The Forrest Frank And Cory Asbury Podcast

In this episode, Forest Frank and Cory Asbury sit down with Ruslan to unpack controversial topics, memes, and misunderstandings that recently went viral in the Christian music world. From a broken back to a viral “snip snip” video, the two artists share their perspectives on self-promotion, satire, worship, and the industry’s pitfalls. What started as offense turned into an unexpected collaboration—and a deeper conversation about purity, motives, and calling. Subscribe and leave a review!

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
I mean, even when I posted that video I knew that I'm literally
piggybacking off of a dude with a broken back.
Forrest Frank and another popular Christian artist, Corey
Asbury. There's like the drama between
Forrest Frank and Corey Asbury. I had seen some of Corey's posts
and texted them like yo what's up with this dude A boy?
Forrest, he turned lemons into lemonade.

(00:20):
So I'm sitting here and decided to cook this song up.
I had contacted two different pastors and I was just like,
hey, like this thing was public.I want to address it publicly.
I signed up for mockery from theworld, and I signed up for unity
with my brothers and sisters in Christ.
Some of the conspiracy stuff is like, oh, it's a play.
Force Frank and Corey Asbury thelast few days.

(00:40):
So fake you think what you mean.Unpack it if you believe that
stuff. I was getting phone calls of
like this is all staged. And then the check started
coming in. I was like, oh, then my eyes are
opened to the industry of Christian music.
I'm going to try to forgive him in my heart.
But his post kept going more andmore viral and sure enough he
ended up texting me and said hey.

(01:01):
Bruce LON Hey, thank you so muchfor tuning in to check out this
interview. But before we get into that, I
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(01:22):
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(01:44):
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(02:06):
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Let's jump into the conversation, Corey osberry
force frank baby, hey bet I'm uh.
I'm so grateful to be here with you guys.
I'm so glad you guys want to have this conversation with me.
Yes, Sir. Boris, thank you for reaching

(02:27):
out. Yeah, we're like 25 minutes
away. And we've been like, dude, we
got to hang. I know.
Long time coming. Long time coming, man.
So thank you, Corey. Thank you, man.
You're a guy that rolls with thepunches, bro.
I like it. I like Nashville.
Yeah. Amazing.
You're here from Nashville. And so, yeah, let's let's just
let's just let's just jump rightinto it.
So you have a pretty traumatic situation.

(02:50):
Yeah. Where you, you, you get really
hurt. And every time I watched, every
time you played the video, I would wince and be like, yeah.
And man, I, I think you did something brave, bro.
Where you decided to document it.
I wouldn't have documented it. And, and and I don't know if
that makes me wise or dumb or a coward or what, but you
documented it and, and, and before the world, the tears,

(03:13):
hearing your wife cry in the background and now you're on the
other side of it. So, so tell me like a little bit
about that and how we got here. Yeah.
Can I give you the long? Whatever you want, bro.
You, you're the one that got a heart out.
I don't have to be nowhere. Fair enough.
Fair enough, man. Yeah.
I mean, if I go, if I go way back, I basically I've achieved

(03:38):
every, every single thing I've ever wanted to achieve in music.
I wanted to do certain stuff in music that happened with
surfaces. We reached these heights that I
never thought I would ever reach.
In the midst of those heights, Ijust felt this call from God to

(04:00):
take a step back. And I don't know what that looks
like. So I'm going to try to condense
the story as much as I can, but basically kind of retired in a
way. I didn't really know what was on
the I was kind of just taking one step in front of the other,
like a daily thing. Like it would look like an offer
for a show would come through. I think it's a yes.
I pray about it. It's a no.

(04:20):
Hey, Grace, it's a no. Tell the team it's a no.
And then? Did you really turn down a
Millie to stay? Home I did yeah, yeah, we, we,
we had $1,000,000 offer and thatwas the line in the sand.
That was the line in the sand. And yeah, I put, yeah, we had an
$1,000,000 offer. It was technically like 850,000,
but you put merch on top of thatand stuff like that.

(04:41):
So someone's going to be like, oh, I appreciate.
You know how? It works.
I know how it works. So yeah, anyways, yeah, that was
kind of the line in the sand of almost, I'm trying to think of
like a holy way to say this, butlike kind of like a middle
finger to like to, to, to anything that isn't of God, just
like, you know what God, like I'm your soldier.
I'm going to do whatever you want me to.

(05:02):
And if that means turning down this $1,000,000 offer.
So anyways, that's, that's kind of my reality.
That's where I'm at. I take a step back.
I'm chilling for, I don't know, a year or so and then in the
quiet, God starts to give me a worship song.
It wasn't a bunch, it was just one worship song which was no
longer bound. So I put that out through

(05:24):
District Kid, independently start this new artist project
and it goes crazy, right? Like, I don't know if you were
tracking at all for that, but. You were doing some like lofi
stuff too before that, weren't you?
Like some more I've. Tried.
Yeah, I've tried a bunch of things and I've always had a
heart for worship. But in the same way that you're
saying you have blessed God because you don't want to put

(05:45):
your name on your, your branding, that was my heart too.
I was like, I don't want to I'm going to brand my worship.
I'm going to release my worship through Distrokid and like
receive money that, that, that Ididn't like that.
And so I just took a, a non approach.
I'm just not going to do it because I don't want to
bastardize a holy thing. But then later, once I had these

(06:08):
worship songs, this there's no longer bound.
I feel like I was telling me to put it out.
So put it out. Then the floodgates opened and
he just started using me to to make all these songs.
Then I put out. I was like 80 songs or something
in like a in the span of a year because it just kept going, kept
going, kept going. So I guess the reason I, I, I, I

(06:30):
say that is I'm on one giant side mission that I never
thought I was going to go on. All of my needs and all of my
wildest dreams were the, the boxes were all checked before
this happened. So all of this is just this
crazy bonus mission that I'm on.And yeah, just like touring.

(06:53):
I'd, I'd, I don't, I have no interest in touring, but then I
feel like God's telling me to tour and I'm like, OK, go.
Like I'm your soldier, God. I'm going to do what you want me
to do. So all that being said, I did
the last tour. I knew you.
You came to the San Diego show, the first.
Time I went to both. You went to both.
It was. Great.
It was, it was, it was phenomenal, amazing.

(07:13):
And I've said this publicly about you, I'll say the CFA,
it's like you stopping and engaging with my son and his
friends, like means the world tothem and means the world to me.
And I think like we people can like dunk on Christian music or
whatever. It's Tupac.
Like you don't get it until you have kids, you know what I mean?
And then seeing how people actually engage with you,
Lecrae, like whatever It's it's like, yeah.

(07:34):
So I've seen, I saw both shows. I saw the arena show, which was
nuts, you know? And, and so, yeah, I've, I've
seen it first hand, but I didn'tjust, I had the privilege of
seeing how you interact with people, like how you treat
people like your heart and your,you're going to stop.
And, and you're, you were, dude,you had like a shirt off and you
were like running a back. Say you just sitting there just
talking to me and my 10 year oldfor we chatted for like 10-15

(07:55):
minutes, you know, so I thought that was really cool.
So anyway, I, I, I don't mean tointerrupt, but yeah.
Well, I appreciate you saying that.
Yeah, I love, I love that. Sorry, I, I side tangent on
that, not that you're even asking about that, but we got to
me, me and my buddy Noah got to witness to some pretty high
profile people, which was reallyexciting.

(08:18):
But earlier that day there was aguy outside of Best Buy and I
got to witness to him just one-on-one and they were equally
exciting. And I was telling my friend
Noah, it's so fun when you follow the Lord because it's, he
leaves the 99 for the one. Come on.
It's, it's just all, it's just so good.
It's always so good. So all right, back to the story.

(08:40):
It's on this, I'm on this bonus mission.
I do this tour. I'm I'm recognizing that God is
blowing up. There's blown up my music,
right? Do this, this arena tour and I'm
just like, OK, there's a milliondirections I can go with this.
I can go do 100 shows. I could go tour overseas, you

(09:02):
know, I could put out a bunch ofalbums or I could not do that
and I want to do what God tells me.
So I took a 2 month break from social media.
One month was just like vacationing with the famine
stuff, just being present with them.
And then the next month I did a daily 30 day journal where I
didn't, I wasn't on social mediastraight up just on the journal
asking God, what do you want me to do with my career?

(09:24):
Like here, here is my career at the altar.
And he he gave me these ideas about this.
Well, technically it was I had this visual of the wave Nazare
is like a picture he gave me. The wave Nazare is 2 wedges that
collide to make 100 foot wave. And I felt like I was saying,

(09:45):
Hey, your, your music, like the two ring and stuff.
That's a that's a 50 foot wave. That's like that's one wedge,
but I have this other wedge for you, if you're willing to work
on it, that's going to make 100 foot wave.
So I'm like, OK, all right, so journalist, I've done it.
And I feel like I was saying, I want you to start capturing your
music in real time. Stop marketing, stop making a

(10:05):
song and then brainstorming how to make it do well on social
media. Just capture the moment, OK.
And so I'm in my journal practically asking, God, what do
you like? What does that mean?
You want me to buy some more camera equipment?
Yeah, I buy this kid. So then I'm on Amazon.
I order this camera equipment. And yeah, Long story short,
finish the journal and I made two songs with that in mind.

(10:29):
So I hit record and then I made a song in like 4 or five hours
and then I edited the video and then like there it was OK, cool,
this is my new path and that that'll come out at some point.
But I, I had to hit the pause button and I made this other
song where it was like watching our wedding video in real time

(10:49):
and then making a song to it in real time, watching the wedding
video and just just cool concepts like that.
So anyways, I'm ready to launch that.
And then I break my back on camera.
So back's broken. I have a weird piece the whole
time. Like you can see in the footage,
like I'm in extreme pain, right?And I'm just kind of like, like,

(11:14):
I don't know. I just remember feeling like the
the presence of Holy Spirit and even in the IT gave me a
stretcher and put me in the ambulance.
I remember just crying in the ambulance, not from the pain,
but just 'cause I felt his presence heavy just like I was
in like a worship and I was justlike, well, God's going to use
me in a big way. He's going to use this.
I feel it. And even like the nurse, so I'm

(11:34):
far from rambling here, but likethe nurse, her son and her dad's
name were Forest and she was a fan of the music and stuff and
just weird down. I felt very connected, like
there's a lot of kind of synchronicities with it.
So anyways, I get back, I'm now laying in my bed and I feel the
prompt from God like, hey, this is this is it.
This is what the journal was about.

(11:55):
I'm like, oh, OK, so you what you have is exceedingly more
abundant than what we can do. All we can do is just show up.
We here in part we see in part. OK, I get it.
This is the reality thing. So I asked Grace to go
downstairs and get my camera equipment and I, I hit record
while I'm getting into bed was when that, because everyone's

(12:18):
like, what do you mean you pulled out a camera and captured
your, yourself crying with you? I was like, I didn't mean to.
I hit record because what I was going to do is I had like 5
hours of runtime on the camera, hit record.
She was going to help me in the bed and then she was going to
leave for five hours. So I could just see what
happened on camera. And we captured that moment.

(12:38):
And then, yeah, like I'm laying down and the record button and
the first thing I'm out, guys got my back and I make God's got
my back. On the caption for that post, I
said turning lemons into lemonade.
That same day, the figs have thesong that they made, like, hey,

(12:58):
Forrest, Frank, we made a song for you.
It's called the Lemonade, Turning lemons into lemonade.
So I'm just, I'm experiencing this in real time, just like,
whoa, this was it. God was preparing me for this
moment. And so now I'm playing this like
it's almost like I'm playing tennis with my reality.
Like like here, like I'm just pulling my phone, like
eliminated. OK, cool, I'll make a song with

(13:19):
that. Then boom, that happens.
And then like now Torn Wells is praying for me with 5000 people
or something at a show and just it genuinely like I felt it in
my spirit. And then, yeah, I just kept
going back and forth, back and forth.
And I'm just capturing everything in real time because
I've got nothing better to do. And I feel like God's calling me

(13:41):
to do that. And then here's another
interesting part going back to the first thing I said.
All of all of the boxes are checked.
This is all a bonus mission. I don't do this for money.
We get offers for shows out the wazoo.
I don't take any of them. It's the answer's no unless God

(14:01):
says it's a yes. And so I took I think 3 or 4
shows this year. That's it.
I had a show that is the Iowa State Fair three weeks after I
broke my back and I was wrestling with that.
I was like, God, why did you tell me to accept that show if
I'm going to cancel it? And so sure enough, two weeks

(14:22):
after I broke my back, it was the day that I had to announce
that I was supposed to cancel the Iowa State Fair.
I woke up and I was fine. Wow.
So ended up accepting it, did the show, The Figs popped out,
we performed Lemonade live. And so I'm just in this crazy
reality show of favor. And yeah, that's.

(14:43):
And externally, the outside person is going to look and say,
Hey, forest, all this stuff is going up.
All this stuff is getting bigger, right?
The songs are bigger. Number one song massive shows,
right? Social media is exploding.
People are praying for you, right?
And so it, I think the, the, theexternal thought would be, well,

(15:03):
you put this stuff on the Internet, the Internet is going
to be the Internet. They're going to take stuff and
they're going to wildlife, right?
And right. That's a good way to.
Say it is going to be the Internet so so so now it's like
hey this is content and and I think some people are like well
this is free game now right likethis is free game and I think
you've navigated this in a way where you're like like I'm not

(15:25):
going to tell you guys what to do or what not to do However,
the I I I put my most traumatic moment on the Internet and I'm
on the other side of a miracle yesterday Amen but that was
still real man and my wife is crying you hear your wife crying
you're crying and so am I kind of summarizing your heart
towards the some of the meme stuff that came now the.

(15:47):
Internet is going to be the Internet every single post.
It you know, it's doing well when people are shredding you in
a post, because that means it's that means it means it's
reaching non followers. Yeah, exactly.
It's reaching non followers. So that's that is a goal of mine
to see random haters. Like this is the worst song I've
ever heard of what's going on. So yeah, you want you want to

(16:08):
see that happen and to that notion like that's a joy.
Like it's a joy to to see like something doing well and like,
oh, cool. It's it's it's working where I
started to feel a little funky had actually, I mean, this has
been a year or two and and I guess in the making is watching
Christian accounts start to do jabs.

(16:32):
I'm not against Christian comedy.
I think some of these videos arehilarious, but there's some
pointed things that are jabiness.
But I mean, especially in the comments section.
It's not just the creators, it'sthe creators will create.
It's kind of like a cesspool. Like it's, it's just like the
comment section is just a an environment where now everyone

(16:53):
can just dunk on on something orsomeone and let.
Me just say this prior to this, the the feedback and you had a
pretty fun, fun song that peoplethought was about forest, which
which the feedback was, oh, forest is too happy.
It's too positive. It's just everything is Peaches
and this and this and so and I was like, OK, I I get it.

(17:14):
But again, as a dad, I'm like, that's what I want my kids to
listen to. Like I want my kids to praise
Jesus and the music be vibing right when you walk through
this. I, I go, well goodness, if this,
this isn't, this isn't a personalike this isn't a, this isn't a
shtick like he just showed. You going through finally I have
a trial so you. Yeah, like this is really who

(17:36):
this dude is. So in that like, I like, I like,
I under like. So like the critique was that
and then I feel like you went through this process, you showed
everybody this who you are. And to me, I would go, well, why
aren't we celebrating that like as a Christian community, like
like the people that made the songs making fun or the post
making fun. Why not go, man, this dude's
really the real deal. Like this is not a shtick,

(17:56):
right? And I think it's, and I don't
want to get too sociological, but there's this concept of like
punching up. And because you're a white dude
who's highly successful, it's cool to punch up.
And so in Christian comedy, we're, we're, we're punching at
the celebrity pastors, we're punching up at the guys who are
the, the biggest things. And I, I understand that from a
humor standpoint, but then from a humanity standpoint, I think

(18:18):
it can get weird, you know, and that's kind of where, where
you're getting at. It's like the cesspool, the
let's just dunk on people. Right.
Yeah. And I guess specifically with
this moment, yeah, there's, there's there's jokes where
people are making it and I thought it was hilarious.
I'm not, I'm not saying don't make fun of me like, but there

(18:40):
is. I don't know, I saw, I saw one
where they had taken the clip ofme crying out to Jesus.
And then the caption was like when I want to help my.
My wife or. Something, yeah, when I like
don't have toilet paper or something.
It was just like, yo chill. I, I, I, I know the creator that
did that. We had a conversation about
that. I know exactly who you're

(19:00):
talking about. And he's, he's actually a
friend. So I I was like you kind of wild
for this brother. Yeah.
And I, yeah, yeah. So I don't know.
I, yeah, I think if, if I was perfect, I'm not perfect.
If I was perfect, I could just look at that and laugh, right?
Because I don't think he's I, I,I know he's not meaning
anything. I'll by that, right.

(19:22):
It's just kind of like that's, that's where our, our brain
goes. Like my brain goes that stuff.
Like when, when, when something crazy happens, I almost just
immediately want to make a joke about it.
Like with when I'm with my siblings in the group chat, Like
we'll, we'll, we'll crack jokes and stuff.
But yeah, there's just a couple of them.
And I, and I think maybe the main tipping point was like, I

(19:43):
would see comments saying, oh, I'm sure Forrest is best friends
with these guys make like this is just how they connect.
And like I've never, I've never met these people and they're
making these posts and they're going so viral.
And like, I felt like I just wanted to say something just to
say, hey, I don't love it. That's all I wanted to say.

(20:03):
Just just just so it's out there, y'all can keep joking but
just so you know, I don't love it.
OK, let me ask you this. Would it have been different if
you were friends with some of them?
If they'd sent it to my phone, yeah.
OK, so if someone says, hey, we're homies, they put we did

(20:27):
the snip snip song. He sends it to you.
Hey, what do you think about this?
I think it's pretty funny. And then you you got it.
Well, how would you have felt? About that, if he had sent me
the the snip snip thing directly, it's.
Killing me. I I still wouldn't have loved
it. OK, and and so then let me ask

(20:51):
you this and Corey, I I kind of want to get some of the context
because you're also you're not just a guy that popped up on the
Internet, right. And when I get there, so but
before I get there, like, So what was it about the Snip Sip
song where it felt like a personal attack more than just a
silly song? I think it was so if he, if he
had done that and just send it to me, it would have been
catered to just me and I would have felt that in intention.

(21:15):
But you could feel the intentionof like, I hope this goes viral
and you can't really escape the feeling of like, OK, that that
post had 67,000 shares on it andlike whatever, 60,000 likes and
millions of years or whatever. I, I can't help but feel like
that is an army of people pointing their finger like Bah

(21:37):
ha ha, ha ha ha ha. And like, you know what I'm
saying? So I think that's, I think that
it's just the intention maybe. Only it was also probably the
straw that broke the camel's back.
You know, there maybe there was a lot of that if you were
happening. If yours, yeah, if yours was the
first post, it would be like, OK, that's that's funny that
someone is doing a parody of this.
But it was just like, OK, it, italmost seemed like all and I'm,

(22:01):
I may have been in kind of a psychosis about this or
whatever. I was chronically online because
I was like in bed, right? But it it almost seemed like all
the Christian accounts had turned to this like kind of
every time I got on my phone, itwas like a new creator make
saying something about it, making fun of this, making fun
of that using as a platform, which granted, it was like a

(22:21):
very viral moment, which makes sense why they would.
And again, I'm just trying to iffor you, it sounds like because
this was like you, you lived through it, that it was a bit
more closer than just content, even though it was content,
meaning you really walk through this and people can say, oh,
like, that's the darkest thing you've ever went through for us.

(22:43):
Like must be nice, You know whatI mean?
It's like, well, that's still his reality.
Like in that reality, you reallydidn't know if you were going to
hold your kids again. You really didn't know if you
were going to walk again. So in that it was still real to
you. And and just because it was
shared with the world, that doesn't mean that then therefore
it's free to make comedy out of.Sure, yeah.
And, and and in this regard, like I'm just following what I

(23:05):
felt like God told me to do. And so in real time I'm trying
to work on my heart as well. I'm just like talking to I'm
praying, I'm just like, Lord, fix my heart.
I I don't want to feel like this.
I'm not trying to be hurt by this, but I can't help that it
hurts. Lord, help me, help me, help me.
Like I'm digging for scripture like it's a it's to one man's
glory that he should overlook anoffense.

(23:26):
And I'm just praying that Lord help me overlook this offense.
Why, why can't like, why doesn'tit work and, and every day by
like midday. So in the morning I would like
see a post. It would upset me by midday.
I've prayed and I'm now cleansedof it.
And then by the evening there's a new post that I have to like
get resolved from. And that's why I was like, I

(23:47):
just want to throw up my hands and be like, guys, let me just.
Which ones did you? Which ones did you laugh at
though? I thought the, I thought the
like, there's a couple people that did like you're trying to
force Frank your career and they're like, they're like
looking over at like a skateboard break the leg.

(24:10):
Could I? That's good.
Yeah, that's pretty funny. OK.
So, so Corey, you're also comingat this like we you're since
you're like exploding on the Internet for your personality
and and and some of your hot takes, but then you also have
this pretty gnarly background with reckless love and just

(24:32):
being AI mean a big, a bit of a staple in the evangelical
Christian worship world. And you've been called a heretic
because you use the word reckless, like just the
stupidest was just so you know, as much as I've defended you
privately, I've defended you decades ago.
Like this is this is stupid. Like it's not because people,
because like the time is all thereform people is all the the

(24:55):
theology nerds, which I was, youknow, I, I like some of that
stuff. And it was like, well, the the
love of God is never reckless. I'm like, it's a song.
Like it's it's poetry. It's it's poetry.
It's embellishing there. He's not.
That's not a theological statement.
So I want you to know, like, I've defended you privately
before there was an Internet. Thank you, my friend.
Right. And and I thought the critique

(25:16):
was always weird. Like, that's just such AI don't
know such a stupid thing. And I saw it in the comments
recently, like, like recently, like, oh, yeah.
The love of God is never reckless, right?
It's reckless to man. It's our view of, yeah, you're
like, you're like, it's whatever.
You. It's whatever you want it to
mean, man. It's so it's so you're on the
Internet now and you, you're kind of within the space.
You have this big record, but you're also doing other stuff

(25:39):
and, and, and, and touching other genres.
And to me, it seems like some ofthe stuff is a bit cathartic for
you. And you shared a little bit
about in that video about like your own upbringing and humor
and, and how that's always been a thing.
Tell me a little bit about that and just how how you're kind of
watching the landscape of all this stuff.
Yeah, I mean, I, I came up in Kansas City leading worship 12

(26:01):
hours a week, 6/2 hour sets at aplace called the House of
Prayer, which has come under a lot of scrutiny lately.
We won't get into that, hopefully.
And I made zero money. You know, I made $500 a month.
My wife and I got married. We made $700.00 a month.
We had our first kid there leading worship so much because

(26:23):
I loved the presence of God and I loved singing to Him.
So, you know, I'm coming from nothing in this space in my
heart is just, I want to worshipGod.
I want to love God, and this is what I do.
So all of a sudden a song pops off a few years into this, but
I've got this foundation that's like, I don't care.

(26:43):
You know, the rooms were not full when I was leading worship
back in that day. There was literally three people
in the room most of the time. So when I'm leading worship, I
want purity. So this song pops off right?
Reckless love goes nuts. And, and back then, virality,
virality was a little different,but it's still existed.

(27:03):
And on the Internet, it was going nuts on CCLI, which is,
you know, church licensing, basically churches playing the
song. It was going nuts and it was, it
was beautiful. I, I considered it such a
blessing and it, it was so amazing.
But as I got deeper into that world the the Christian music

(27:24):
industry and saw how it was, especially within the worship
space, I saw so many people perverting it because they saw
that when you write a song that blows up in the church and makes
a lot of money. Can you explain CCLI?
Because that's a thing that onceyou discover and you go, whoa,
it's crazy. And there's a lot of folks that
have became extremely successfuland wealthy off of CCLI.

(27:46):
Some have deconverted, some havewalked away and you know, and
it's just a weird, it's just a weird, it's a.
Polarizing thing. So, so CCLI, I think it's church
copyright licensing, incorporation or something like
that. Incorporated or something.
Basically every time a church sings a copyrighted song, they

(28:07):
put it up on the screens, right?So the, so the people can listen
to it and sing along. They have to pay for a license,
typically a blanket license for a year depending on how big
their church is, to put those lyrics up on the screen, which
is crazy. So Reckless Love was #1 on CC
Live for two years. And I didn't understand what

(28:29):
that was going to mean financially at that time.
And some of my friends who had had a number one were like, bro,
trust me, when these checks comein, you're going to freak out.
Like, get your tax attorneys ready.
And I was like, whatever, dude, Like the it's not a reality.
Like, that's not going to happen.
And then the check started coming in and I was like, oh,
OK, they weren't messing around.But then my eyes are opened to

(28:54):
the industry of Christian music,which is to me a very
unfortunate. Even calling it an industry
makes my heart a little grieved because again, I come from zero
people in the room, $700.00 a month in Kansas City in a in a
one bedroom apartment because I loved God and I wanted to sit in

(29:16):
the prayer room and just worshiphim as much as I possibly could.
So I start seeing that and and again, the equation is you write
the song that blows up in the church, you are within about a
year an instant millionaire. And it doesn't stop depending on
what that song is like. And reckless love has gone like
this, which is crazy. Like it it hasn't stopped.

(29:39):
And and there are probably few songs that have done that, but I
just saw, you know, like, like Ezekiel's temple, like he sees
all the junk in the temple and starts freaking out.
I felt like when I was given theopen door into that industry, I
started seeing it all. And when I want nothing to do

(30:00):
with any of this, it's so reckless.
Love is taking off. It's 2018 and my wife and I are,
you know, seeing all this and going.
We have to make a change. So we very similar to Forest
with with surfaces and all the things that he's chosen.
He's chosen the better part so many times and that's what I

(30:21):
admire about Forest. We just went, we're taking a
whole year off at the height of this.
My manager hated me, my label hated me because it was so
monetarily successful. We could have gone and done the
tours and done all those things and we just went, we want to
save our family and we want to save our hearts.

(30:42):
Then we took the entirety of 2019 off.
We didn't do anything. No shows.
I didn't write, I didn't, I didn't, you know, release music,
none of that. And we just took that time off.
So that if, if people know that about my background, I think
that's helpful context for when I'm poking holes satirically,

(31:05):
you know, through all these videos that are very pointed,
like they're pretty intense for the most part.
And I'm sure you've alluded to afew of those, but I'm poking
holes because I want purity, I want authenticity, I want
humility. I want people to actually do
things for the right reasons andthe right motives.
And the quickest way for me to communicate that is typically a

(31:27):
minute long satire video that's making fun of something probably
pretty pointed. But the point is, hey, let's do
this the right way. Typically, sometimes I miss it,
sometimes I'm I'm a little off, but that's the goal for me.
I want purity in that space. So I stepped away from that
space, started making other music, whatever.
So that's that's kind of where I'm coming from and all that.

(31:51):
Yeah, that's awesome. Now I reacted to a video of
yours and we ended up connectingand was like we got to chat.
Was that video satire and and? And what was it?
The one where I was talking about self promotion?
Yeah. No, I was dead serious.
Dead serious. Dead serious.
OK, I believe so. So.
What was that one? The video that you're referring
to is I'm just selfie style. Someone asked the question, Hey

(32:13):
Corey, what are the pitfalls that you see young artists fall
into in the Christian music industry or the CI?
Can't remember CCM or Christian.I can't remember worship.
I can't remember how they said it.
So I just no filters, no holds barred.
Went in on the self promotion that I see on the Internet from

(32:35):
these young artists who so badlywant to break, they so badly
want to make it so they'll sell their souls to anything.
And often that thing is the Internet and they're on there
talking about, you know, we I won't even get into what they're
talking about, but self promotion is antithetical to the

(32:56):
way of Jesus. It's it's like Moses striking
the rock when, when God was like, hey, bro, I'm going to
take care of you. Don't worry.
Like it's all good. And Moses like, I can't wait and
he hits the rock. You know, it's to me, it's not
trusting God's goodness to breakyou when it's time, meaning,
meaning to give you success whenit's time.

(33:19):
Because often times what happensis I see these young artists
come up, they're super talented,but their talent outweighs their
anointing. You know?
So what I mean by that is they're so talented, they get
put to the top and they're leading huge conferences, but
their actual capacity to deal with the success is here.

(33:41):
So their lives blow up in two years.
They lose their wife, they lose their family.
And then you hear about them andthey're a statistic, which is a
huge bummer to me. So what they did is they sold
their souls to that success because they wanted it for so
long. It came along they didn't have
the platform and their spirit todeal with it.
And they, their lives implode. So I look at, you know, Sarah

(34:03):
and Abraham, God's like, I'm going to give you as many kids
as the stars in the sky. And, and they both kind of laugh
and, and they're like, there's no chance God's going to be
faithful to that. And they bring along Hagar and
they produce this for all intents and purposes, bastard
child, who, you know, is a completely different thing.
And I am an Ishmael by all means.

(34:24):
Oh, Ishmael was called a wild donkey, a wild ass.
He kicks against the goads like Ishmael rips apart those
religious, you know, constructs.And I love that Ishmael spirit,
but it was born out of a place of not trusting God to break and
do what he was supposed to do. So I think people build a
theology out of necessity and they go, I've got to travel 250

(34:47):
days a year. I've got to post my stuff on the
Internet because if I don't, God's not going to take care of
it. I'm going to have no success.
Absolute BS Force is an example of that.
I am an example of that. Reckless Love had zero
marketing, zero budget whatsoever.
It just was organic and it was viral.
It's just how it took place. And everyone looks at us and

(35:10):
goes, well, you have this, you know, you've, you've got this
soapbox because you got so much money from that thing.
They don't realize that thing came from simply loving and
worshipping God. Revelation comes, I realize I'm
a piece of garbage and God stillloves me, still wants me.
And I write the song Reckless Love from that place.

(35:32):
Boom, it goes nuts. So people who say, Oh well, it's
easy for you to say with your millions of dollars, I didn't
come from that place. I came from God, you better do
it or it's not going to happen. I did not want that self
promotion. So do I still talk about my
songs on the Internet? Yes.
But it's a heart motive and intention that I'm trying to get
at. Do it with pure motive and I'm

(35:54):
I'm good. Tell people about your song.
It's going to bless people. It's going to change people's
life. It's just this fear that we're
not going to make it without him.
That is so frustrating to me. And that is a pitfall that I see
young people fall into. OK, no, that makes sense.
So, so can I, can I push a little bit?
Absolutely. OK, So this is this is what I
think it's, I think our contextsare very different when you're
coming from the CCLICC AM world.I'm coming from the Christian

(36:18):
hip hop world. Totally.
I think the issue within the Christian hip hop world, and
I've said this repeatedly, is I think there's a little bit of
what you're describing, but I think generally there isn't the
humility to do the inputs to getthe outputs.
So they look at forests or they look at Nick D or they look at
Connor and they look at these guys and they go, Oh, it must be
nice. It's like, but but you're not

(36:40):
doing any of the things that they do.
Like your marketing is you putting a camera on a tripod and
lip syncing to your song. There's no thought, there's no
creativity, there's no story. There's no, there's no skits
because oh, that's cringy. I don't want to do a skit like
Connor price. That's cringy, right?
And it's like, dude, you, you'renot doing the inputs.
And I just went to Holy Smoke Fest.
Like I think Christian hip hop is better than the world and has

(37:03):
been for a long time. And it's not just me, it's guys
like Foggy Raw that are like, you guys are better than
anything I've seen in the world.However, we have to do the
inputs to get the outputs right.So I think our context is
different. Like I'm coming from a place of
like immense poverty, people struggling, people coming from
trauma. And yes, you're right.
I think some of them, if they were to blow up it, it may ruin
them, But others are like not even able to sustain themselves

(37:26):
and they're growing frustrated and disoriented.
And then it creates this resentment and this bitterness
to folks who have made it. And then like a guy like Nick D
is like, I'm here to help. Like I did a whole book, I did a
podcast, I got Freddie for artists and they're not willing
to do it. So I think that the issue that I
would I would just push back on is that motive is a tricky
thing. Absolutely.
And can't judge. Motive can't judge.

(37:47):
I can't see it right, you know, only God can.
And it is a fallacy. It's called the appeal to motive
fallacy, where people will look and say, oh, well, Forrest just
wants this, this and this and hewants to be more famous.
It's like you don't know Forrest's heart.
I don't know your heart. You don't know my heart.
And I think that those of us whoare in Christ Jesus Philippians
says that, you know, it's the, it's the verse, work out your
salvation with fear and trembling.
And the very next verse after that says, for it is God who has

(38:09):
worked in you, giving you the desire and the power to obey
him. Yeah.
So I think we have a new heart, new desire.
I think what you're, what you'recautioning, I think is real.
Like I think it's super real. But I think within our context,
like I'm like, I'm at Smoke Festand I'm like, this is the this
is the best thing I've ever beento, period.
And I've been to all the big hiphop festivals.
Yeah. Why is there not 10,000 people
here? Why is there not 20,000 people

(38:30):
here? Yeah.
And then when you look at people's socials, with the
exception of a handful of peoplelike Dill and a handful, most
people aren't doing the inputs yet.
Yeah. And I want them to do the
inputs. I want them to study and
understand skits and understand story and understand there all
the things you crush on. Well bro, the we're coming from
two different worlds. 100% I love that push back.
I'm I'm an aide on the enneagram.
I am an arguer to the Max. I love it.

(38:52):
My love language, it's fun. So we're coming from two
different worlds. And and to me, there's a slight
nuance of language, self promotion versus promotion or
telling your story. Telling your story is so
important. Connecting people to story.
It's what he's brilliant at, brilliant at that was.
Going to be my next question is like how would you define the
difference for me? Yeah, OK, so, so for me again,

(39:15):
always heart motive and intention.
But in my world, the worship world, which is where I come
from, people know reckless love.They know me from back in the
day where I LED 12 hours a week in a prayer room with three
people. If I say come to my worship
night and I ask you to spend $75on it, I have a problem with

(39:36):
that. OK, I have a massive problem
with that because I am monetizing the cross.
I'm monetizing anointing. I'm monetizing me being a better
worship leader than your Joe Blow at Sunday, you know, on on
Sunday morning at your church. That's literally what I'm
saying. Hey, I'm actually better at
this. Come hear me.
That's an arrogant take. Not only is it arrogant, but

(39:58):
it's monetizing something that Ibelieve was not supposed to be
monetized. So, so to me, that's the
different self promotion. To me, looks like the scripture.
Don't let your left hand know what your right hand's not
doing. So when I do something
charitable or when I walk out tothe street and there's a
homeless man, I give him $100. If Forrest, if I tell Forrest,
hey bro, I'm about to do this, please get your phone out.

(40:19):
This is going to be powerful on the Internet.
People are going to really like this.
I think that's crappy personally.
Me, other people might feel great about that, but I look at
it and I go, I'm not trying to show people what an amazing
person. When I leave $100 tip at the
restaurant, I'm not asking my buddy to accidentally video and
go, oh, this might go viral. People going to think he's so

(40:40):
generous. I want to do it in secret
because what Jesus said about those folks is he goes, you have
your reward. And what he meant was, I hope
it's good enough for you right now because it doesn't exist in
eternity. You're not getting anything on
the back end. There's no back end on this deal
for you, brother, and that's what I'm cautioning people
against. I love that.
Do it before God and don't do itso that people say good things

(41:04):
about you. Tell your story.
This dude is brilliant at that. You know, tell your story.
That's beautiful. Yeah, yeah.
So I, I love that. And this is this is.
So now this is what I get. OK.
And I'm sure you can relate to this.
All my single buddies and all mybuddies that are like dating,
engaging, the biggest thing theytell me is, hey, we want to see
more of your family. Like we come here, we kick it to
you. You get to see your kids, you
get to see your wife. Like this is so they literally

(41:25):
just come over and just kick it like with my family.
And they're like, we need to seemore of that and the world needs
more of that. And I go, but I don't want to
put that on social media, right?I don't want to put I don't put
my wife on social media. I don't do that.
But they're saying, hey, we needto see more of that.
So I I. I don't know, Corey, where that
line is in terms of man, what isthe world need versus what can

(41:45):
Ioffer. I am very private about my
family, but I hear a lot of people saying, hey, we need to
see more of that. And so there are folks that are
like, man, that like Bryce Crawford going out and preaching
and like walking up on the people and like pro like I'm
like, I, I look at that and I go, I, I wouldn't do it that
way. However, praise God, right?

(42:05):
Praise God that he's doing it. So so that I don't know where
that line is. I think, I think where
everything you said is valid nowwith yesterday name in that.
I just know that when I and I know people are blessed by that
because they feel emboldened andthey go, Bryce Crawford did it.
I can go share my faith now. We all should be sharing our
faith like all the time. We all should be very generous
with how we tip all the time. I'm with you in that like
throwing it up on Instagram kindof it's.

(42:26):
A little self-serving. It's a little self-serving, but
I think there are people that doit and I think it works.
So I don't know if you guys got thoughts on it.
You and your family, you've beenintentional with that.
Yeah, we don't show our, there may be some baby photos of our
son, but we don't show him anywhere.
But two thoughts I had one, I was already thinking about Bryce
Crawford cuz he was saying I mayhave asked him about that.

(42:48):
He was saying sometimes they just don't turn the camera on
and sometimes they do. And he'll, he'll ask God, he'll
like, he'll check, check my intentions.
God, if I have any sort of like,oh, I think this is going to do
well. They'll just do it without the
camera on. And for me personally this
literally like last week I spentall day like 5-6 hours on a post

(43:08):
and right before I hit post I said Lord can I post this He
said no. I was a little bummed when you
texted me that. I was like, I kind of like that
one. Yeah, it was, it was like a full
recap, which is nice because nowI'm kind of explaining here, but
I did like a full recap of everything.
I'm like, oh, this is just goingto make everything so clear.
And God was like, no, like I, I,I defend you, don't defend.

(43:30):
You let me defend you. Almost like what you're saying
with the back end, Like there's your reward, whatever, whatever,
you know, social favour you get from explaining yourself here,
that's your reward. But am I not powerful enough to
go touch every single person's heart out there?
I was. Instantly gratifying to you,
yes, in the moment, right? But maybe God wanted to do a

(43:52):
whole lot. More exactly.
So yeah, that's that's the balance is try put your best
foot forward, go do the marketing thing.
Yeah. And then before you hit post,
just say, Lord, was this was this you?
Am I allowed to do this? Yeah, because to your to your
point, people just don't even try because that's where I
that's where I used to be. I said I'd I'm a worshipper, but

(44:12):
I don't want to put out worship music because I don't want to
bastardize this thing. And then it never gets shared
because I'm afraid of my own intentions.
What is that? Yeah, it's fear.
Yeah, some of that's fair. And I and I would also say like,
again, like props to to to Brandon Lake, props to Phil
Wickham. Like Phil, I consider Phil a
friend. I think you guys go to the same
church. Yeah.
I think what they're doing stadiums, I think it's huge
whether or not they're branding into worship.
I, I'm with you in that like saying worship night and then

(44:34):
charging feels weird, you know, but there's people that feel
weird that we sell a 60 day devotional that I spent 10s of
thousands of dollars putting together.
There's people that are mad that.
Christians want it for free. Everyone wants it for free.
So there's also that like, see, we told you they're just in it
for the money. And it's like, no, no, no, there
is an economic side to even giving people free Bibles.
Like someone's paying for that, you know.

(44:56):
So I'm, I'm with you. I just think that they that they
just they're more idiosyncrasiesto some.
Of that, oh, there's, there's somuch nuance.
Yeah, this is this is maybe not the best parallel, but it takes
me back to they'll say somethingabout adoption and it's like,
oh, well, the the kid can just what do you mean?
Oh, oh, churches aren't steppingup enough in adoption.
How about you, as the church member, adopt the child and

(45:17):
they're like, woah, no, no, I don't want to.
So it's like as soon as you givethem the resolution.
So you're like, OK, so now all Christian concerts are free.
Now. Now what?
That didn't do anything in my heart.
My heart's still broken. Yeah.
So it's an it's you can't satiate the the heart problem.
That's good. That's good.
OK, so let's get to how we got this amazing record from you 2.

(45:41):
And if I may, and, and let me just say this like I'm so pro
you guys, both of you guys, I want to give people the timeline
because there's been some criticism about it that I feel
is just unwarranted. And then we'll get into some
questions about some of the the idiosyncrasies around that.
So can we just give people the actual timeline?
Because people some of the conspiracy stuff is like, oh,
it's a it's a play. They have this all mapped out,

(46:04):
which I think is extremely unfair.
The bummer, I guess the bummer to me, First off is like this
song, like songs never have to happen to me.
They're just these like beautiful gifts that just keep
coming and stuff. So that really bums me out.
The people think that this was some sort of a fabricated thing
to like to get a song out. Yeah.

(46:25):
And, and many times we would text back and forth and go,
should we just not drop the songafter we'd finished it?
And we were both kind of like, we're good with that.
Like we're, we're fine with that.
And I think the greater good of the song actually touching
people outweighed, you know, almost the virtual virtue
signalling of like, we just won't drop the song.

(46:46):
Like neither of us need money, literally.
Virtue signalling is exactly what that was.
Which is in one of my videos that I couldn't post.
I was. Like I was like.
Look guys, yeah, we like, don't you have to drop some?
So yeah, I guess I had had a couple things.
I even like screenshot of them, but I don't have to share them.

(47:07):
But like I have, I have the receipts that show that between
me and my friends over the course of, I don't know, a year
or whatever, I had seen some of Corey's posts and texted them
like, yo, what's up with this dude?
Like is he like I think? Everybody had that moment with
me, honestly. Yeah.

(47:27):
And so because I I didn't know you like deeply.
And so I'm like, OK, what's I, Idon't, I don't really know how
to pinpoint it, but just like, is this guy lost straight up?
Like is, is, is he walking with the Lord?
I don't really understand it because he's like, he's a
worship leader, but then he's kind of doing his country thing.
So is that, is that a lukewarmness?
That's, that's just kind of like, I'm making all these

(47:48):
assumptions without even talkingto him, right?
Which is. Questions honestly and to to be
I I'm not those are good questions like legit.
So, but yeah, I hadn't, I hadn'ttalked to him about it just had
like when I'd be on like a tour bus or in the green room or he'd
post something like what's up with the with this quarry guy?
And anyways, when he posted that, it was like you you'd

(48:12):
mentioned that term for like kind of the straw that.
Broke the camel's back. What are we talking about?
What did I post? The sniff, sniff.
I had to get to do it one last time.
Yeah, so he did that and I was like, man, I had like I said
that that that tennis match withreality.
So like the lemonade do the thing.

(48:33):
I react to them and then like Crowder breaks his leg and tacks
me in his post and I react to his video.
And then like in real time thesesongs are are happening.
And did you feel? Like any of those were
condescending? Like was the figs thing
condescending or was it legit because I didn't hear?
That I will be honest, it was a little bit condescending.

(48:54):
Yeah, it was, but it was condescending kind of towards my
sound like because I'm it's it'sthey're like, oh, you're the
happy go lucky guy, like joy, whatever.
Which even that when I worship, I I come alive, I can't help
totally. Even if I'm having a bad day, I
connect with God and then all all this good fruit comes from
it. So that's kind of why my sound

(49:14):
is what it is. So yeah, anyways, so.
The figs. Damn Crowder.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then so, yeah, I was, I
wanted to react to your video and I had contacted two
different pastors and I was justlike, hey, like this thing was
public. All these things are public,
public, public. I want to address it publicly.

(49:38):
And they were like, yeah, but you know, it like in Matthew
says you should connect some privately.
And then also like overlooking an offence thing.
So I was praying that like I said, I was, I was praying like,
Lord, help me overlook this offence.
So I think like a day or two went by and I think, I think I
had said, I'm not going to do anything.
I'm just going to let it be Let I'm, I'm, I'm going to try to

(50:01):
forgive him in my heart. But his post kept going more and
more viral. And sure enough, he ended up
texting me and said, Hey, my team reached out.
There's like a lot of comments going on.
Are you bothered by this post atall?
Let me know. And so that's when we officially
connected. And I was like, hey, man, this,

(50:22):
this bothers me. You know, you don't have to take
it down, but yeah, honestly it does.
So, so you had already got backlash prior to your video
even going up. You already getting some heat in
the comments. From the vasectomy video, yes.
Yeah. So my team posted that video for
me. I think it was Friday night.

(50:43):
I was flying to Knoxville to seemy son's high school football
game and didn't look at my phoneall night until we got back from
the game and I was driving home.It was like 1:00 AM or
something, and all of a sudden my team is texting me like, hey,
this is gone. A little more intense than we

(51:05):
may have thought. Like, I knew you.
You said earlier, like we're hoping it was going to go viral.
There was no hope. It was.
I knew it was going to go crazy.Absolutely 1000% new like you
can you know you he had a gigantic moment.
I'm piggybacking on that in an idiotic way that it's it's so

(51:26):
polarizing and that's what the algorithm rewards.
So you know it's going to go nuts.
Sorry, no pun. Incredible.
No pun. I didn't mean that.
Well done. So I get all these texts from
from my social media guys like, bro, this is kind of like a
little out of hand. Everyone's piling on and saying,

(51:48):
you know, yeah, you know, Forrest doing this whole thing,
marketing his songs through a blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And I'm like, wait a SEC. That's not what I intended from
this video. I just was being a dummy, you
know, and doing something silly and poking some fun and knowing
it's going to go viral. You're going to get some clicks.

(52:09):
You're going to get some hits, like 1000%.
So the intention not fully pure,if if I'm honest, you know, like
I know what it's going to produce, but I didn't know that
it was going to be a dogpile on Forrest and his miracle and his
tender moment with his family, Like you said, not knowing if
he's holding his kids again or not.

(52:31):
That's what I didn't kind of throw into my equation in my
head. So immediately I was like, bro,
this is not cool. And texted him like, dog, I
didn't know this was going to happen.
Please tell me if this offends you.
I'll take it down in a heartbeat.
Didn't even know if Forest wouldrespond.
Like we hadn't talked in a bit, you know?

(52:55):
But the honesty and the vulnerability from him to just
be a man and say, actually that bothered me.
There's a lot of people who would stuff it and be like, no,
I'm fine bro I'm good. I had this exact moment with
another artist and I wish to GodI could talk about it.
It didn't go well. Like roles reverse you're
saying? It's just a different.

(53:16):
Person A. Very, very, very, very popular
person right now. And this happened and they just
deflected. They said, Oh no, no, that I
didn't mean that. It's all good.
My wife didn't mean to say that.And I was like, OK, that's how
you want to play it. That's fine.
Yeah, but he didn't do that. He said, bro, that yeah, it

(53:38):
bothered me. And here's 2 reasons why it
bothered me. I was like, dog, I'm so sorry.
Like immediately I want to own that, you know, because it, it
was not my intention. I, I knew it could possibly get
there, but it wasn't the intention.
So that was kind of the groundwork for how all of this
laid out. Right.

(54:00):
And then I guess the part that people, this is where people are
having a problem is I said, hey,I've I really want to respond to
this publicly. I have a reaction to your video.
Do I have your permission to post that fully knowing that
this is going to spark controversy?
Because like I said before, I'm just wanting to put up my hands

(54:22):
and say, hey, I don't love this.Like, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not
a part of this. And to his point, he's saying he
didn't even know that this couldpossibly bother me.
And I'm just saying, hey, can wethink about the fact that this
could? Possibly.
Could you be smarter? You know, like.
Yeah. And then his response was I did
my thing publicly. I feel like you have the right

(54:44):
that, you know, thank you for asking permission, but you don't
have to ask my permission. You can just do that.
And so then started the back andforth.
Yeah. So it's like did.
You did you know that the comments were going to come from
that, I guess. It was crazy.

(55:04):
I don't know if you read any of those.
I try, I try to stay out of the comments, man.
So, so just for the people who aren't, who aren't keeping up,
this is, I'm frustrated in some of this because I don't think
people understand how time works.
It is complicated. Yeah, because you go.
You, you, you, you shoot your video, right?

(55:25):
Addressing his snip snip jam. And I'm like I'm keep saying it.
Thank you for that, means a lot to me.
You, you, you and I have. I have the spark of the song,
Yeah. I have the the concept in my
heart, but it's not written. Yes.
So you have and then you have this idea and you're like, hey,
let's see if he'll play play balls so.
Was that you're you're cut off bro.

(55:47):
You're cut off. No, no dude, that actually just
came on that. Was great.
Someone pointed that out and I was like, so good.
He meant that, that way. So you have the idea of a song,
you shoot the video. I think it was you said a Friday
or something like that. Whatever it was, whatever it
was, you guys speak. Yeah, you guys talk about it,
You patch it up, and then you ask him, do you mind if I still
shoot this? I mean, put this video out

(56:09):
that's already been shot. Yes, you go.
Yeah. Now at this point, is this song,
are you, have you agreed to hop on a song or is the song?
No, no, he's just going, hey, I've I've got an idea.
And what may work. Could this work or could this
not? And I said, bro, I'm I'm down to
try. Yeah.
And if it happens, amazing if we're just not gelling and and

(56:29):
we actually don't like each other, like, OK, cool.
Like at least we've spoken and and he's forgiven me, I've
apologized, you know, there's. Also a little bit of like blind
faith, 'cause it was like at anypoint you could use, like you
could use my vulnerability to double dunk on me if you wanted
to. Yeah.
And and vice. Versa, Yeah.

(56:50):
So the song, was the song talkedabout when you guys initially
spoke or was there no song talked about?
In in. I mean, we had a pretty long
conversation, so it started withjust.
Yeah, when we heard when we first talked, it was via text.
Yes, cuz you posted the screenshots.
Yeah, that was via text, so there was no hey, let's do a
collab. It was just like, bro, thank you

(57:12):
for being honest. And dude, I'm so sorry.
I'm taking the video down, right?
That's kind of where we started.Yeah, and just like I think God
might be doing something here. Yeah, I love that.
So there. Might be a journey for me.
Yeah, so. You tell you tell force dude
post a video. It's cool.
I said it publicly post a video,you post a video and then but

(57:33):
you guys already spoken and thenyou respond to the video and and
agree to to you basically do theB part of the song.
You would do the first part, youdo the second part.
What? At what point was the song
already laid down? It hadn't even.
Been laid down yet? OK.
Yeah, it was a while and we werestill going, how are we going to
write this? Like, am I, you want me to try

(57:55):
to write the second verse? Like what's the vibe here?
Do you have a full first verse? Like what's what's the feeling
here? So it was all very formational
at that point, but we were just both down to.
Play ball. Yeah, just just.
See, is this, is this going to happen?
Yeah. You know.
So I think the part that people and again this I think goes back
to to two things. One, not listening because then

(58:16):
when you released your response to him, you said, hey, we spoke,
the video was shot. I asked.
Him. You literally said he.
Cleared all that up right? And people either aren't
listening or they're just they have trouble processing
timelines. Or just words.
Yeah, it's just words, right? So then they go, oh, this is a
big play. They're manipulating us.

(58:38):
They have had this song in the tuck for weeks and weeks or
whatever. And I and I and I think that
the, the confusion is you guys spoke, you asked, then you put
it out what you were transparentabout.
I don't think you were hiding anything, but I think the
confusion was the time. They just didn't know the
timeline. And then they're like, oh, this
is marketing, they're manipulating us, right?

(58:58):
And I don't, I think that on social media there is a, an, I
don't say embellishing, but there's an agreement that we're
telling a story. And I thought you guys were
like, hey, let's try to tell this story and see what happens.
Is that is that a fair assessment 100?
Percent yes, absolutely no one was Kanye and anyone like we
weren't Justin Bieber with the what?
What was his his famous thing clocking.

(59:20):
It's not clocking you. Like I believe that was all
super brilliant, right? Very forecasted marketing, I
think. Oh, absolutely.
That's a whole. That's a whole 100%.
Kanye would do the same thing. He would just start going nuts
on the Internet when he was about to.
Release music I've seen. That we did not have music
ready, right? We simply had a moment that we

(59:41):
saw playing out in real time andwent, this could really help
people, right? So are we down to to kind of
make this come to life for the Internet in real time as we're
working it out ourselves? And in the midst of that, we're
going, OK, well, we got, we saidwe were going to write the song.
Are we going to write the song? And also just fully unattached

(01:00:02):
to the like, it's like the macrowas the conversation and healing
and literally the fact that like, we're here today.
You know what I'm saying? That's what I keep saying.
I'm just like the we. Serve we bodies.
Serve bodies. Morning in the freaking ocean.
I'm just. Like the, the the victory is
that we had healthy resolution and we've each gained a brother.

(01:00:25):
Yeah. And like, that's the macro.
The next macro is that it happened publicly as an example,
in this, like, weird nuance of social media.
And then like, just the the cherry on top is that it
actually formed into a song. Yeah.
What do Westhoff, KB from Southside, Rabbi Ninjas or
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(01:00:49):
They're all going to be with me live at Blessed God Summit 2026
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(01:01:12):
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(01:01:33):
night of the Blessed God Summit.We heard your requests that kids
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(01:01:53):
March 5th, 6th and 7th here in Oceanside, CA.
Let's got something. Go to blessgotsummit.com and get
your tickets now. So.
Yeah, I think that I was gettingphone calls, as a matter of
fact, right when you and me hopped off a FaceTime, I was
getting phone calls of like, this is all plotted, this is all
staged. And I was like, what?

(01:02:14):
I was like, I was like, look, you could force is not perfect,
but like, I don't think Force and Corey are sociopaths.
No, like I don't think this is not.
Only that, but we don't need this.
Yeah, no. Like, forgive my
straightforwardness. Forrest has a lot of money.
Corey has a lot of money. One single is not going to

(01:02:34):
change our lives. Like we don't need this.
But the the public discourse andthe example of a legitimate man
saying this hurt me and a legitimate man saying I
apologize can change people's lives.
And that's why we were like, yeah, we're down to try this.

(01:02:58):
Well Even so in in one of my videos that God didn't let me
post. But I'm I'm not saying now,
yeah. Yeah, yeah, I was, I was like,
we could, we could A give all ofthe proceeds away to charity.
Just so you guys know that this was not any sort of any play 2.

(01:03:23):
We could just not release the song and I don't remember what
the third one. Was I like #1 and 2.
Or maybe third was just just just released, but God was God
was reminding me. Just like if you start focusing
on the haters per SE and start trying to feed them like it's
an, it's an unsatiable thing or an insatiable thing because then

(01:03:45):
you do that and then they're like, OK, we'll, but we're going
to poke a hole over here and then poke.
It's like, no, it's don't focus on that.
Focus on just what God's doing and just the just being
fruitful. Amplify that.
Yeah, just be fruitful and let the haters be the haters.
So in, in hindsight, do you guysfeel there was any aspects of
this that weren't handled as best as they could have been in

(01:04:07):
terms of being, I don't know, more transparent about
timelines? I don't, I don't know, like, but
in hindsight, considering the this trauma that it caused, was
there any aspects that you guys,I mean, we should have kind of
went a little different about this.
Maybe I should have been more clear with the timeline, guys,
just so you know, like what, what, what would you have done
different? I mean, the easiest thing would
have been to not have a timelineat all and just like have our

(01:04:28):
resolution and not post it online.
But it just felt like what God had for us at the time.
So I know, I know it's messy andlike, yeah, some people don't
don't love it, but I think as a macro, it did so much good and
so many DMS. And so dude, even 2 days ago, my
barista gave me free coffee. She's just like what you and

(01:04:51):
Corey did online blessed me so much.
Even yesterday a guy, a guy cameup to me at the zoo and he was
just like, dude, that was that was insane what you guys did.
So I don't know so. Yeah, I mean to answer the
question, no, I I think again goes back to intent it it was
all to display humility, forgiveness, honesty,

(01:05:16):
vulnerability, transparency and we both put ourselves in
ridiculously vulnerable positions when he posted the the
response to snip. I cannot tell you I'm talking 10
to 20,000 comments direct messages across platforms mean

(01:05:36):
like hateful mean that morning and I told Forrest I'm down to
be the bad guy I am I'm down to hold that space.
I've been the bad guy my whole life.
I'm used to this. Like that's very much I put
myself in those positions, but Iwant to display something

(01:05:56):
beautiful. So all these comments are are
coming in and that morning for probably 30 minutes, I was
looking at the comments and I and I was like, all right, I
can't, I can't do this. And I actually sent you that
video where my wife walked up while I was, you know, trying to
form a response to that video inthe midst of just getting

(01:06:19):
shredded on the Internet. Shredded like PR.
They, my PR team would, would fire me, you know, like, and
she's like, she's like, are you OK?
And I'm, I got tears in my eyes,like I'm crying.
And she's like, don't look at the comments.
But like, I looked at the comments.
Don't look at the comments because they're coming after our
family, they're coming after Anna.

(01:06:40):
They're I got 5 kids. I got a 15 year old son who can
read these comments. He doesn't have social media,
praise God, but his friends knowwho jeez daddy is and they're
going to show him these comments.
And I'm like, oh, Dang. So that's an incredibly
vulnerable position. Forrest put himself in a
position to go to allow people to say, oh, he's so soft.

(01:07:03):
Grow some thicker skin, bro, come on.
You know, so like, those are difficult positions to be in,
but for the greater good, to show the world it's OK to be
vulnerable, it's OK to be misunderstood.
There's a dude who was like pretty misunderstood over here
and was on a tree. That I I do want to talk about

(01:07:26):
that concept of like hater comments, I guess and maybe what
that means in the church. Yeah.
Is that OK if we go there? Can I, can I just follow up
because I think this kind of this follows that lane.
How did you feel with people then going at you for
apologizing? Meaning after I had apologized.
You in my opinion, your video I'm like this is beautiful like

(01:07:48):
this is this is what we want like yes, it Amen.
You know I'm I'm I'm leaving youa positive comment.
I'm encouraging. I'm D Ming, you privately like
this? Is great you went full K love on
me yeah. I want full K love on.
Positive and encouraging brother.
And and and and and all of it. So, but then there was like
people that were mad at you. Yeah, they're like, like.
Oh, you're meaning people were overcorrecting.

(01:08:10):
Like how could you apologize? You didn't need to.
Apologize. You're losing that whole thing.
You're lame. That's insane.
I told, I told multiple people and I told Forrest, I'm not
going to use personal pronouns in this in this podcast, even
though I have not. Not going to name drop.
I'm not going to name any names,but so many people reached out
to me personally via text or call and said, bro, I can't
believe you would. You would just lay down and

(01:08:33):
apologize, you didn't hold your ground, blah blah blah.
And I said bro, right? How stupid is that?
I literally said to all of them.I said the same thing to all of
them. I said bro, if being humble and
apologizing is uncool, consider me the lamest person you have

(01:08:54):
ever met in your life. I will sacrifice all the cool
and all the, oh, he's so strong for actually gaining a brother
because I was able to just say, dude, that was stupid of me, I'm
sorry and just own it. I will do that every single
time. And it's difficult.
It's it's not the easy position.You know, I could double down

(01:09:16):
and be like, yeah, you are so soft.
Like that's that's whack that that's super lame.
So I told each one of them, how could you back down?
You shouldn't have to apologize,dude, are you kidding me?
And and that scene in in a in a weak light like dog, then Jesus
is the weakest human you've evermet in your life because they

(01:09:39):
nailed him to a tree and he didn't call down the legion of
angels like he could have. He didn't get himself down.
He just said forgive them. They don't know what they do
right. Yeah.
And if story I mean. Yeah, that's good.
That's good. Haters in the comments.
I got lots of thoughts on this, but I'll let you cook because I
I go ahead. Yeah.

(01:10:00):
I don't want to be, I don't wantto.
I don't, I'm not, I'm not tryingto like demand respect.
I'm just kind of opening up the,the opportunity to, to think.
And this goes for everyone, but social media is just so weird
because it feels like nothing. You're just on your cell phone
and you type in a little hater comment or whatever, but to the

(01:10:21):
recipient, for whatever reason, it feels like they are somehow
in your living room pointing a finger and laughing at you.
And I think a lot of people can agree with that.
I think kids in junior high highschool, I think I mean my mom, I
like every every age can experience that When you get a
pointed specific dagger from online, it feels like a real

(01:10:46):
dagger from online. Am I, am I correct in that?
And so I'm just kind of posing that like as Christians, as
believers, as people that are supposed to be, yes, full of
discernment and there's, there'sa balance.
I I think overarchingly we're we're a little too far over
here. I think we could come a little

(01:11:06):
bit more to the the middle and be a little bit softer there
you. Go yeah, I like it.
I, I would say as, as like a public person.
I, I think at some point it, this comes along with it I, I'm
not exaggerating. I probably had thousands of
videos made about me from all types of different issues and
some of them very superficial and some of them like, Oh,
that's, you know, that's, that'sfair.

(01:11:27):
I think the, the part that bugs me is now that we're, if I'm
looking at the scriptures and I'm trying to let the scriptures
guide me and, and maybe that's adeeper conversation is like, do
the scriptures guide us? Yes or no?
And I look at the scriptures guide us, right.
I'm talking about like the broader Christian community.
I see stuff like and the world will know your disciple.

(01:11:47):
You're my disciples about how you love one another, right?
I see that and I and I understand that, like love is
not uniformity. Love is.
You don't have to love every song that force has ever made or
every song that Corey has ever made or every every thumbnail
the Ruslan has ever had. You don't have to right, fair
enough. I don't like every thumbnail
ever. Right?
Fine, but I think. That's good, I like it.
And I'll say this, there's a degree of cringe that every

(01:12:09):
platform comes along with. You want to pop on Instagram,
There's a there's a you got to sip your degree of cringe.
You want to pop on YouTube, You want to pop in a worship world,
daddy Jesus kind of soft songs, That's fine.
Like there's a degree of cringe.But The thing is to then go out
of the way and attack people fora platform you don't understand.
I think, I think it's unhelpful in light of scripture.
Let nothing unwholesome come outof your mouth.

(01:12:30):
But that is which is edifying, right?
There's so much in scripture. You'll give you'll give an
account for every idle word thatcomes out of your mouth.
So I think this situation, and maybe this is just me as an
optimist in the Bible, guys, like I feel like there's a line
in the sand being drawn that youdon't got to like everything
force has done. You don't got to like everything
Corey's done. But this is a a moment for
brothers to come together and outside of you not understanding

(01:12:51):
the timeline and the, you know, perhaps the the story, the
marketing of it. This is a good moment and I
think that Dash people should acknowledge that.
And you're right, I think we need to come a little bit more
into like, let's humanize one another because and I said this
to someone and they know who they are.
I said you're more upset about forest marketing and not him

(01:13:11):
maybe not being as clear on the timeline.
And there's actual people that are crashing out in the name of
Jesus saying the most heinous things about people unloving and
you have no smoke for them. You have nothing.
And these are acquaintances of yours.
You have no, no smoke for them. And I said, why?
Is it because is of course Coreyand Forest, of course, chorus.

(01:13:33):
It's kind of like Forest and Corey are Tor Tor they're all
scared. Is it because he's successful?
So therefore it's like this dynamic of punching up.
And it's cool in in comedy, because we could punch up and
and we could talk about people that are more, but like that's
still a human. And whether or not he's too
sensitive is irrelevant. If someone, someone has a way, a
right to feel the way they feel.And if they go, hey, man, like

(01:13:54):
that, that bugged me out. Can you not do that again?
And you go, you're soft. It's like, no, dude, if this
dude is in your Bible study and this happened.
Yeah. And he's like, bro, that hurt my
feelings. Could you not say this anymore?
Could you not make fun of my nose?
Or can you not? We would all be like, oh, yeah,
it's with social media. Yeah.
It's no holds bar at the dynamicof success.
And it's they're letting you have it right, You know, because

(01:14:16):
they can go viral just in a comment.
They say the right snarky comment.
And now their Instagram is popping.
Well, I think I was talking to my my sister about this.
I think it's actually a dopamineaddiction.
Obviously though, cell phones, all dopamine addiction, but I
think the hater comment and thatkind of thing, it's super low
hanging fruit to get clicks and get likes and even that is just

(01:14:36):
a dope. If you take a step back, just
put the phone away and like liveyour life right here.
Touch grass, brother. Yeah.
Touch grass. Yeah.
That's real. I mean, even when I posted that
video, I knew. I knew that I'm literally
piggybacking off of a dude with a broken back.
You know, like, if I'm honest, Iknew that and I was still

(01:15:00):
willing to do it. I think if there's anything that
I regret, it's that that I was able to kind of know in my own
heart, like this is going to getsome clicks and some views is
going to pop off like for sure. And I love ruffling feathers.
So I was willing to still do it.I think that would be a

(01:15:21):
legitimate regret. But that that comes with any
successful person. The reason anyone is bashing on
that person is because they're jealous.
You know what I mean? Like, let's just be freaking
honest. If you talk trash about Brandon
Lake, it's because you want to be Brandon Lake.
Well. If you talk trash about Forest
Frank, it's because you want to be Forest Frank.

(01:15:43):
When people were mad at me aboutRex Love's because they're dumb.
Just kidding. It's because they're reformed
and they hated the theology, butthey still didn't like the
success. I told Forrest like bro, when
reckless love popped off, I thought everyone was my friend.
I thought everyone liked me. What I realized after everyone
hated me because I was taking them number, their number one

(01:16:05):
spots. I was taking their tourist
positions. I was taking all of these things
that these guys wanted. I was usurping them as this
young, you know, new artist. Caleb called me a new artist.
I've been making music for like 15 years, but I was like 8000
years old and Caleb was like a brand new artist with reckless
love. I loved it.
It made my heart so happy because God was like, here you

(01:16:27):
are on the scene. I thought people genuinely liked
me and were happy for me becausethey would be.
Bro, you're amazing. So cool.
Let me get your number dawg. They didn't like me, they hated
me. They were jealous of what God
was doing in my life. For the most part.
I'll say there was some genuine people in there as well.
As I said, dog, that's how people feel about you right now.

(01:16:50):
Whether you like that or not. It's typically I want what that
person has. Therefore I'm going to subtly
lash out at them via comments orvia satire or via whatever
that's real. Yeah, that's just facts.
That's how life is. Let's talk about the guardrails
for some of this stuff, right? You talked about seat belt.
I was like, I think the seat belt should be the scripture,

(01:17:12):
right? I understand there's
idiosyncrasies with that within comedy.
I understand that there's certain things.
My, my, my heart would be, Hey, if there's if there are things
within comedy, those are still submit the scripture, right?
So, so like we don't, we don't allow the art to drive our
faith. We allow our faith to drive the
art. And in my world with, if I'm
paralleling this, and I'm being honest, like we had an issue 10

(01:17:34):
years ago where it was like, howedgy can we get?
How, how, how much can we, can we drop a cuss word here and
there and then still be a Christian artist, Right?
Yeah. And it just wasn't helpful in
hindsight. Like it was, it was kind of
dumb, right? And so because we were, we were
usurping our our faith underneath our art and doing
whatever we want to do in the name of art.
And I, and I think that's asinine.
And. Backwards.

(01:17:55):
Yeah, that's good. So, so from your guys's vantage
point, like being on the other side of this, what are some
guardrails? You're probably still going to
make funny videos. You, you laugh right there.
Then we all got group text with the Bros speaking to the
Christian mean pages, the comedy, the all the, all that,
that world. What would be some seatbelts
that you guys would recommend? Obviously scripture, but like,

(01:18:18):
how can we hopefully give a bit of insight?
Maybe we're the wrong people to give a bit of insight, but what
would Yeah, what would you guys say is like, hey, moving
forward, this would be cool. Oh, I mean, I can speak on just
firstly my my own heart, like I felt my heart grow.
I'm the I'm the soft guy with the with the big heart.
I guess my switch that happened so quickly from thinking that

(01:18:45):
Corey was kind of like an enemy in my life, like it like somehow
I'm sorry, kind of like an arch nemesis.
Like we're we're fighting different battles here to now a
close friend and a brother. That quick switch I'm like, oh,
that could be anybody. So my I went from being like
man, screw these comedy things. Now I'm just like, oh, I love

(01:19:07):
these guys and when I see them it's a it's a DAP up in a in a
hug because they're human beingsand they all have stories and we
also we all fall short. So all the comments personally,
my heart has grown and So what Iguess what I can do is kind of
be productive from that. And what I would ask is maybe in

(01:19:30):
the regards to the, the seat belt or the the barricade that
other people can kind of mirror that as well.
It's good. Corey, what would you say?
Two thoughts. I'll answer the question
indirectly. First, I think I've been very
much, you know where you said that you were for a bit where
you wanted to be edgy, you wanted to push bounds, you

(01:19:50):
wanted to sort of push the envelope to say, Hey, stop being
so prudish, church. Stop being so, so stuck up and
caught up on the wrong things because it's not about being
perfect, right? It's it's about submitting and,
and just laying into the grace of God, right?
You can only do that when you know how screwed up you are.

(01:20:11):
But for me, honestly, having conversations before us, seeing
the way he does his stuff. Convicted the heck out of me
like and I've had to repent to the Lord for going.
I just push the balance too much.
You know, I went way far in thatdirection trying to be edgy and
trying to show the church you don't have to be so AB and C
whatever those you know, qualifiers are there and just

(01:20:34):
went. I just want to love God simply
and I and I want to be a good example to me.
I don't often think, Oh, kids are on social media because my
kids are not on social media. I got so many comments like,
bro, I can't believe you'd make a video about a vasectomy when
my kids are on social media. I don't immediately think a kid
is going to see this. I never think that.

(01:20:55):
I think that my page and my social media presence is very
adult driven, typically caters toward kind of jaded post church
folks who really love God but are kind of frustrated with some
things that they've experienced in their life.
They might have some bitterness,some some hatred towards some
things and I want to give them aplace to belong and exist and

(01:21:15):
go. God still sees you, God still
loves you. But the perspective change for
me was why am I doing this? I know why I'm doing it.
It's not a good intention, but do I need to continue down that
path? Probably not, probably not maybe
as much. I'm still going to do some
things here and there. But seeing the way that he

(01:21:39):
operates has really convicted mein the most beautiful way.
And now I'm just like, I don't need to do any of that junk.
But as far as answering your question directly, I think there
are things that are blatant sin to to me, you know, like there
was one the meme of of AI Forrest and me kissing and

(01:21:59):
saying. Like.
It was, it's wild, like wild. And it was like, you know,
unhinged Christian memes or whatever.
Whoever runs that account is wild, unhinged, unhinged.
It's, it's worse than me, like, and that's saying a lot.
So that one to me is like, that's a bit far because I think
you're entering into sin territory and you're making it

(01:22:23):
OK or you're, you're giving a license to that thing.
And I'm kind of like, I'm not down with that.
And I've seen the same thing with Phil and Brandon.
They do the same thing where it's like, guys, that's probably
a bit much, but you know, they're like, oh, it's it's
light, It's whatever. I'm like, I think you've gone a
bit too far at that point. And for me to say that you need

(01:22:44):
to check your spirit talks like you need to figure some things
out. I think of the scripture too
that says let no unwholesome talk come out of your mouth, but
only what is edifying to building others up.
That is, that's difficult. To only use your mouth to build
others up is extremely difficult.
I don't. I mean, I feel like social media

(01:23:05):
would be a completely different place if we practice that just a
little bit. Yeah, I think, I think, you
know, I feel like you guys, I don't know, maybe maybe because
I, you guys have been accessibleto me, but I feel like you guys
make yourself accessible and that you're not like beyond a
conversation or beyond hearing from other people.
And I think the beauty about accessibility is then people

(01:23:25):
understand like, oh, no, no, like force is really this guy
all the time. Like, this is not a stick.
Like he's not fake happy. Like this is really who he is,
right? And so I think like, when we
humanize each other and we have some degree of relationship and
rapport, then we go, oh, OK, I get it.
Like I was on Live one day and Andy Mineo calls me and he goes,
wow, y'all Youtubers make those stupid thumbnail faces and I go,

(01:23:49):
hey, just so you know, I'm live like I'm live on YouTube.
And so we're we're cracking up and I go, what's the same
reason? Like rappers be like hey yo, hey
yo, turn my headphones up. Turn turn that snare up in my
headphones. Like you're not, it's just, it's
just, it's just a thing like within that medium and that
format, you're, you're doing something that is contextual and
it makes sense. It's like within YouTube,
there's certain things the packaging of something with the

(01:24:10):
music, there's certain things the hook right that there's the
this Instagram reel of the firstcouple seconds right and I think
the more we can humanize ourselves and the more we can
connect with people and hear from people, the more people
could go yeah, I mean, you know,force man he really happy and
sometimes I just want to be cathartic and listen to music
that reflects that. But like that he really is that

(01:24:31):
dude, man, and I think that thatthere allies the conversation.
The maybe again, props to you for reaching out to people, but
like being willing to have some conversation with some of these
folks. And it seems like you've done
that with Corey. I'm so I'm always like, let me
understand and then let me acknowledge you.
Like I don't like all my own thumbnails, Like, but if that's
your biggest critique of me is like thumbnails or like you guys

(01:24:54):
sell devotionals like you, you make money.
Like that's your like, I'll takethat on the chin.
Like you're fine. Like that's OK, you know.
So I think a conversation like this hopefully encourages people
to to not dehumanize people because sometimes people think
you guys are avatars. Like you're just like a dude.
You're not real, you know. Or, or just believing the worst

(01:25:15):
about people from the drop, I think is a problem.
Love believes all things. Love hopes all things, right?
So they look at a guy like Forrest who pops off on social
media. Maybe they're a little jealous.
Who knows whether that's there or not, but they immediately go,
why has he got a camera on him all the time?
What does he got a camera in every room?
Like he must be trying to monetize his life.

(01:25:36):
He's trying to do all these things he and they immediately
see the worst and go, oh, he's just trying to make more money.
He's trying to get more streams.He's trying to get a bigger tour
next time, not knowing Forrest is operating out of obedience to
what God asked him to do. I can't judge that.
Like you said, I can't see intention.
I can't see intention. But once I hear that from my

(01:25:58):
guy, I'm like, do you, baby? If people, if people want to
hate that, they can hate that, you know, and God knows that's
the only thing you know. But we constantly want to
believe the worst right off the bat.
And I'm like, bro, what if we gave the benefit of the doubt?
What if we gave grace? What if we saw, you know, the
thumbnails and and thought he's just trying to reach more

(01:26:19):
people. He's just trying to have impact.
He's trying to help people's lives.
He's trying to, you know, AB or C, whatever that intention is
that's in your heart. What if we did that instead of
immediately going to, oh, I don't know why they're doing
that. Like that's silly.
Yeah, yeah. Let me read this passage 'cause
you, you referenced it. I referenced it.
We can kind of land a plane here.
Ephesians 429. Do not let any unwholesome talk

(01:26:42):
come out of your mouths. But only what is helpful for
building others up according to their needs that it may benefit
those who listen. And he said that's hard to check
out the next verse. And I think there's something to
this verse 30 then goes on to say and do not grieve the Holy
Spirit of God with whom you weresealed for the day of
redemption. Get rid of all bitterness, rage

(01:27:02):
and anger and brawling and slander along with every with
every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one
another, forgiving each other just as in Christ God forgave
you. That's.
Powerful. Right, So, so that aspect of be
kind and compassionate, right? If I'm if I'm seeking to

(01:27:23):
understand, you better seek to understand before seem to be
understood. And I'm genuinely trying to
understand something that I don't get on the surface.
That is a that is that is being kind, that is being compassion
is believing the best, you know,and and people will hear this
conversation and be like, must be nice, you know?
Yeah, three handsome white guys talking about how successful and
they are and the haters too, too.

(01:27:43):
No, no, no, no. You're in there. 1 old guy.
But I, I think my mind has shifted so much on this stuff,
you know, from wanting to be edgy and wanting to do this
stuff that was like, in the nameof art, in the name of
authenticity. Yeah.
And making that your God and making that your North Star.
It's so good and. Then God is submission really
good. I'm, I'm, I feel like, I don't
know, I feel like this is a linein the sand.
And now it's like you got to, you don't have to sort this out

(01:28:04):
with your pastor. You have to sort of like,
because I know who your pastor is.
You know, your pastor is like, I, I, I, we, we're, we're
interconnected. So it's like folks are going to
have to sort this stuff out. And again, people will take this
and, and clip it out and be angry about it.
But I, I think this was a great conversation and I think this
moment was great. And I, and I also just want to
say this to you guys. I think the haters air quotes

(01:28:26):
are a very small. The vocal minority.
They're the vocal minority whereI think most people was like
that barista at the coffee shop,that person at the zoo.
I think most people are looking at this song and going, praise
God, this is awesome. You know, most people aren't
chronically online, so most people aren't glued to their
phone. Most people don't even know this
was a thing. You know, I appreciate you guys

(01:28:47):
wanting to acknowledge it and lean into the tension.
I think that makes great content, tells a good story.
But I think that that most people don't even know.
I think most people are blessed by the song.
They're blessed by the miracle. They're blessed by all the, the
cool stuff that's happened and, and ultimately the picture that
this serves as two brothers coming together, being homies
and saying, man, maybe this could be an example for others,
you know, and, and you know, I've like, I've attempted to

(01:29:09):
reach out and try to reconcile and, and squash stuff and, you
know, with the people that I need to do that with, you know,
And so I think like this is, this is beautiful to me.
So any any final thoughts beforewe get out of here?
What you got, Brov? I mean, kind of going off of
what you were saying, when we were like finishing up the song,
I just had this picture of, I feel like this song is for

(01:29:32):
marriages. It's for so many things, but
specifically paramount. I was like, I and so many times
as artists, we're we're so mysterious.
And so you'll like, you'll make the song and then you'll present
it a certain way. Whereas this one was just
exposed for the whole world. And sometimes, like songs, it
can be used in so many ways. We were just talking with your
friend about it, how songs can be used in so many ways.

(01:29:52):
And I remember thinking macro wise, I was like, man, if, if,
if marriages can just tap into this, I think it would cause so
much healing. Yeah.
It's beautiful, any. Final thoughts.
I was grateful to be here man. Happy to be here brother.
It's amazing. God is kind.
He's better than we deserve. God knows I don't deserve to be
here with all the dumb stuff I've said on the Internet and

(01:30:14):
still here we are sitting talking about Jesus and loving
each other. Fantastic.
We're going to have a chorus tour.
Yeah, Chorus. Chorus.
I'm headlining, so you know, Chorus is actually going to open
and go for the yeah, it's going to be great.
I'll be outside. I'll be busking outside for your
show. Fellas, thank you so much man,

(01:30:35):
and I'm humbled that you guys would would have this
conversation with me. Thank you for for asking.
And I'm just so pumped, man. I think this will hopefully be a
blessing to people, you know, and maybe soften some hearts,
maybe soften some of the criticsand some of the folks that are
misunderstanding. Maybe this will yeah, slowly
bring them over. Amen.
So thanks for having us. Thank you.
We're out here. Peace.