Welcome, Scripture, And Connection

Chris Grainger 0:02

Welcome to the Lion Within Us, a podcast serving Christian men who are hungry to be the leaders God intends you to be. I'm your host, Chris Granger. Let's jump in. All right, fellas, meet episode time. Let's get into it. This is going to be an exciting one. Right at the gate, the scripture of the week is Colossians 1, verses 28 to 29. It says he is the one we proclaim, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ. To this end, I strenuously contend with all energy Christ so powerfully works in me. Fellas, took some time, unpacked those scriptures at length in our spiritual kickoff episode. It's the last one in your podcast feed. We do it every day, Monday through Friday, called the Daily Spiritual Kickoff at The Lion Within Us. It's our way to serve you, to encourage you, to get you into the Word. Fellas, it's all again, it's all free. Go check it out, thelionwithin.us. Sign up for your daily SQO. We also give you a free gift, and you have access to our prayer request space where we're praying with guys on a consistent basis. And every Monday we have a prayer call. So look, we're inviting you in. This is a great way to get connected, and we love to see you there, okay? Thelionwithin.us is how you do that. So now for this episode, this has been on the list, guys, Pastor Robbie Galilee, okay? So he's a senior pastor of Long Hollow Church in Hendersonville, Tennessee. That's out in the Nashville area. I got connected with Pastor Robbie, been listening to him for years. So this is an absolute just a thrill for me personally. But he has his master's of divinity degree and expository preaching in 27. He's got a PhD in preaching in 2011 from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. He's the author of many, many books. But just the way he unpacks the word has been so impactful for me. Uh one of my pastor buddies, Pastor Corey, actually introduced Pastor Abi to me a couple several years ago. And I've been many runs through on the trail listening to Pastor Abi unpack the word. And his testimony will just absolutely blow you away. If you've never heard of Pastor Abi, get ready. I mean, you're you're in for a treat here on this podcast, guys. I'm telling you, he did a he just he he he blessed us. He absolutely blessed us, and I'm so honored just to be able to share this with you. This is gonna be one you want to listen to. Maybe you want to listen to once or twice. Okay, so I'm telling you, lots of fun stuff here we talk about. He's married to his wife, Candy. They have a couple teenage sons, uh Rig and Ryder. But again, this just the wonderful things that he shared. Hopefully, you're gonna be encouraged by it. So sit back and enjoy this conversation with Pastor Robbie Gatile. Pastor Robbie, welcome to the line within us. How are you doing today? Great, man. Thanks for having me. Man, I'm so excited to have you to be working with you here. I mean, I've been listening to you for years now, and I'm thankful to my Pastor Corey. He connected with me to you a couple years ago, and then uh one of your church members, Justin, connected me, and then Drew Parker. And I was like, all right, I I've got enough science. I need to reach out and make this happen. So I'm really excited to have you here today.

Robby Gallaty 2:55

Well, thanks for having me, man. Yeah, Drew uh is a good friend, and uh anybody's friends with Drew is a friend of mine.

Chris Grainger 3:01

So there you go. There you go. Well, I mean, I know lots of guys know you, but we always like to start the line with a little bit of something fun. So maybe what what's up, what's something that's fun about you that maybe not many people do know about, Pastor Robbie?

Robby Gallaty 3:15

Um I am a magician. Well, a card, a card illusionist. I got to be careful when certain Christian circles that when I was uh born and raised in New Orleans, I'll

Meeting Pastor Robbie

Robby Gallaty 3:25

share my testimony, Chris, in a moment, but I was waiting for the Bacchus parade. I was 16 years old and uh went into the uh Jack's Brewery, which was uh kind of a place that had stores and uh shops, and there was a guy doing magic there at the Magic Masters, and I was 16, boastful, prideful, and thinking, who does magic as a 20-something year old? And he called me from the back. I'm kind of tall, so he called me from the back. He's like, Hey, big man, come over here. And he said, Hey, I'll do a trick for you with one stipulation. If you can figure it out, you don't have to buy it. But if you can't, you have to buy it. He sold tricks for a living. And he took this uh cloth out of his hand, he put it inside of his fingers, and then he made it disappear. He leans over, Chris, pulls it out the top of my shirt pocket, and I said,

Magic, Cards, And New Orleans

Robby Gallaty 4:10

How much? I'm in. And uh after that, I I traveled the world doing tricks. When I first started preaching, I did tricks and preaching. I mean, I've been all over the world, David Copperfield, Siegfried Roy, David Blaine. I mean, I've got to meet those guys. But anyway, that's what I do it sometimes for fun now, but not much. That's awesome. That is so cool.

Chris Grainger 4:29

Uh so what's your go-to trick? Like, I mean, if you're at a at a at a dinner or social, is it a card trick or something like that?

Robby Gallaty 4:35

Yeah, I like card tricks. You know, I used to, when I first started, I bought all these trick decks because you can buy them. But uh after spending probably a couple thousand dollars, the guy, his name was Jeff Schmidt, he said, Don't buy any more tricks. I'll show you how to do real magic with cards because it's more impressive. I can go to your house, get your deck of cards. And so I like card tricks, yeah. There you go. There you go. Awesome.

Chris Grainger 4:57

Well, well, I know just from listening to you. I mentioned to you before we started recording, I started listening to you at a very unique time. You had started going through the book of Revelation, and I was like, man, I don't know about this. I study on Revelation, so I listened to it while I was on my runs. I have a trail here close to our farm, so it's just trail running. But I found myself in the woods listening to you unpack and revelation, and I was it just it it drew me in into a way to studying the word that I never had considered before. I just wanted to say, first of all, thank you for doing that because I'm sure that wasn't an easy, easy dive. Most pastors want to stick to the gospels or something easy, like you just dove right into Revelation and headfirst, and it was incredible. So I just want to say thank you for that.

Robby Gallaty 5:39

Well, thank you. Yeah, uh, I tell you, I went into it like most people, premillennial, pre-dispensate or dispensational, pre-trib. I mean, that's what everybody was taught, like mother's milk, you just got fed that. And I'd already told the church I was going to preach through it, and about six months in, so I was preaching concurrently and studying, getting ready for the next year. And about six months in, I went to my wife Candy, and I said, Babe, I got a major problem because everything I thought I knew about Revelation is different. And I'm learning something totally different than what I was taught because I'm looking at it from a Hebraic Jewish perspective. And Matt Chandler, who's a friend of mine, and I was he had preached through it before me, and I called him and we started the dialogue, and he gave me a line that was so good. He said, Before you can apply it today, you have to know what it meant to them in the first century. And that's literally what changes everything. And I tell people it can't apply today differently than it didn't back then. And not that it doesn't have today or future implications or present implications, but you have to know why it was written. And a lot I always tell people is the the Bible was written for you, but it wasn't written to you. And when you understand that, it changes how you read your Bible. Amen.

Chris Grainger 6:47

Well, just hats off for that. And for guys, go check it out, you know, the long hollow podcast. It's it's a must listen to every week. It's in my feed. I just want to just hats off to what you're doing, and thank you so much for your obedience there. And you have quite a testimony. And I definitely think we want to take an opportunity and for you

Revelation Through First Century Eyes

Chris Grainger 7:05

to share that because that testimony is another reason that drew me in because it's like, wow, this guy has actually lived some life. It's like he didn't just grow up blessed and highly favored and went to seminary. Like he went through some things to get to where you are. So definitely the the floor is yours. Just share with share with the listeners a little bit your testimony.

Robby Gallaty 7:22

Yeah, it's a long story. I'll try to make it shorter, but I was raised in New Orleans, Louisiana. I had a very religious parent, very religious upbringing uh in the Catholic Church. And we weren't like CEO Catholics, Christmas Easter only. We went every single week and half Italian, so we were pretty religious. And if we missed church on Sunday, went to confession on the following Saturday. And this is how I lived back then. I went into confession, went into church, and then uh felt like the peace of God was over me, so I could go out and live Monday through Friday, Saturday like I wanted. And then came back in and did it over, hit, rinse, and repeat. The problem with that is I found that that doesn't just happen in the Catholic Church. That happens in the Baptist Church, Presbyterian, Methodist. A lot of people live like that. Uh I didn't know the Lord personally. Uh I knew who God was, but he was for me like this overbearing dictator out to get me every time I did anything wrong. It was this uh overbearing father who was always against me. I've since come to know, obviously, if you're listening, that's not who God is. He's loving, compassionate, long-suffering. But back then, that's what I looked at God. And so I went to an all-boys Catholic high school, played basketball. I got a scholarship. Uh, I was gonna go play at UNC Greensboro, which is a college in North Carolina. Right.

Chris Grainger 8:36

That's not far from me, man. About an hour.

Robby Gallaty 8:38

Yeah, about an hour away. Yeah, beautiful campus, by the way. I went years later uh to hang out there. But uh, I got a scholarship to play, and the girl I was dating at the time was going uh to LSU in Louisiana, and she said, Robbie, there's no way you're gonna go that far away to college, right? You need to go close to home. And I thought I was in love, and so I opened, I know this is gonna date me, I opened a phone book, you know, with lines and pages and names and numbers, yeah, people who don't know. But I opened a phone book and I called this college William Carey College in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. I didn't know who William Carey was. I didn't even know what the college was about. I called the coach and I said, Coach Knight, can I come try out for the team? And he was hesitant because the school uh semester started in a couple weeks, and he let me come try out, and by God's grace, I had the greatest. My mom was there. She said, Robbie, you had the greatest tryout I've ever seen in your life. I mean, Michael Jordan-like reflexes, Chris, I'm donking the ball backwards, you know. And uh my mom told me years later, she said, son, I have to be honest with you. She said, uh, that was the best I've ever seen you play up to that point. And frankly, that's the best you played since that point. But on that day, bro, I mean, that was little did I know what God was doing. But uh the coach called me right after that and he said, we're gonna give you a full ride to play at William Carey. Two weeks into the semester, uh, the girl I'm dating at the time breaks up with me. She thinks I'm cheating on her, and now I'm stuck at a unbeknownst to me at the time, Southern Baptist College as a Roman Catholic. And if you don't know what that means, man, I am the target of every evangelism class on campus, right? Who do we tell about Jesus? It's Robbie. There was a secret game, I was sure. Convert the Catholic, I was the deer in the headlights, you know.

Religion, Injury, And Drug Spiral

Robby Gallaty 10:20

The first year I heard the gospel a lot, but it was more transactional. People were trying to win me over, put my name on a page, send my information to a convention. I wasn't a Christian, but I knew that. You know, I knew I was not, it was not sincere in a sense. My second year, I met a guy named Jeremy Brown. Jeremy Brown was about as tall as I was. We both love basketball, we both play guitar, we both love music. And uh he did something novel. He became my friend. And he earned the right over that semester, those two semesters, to share the gospel with me. Now, I wouldn't accept Christ at that point, although I would say a prayer, uh, but I wouldn't become born again until seven years later. But here's the encouragement to those listening: don't ever underestimate the power of the sown seeds of the gospel into the hardened hearts of believers and lost people. You you never know what God's gonna do in a person's life. But Jeremy planted those seeds. I got out of college in 1998. I was in a network marketing business, uh, my second to last year, kind of like Amway, Excel, if you're familiar with those kind of businesses. God, by God's grace back then, I didn't know him, but I was uh I was blessed with an amazing business. I had 2,000 people in my downline. I thought I was gonna be a millionaire by the time I was 22, and the whole thing was a pyramid scam. I never forget the FCC called or the business called and said, the FCC shut us down. Uh, not only will you not get paid, but you have to call your downline and tell them they're not gonna get paid. I was 22, I wasn't able to handle that. I didn't know it at the time, but I went into a bit of a depression. And I decided to distance myself from anything in the business world. And so at that time, I'm 6'6, 290 pounds back then, and I thought, I know what I'll do. I'll be an MMA fighter. I want to fight the UFC. You know, college degree, UFC fighter did make a lot of sense, but at the time it did. And uh I started to train mixed martial arts. Now, don't miss this. This is not UFC glamorous today where you're making money. Guys, I was training with, we we weren't winning money as prize money to cover the medical bills at the hospital because nobody had insurance. It was kind of insane. But uh I'm at a restaurant one night and uh a guy sees me with my parents. I'm out with my parents, and he comes up to me. His name is Gino, and he said, Hey, would you be interested in being the head bouncer of my club downtown New Orleans in the middle of Mardi Gras? And I said, Wait a minute, you're gonna pay me to fight? I'm in, right? Just seemed like logical next step of my life. Yeah. And so I did that. If you can imagine the wildest three months of my life, I got a gun pulled out on me. Uh, I was escorting two guys to the parking lot for causing a ruckus in the club. And uh guy leans under the seat, pulls out a loaded nine millimeter, points it at my face, and says, Now tell me what to do. I didn't know the Lord, but I knew that was a time for a career change, and I made a lateral move from bouncing to bartending, seemed like the right move. Uh, I was coming home from work uh November 22nd, 1999. 18-wheeler comes across two lanes of traffic. If you're familiar with New Orleans, there's uh the Interstate I-10 connects with Mettery. And an 18-wheeler hit me, rear end of me, 65 miles an hour, slam my car into the guardrail. Uh, my seat actually broke off the hinges, my lap, my seatbelt locked, my back torqued, perniated two discs in my neck, two discs in my back. I'd never done drugs before, but I was in pain. And this is why, if you're listening, a lot of people we know who become addicts, uh, they're addicts as the result of a car accident or shoulder surgery or dental work, right? And so I started to take the drugs as prescribed because I was in pain. And the doctor sent me home. This doctor was in cahoots with lawyers that I was dealing with. The doctor sent me home with 90 oxycontin 40s, 90 Valium, 90 soma, 90 percocet. And you know the story. Within three months, I'm addicted to pharmaceutical drugs. Uh, I I can't work, I can't train, I just want to get high. And uh with my addictive personality, I'm running through the 30-day prescription in two weeks, and I've got to find a way to fulfill this insatiable desire to get high. And uh, I take the business knowledge from the network marketing world. This is where God used this as a blessing, and then it became a curse, and I use that to work my way up in the drug world. And uh, I started to import drugs. I started an illegal import business. I was trafficking drugs from Mexico to Miami, uh, heroin, cocaine, special K, GHB, marijuana. Uh again, I'm not telling you, if you're listening, to impress you any with any of this. I'm just telling you to impress upon you how far the Lord has brought me from. Times were good in the beginning, like any addiction, like any sin, you know, but it always takes you further than you want to go, keeps you there more than you want to stay, costs you more than you ever want to pay. You know, you you think you can manage the addiction until your life becomes unmanageable. Right. Uh I I ran out of money. I mean, I was making tons of money at first, but I ran out of money. And uh I did the unthinkable, close Italian family. We ate dinner every Friday and Saturday night. My dad was the best man in my wedding years later, so very close family. But I didn't know what to do. So what I did is I took his credit card when he wasn't looking, and I memorized the number, and I used it over the next three months to charge at that time fifteen thousand dollars unbeknownst to him on the family business bank account. Almost bankrupted the whole business, probably thirty grand today in today's time. And uh my parents found out about it. And my dad is a hardworking middle class, owned a body collision center, and so didn't have that money to throw away. And my mom found out, dad found out, mom called me and said, Robbie, we found out about what you did. Your father's furious, and I'm disappointed. Don't ever come to this house again. You're not welcome here. And I was prideful, you know, selfish. I'm like, mom, I don't need you guys. I never needed you before, I don't need you now. And I took the little bit of money I had after I hung up the phone and I blew it on drugs and alcohol. And for the next three months, Chris, it was literally, I mean, excuse the language, hell on earth. I was um, I lived without gas for three months, no cold, no hot air, no hot water. We mastered the art of the cold shower. I get freezing cold water, get out, lather up, back. I don't even know how I did this. This is coal plunging before it was cool, you know, back then. Right. Uh, but I was more interested in getting high than paying the bills. We lived without electricity for a month, the phone got turned off, the bill collectors called until they finally knocked on the door and evicted us. And I tell people, just kind of pull over for a moment, if you're listening and you have a drug addict in your life, an alcoholic, in any perpetual sin in a person's life, normally, and I've had the privilege of counseling with over a thousand people, let's say, in 23 years, but here's what I found. You can always pinpoint the reason for a person in a perpetual drug addiction. You could draw it back to an enabler in their life. Somebody is an enabler. For me, it was my dad. Normally it's a mom, maybe it's a spouse, maybe it's a child. And here's the thing: if you're the enabler in someone's life, you have to remember my heart breaks for you because you want the best for them. You want to help them. But the thing about any addiction is there's only three ways it ends jail, institution, or death. And it was the tough love, you're gonna love this, the tough love of my mom that saved my life. My mom lost her mom at 11. She had to raise her three kids. Her dad was an alcoholic, he married two bar waitresses, and so she became an adult at a young age, and she knew and had the foresight to know that she couldn't contribute to my addiction. So she created a tough love scenario, it saved my life. Here's the line I've come up with because of that. If you're an enabler, listen to what I'm saying. I say this with love. If you keep being their savior, Jesus never can be.

Chris Grainger 17:58

Amen.

Robby Gallaty 17:59

Let me say it again. If you keep being their savior, Jesus never can be. Why? Why would they turn to God if they have you? Why would they turn to Christ when they have dad? And so I hit rock bottom. I tell people you have to hit rock bottom to realize that Jesus is the rock at the bottom. And so I hit rock bottom. I went to rehab, short, long story short, went to two rehabs. Uh, after I got back from the first rehab, I did well for about nine months, relapsed. And here's the thing about a drug addiction: when you relapse and get back on drugs after you have a season of sobriety, you never start over. You always pick up where you left off. And that's the reason we, you know, you hear a guy, you're like, man, he had 20 years sober, he relapsed and died. What happened? It's because they pick up where they left off. And that's what I did toward the end of my addiction, $200 plus dollar a day heroin and cocaine addiction. Every day I woke up, I had one thing on my mind, and that was to find drugs and alcohol. Uh, after the second rehab treatment, I came home and literally I was in my room. I didn't have a dad that was a pastor. I didn't go to church, never read my Bible,

Tough Love, Rehab, And Conversion

Robby Gallaty 19:00

but I remembered what Jeremy told me seven years before. And I was desperate. And here's here's what I tell people I didn't know much about Christ, but I took the little bit of faith I had and I put it in as much of Jesus as I knew. And it wasn't a lot, but it was enough to be radically saved. 12, 2002, 23 years ago, I was in my room and I had this Paul-like conversion, brother, and it changed my life. Now, I became a free man at that point, not a perfect man, but I was finally free from drugs and alcohol, and that was 23 years ago. The next nine months I wandered in the Christian life, eight, nine months. I didn't know how to read the Bible. I didn't know how to pray, didn't know how to memorize scripture. I'm at church one Sunday morning, Edgewater Baptist, Paris Avenue, New Orleans, Louisiana. And a 15-year-old looking, I always say 15, because that's what he looked like. 15-year-old blonde-haired, blue-eyed seminary student named David Platt is a church member. Yeah, and David comes up, I mean, this is the grace of God. David comes up to me and says, Hey, would you want to meet once a week to study the Bible, memorize scripture, and pray? I said, David, I'd love to. He said, Pray about it. I said, I already have, bro. When do we start? And we met, Chris, for the next two and a half years, twice a week, every week. David baptized me, stood in my wedding, took me on my first mission trip. David took me down to the French quarter, showed me how to preach the word, how to share my faith. David was the one who invited me to be his assistant at the seminary. I traveled the country, traveled the world with him. People always ask me, what is it like? And if you're unfamiliar with David Platt, he's an author, he's a pastor now. Uh people say, what is it like to be disciple? What was it like about David Platt? And I can't tell you everything we we studied. Did we study the eschatological arguments of end times? Of course we did. Did we study through the book of Romans? Yes, we did. We did we talk about justification, glorification? Of course we did. But here's what I remember. I watched David love his wife. I watched David unapologetically preach the word. I watched David share his faith fearlessly, and I emulated that. I just believe that's what a Christian does. They read the Bible, memorize scripture, and pray, like riding a bike. And that's what I've done now for 23 years. And that's why we started a ministry for discipleship, and I've given my life to discipleship because I'm the product of discipleship.

Chris Grainger 21:16

Right. Right. Amen. I am curious just to backtrack a little bit. You said your dad was the enabler. Walk us through that a little bit. What do you mean by that? He was the enabler. I know you got you got the credit card from him. You mean he didn't he didn't push to get the money back? I'm just curious, what were you what do you mean there?

Robby Gallaty 21:33

Yeah, so an addict all like for me, my rent was always due twice a month. The phone bill was always due two, three times a month. Just always, Dad, I need some more money. Can I have some more money? I'm sorry, golly, you're never gonna believe. And so my dad, in his desire to love and care for me, okay, continued to provide for me. And that's normally what happens, you know. See, an addict has to have a bottom. You have to create either they're gonna hit rock bottom or you create an artificial bottom. And it was my mom. Who basically said, You're done. And it was during those three months of just, you know, ruminating in my room and just being isolated and alone that the Holy Spirit, even though I didn't know the Lord, was working on me and ultimately brought me to Him.

Chris Grainger 22:16

Amen. Guys, we're going to take our first break with Pastor Robbie. We'll be right back. Trying to find genuine resources to help grow spiritually can feel overwhelming. At least it was for me. For the longest time, the support that I was looking for didn't exist. And I knew I wasn't alone. And at the same time, God was leading me to take action. That's why we built the Lion Within Us Community, which is simply a place for Christian men to grow together in an honest, practical way that's always rooted in God's Word. We've made it simple. We have our daily spiritual kickoff for that little boost to get you going. We have Bible studies focusing on discerning truth and applying it. And we have a private forum where you can speak freely amongst other guys who listen. And then we have things like Friday Forge, Couples Night,

Building A Community For Men

Chris Grainger 23:10

where we kind of tackle the hard items that guys are craving to talk about, but most face settings just refuse to explore these areas. So our community is about a growth mindset, intentionality, and transparency. Simply put, leave the mask at the door and come as you are. No perfect resume, just a willing heart and a desire to lead. I believe in what we've built simply because I've seen God use it to strengthen so many men. And I'd be honored to walk alongside you. So if you're ready, visit the LionWithin.us to explore the community. Start your free trial. Look around and see how this could help you lead with clarity and courage. So your journey begins here at the LionWithin.us. I look forward to seeing you inside the den. Pastor Robbie, you know, you've gone through this. You had David, who was, you know, what a God moment, right? To put David in your path to be able to mentor you, disciple you. Where did you feel the tug to full-time ministry?

Robby Gallaty 24:19

Yeah, that's an interesting question. I I actually felt called to ministry the day I got saved. It doesn't happen for many people. I don't know many people who have had that call. I I felt like God, I didn't know what it meant either. I just felt like God was calling me into full-time ministry. I went to my dad the next day after I accepted Christ. You can imagine my dad, he's a middle class, beer drinking, Budweiser, every night on the couch kind of guy, and he's kicked back watching TV. And I went to my dad the next day and I said, Dad, you're never going to believe this. But God has called me to preach. Dad looked up from the couch and he's thinking, Didn't you just get off of drugs? What are you smoking? You know, I thought you were, I thought you were sober. You know, he he didn't even have a category for that, right? And I said, Dad,

Called To Preach And Seminary

Robby Gallaty 25:01

I don't know what that means. And so I started praying a couple weeks. I was like, Lord, you call me to preach. I don't have a dad that's in ministry. Don't know anybody, I don't even know a church, but I had, thank God, Christian radio. And I had a friend call me out of the blue from college, invite me to church. That's why I started ultimately to meet David and Tony Marita and Jim Shattocks and others who invested in me. But I started to listen to Christian radio and John MacArthur, you know, um Michael Yousse and Charles Stanley, and those guys really discipled me through that. And one day I was praying. I just would pray all night and I would say, Lord, you've called me to preach, but I don't have anywhere to preach. And I felt like the Holy Spirit speak to my heart and say, Robbie, you don't even have a sermon. If somebody calls you to preach, you don't have a sermon. I thought, you know what? That's a good idea. I probably need to put a sermon together. So I listened to these guys and I put a sermon together. I'm not making this up. This is a true story. I was at the water fountain of this church I was going to at the time. It was celebration church in Mettery. And a person walks up to me, and I just met him a couple weeks before. A person walks up to me and he says, Hey, Robbie, are you a preacher? And I look up from the water fountain and I said, As a matter of fact, I am a preacher. Now, I never preached before, but I knew God had called me to preach. And I said, Yeah. And he said, Would you want to come share? I know you got a crazy testimony. Would you want to come share your testimony downtown at the Brantley Center, which is the homeless shelter? He said, I go every week. He said, Here's what's cool. The people in the homeless shelter have to hear a message. They have to hear spiritual food before they get physical food. So it's kind of a bait switch in a sense. And he said, Would you come next week? I think it was a Tuesday, would you come and share your testimony? So I went home, told my parents, which they they don't know what to do with me at this point. And so mom and dad come, Chris, this is crazy. My parents show up at the Brantley Center, the homeless shelter, dressed with their Sunday best on. My dad's homeless shelter. Oh yeah, my dad's got his uh polar, you know, his button-downed shirt, his floor shives, mom's dressed up, and everybody in there. And I get up and I share, I mean, it was a horrible sermon. I don't even know what it sounded like, but it wasn't the best. But I share my testimony, and I knew back then from listening to guys that I should invite people to accept the same Jesus I did. And I just got at the end of the message and I said, Hey, about 75 people in there. And I said, Hey, if you want to know the same Jesus I know, I just want to pray over it. Would you just stand up so I can pray over you? And seven guys out of those 75 stood up and you could sense the presence of God in a palpable way. And I and they came up in tears and they hugged me, and I left there and I knew this is what you'll do the rest of your life. I didn't know fully, but I had a hunch this is what the Lord would.

Chris Grainger 27:35

Wow. Incredible. So so did that lead you now to like the formal training and like walk us down that path of okay, now you got the call. Now you got to take the next steps to actually put it into fruition. Yeah.

Robby Gallaty 27:47

So Platt started discipling me in August of 2003, and he starts pushing for me to go to seminary.

Chris Grainger 27:53

Okay.

Robby Gallaty 27:53

Um, and I uh I was like, David, I'm not good at school. I didn't like school the first time. I I'm I don't really know the English language well and Hebrew and Greek. Come on, man. And so David's like, no, you need to go to seminary. And so David encouraged me to go to seminary. Uh uh, it was kind of a cool process. I was leading a Bible study in my hometown with a bunch of former drug addicts and alcoholics who had gotten radically saved. And we had a Bible study. Now they were part of a charismatic church, speaking in tongues, flags, banners, and and again, I wasn't against any of that. I was I was going to that. They prayed over me multiple times and never got the gift, but prayed over me, and I was okay with that. And then I'd go to the Southern Baptist Church on Sunday, that church on Wednesday, Southern Baptist on Sunday, and then we'd have a Bible study during the week. And I think that really helped me early on to show me so often in the church, we swing the pendulum one side or another. We get the chosen frozen on one side, the charismatiacs on the other side, so people call them. And I've always had kind of a middle of the road. I'm a, I'd say I'm a spirit-filled biblical expositional preacher, which I think the apostles Jesus would have been as well. So I felt like that helped me early on. But I went to those guys when David encouraged me to go to seminary and I got accepted. And I told those guys in the Bible study, I said, hey, listen, I got accepted to seminary. And one guy said, The cemetery? I said, What? He said, they're gonna literally they told me, they said, they're gonna, they're gonna squelch the Holy Spirit. They're gonna quench the spirit. Why do you need to go to school? You got the Holy Spirit. You don't need that, you got the Bible. And there is some truth to that. So I went to David, I was a little disillusioned, and I went to Platt and I said, David, here's what my buddies are telling me. And David said, he gave me this illustration I've never forgotten. He said, two guys go into a field to cut a path in the forest. They both have axes, both of which are old, rusty, and dull. The first guy just decides he's just gonna go at it. He's gonna take the axe, he's gonna start whacking the tree, bark and debris and chips are flying everywhere. He's gonna make a path that's gonna take him a long time. He said the other guy decides before he ever picks up the axe to sit down and sharpen it. And he's gonna spend a long time sharpening it. The whole time he's sharpening it, it looks like he's doing nothing. The other guy's making progress. But when that guy gets up after spending time sharpening his axe, he's gonna make quick work of the forest. He said, that's what seminary does. It's gonna help you sharpen your axe. He said, for the next four years, you're gonna set the course for the next 40 years of ministry. Now, little did I know, after I got my master's degree, I went to New Orleans Seminary, got a master's. David encouraged me to get a PhD. And I just continued on. So I was in school for eight years, two kids. It was brutal, it was difficult, uh, and pastoring full-time and traveling, but so grateful I did it at the time. And uh David was really a big push for that. And so got out of school in 2011, uh, got a PhD, uh, a master's, and then pastored a small church in South Louisiana uh in seminary, and then went to Chattanooga seven years at Brainerd Baptist in Chattanooga. Amazing time there, love that time. And then I've been in the Nashville area at Long Hollow for I'm in my 11th year, September of the uh going into my 12th year.

Chris Grainger 31:06

Wow. Incredible. So how did a door open at Long Hollow? I mean, that's that church is booming, growing, one of the biggest growing churches out there in the country. What we kind of walk us through how that how that opportunity came.

Robby Gallaty 31:17

Yeah, I mean, that was an interesting. I was not looking to leave Brainerd Baptist. My parents had just moved there a year before. They were our next door neighbors. My sister had moved to Chattanooga three months before. My aunt and uncle were in the process of moving. The church had grown not only numerically, but spiritually, emotionally. We loved it there. We had we had people in discipleship groups. It was great. God actually spoke to me in a dream. Um, I was we were looking to expand at Brainerd. We were growing, we'd grown from about 800 to about 2200 over seven years. Slow, consistent growth. And I'm not telling you to impress, just give you concept of numbers, uh, just where we were. So we had outgrown the facilities we had. So we were looking to build. I heard about this church

Dream Call To Long Hollow

Robby Gallaty 32:00

called Long Hollow in in the Nashville area, Hendersonville. I never heard of the church, but somebody had told me about it. Uh in fact, when I came to Long Hollow, Kevin Izell, who is the president of the North American Mission Board, was the interim for Long Hollow, and he said, You're coming into the largest megachurch nobody's ever heard of. And I said, Really? And I said, Why is that? And he said, Because the pastor I followed, amazing man, died at the height of the ministry of cancer. He never passed, he never preached outside the church, never wrote a book, never traveled, never spoke, never wrote blogs, didn't have an online present presence, but he loved his people, invested in the community, and God bless the work here. And so anyway, we were coming through here to uh look at what the worship center looked like. The worship center I have now is about 2,500 seats. We were trying to build something about 1,200, 1,500 seats, and so we're gonna build a smaller version of that. Well, the pastor was David Landret. That's the pastor I followed. He was struggling at that time for almost uh a year with uh cancer. And almost a year he had cancer. And uh we he never toured anybody around the church. He never toured anybody normally, but he was always he was just sick on interferon medicine. But on that day, this is God, on that day in April of 2014, he had enough strength to give me and my wife and another staff member or two a tour of the facility. Little did he know at the time, he was touring the only tour of his life, the next pastor and his wife. Wow. So he gives us a tour of the place. We finish, we pray over him. He thinks he's gonna beat the cancer, which he was doing well. Uh the church thinks he's gonna beat the cancer. He's got thousands of people praying. Everybody thought he was gonna make it. November of that year, he has a brain bleed and dies. My gracious. And so at the height of Long Hollow, a church with five campuses, almost 7,000 people, uh, he dies at the height of the ministry. And uh they didn't want to lose their pastor. They didn't think they would lose their pastor. They don't want a new pastor, and they definitely don't want me. But what happens is between that April and November, middle of June, I am um home with my wife. We go to bed that night. I wake up in the middle of the night, 2 a.m., with this dream. It's only happened to me twice. Vivid dream like I'll have dreams, but not like this. And I woke up in the middle of the night uh and it was so impactful. The next morning I went to Candy and I said, babe, you're never gonna believe this. But I had a dream last night, and the dream was crazy. I was the pastor at Long Hollow. Now, you could do the numb, the math. Long Hollow's three times the size of my presentation. They don't know who I am. By the way, I don't have, for you listening, I don't have the best resume. I mean, former Catholic, drug addict. I mean, they're not looking for guys like me. And I'm like, and Candy's like, are you my wife, the voice of reason? You know, she's like, are you sure it wasn't you were just at the church? I was like, I'm like, baby, I'm telling you, I was the pastor. I was preaching on that stage, and they call me pastor. Now, what was odd was David was still alive at this point. So I said, I said, I don't know what to do with it. So I told my wife, I said, Listen, let's just file it away with anything like that. And I filed it away and we didn't do anything about it. You know, so November, David passes. We don't really know what's going on. We kind of have a little bit of a check in our spirit, like, who knows? And then fast forward to the Southern Baptist Convention. We are down uh at the convention that year, and two guys, independently of each other, come up to me and say, There are a lot of good churches out there that you would be a good pastor for. Have you considered going to any? And I said, I'm not looking to go anywhere. And I said, Well, what church are you thinking about? And both guys didn't know each other, didn't I mean didn't talk to each other. Both said on two separate days, you ought to go to Long Hollow. It was the first time anybody verbally said the words. When I got back from the convention, Kevin Ezzel called me on a Monday and he said, Hey, I know you love Brainerd. I know what God's doing there. I think you ought to consider coming to Long Hollow. Would you be open to it? Little did he know. No, we had a dream. I had a dream about this. So I was bank, I mean, I was like, of course I'd be open to it. Yeah. And so watch this. This is crazy. Three months. The process is three months long. And if anybody's ever been in a pastor search process, it's like being on a blind date with someone and you never know where you stand. You know, it's like, do they like me? Do they not like me? And so we get to the end and they call us to come. We preach in view of a call, they vote us in. I don't tell anybody this dream. I didn't tell anybody till a year later, even. I don't tell anybody this dream. Only my wife and I, my parents know about this dream. And so we preach in view of a call. Fast forward, there are three weeks before when I preach to when I start, or three Sundays and then I start the next. The last Sunday up, Kevin Ezel, who was the interim pastor at that time, he was the interim, and then uh and he was friends with David. He gets up. You can watch the sermon online, Kevin Ezel's last sermon. He says, I want to do two things I've got approval for. Number one is I want to read from David's journal before he died. I got approval from his wife. And brother, it was emotional, David's last word. Still praising Jesus, man. He died at 52. Larger than life, God used him mightily. And uh he he basically said, Long hollow, I love you. Thank you for the time I've had as your pastor, 17, 18 years. My family loves you. I could never give back to you more than you've given me. But I want you to know the next uh the next few years will be better than the last, and the best days are ahead. Now, I mean, I I don't know if people believe that, but he believed that, right? So he said, the second thing I'm gonna show you is a video of one of David's last sermons at Long Hollow. Candy and I at that time are riding in our car down to the beach. I have my phone on the dashboard. Don't pull me over, but phone on the dashboard, sermon playing. I'm driving, and we're listening to this with our two little kids, six and four, in the backseat. And Kevin gets up and he says, I want to play you the last sermon from David Landry. And he says, Here it is. And David's preaching on Peter and Jesus and the Apostles, where Jesus is sleeping in the boat. And he says, Hey guys, listen, he said, I know it looks like Jesus right now is sleeping in the boat. He said, and you're probably frazzled and you're probably upset and you're wondering what's going to happen. But let me remind you, Jesus is still in the boat. And if Jesus is in the boat, this is his church, not mine. And he said, right now, I just want to tell you something. Right now, God is waking up a man in the middle of the night who's having dreams about coming to Long Hollow. Let's go. And bro, when he said that word, it was like I get emotional thing about now. Yeah. It's like the power of God came in that car and we just wept. My wife and I just weeping. And I said, baby, God spoke to us. Do you like you believe God spoke to us? We would need that. Why? Because the next two, three years, Chris, we're living Hades on earth. It was the hardest three years of my life. Now, here's the thing. I don't fault anybody at the church. I don't because they were grieving. And people grieve differently. And so they I I never pastored a declining church up to that point. They were leaving in groves, thousands, thousands of people over the course of those next few years. And it just, it just rocked me. People, I started an anonymous email account was started week one against me. Called to be an observer at gmail.com. I'm not making this up. Guy emails me, Robbie. I've been here a long time. You haven't. He said, I'm older than you, you're younger. I'm going to teach you how and help you pastor this church. Guys, give me the gift of constructive criticism, and I'm going to help you. Oh, how nice of you. Thank you so much. Wow. Every week, I'm not making this up. Your beard's too long, your hair's too high, your sermons are too deep. You think you're smarter than us. You got degrees. You broke books, written books. What's you think you're you're better than us? Next week, not even not even exaggerated. Next week, a concerned Berean at gmail.com, another anonymous email account. For six months, brother, they just hammered me. People said, Why did you keep reading those emails? It's like crack cocaine. It's bad for you, but you still go back, unfortunately. What did he say this week? I had a principal blogging against me, well-known principal. This guy's arrogant. He stuck up. Anyway, long story short, the church just capitulated, just gone down, launched the campuses. Now we're down to one campus, and we bottom out around 3,400 worship. And people say, well, 3,400 is still big. Yeah, I guess it is. But it's half of what I had when I got here. That's a hard pill to swallow. Sure. And that led us into 2020. When I went into 2020, like most people, I was totally unprepared for what was coming. You remember that, those? I mean, you couldn't win if you if you were a pastor or a leader or had a platform of any kind. If you had a Twitter account, you could win because everything you said bifurcated everyone, right? You you divided everyone. Mask, no mask. In person, watch online. You know, shot, no shot. I mean, you know, it it you just could win. Not to mention the political tension and the racial unrest in our country, George Floyd passing. So all of that played into me literally in March of 2020, basically saying, Lord, if this is what the church is, I'm I'm done. I don't I don't want this anymore. Tot of playing games, tired of making people happy. And a friend of mine came to me, uh, he had the foreknowledge to see this, and he said, Robbie, you are gonna burn out. He said, You're running at a frenetic pace. You have to slow down and be silent and still before the Lord. Now, I didn't know what that meant. I'm not a big silence and solitude guy, as you can probably tell. And so I but I was desperate and I started to study about silence and solitude. Uh, full disclosure, I had to go back into the dark ages because there's not a lot of books in present-day theological books about it. So went back into the dark ages. I knew how to eat fish from South Louisiana. I ate a lot of fish and sped out a lot of bones. There was a lot of lot to get rid of. But I started to develop this practice where I went out to the porch in front of my house and I started to sit with the Lord in silence and solitude. Right. Started with five minutes

Porch Practice Of Silence

Robby Gallaty 42:00

and um it was very foreign. It's like lifting weights. You don't put somebody under 225 the first time. You you start them at the bar and you So I started with five minutes. And over time it went to ten minutes, and then pretty quickly went to twenty minutes, and then it was an hour, and then it was two hours every night on the porch with the Lord. I'd put my two boys to bed and I would go sit with the Lord. It became this insatiable desire I had to be in the presence of God. And I had to relearn what it meant. You know, people are like, What do you mean silence? Why would silence be important? Well, most people don't know this, but God's first language was silence. What do you mean? Well, he spoke the word, the world, out of silence. Uh when he was trying to communicate with Moses and Elijah, he's like, No, be still. Not in the fire, not in the wind, not in the hurt. No, I'm in the still, small. That word is not voice, it's whisper.

Chris Grainger 42:53

Whisper.

Robby Gallaty 42:54

Yeah. And if you're listening, have you slowed down enough to hear the whisper of God? I think a lot of people say, Man, I don't hear from God. Well, have you even tried? Right? So I started to sit with the Lord. I realized right away I did not understand this because I was used to spiritual disciplines that gave me something in return. I would get something for giving something. For example, most disciplines have a built-in law of reciprocity. What I mean is you read the Bible, you get a word, right? You pray, you hear from God, you get an answer. You give, you don't do it for that, but you get back in return. That's just how it works. Let me temper your expectations if you're gonna try this. Most of the nights I sat out, and I sat out for 10 months before I heard the Lord clearly in my head that changed my life. Most of the time, I got nothing. Like no tangible results, right? And not that I wasn't looking for it. I mean, I would sit on the porch some nights and I'd look in the sky and I wouldn't see any constellation of stars in the form of a Hebrew word. I mean, I look for it, but I couldn't find is that Yahweh? No. Uh yeah, I would listen uh for a megaphone from heaven, Robbie. None of that. And one night I'm going inside Chris and I've been out for about an hour and a half and I look up to the to to heaven and I look up to the sky and I'm like, God, what was that? What was that? I was out here for over an hour and a half and I got nothing. And the Holy Spirit just kind of lovingly tapped me on the shoulder and he said, You know, you didn't get nothing. You got everything because you got me and I got you finally. And that's when I realized God did not want me to go to the porch so I can get something from him. God wanted me on the porch so I could get him. He just wanted me. He just wanted to be with me. I would say for those listeners who are with us, I would say, I bet God misses your company. If you're listening. When was the last time? When was the last time you went with to the Lord? No agenda, no laundry list, no idea. No, God, if you do this, then rubber stamp my plans. I was, you know, I got really good at trying to tell God how to do his job better. Right. You just bless this, this, this, and this. And I realized if I wanted to get my agenda into heaven, I needed to keep talking incessantly like I was in prayer. But if I wanted to get God's agenda from heaven on earth through me, I needed to do a whole lot more listening. Yes. And I was lamenting, here's where my life changed. I was six months in and I was uh, it was too much. It was George Floyd, and I mentioned George Floyd from the stage, and I got hammered. People left. I had an African-American preacher, Derwin Gray, who's out by you. He's a friend of mine. He preached for me. That made people mad. Uh, and I was like, Lord, I'm I'm done. You have to fix the problems in my church. And while you're at it, fix the problems with my staff and my deacon body. And then if you have any time, fix the country because we're in a mess. One of those pity party moments with the Lord. And I remember the Lord just, you know, are you done, Robbie? Yeah, I'm done, Lord. And just lovingly, as he always does, just spoke to my heart and said, Robbie, the problem is not with your staff. It's not with the church, it's not with the deacon body, the problem is not even with the country. The problem to revival come into Long Hollow is you. You're the problem. Now, if if you've ever been that gut level honest with the Lord before, it's pretty painful. And I start pushing back. I'm like, what do you mean? I I don't have a drug addiction. I'm not an alcoholic anymore. What do you mean, God? And uh the Holy Spirit hasn't a way to put his finger on the pulse of the problem if you ask him. And so he began to say, No, that's not the issue. The issue is you are way too prideful. You're the master, Robbie, of fishing in the pond of approval of other people. You know how to ask a question to get a positive response for you. What did you like about my sermon? You know, that's kind of then he began to show at me, Robbie. You know how to steal credit from me with the best of them. The the cause of Robbie or the platform of Robbie and the cause of Christ is so blurred you don't even know the difference. The stuff you post online, it ain't about me, it's about you. This is the one that got me though. Robbie, you're way too jealous. I was like, what do you mean? What am I jealous of? I mean, and and and and I wouldn't say it publicly, but I would think it internally. If a pastor baptized more than we did down the street, I would get jealous. If a guy wrote a book and it got more traction, I was jealous. If a guy had a podcast or, you know, a guy wrote an article and it got more traction, I'd get jealous. And the Lord began to show me, Robbie, if you can't pray for the church down the street to be blessed in spite of Long Hollow, I'm never blessing your church Longhollow. Let me remind you, it's my church, not yours. And brother, that's the day the Lord broke me on the porch. And he gave me this line I've never forgotten, Robbie, every great movement of God begins by not moving. Every great movement of God begins by not moving. Here's what I mean. Who is willing to say, God, I'm not going to move until you move in my life? I'm sitting with the Lord November or December 15th, 2002, or 20, 2020, December 15th. It's clear as day. I hear in my ear spontaneous baptism. Two words. Now I was raised Catholic. I didn't, I mean, I hadn't seen this before. I don't know this. I don't even know if it's theologically correct at that time. Like, the I'm like spontaneous baptism. Up to that point, we were not a baptism-only church. We had a long process, six weeks before they get into the tank. But I but I heard these two words and I prayed two more days and I was obedient. I told my staff, I said, hey, we're going to offer December 20th, 2020. The last Sunday, we're going to meet in person before we go online for the next four weeks. We're totally online. Tennessee was leading the country in COVID cases at the time. But number two is I uh it was the last time we're meeting in person and it was the week before Christmas. I also emailed the church that week and said, if you're sick, stay home. If you come, wear a mask, made everybody mad. I created a scenario where nobody came. It was the lowest attended Sunday in the history of me being at Long Hollow, and

Spontaneous Baptism Revival

Robby Gallaty 48:47

I was going to ask for the hardest response I'd ever asked for, which was, I know you didn't come prepared to be baptized, but if God's leading you to do that now because your baptism is on the wrong side of your salvation, or you were sprinkled like me as a child, never followed through a believer's baptism. I'm going to ask you to come forward now. I got up that Sunday, and before I got up, the Lord put a number on my heart. The number was 100. He put it on my heart on Friday night. I emailed or I filmed a video for my staff. I still have it. I didn't know it was prophetic at the time, but who knew that God would use this? And I told the staff on Friday for Sunday, I said, we're going to do something crazy. Never done this before. I've since known, uh read every baptism in Acts was spontaneous because I mean every one of them. But so, but at the time I just said, hey, we're going to trust the Lord. I'm just being obedient to God. And I believe a hundred people are going to be baptized Sunday. Now, Chris, you've been in church long enough. That is miraculous, bro. I've never, I've never seen anything like that before in my life. Maybe a camp share, maybe. But this is COVID. No, I mean, you couldn't pay people to get in face to face with you, much less a bacterial-filled tank. I mean, golly, come on, that's a big ask. And I get up that Sunday, nobody's there. I give the invitation. The first service, nobody moves. I'm standing by the tank. I said, I'm gonna go stand by this tank if you want to come. Nobody moves. And I thought, Lord, okay. What was that? You know? And then one person, two people, at the end of the first service, 25 people were baptized. It was unbelievable. It was unbelievable. I was in the green room between services. I was waiting back then. I'd go backstage because it's COVID. And I'm waiting backstage, and all of a sudden I hear a knock at the door. And my staff comes in and they said, Hey, Pastor, don't mean to bother you. But there's a girl who just drove an hour from Jolton, Louise, uh, Jolton, Tennessee, which is an hour away. She watched the service online and she wanted to know, could you baptize? She drove in, could you baptize her between the services? And I jokingly say to the staff, can we even do that? You know, and they're like, Pastor, you're the pastor. We do whatever you want. So I walked outside and I baptized her. And I asked her two questions. You're going to love this, that I asked every single one of the next 1,600 people over the next eight months through COVID who would come in to be baptized. 1,500 in eight, eight months. Unbelievable God. I'm telling you this, not to impress you, but show you what God did. It's a God sent revival. But I didn't know it was coming. And I asked her the same two questions that I would ask everyone else. Number one is, where are you from? And she said, Jolton. But they would say to me, because they flew in from 17 different states. I'm from Maine. I'm from Boston. What? I'm from Las Vegas. And I'd ask the second question. And I would say there's a lot of churches between here and Washington State or California. Why did you come? Where are you from? Why did you come? Every single person said in some form or fashion, this was the thread woven through the whole revival. I had to come. The Holy Spirit of God compelled me. Wow. I had to come. So you flew on a plane. Yeah, I flew on a plane last night to be baptized today. I baptized her, went back in the green room 10 minutes before the service. Another knock at the door. They said, Hey, I don't want to bother you again, but I'm not making this up. There's a guy outside pulled up on a Harley. He's wearing a vest, a biker vest, and he said he watched the service. And when I walked out that second time, I said, All right, something is different today. By the end of that service, we saw 99 people baptized. Oh, come on. Bro, 99 people. Okay. In COVID. Nobody was there. And I always assume there's got to be one guy in his bathroom watching a lot. 100. But I was telling the story years later, and a person came up to me and said, you know why you only baptized 99? Because the Lord wanted you to know there was always one more to come. There you go. I went home that night, and this is the end of it. I went home that night and I went to the porch. I was overwhelmed with just joy and just couldn't believe what I just saw. And when I went to the porch, the Holy Spirit, as he always was, waiting for me like he always has been. And I just closed my eyes. I was so overwhelmed. I just started getting emotional. I was like, God, what just happened? I was like, I'm going to tell my kids about this. I I'll talk about my this with my grandkids this one day. Little did I know it was coming. When I closed my eyes in silence, I saw this image of heavy raindrops before the torrential downpour. And the Lord, you know, when those heavy raindrops fall, like the bottom's going to fall out. Little did I know what was going to happen. And like I said, over the next, over the next 15 weeks, four of the weeks, four of the weeks we didn't even meet in person, we saw over a thousand baptized in 15 weeks and then uh 1,600 in eight months. And here's what I tell you if you're listening. I'm not telling you to do spontaneous baptism. You might not even believe in it if you're listening. I'm not even telling you to go and do any of the things I said. But what I'm telling you is this you need to get a word from God. And that's what I did. I sat long enough to bend my ear to the accent of the Holy Spirit where I began to hear the voice of God. And just for preachers or teachers out there, that didn't happen from a revival uh sermon series. That didn't happen from a strategy, that didn't happen from handouts and yard placers. I'm not against any of those things. That was a God-sent, spirit-led move of the Spirit of God at Longhollow. And bro, it changed the course of our church. Easter Sunday, we had over 15,000 people, and I'm not telling you that to impress you, but just to show you God turned the entire church around. Why? Because he changed me.

Chris Grainger 54:11

Wow.

Robby Gallaty 54:11

I tell people I tell Longhollow before the revival to after we call it pre-porch, post-porch robbing. When I got back from the revival, I got a new church and they received the new pastor, and nobody had to leave.

Chris Grainger 54:25

Amen. Amen.

Robby Gallaty 54:27

God story. Holy God.

Chris Grainger 54:29

That is an incredible story. Thank you for sharing that. And and I know you have such a heart as well for discipleship. And for our guys who are listening, lots of men out there, Robbie, lots of guys who are struggling with really understanding what that even looks like in the church these days. What where do you point them to be the disciples, to be the spiritual leaders of their home? What's the word you share with them?

Robby Gallaty 54:51

Yeah, I mean, that that's one of the people have asked me, why do you think God sent revival to the discipleship guide? Because I've given my life to discipleship. I wish I could say I was praying for revival for the church or the country. I was praying for God to revive me. I mean, frankly. He did as a byproduct, he revived the church, obviously. But I would say the number one thing you could do as a man is to be a man of the word. The line I use all the time is get into the word until the word gets into you. Period. Lifeway did a study years ago where they tried to determine what the number one spiritual discipline was for the Christian life. Like

Bible Engagement And Brotherhood

Robby Gallaty 55:26

if you're going to wage a bet, which I'm not a betting man, but if I were going to wage a bet, if you're listening, and you're saying, I'm going to bet on this spiritual discipline, let's take them all. Worship, evangelism, Bible reading, journaling, scripture memory, prayer, meditation, take them all. Silence, solitude, frugality, whatever. They said the number one spiritual discipline, this is a study done of thousands of churches, tens of thousands of people, the number one spiritual discipline, and its head and shoulders above every other discipline is Bible engagement. Period. Not Bible reading only. That's part of it. Engagement is you read the Bible and you engage and you apply it to your life. I've come up with a system called the Hear Journal Method. If you're unfamiliar with this, uh you can go to we have a website ministry called replicate.org. You can get it. It's all free. You can go online. We have Bible reading plans for this. But here's the second insight they found, and this is fascinating. They not only wanted to know what the number one Bible, uh, number one spiritual discipline was, but they wanted to find out how that discipline affected every other spiritual discipline in the Christian life. And here's what they found. Bible engagement was the ship that raised every other uh raised all the other ships, or I'm sorry, the Bible engagement is the tide that raises all the other ships at port. So, so when you people they found that people who engaged the Bible were more likely to give more. They were more generous in giving, they were more passionate in worship, they were more likely to share their faith. Why? Because when Jesus goes on your mind, he always comes out of your mouth. Why? The reason you're you you think the way, the reason you talk the way you are, is because you're not saturating the word or your mind with the word. Paul said, be transformed by the renewing of your mind, implying the word. And so I would say that's what I would start as a man. Number two is you were built for community. Satan loves to whisper in the ears of men, you can do this alone. Man, you got this. You and God, you know, us, you know, we're gonna do this together. I'm a self-made man. That's a life from the enemy. You know, it's meant to be, it's up to me. These are all mottos I used to say back in the world. The trinity, in and of itself, is a tri-unity. It's three and one. So even the trinity is a relational, is a discipleship related, if you could, you know, a group. So I would say uh the enemy thrives in your life when you live in anonymity and obscurity. If you're a man and you don't have a group of brothers, you know this brother. I've listened to your podcast. If you don't, if you don't have men around you to hold you accountable, to live life, if you don't have a 2 a.m. friend that you can call right now and say, hey man, I need you. My my my wife's sick, my son just got in a car. If you don't have that, I guarantee you can find that at your church and pray for that. I had that with David Platt, I had that with others, and I would say Satan thrives when you hide. And so stop hiding. Amen.

Chris Grainger 58:19

Well, Pastor Robert, this has been absolutely phenomenal. Before we let you go, we love to have a little lightning round at the end. So if you're willing to play, we'll jump right into it. Let's do it. Okay. All right. So much fun today with you. Favorite hobby. What do you enjoy doing for fun?

Robby Gallaty 58:35

My favorite hobby now, uh, I just started a YouTube channel. I think I told you about this before. Yeah. That is, and I see you got a YouTube channel and you got some people following you too. I just started this channel. That takes a lot of time and effort, so that's something I love to do. But I love to play disc golf. Not regular golf, but disc golf.

Chris Grainger 58:51

Yeah.

Robby Gallaty 58:52

Disc golf. Not regular, though. Okay. I'd like you to get there in the link. It's not a frisbee, but it's like a frisbee.

Chris Grainger 59:00

Love it. What's your go-to uh meal? You're a big guy, you're a strong guy. What's your favorite? If you sit down for that meal, what's your go-to?

Robby Gallaty 59:06

Man, I'm a breakfast guy, by the way. Uh, I love uh waffles and eggs uh and bacon, man. I'm a big I'll eat

Lightning Round And Leadership Wisdom

Robby Gallaty 59:14

breakfast any time of the day.

Chris Grainger 59:15

Okay. Oh, I was thinking you're gonna be a steak and egg. Uh or a steak and bacon.

Robby Gallaty 59:18

I mean, I like eggs and waffles. Yeah, I do like steak and eggs, but I do like breakfast, too.

Chris Grainger 59:22

Yeah. Love it, love it. What's uh what's the book, the most recent book that you read recently?

Robby Gallaty 59:30

Man, I would say, well, I'm reading a lot of different books now. Uh um I just read this one on uh the rise and fall of dispensationalism. That's an interesting book by a guy named Hummel. Uh yeah. Um I study, I'm studying for my Revelation series, so I'm doing that again on my channel. So yeah, that's what I was reading recently.

Chris Grainger 59:53

There you go. Uh for if you and your wife had a perfect date night. What are you guys doing? Where are you going?

Robby Gallaty 59:59

Uh we love to go to Oak Steakhouse. So there you go. It's a steakhouse in town. We know a lot of the people there. It's a little expensive. We don't go all the time, but we do go for special occasions. I love that place. If you're in Nashville, go to Oak Steakhouse. Great.

Chris Grainger 1:00:11

So if you could have a superhero, uh superpower, rather, which one would you have, Pastor Robin, uh, Pastor Robin? How would you use it? Uh superpower.

Robby Gallaty 1:00:19

Wow. Yeah, man. I would like to have the superpower of reading people's minds. That would be a good one, I think. That would actually, you know, I could get ahead of you before you think it or something. I would like to have that.

Chris Grainger 1:00:32

I would like to have that with my wife. Things would be really hard there. Exactly. Love it, love it. Well, when you think about God, what just what's your favorite thing about him?

Robby Gallaty 1:00:46

Man, for me, the Lord is so kind to me and just um the things I've done. I remember when I first accepted Christ, the guilt and shame of my past was cruci crushing at the time. Luke seven is one of my favorite verses. He who has been forgiven much loves much. I think it's Luke 747. He who's been forgiven much loves much. And I just feel like God has forgiven me so much. I've never gotten over being saved, brother. I mean, I just Paul in 2 Corinthians 12 always talks about the man who was brought into the third heaven to keep me from becoming conceited because of the great surpassing revelations that were given to me, a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me. Because when I'm weak, he goes on to say, Then I'm strong. I feel like that's my life. You know, I'm just thankful for God's grace.

Chris Grainger 1:01:30

Amen. Amen. And let's flip in 180. What's your least favorite thing about the evil one?

Robby Gallaty 1:01:37

The thing about spiritual warfare, people don't realize. My wife gave me this line. We know Satan attacks, we just don't imagine, we just don't expect him to attack the way he does. That's what gets you every time. Like you know Satan's out there, but you don't expect your best friend to turn on you. You don't expect someone you've gone to church with all your life to stack. You don't expect the guy you were in business, you know, business with to turn on you. And that's why I say Satan does not know the future, if you're listening, but he does know the past. He he's like uh he's like an offensive coordinator scouting a team. He reads game film from the past and he puts together a plan and a scheme for the future. So he's not omniscient, he doesn't know the future, but he does know our tendencies. And so once you know how Satan rolls and you understand the script, he does the same script over and over, and you don't get caught off guard with it. So I would just say uh educate yourself uh and and be aware of your consistent, persistent sins in your life. He loves to pull from those in your life, you know, same old, same old.

Chris Grainger 1:02:33

That's right. Amen. Well last question for you, Pastor Robbie, is what do you hope the guys listening remember the most from our conversation today?

Robby Gallaty 1:02:43

Um my mentor R.T. Kendall told me right when the revival started, he said, the greatest freedom in life is to get to the place where you have no one to impress and nothing to prove. And I think it's it's easier said than done. I'm still in remedial classes, but I am learning. And I just leave you with one more. That one's a big one. But the other one is this uh I love this line. But the cheapest, uh the loudest boos come from the cheapest seats in the stadium. The people who go to the Titans games who are drunk and screaming and cursing the team out there in the rafters, but the people who are all in are at the 50 yard line, never receive advice from someone or never receive criticism from someone you wouldn't seek for advice. Never receive criticism. So the online trolls, they don't know you. Don't worry about them. The people who do know you, they'll tell you the truth and they'll do it in love.

Chris Grainger 1:03:33

Amen to that. Amen. This has been absolutely phenomenal. Where do you want to send people to connect with you? All the phenomenal things you're doing, your books, all your resources, your new YouTube channel. Yeah, where would you like to point them to?

Robby Gallaty 1:03:46

Um, my I got a YouTube channel, Pastor Robbie Gallity. Uh, the story I just told you about the revival, it's coming out in a book uh September 22nd. Okay. I wrote the whole thing in a book. It's called Wait Here, W A I T, and there's a slash H-E-A-R. It's a play on words because I was sitting on the par ports, wait here. And the subtitle is Recapturing the Lost Art of Hearing God's Voice. And so I'm really, I'm really proud uh about that work and excited to have that. So that's coming out. And I'm at Longhollow.com. You can follow me uh every week at Longhollow.

Chris Grainger 1:04:16

Amen to that. And highly recommend that, guys. It is one of the top go-to on my podcast feed. So I look forward to every time that drops, it's like, let's go. So, R Pastor Robbie, it's been an honor. Thank you so much. Anything else you'd like to share with today? No, thanks for having me, man. It's been great. Absolutely. Well, I hope you have a wonderful day and blessing, continue blessings for you and Long Hollow in the future.

Robby Gallaty 1:04:36

Thank you.

Chris Grainger 1:04:38

Guys, I told you it was going to be amazing. So thankful for Pastor Robbie for coming on and just for taking the time for his care before and after. We had just a wonderful time talking before recording, after recording. Just just a stand-up guy. I can obviously see how why God is moving in his life and the impact that he's making in Israel. Okay. So hopefully you enjoyed that one. Question of week this week is where are you softening truth to avoid offending others? Look, fellas, if you're softening truth at any areas of your life, be careful. We don't we want to just curb that. We don't want to soften anything. We want to lean in and do what God's called us to do. And that means standing firm on the word of God, fellas. Okay. So look, share this out with others. Take this podcast, particularly if you like this one, share it out with others. Also start listening to Pastor Robbie on the Long Hollow Podcast. I listen to it again every week. This is one I'm constantly going to over and over and over because I get so much value out of it. He's just, he's he's been discipling me for years. He just didn't even know it, right? So go check that

Weekly Question And Sharing Challenge

Chris Grainger 1:05:33

stuff out, fellas. Come back on Friday. We're going to have our member spotlight. We'd love to have you take a part of that just to be a part of our member spotlight, just to see some of our wonderful guys that we have within the line within us. And then again, again, guys, the lionwithin.us is how you connect with us. So we have our daily spiritual kickoff. We have our lion's den. We have our leadership mastermind. We have all the stuff we're doing on the Bible lab, guys. We have so many things that are just absolutely God is doing an incredible work at the line within us. We'd love to walk with you. Okay. So the linewithin.us is how you feel. Find all those resources. And guys, hopefully you'll be encouraged by something there. Okay. Give us a rating and review if you don't mind. That would be awesome. Love to get those. Head over to Amazon, get our book, Unleashing the Lion Within. Guys, we'll see you on the next episode. So have a great day. Get after it. Stand firm. Keep unleashing the Lion Within. It's time to stop battling pornography, lust, and temptation alone. We're done sitting on the sidelines, seeing shame win, and hearing from guys that are fighting private wars with no backup. So we decided it's time to fight back. We have our sexual integrity support group, which is a confidential space inside the lion's den for men who are ready to step into the light and pursue real freedom. This isn't just for guys in crisis, by the way. It's for any man who's tired of the cycle, who's tired of living in secret, who's tired of saying, this is going to be the last time. Look, most guys don't need another app or some rules. They need some brothers to come alongside them to say you're not the only one. This doesn't define you. And freedom is possible. So look, inside our group, you're going to find a confidential, judgment-free forum to engage and ask questions.

Sexual Integrity Support Group

Chris Grainger 1:07:14

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