast are that important to you, why wouldn’t you also nourish your spirit? James talks about this man beholding in the meter himself and then walking away and forgetting what he looks like as spiritual beings. Once we have the Holy Spirit and dwelling in us, if we have the truth and wisdom of scripture, why would we not want to seek it out every single day just like sustenance in the morning? And I obviously love coffee, coffee and a couple scrambled eggs and cheese.

It is my love in the morning to the extent that as this program, this thing has grown, I’ve now rescheduled my calendar. I don’t come in until nine in the morning now so that I have a longer period of time to really delve into God’s word. But it is transformative. I don’t know any other word than to say if you committed to any of your listeners committed to just the next two weeks, every single day, pick a New Testament book and start and just pray before you go into it. God, show me your truth and be open to what that word is saying. If you don’t walk away just in a two week period getting some dose of truth, I’ll be shocked. It is transformative is the right word.

Isaac Crockett:

I love that. And I want to get into if we have time some more about that. Curious though, we’ve been using the word some of the time devotions and sometimes you hear a pastor or you’ll hear Sam Rohr or myself or one of our pastors on here, talk about that Rod. When the word devotions is used for this idea of this scripture and application of it, what does that mean? And would you have maybe any encouragement for somebody who’s listening right now and they want to try this, say, you know what, I’d love to do that. This is a good idea. Let me make this a pattern for two weeks. What are some ideas that you might encourage them even using the V blog that you’ve started, but other possible things that they might do to establish a pattern of devotions?

Rod Reasen:

I heard an analogy, I love this out in the world. Sometimes people will use a verse in scripture and pull it out of context. And that’s like grabbing a single piece of a puzzle and saying, without looking at the front cover of the box that you can identify where exactly that puzzle piece fits and how it goes into the overall picture. Scriptures like that, you need to understand the full context from Genesis to Revelation, the story, the larger story that’s being told, and then the individual story as we read through it. The application in our given lies is just astounding. I use the word transformative, but from when I’m in God’s word every single day, it will always amaze me that whatever I’m reading in that given moment, somehow in my conversation in the workplace or a decision that I need to make or a conversation with a colleague, the very scripture that I’ve read in that given day will be applicable in the moment. That’s the power that no other book in the world has, and that’s the power of God’s word, not man’s word.

Isaac Crockett:

I love that. And that’s happened. I cannot tell you how many times just the text that you send out, how many times within 24 hours of that text, that exact situation comes up. I think it was this past week you were talking about when you got saved, you’re quite young and what your mom used to tell you. And I was having less than a day before that. I was having almost identical conversation with my three children about those sort of things. And so it’s so cool and all of scripture just so practical, it all works together with these overarching narratives and meta narratives and things. And as we work through it verse by verse, we’re connecting to the whole, like you just said, the whole puzzle. What about so many times we go through the Bible kind of casually, kind of nonchalantly and we don’t find it transformational. In fact, it’s more information than transformation. What role do you find in finding the exposition, this daily exposition and daily immersion? How does that help change our character, change our decisions? So that really transforms us.

Rod Reasen:

Well, you’re theologically trained. I’m not, but I’ve been in scripture a lot through my life and I think one habit or one concern I think with anyone approaching at least Americans is we approach scripture as if it’s written in our time and in our, we Americanize it. One of the first things I do before I start another book in the Bible is I go do research on the context of that scripture. First. Peter’s a great one I talk about all the time and when I’m in working with guys is first Peter talks about counting it joy when you’re in trials. Well, the trials was during a heroic time when Christians were being pulled into the square and put up on stakes and had oil put over them and lit on fire so Nero could light his backyard barbecues different trials than what we face today.

And without that context in scripture, you might read over those words very tritely and only apply them to your own situation. So I think it’s important that we understand both the writer, the context of scripture and then read it in its entirety so we have a better appreciation of what the author was trying to portray Peter as a pastor to his parishioners, his congregation, he was a pastor shepherd and loving and caring for them. And we talked about this, a group of guys last week, Nero. Then during all this persecution he says, honor the emperor. And we live in a world where people want to choose a political vein and Nero’s saying, honor the emperor. And that is very, very biblical, not American. And I think it’s important that people just understand the truth of scripture and then look at how do we apply that as Christians because we should be set apart, we should be different. The world should look at us and say, man, there’s something odd about you and it’s not me, it’s the Holy Spirit living in me.

Isaac Crockett:

Yeah. And I think so many times we think, oh, this is the only time this has ever happened. And I remember just a couple of weeks ago, it was just a few days after the protestors had gone into city’s church, we were interviewing Pastor Joe Rigley who was one of the founding pastors of that church. And so that was the same week that it all happened and he said, scripture doesn’t repeat itself but it often rhymes. And he was comparing what happened in the beginning of the book of Acts at the very start of the church and what’s going on now and some of the similarities and some of the difference, but some of what we will expect to happen based on what happened in scripture and getting ready for it by digesting what scripture tells us. Alright, well these daily insights that you do via text and now with the blog as well that the website, how has it helped reinforce your own commitment? You were already digging into scripture, but has it transformed you even more or made any changes in your own I guess researching of the word of God?

Rod Reasen:

A hundred percent. That was the interesting thing from January this year through June was much more of a light study. And when you, James three verse one talks about not many of you ought to be teachers and he talks about the responsibility to stand in front of people and or rate God’s word. And I heard an analogy once said that we should be less cooks in the kitchen and more servers delivering what God already says. So it’s not my words just to make it very clear what people are reading. I want them to pay. I’m only trying to draw attention to what God is saying and to wet people’s appetite to get them into scripture. So it’s not about what I’m saying to make that clear, but what it has done for me is created a level of accountability. I mean it’s humbling, honestly, Isaac, knowing that you read this, there’s 13 pastors that are on this list.

I’ve got crazy elite war fighters, senators on this. I mean there’s some people on here that God’s put in my life and I just said, Hey, do you mind if I add you to this? And then I get responses back with men and women that are going through tough times and I’ve found myself in this weird place of just being a voice and another shoulder that people can go share problems with. So I guess if anything it has caused me to really make sure I understand scripture before I then send a text out or write something on it. And man, it’s so fun though. I mean that’s a positive peer pressure knowing that people do read it. Unfortunately for many it is their devotion time, but it’s also exciting to know that it’s drawing me closer to the Lord.

Isaac Crockett:

I love it when you describe it like that Rod, because the more I study scripture, the more exciting it is, the more real it is and the more I get to share it with people, whether it’s just my wife and kids or my church family or other friends or people on the radio, I love knowing the word of God and sharing it and that’s how God has created to be. Well, don’t go away. We’re going to be right back. We’re going to take a quick break to hear from our partners. We want to come back and talk about guardrails that keep us from veering off course. Rod mentioned accountability. Alright, well welcome back to this program. I’m Pastor Isaac Crockett and we’re joined by Rod Reasen today as we talk about Stay on Mission and the devotions website that he has started to stay on mission.com.

And before we get back into that and asking Rod some more questions, I want to remind you that if you’re listening to us maybe live on the radio or maybe you’re streaming from something or downloaded already, but we are available to Stand in the gap today is available on most of the major podcast platforms like Apple and Spotify, iHeartRadio. It’s also available where you can find sermons@sermonaudio.com. They’ve created a great archive for us. They work with us, we partner with them on some things and so you can go to sermon audio.com. If you go to sermon audio.com, you can find all sorts of great speakers and topics and you can look by bible reference on things. So a great partnership there that we have with sermon audio, you can listen to us there and then of course you can listen to us on the Stand in the Gap app.

If you go to your app store, whether it’s the iTunes store or Android store, find Stand in the Gap app, it’s usually pretty easy to spot, easy to download, it’s free and you can get all of our radio and TV archives and a lot of other cool stuff that’s on there. Our program producer, Tim puts a lot of neat things on there, the question and answer podcasts and things. So there’s stuff that you can get on our app that is just, I’d say it’s phenomenal, just a really big help and a really good resource. So I want to mention that before we go back to talking about this resource rod that the Lord has worked in you to develop, stay on mission.com. And so Rod, again, if somebody’s just tuning in, you started this just texting devotional ideas, devotional thoughts that you were having from your own time with a literal handful, five guys, a handful of friends, and it’s grown just significantly to more and more and more. Now it’s its own website. But do you think that there has been something about using the technology of just something as simple as a group text, it’s different than a book, it’s different than a website, but do you think that that format of using a text has been part of what’s been helpful for this group that’s developed

Rod Reasen:

Perhaps? It certainly is. Of all of the technologies that we have access to today with many, many apps and websites and so on, it’s the one thing when your phone goes ding or vibrates in your pocket, you do look. And so I think there’s an advantage of having a regular interval of a text coming in. I mean, I think I’ve started to push this out to the website to give the access a little more because the text group grew so large, apple limits you to 20 people on a text group and I’ve found myself, it’s over 13 groups now. You’re replicating that process and the texts aren’t always going through now. So we wanted to give another platform through some social media now to absorb that content. But I do think the simplicity of text is a value.

Isaac Crockett:

There’s something about it that seems more of a group to me. I don’t know and I love it when I get that little thing, oh, that’s got to be Rod’s group. That’s the devotion for today. I also like going to the website to be able to search through things more categorically as well as I’ve asked different AI assistants, Hey Rod Reason was talking about such and such and one of his devotions, can you search his website and pull up what I’m looking for? What I’m talking about? It makes it more searchable now that you have your website. Well this kind of reminds me of the iron sharpening iron principle, Proverbs 27 17 about iron sharpens iron. Why do you think that Christian peer pressure, you talked about accountability, I think you used that word last segment, why is it helpful? And I’m finding it being a part of your text group, but I think we find it in church groups, we find it in associating with other people maybe in jobs that we have or maybe in the same workplace as us or same community that we live in, but finding accountability from other Christians, why do you think that is so helpful in helping prevent us from falling into temptations?

Just kind of the spiritual drift that’s so easy to get distracted in

Rod Reasen:

Today. Well, in the very first few chapters of the Bible, man was created without any companionship at all. Adam and God and Adam both recognized that there was a lack of companion and so he created woman and throughout life. I love being married. My wife’s amazing and I love having friends and sometimes you go through life and you just need other people that you can lean on and God’s word should be the first place that we go to, but we may not know where to go if we have no familiarity with scripture, don’t know where to find something. Certainly like you said, there’s new tools to be able to go get that research, but sometimes you’re just looking for experience and having a group of friends around you that you can rely on is a very, very valuable asset going through life.

Isaac Crockett:

I’m trying to think through all the questions I want to ask you, rod, because even as we’ve started talking I’ve come up with a lot more I wanted to ask you about, but what is it like, you talked a little bit about getting up very early in the morning and working on this and even changing your work schedule so that you can be focused on this first thing, but can you maybe kind of walk us through what it’s like, how you develop this, going from that personal time into then taking it and then teaching it and bringing it out and sharing it with others. Maybe talk to us a little bit about what it’s like, how you develop these devotions.

Rod Reasen:

Sure. I’ll try to make this super fast, but we live in a technology age, so in any given morning I’m going through the New Testament. So I’m currently, as we speak in First John chapter three, and I am going to use tools that are available, a combination of AI tools, blue letter Bible, Bible Gateway, maybe log offs, other things that are out there at my fingertips. I came from the software space. I use those technologies as tools to help me and I’m going to break apart the scripture and look at where the natural segments and then I’m going to read the chapter so that I have my own view on what the Holy Spirit is doing through me. So one of the things I tell people is I don’t write using ai. It is a great tool, but I write based on what the Holy Spirit is and laying on my heart and my blog is called Fellow Traveler.

I don’t think that I’m any better than anybody else. This is just my journey and I’m sharing it and hopefully people can say, man, I relate, but I will use a combination of various AI tools to help me understand and grab. So old world would say I need a lot of physical books or software to be able to go get commentaries from various authors and look at versions. So I’ve trained my AI tools to be able to look at seven different versions of the Bible and now I’m up to nine different commentaries. And so I will let that run. This is really geeking out here, but I’ll let that run as I go, make my eggs and it’s done when I get done. And then I’m reading about probably 10 to 12 minutes worth of reading from authors like Weby and Spurgeon and Moody and I’m learning their segments on how they looked at the particular scripture. So I’m using tool set but in a technology age so that I can digest information a lot faster, but that whole process still takes about 60 minutes. Then I write and then from that writing then I’ll call that, put it through some grammar systems and I’m always wrong. I mess up and I apologize to all anyone that does read I mess up because I’m human, but it will ultimately end up in my wife reading it and then I’ll post it.

Isaac Crockett:

I love hearing how you go through. It reminds me a lot of what we do here for the radio and what pastors like myself and others do in our Sunday school lessons and preaching and sermons. It is fascinating. And our partners@sermonaudio.com, they are using AI and other advanced technologies to help us and to help point us to the guys like Spurgeon and Moody like you mentioned and some of these old time pastors that they’re bringing into this digital age. And it’s amazing the free resources things that even when I was in my first seminary degree a couple of decades ago, cost so much money to buy. These volumes are now at our fingertips free on our screen and we can even hear the audio of it sometimes. And so I love how you use that. But then there’s websites like your website that you’ve gone through this and to share with you and to get that. I love this. Real quickly before we go to our break, you’ve talked to us before because you do work with so many people and you’ve talked about workplace mentoring. How does what you’re doing with staying on this mission of devotions and things, how has that maybe personally translated into helping you with discipling or discipleship making or maybe just discipling in professional settings?

Rod Reasen:

One of my favorite leadership quotes, and I’m going to paraphrase I believe by John Maxwell and he talks about the airline oxygen mask leadership principle. And in its simplicity, I have to be as close to God as I possibly can. You think about when Moses came off the mount, he was hard to look at because he had been in the presence of God. It wasn’t Moses, he was in the presence of God. And I think about that analogy as the closer to the Lord that I can walk, I may be the only Christian that someone else sees, and the further away from Christ I am the less shiny I become. And so I want people to see Christ through me so that I can tell them. One of my employees said, man, you’re so calm, even though we have so much going on. And I said, that’s not me. I’m anxious, I’m scared, I’m fearful, I’m lazy. That’s who I am. But you’re seeing Christ in me because he gives me that peace and joy. So the mentoring comes because I’m being mentored by the Lord through scripture and others get to benefit from it.

Isaac Crockett:

I love that. And that being intentional about it and that transformational part of it that as the Lord transforms us, it should be obvious to people around us. When Moses got a little glimpse of the Lord, it was obvious to the people around him, he was glowing. When Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration, it was so obvious that they had been with Jesus, even his disciples that these men had been with Jesus. Is it obvious that I’ve been with Jesus? Is it obvious that I’ve been in the written word and that I’ve been communing with Jesus the living word? So many exciting things. But please stay tuned after this last break, we’re going to wrap things up. Finish up this theme of staying on mission and I hope that you find this very practical and helpful in your day in your life, whatever’s going on in the news or in your life today.

You can stay on mission. We’ll be right back on Stand the Gap. Alright, well welcome back to our program and we’d like to encourage you as maybe you just heard, to go to our website, stand in the gap radio.com or stand in the gap media.org or just go to our Facebook page. And we don’t necessarily put something up necessarily every day, but there are some things up there from this week. There’s some quotes up there from Pastor Ney that was on with us. There might be some other things on that you could find applicable and helpful and encouraging as well as go to stay on mission.com. If you haven’t already gone there or written it down or texted it to yourself, go to stay on mission.com and look at these devotional thoughts that we’ve been talking about with Rod. Rod, anybody who’s looking at that website right now, they’re realizing that your focus, as you described just a little bit ago, it’s an expositional focus.

It’s a going through the content, not saying, well, what am I going to say about the Bible today? But what is the Bible saying to me? What is this passage? What is Jesus saying through this passage? Not what can I say about the passage and what is Jesus saying about me? And that’s how I prefer to preach as well. But what drew you to walking through parts of the Bible verse by verse for your devotions as opposed to just kind of picking a topic and going with that and how does that approach, that verse by verse or expository approach, that contextual approach, getting the context of it, how does that keep things fresh and give good application?

Rod Reasen:

Probably theory or philosophy, but I like flowing through an entire book just so that I can understand the broader story. It’d be like watching a movie but only watching 30 seconds of it. You might see a scene and maybe you can guess what the story is about, but if you just try to do topical devotions, it’s probably fine for some. But for me, I want to understand the entire story in its context from the writer, from the history as I’ve mentioned. So it’s just how I’ve been doing it and that’s the intent is to understand the entire story. I think there’s an argument out there that there’s a broader story going on in the world and there’s my story. So I want to understand how that broader story in scripture applies to my story today and letting the Holy Spirit use that scripture in the form of application in my life.

Isaac Crockett:

I love that we have elders meetings at our church and myself, the other pastor and sometimes some of the other leadership team. We talk through what passages are we going to get into and one of the books of the Bible we were just in, we just finished it, took us a couple of years or maybe more than a couple of years to get through that, but we spend a lot of time praying and fasting about it. We’re very intentional choosing these because of what you just said. We want to see the full context and we want to go through it scripture, but it also makes it easier for me. I don’t have to each week say, oh boy, what am I going to preach on this? No, it’s verse by verse, it’s section by section. I know what’s going on for quite some time and I love what you’re doing, but you’re doing it on a daily basis and making that very applicable, encouraging bit every day for listeners who are inspired, maybe they do have devotions every day, some are maybe just being inspired as they’re listening to you saying, you know what, Lord, please help me help to do it.

Like Rod suggested two weeks of devotions and see what I gain, see how I grow, see how the Lord is glorified in my life. But there might be some who are having devotions, they say, you know what? I love this idea that like you said, there were a lot of guys that joined because you invited them and they had never been invited to something like this before. And there are people thinking, you know what? There are people in my sphere of influence that I think I could invite, and they’re looking for a way to impact others and see their impact for God grow. Maybe they could start texting insights to their friends or something else, but what would you suggest? What might be some simple ideas that you could suggest that they could use whatever God is doing and working in their life with to impact others with that same model? Same approach?

Rod Reasen:

Yeah, that’s a good question. What I’m doing is not really that unique, and I’m sure some people listening are like saying the same thing. He’s not doing anything that’s really unique and I agree the only thing I did was execute. I’m in God’s word. I have the change in the information that I’m able to put in writing that forcing yourself to put it in writing makes you have a much more strong mastery of the content, which means you can’t just go. The problem with topical is that you can cherry pick and you don’t understand contextual. So contextual, going through the scripture, through an expositional fashion gives you far better context, which gives you much more authority on you’re saying, but anybody can do what I’m doing. Just create a group of people that you know and say, Hey, I’m just going to spend time in God’s word and I want to send you out a text that meant something to me. It’s God’s word that changes people. All you’re doing is being a conduit using either the technology or the relationship that you have to draw people into a closer life-changing relationship with Jesus.

Isaac Crockett:

What you’re saying there is really all of our life we are supposed to be disciples, being discipled and making disciples discipling others. And when you say it like that, rod, it just sounds so simple, but when it comes to actually doing it, like you said, it’s that idea of actually executing it and no pun intended, pulling the trigger, but I love that. Well, looking ahead and as the Lord tarries, if the Lord tarries long enough for more things to happen, what are your goals? What’s your vision for what you see happening with what the Lord is doing in your life right now? What does this lifelong discipleship process that you’ve been involved with look like? What is your vision, your desire for how stay on mission continues to grow? Or maybe how is it possibly challenging others with continued gospel proclamation? Any thoughts on some of those things coming up or down the road that the Lord might be leading you into?

Rod Reasen:

Yeah, you set the context perfectly as the Lord. Terrys, I got about a hundred days into this and someone said, man, have you saved these? And I said, well, they’re on my group text. And so I had my assistant pull all those and we put them into a Google doc and they said, if you keep doing this within a year, you’re going to have a full devotional booklet. And I’m like, okay, well, I mean I’d love to write a book. So theoretically, I am contemplating, I’m 167 days into this, so I have about 200 more days. And if it works out, we’d like to actually complete a book launch, a 365 day devotional book that would be available sometime by the end of this year, ready for January, 2027. And I’m going to dial it just for a second. One thing that I would challenge every single one of your listeners is God puts people in positions for his purpose.

And one of your programs mentioned the names Daniel, Joshua, Esther, Ruth, fill in your name. God’s put you in a position and given you a network authority, relationship influence. And if you don’t use that for his glory, he’s just going to take you out and put someone else in that will. God’s put me in a really interesting spot that I didn’t seek out. I mean, it was a really interesting just process, how God led me here, moved our family, which we’ve covered in different podcasts. And one of the challenges I think I have personally is how I make sure that I’m using the seat that I have in the position to actually bring God glory on me. And this is one way, and I’m in a very humble perspective. I’m not a pastor. I am not a theologian. I am just a fellow journeyer on this planet, but I want to make sure that I get to heaven. And God says, well done by good and faithful servant. I put you in position to use it effectively. And that’s a challenge I’d give to the listeners too.

Isaac Crockett:

Rod, this is fantastic. Thank you so much for taking the time to do what you do every day, but taking the time today to just open up so you and I could have this conversation. We’ve had similar private conversations with a lot of these questions I’m asking you, I’ve asked privately, but to have this where people can listen in. And so whoever is listening to us in their car or in their home, their place of business right now, thank you for opening that up. Thank you for what you’re doing and what you just said was so fantastic. I’m just going to close this program now in prayer. Our gracious, heavenly Father, we thank you for the way that you work. We thank you for what you’ve done in Rod’s life and for all of us who are listening, and we pray that if anyone is listening and seeking Jesus Christ, that they would find him today and that those who know Christ would seek him in the written Word of God, drawing closer to him and letting the word of God transform us to be more like Jesus Christ. It’s in his powerful and precious name. We pray. We thank you Father, and we love you. Amen. Well, thank you, rod for being on with us. Thank you for listening. Please listen next time and please share this program with others. And until next time, please stand in the gap for the Lord today. Wherever you are.