Podcast appearances and mentions of bob john

MLB's Investigation Into Shohei Ohtani, His Interpreter, & Illegal Sports Betting with Richard Deitsch. Like any other Monday, Richard Deitsch joins the show... unlike any other Monday, one of the biggest stars in sports is under investigation for illegal sports betting. While Shohei Ohtani's lawyers claim the newest Dodgers star was a victim of a “Massive Theft,” others think it could go deeper than that. With the Japanese Superstar set to address the situation later on in the day, much is still unclear... what we do know for sure, though, is that Ohtani and his longtime interpreter are at the center of an investigation into massive sports gambling debts. Bob John and Richard dig into the situation at hand and speculate on what could come next as the three take a look at all of the angles in a case that, so far, has provided more questions than answers.

In years' past, The AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am signified to many that Golf Season is back… but now with all of the Drama surrounding the PGA, LIV and various investment groups, it feels a little different this year so Richard Zokol comes on the show to talk about it.  Bob John and Richard react to The Strategic Sports Group's $3 billion investment to partner with the PGA Tour  and wonder what that means for the agreement with the DP World Tour and Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund to create PGA Tour Enterprises. 

Well, we did it again!  We managed to corner one of the Wrights and demand they speak to us and answer our increasingly inane questions.  There is a lot to dig into in this interview, with John giving some great insight into his amazing new project Dead Bob, news on the upcoming tour, and some tantalizing bits about upcoming projects.  Grab a fork and dig in folks!!!!

Our friend and MLB expert, Jon Morosi, joins the podcast to catch up with Bob & John and talk some baseball on todays episode. The three go over some of the recent signings around the league and discuss some of the players who have yet to sign a contract so far in Major League Baseball's off-season. We also dive into the Toronto Blue Jays, what the Jose Berrios extension means for their future roster moves and what the payroll may look like for Toronto in the very near future. With the idea of being able to afford to keep this young Jays roster intact becoming more and more unrealistic, the gentlemen discuss the idea of trading away some big name players and the benefits that may come from it.

President of Hockey Operations for the Pittsburgh Penguins, Brian Burke, Joins the podcast to catch up with Bob and John. The three talk about Pittsburgh hot start to the season and their recent struggles with injury and COVID-19. Brian gives us some insight on Malkin's time table to return.  After hearing Bob & John's yesterday we have a lengthy discussion on Brian Burke's reaction to Gary Bettman's press conference regarding the report on the Chicago Blackhawks sexual assault investigation. We debate on what punishments were fair and those that weren't harsh enough and we get Brian's assessment on how well the NHL did in terms of dealing with the issue at hand.

SHI DAVIDI from Sportsnet joins the show to talk some baseball with Bob & John today. The three discuss George Springer, his injury problems and his impact on the young Blue Jays team even when he is not playing. The three talk about the Jays recent performance and get realistic about the teams playoff hopes. Before Shi leaves, we talk about the Jays bullpen problems, the field of dreams game and whether we really needed it

DAN SHULMAN, the voice of the Blue Jays stops by to talk some Toronto hoops and baseball with Bob and John. The three start the show discussing team USA's performance at the Tokyo Olympic games and how impressed Dan has been with Kevin Durant. We move on to the Toronto Raptors as the three talk about Scottie Barnes' debut as a Raptor in the Vegas Summer League. Bob John and Dan also talk about the Blue Jays and their pitching inconsistency. As the team makes a push for the playoffs, should we be worried about their lack of depth in the bullpen?

Most recently, the former head coach of the Minnesota Wild, BRUCE BOUDREAU joins the show to talk about the playoffs so far, and Bob & John find out if "Gabby" has any plans to coach in the near future. Firstly, the boys find out what it's like for a coach to simply... watch hockey as a fan, if that's easy possible. We learn who Bruce is cheering for this summer, how he watches games and whether he has an affinity for the teams that he has worked for.  Bruce gives us an idea as to who he thinks has the best chance to win it all. We also spend some time learning about the bench boss' coaching style, how he uses his timeouts and if he is ready to get back behind the bench after taking a year off.

EPISODE 34 - The MONDAY MORNING RECAP with Bob & John. Jimmy Butler makes history vs. the Lakers. The Bills are 4-0... yes, THE BILLS ARE 4-0! Are Baker Mayfield and The Browns for real? Tom Brady is 3-1 and does Bob still believe in the Raiders? NHL Free Agency opens this week, who's shopping for goalies? An extended episode to kick off the week!

在遊戲公司工作曾是Bob夢寐以求的職業。John的工作是遊戲企劃，曾參與過幾FF15，惡靈古堡3重製版...這些世界知名的遊戲。我們今天就來請John來解釋遊戲企劃到底在做什麼，以及遊戲製作的過程。在遊戲公司工作真的像Bob想像的那麼快樂嗎？

God is Good (Part 1) - John & Donna BishopGod is Good (Part 2) - John & Donna BishopGod is Good (Part 3) - John & Donna BishopToday® Radio Transcript  References to conferences, resources, or other special promotions may be obsolete. Making New Memories Guest:                        John and Donna BishopFrom the series:       God is So Good  Bob: The Bible teaches us a different way of thinking about trials, to count it all joy when we experience various trials.  That can be easy to read but very difficult to do.  Fifteen years ago, John Bishop lost his memory completely as a result of meningitis.  In the years that followed, there were many difficulties the Bishop family faced. John: That night I hurting so bad, and I'd listen to Psalm, and it said, "O taste and see that the Lord is good," Psalm 34a – "Blessed is the man trusteth in Him," and I said, "God, I going to believe you're good.  If I never get better I still going to believe you're good because that what Your Word says."  And I said, "Lord, this must be what faith means is believing You even when I don't feel like it."  So I'm going to believe God good whether I feel good or not.  I'm going to believe God good whether I get better or not just because the Bible say it. Bob: This is FamilyLife Today for Wednesday, August 6th.  Our host is the president of FamilyLife, Dennis Rainey, and I'm Bob Lepine.  No matter what happens in your life, can you say God is so good, and all His ways are good? And welcome to FamilyLife Today, thanks for joining us on the Wednesday edition.  This past weekend we had a wedding.  My daughter, Katy, became Mrs. Katy Walker, and … Dennis: How did you do? Bob: I was fine.  I was thinking back to how all marriages start, and they all start with hopes and dreams and the expectation of a storybook romance and they all live happily ever after – that kind of a fairy tale scenario. Dennis: At least that's what we think is going to happen.  But when we start out a marriage relationship, we have no idea what God has in store for our spouse or for us, as a couple. Bob: Yes, and as we've been hearing this week, John and Donna Bishop experienced a unique circumstance in their marriage 13 years ago when he lost all memory, and the story had to begin again with a whole new set of circumstances; that the love story had to start up again from scratch.  And yet it's been remarkable to hear how God has sustained this couple and to hear them testify to His goodness in the midst of this kind of adversity. Dennis: And, you know, I want to turn to the listener at this point before you hear the rest of the story, and I want to encourage you to order a bunch of CDs and pass them out to your buddies. Bob: I've already done that.  I took … Dennis: I have, too, Bob, I'm telling you, I'm going to talk to the folks down at the warehouse, and I'm going to see if we can't make a deal so that you can order these – this story in quantity and pass it out at church, pass it out in your neighborhood.  This is going to be a story that I think is going to touch, literally, millions of people's lives around the nation. Bob: And as we hear part 3 of this story, we're beginning to get a picture of the tremendous impact John's illness had on a marriage and on a family.  I mean, here were John and Donna raising three sons. Donna:  It was hard on the boys.  I think it's probably hardest maybe on my youngest son, because he was 10 years old, and I remember one day Luke came to me, and he said, "Mom, it's not fair, because my brothers had a daddy that got to play ball with them and go hunting with them and do fun things with him," and he caught me on an up day there, so I said, "I know, but you know the Lord's going to let him be special in a different way than he was with your brothers."  And so I thank the Lord – my youngest son, he's a good boy, and I thank the Lord, and I think him and his dad are close. Bob: That had to break your heart, though, for your son to say, "It's not fair.  I want a daddy like my brothers had." Donna: I know.  It was – I struggle with the things – I was going to tell you that when – I remember one night John was laying on the couch there, and he said, "It's okay, God, that you let me be sick."  Well, when he said that, you know, I said, "Oh, no, it's not okay."  Because I just kept saying, "You know, Lord, you know, I married that other man back there, and I just would like to go back to that," and I struggled.  That was one of my struggles – the Lord just saying, "Okay, Lord, it's okay."  And it was easier for him to say it than for me to say it.  I just had a hard time. And so the Lord and I have had many discussions over this. Bob: Do you feel like you've had two husbands? Donna:  Yes, sir, I sure do. Dennis: What's the part of John before the illness that you miss the most? Donna: Probably the part just take the leadership and go on and just the energy just to go on and keep going into things. Dennis: So he was the leader, he was leading you and the family and the church and taking you in a direction. Donna: Yes, sir.  And he was, you know, just never stopped, just keep going. Dennis: What's the part of the new John that you like the best? Donna: I like the best part is he's very loving, very kind.  I guess the Lord slowed him down, and he slows down, and he appreciates things and is just – you know, when we slow down, it's amazing how many things we've learned to miss, you know, that we have missed along the way until we slow down. Dennis: John, as you hear your wife describe John prior to 1995, prior to the illness, as a man, and you are a man, I mean, you have to be like all the rest of us who want to say, "I want to be that man now." John: Mm-hm. Dennis: Do you feel that? John: Yes, I do, and yet they had some tapes of me preaching before my illness, but one day I listening one of my messages, and I was pretty harsh, and I was listening and "I don't like that guy," and I took tape out and threw it out window. [laughter]  And I like the new me better.  But, you know, my Donna puts it this way, said, before my illness I sort of knock them over the head but now I grab them by the heart.  But, you know, I think the Lord just decided if I going to use John, I going to break him all the way down and start over.  But what I know of me before, and what she telling me and so forth, I like the new me, and things don't bother me maybe like bother other people, because I've been through just so much, and not a whole lot more I could lose, you know?  So, okay, that part of it, let's go on, and I have a good time.  I tell people I'm a few fries short of a Happy Meal, but I'm happy. [laughter]  Bob: You know, in circumstances like this, it's not unusual for people to say "Lord, why me?  Why is this the path You put me on?"  And it's not just the person who goes through the meningitis who asks that, but it's the person who is caring for the person who goes through the meningitis.  How have you wrestled with the "Why me?" question, Donna? Donna: I have wrestled with it, that's, you know, why – you know, I kept telling the Lord, "Lord, we were fine," you know, "we were fine," but the Lord has just showed me, "Donna, I have something special for you," and I have learned so many things through this, and I thank the Lord that He's brought us through this because I love him more, and I love him in a different way, and it's closer, and God is able to use us.  And if we're just willing to say, "Okay, Lord, it's all right.  Whatever you bring to my life, I know it's for my good."   Every day when I surrender the new thing that, "Okay, Lord, you can have that," and I was just – struggled.  I hung onto the back things, I guess, because I could remember them.  I hung onto the things in my past, and so – but every time I'd surrender, it was just so much better, and the Lord just eased and gave me so much comfort in knowing that the Lord has a reason for it. Bob: This is almost an impossible question for you to answer, but if the Lord came to you today and said, "Okay, I'll give you the old John, and we'll start from here with things the way they were, and we'll take everything of the last 15 years." Dennis: That's a hard question. Bob: You can have your choice, what do you want?  If you could go back and undo the last 15 years and just kind of be on the path you were on, which is what you longed for at some point, would you pick that, do you think? Donna: No, sir.  I'd take what the Lord has given us, I really would. Bob: You'd say, "This path has been the right one for me." Donna: Yes, sir.  I think if you'd asked me that a few years ago, I'd probably have said no.  But I know that God – this is God's plan for my life, and it's okay. Dennis: It's back to what John said earlier – "God is good, and He's right." Donna: Yes, sir. Dennis: And … Bob: … blessed be the name of the Lord, right? Dennis: Yeah, even though it's not been easy, you've begun to experience some of the benefit of the pain that you've been through.  Can you share some of those benefits, what they would be? Donna: It's a closer relationship with the Lord.  Also faith – just knowing that God's going to take care of us, regardless of what we go through. Dennis: Give us an illustration of that.  How has He provided for you? Donna: Oh, He's taken care of everything.  I mean, we have more than we need.  As far as the physical things, God supplies everything.  Every time he goes to the hospital, I think, "Oh, here we go again," you know, but the Lord always takes care of everything, and everything always gets paid, we never late on bills.  God takes care of everything, and also our spiritual – God takes care of us spiritually, too, and gives us courage and strength and I think one thing that really touches my heart, too, is, you know, when John was in the hospital, you know, he'd just say the name of God, I knew he was praying to the Lord.  And, you know, God does – He never leaves us or forsakes us regardless. And so, you know, John might have forgot everything, and John with that hard – I couldn't go through those things at the time with him, but the Lord was with him all the way through it.  It doesn't matter how hard it gets, he's there.  And so how hard it gets on me or whoever, God is there, and we've just got to trust Him. Dennis: John, do you have anything to add to that? John: Well, the Lord gives us grace not just endure but enjoy, and, you know, he doesn't just say, "Okay, I'll give you enough grace endure this," there are times of endurance, but most time it's enjoyment.  And I get to travel, and I really cannot get to all the places people have invited me.  It's just incredible.  That's how I met one of your staff.  I took my first trip California by myself, and on airplane.  I told my Donna, "I can do it." Dennis: What's your vision?  What is it again? John: I'm blind, legally blind. Dennis: But it's 20 what? John: I don't know the number.  I can – one eye I can just make figures.  Like, I can tell you're there, but I wouldn't be able to recognize you.  Now, with these goggles that I have under here, I can read if I'm up close, and … Dennis: So how do you negotiate steps to get on a plane and to travel to California? John: You know, people are so nice to blind people.  If you've got that cane, they get out of your way. [laughter]  And I just able to make it through, and I called her, and I was there at the place, and I said, "Donna, nobody speaking English here, where am I?" [laughter]  Dennis: You were in California. [laughter]  John: She teasing – I was teasing her like I ended up another country or something.  But, you know, it's been fun.  One time I went and heard a speaker, she went with me, and this man said, "I know some of you out there got skeletons in your closet."  Well, I not been taught that yet, and I'm thinking real, and I'm sitting there thinking, "Oh, mercy, if I knew somebody like that, I'd tell on them," you know?  And who would do that?  You know, and what skeleton is it?  And I got home, and I said, "Donna, that man knew people there with skeletons, and he wouldn't tell on them."  And she then had to explain to me. So I am learning all those things, but I do have fun, I do, and the Lord has been – just give me joy as well through the trials and I'm not always laughing, but I love hearing you, because you all laugh a lot, and I love be around happy people.   Bob: John, when you started losing your eyesight eight months ago … John: Mm-hm, yes. Bob: You had to think, you know, "Lord, haven't I had enough?  I mean, couldn't we just keep the eyes?  That would sure be helpful."  John: Yes.  Oh, Bob, that was one of the biggest struggles.  I should have been able to ace that one after what I've been through, but, I tell you, I struggled.  At first I couldn't believe it happening.  I thought, "Surely not."  Then I thought, "Oh, this just be two or three week, and the Lord say, 'Okay, I just testing you.'"  But it went on and on and on.  I almost felt like when Abraham was asked to give his son, and I thought of my sight, oh, I remember, I'd tell God, "Okay, Lord, not my will, thine be done," and then I had to tell Him, "I sorry, Lord, I didn't mean it," like I needed to tell him, but, I mean, I knew I was just saying the words. Because my ministry been built around telling people that we can trust the Lord with anything, and we can go on.  He said, "Rejoice in the Lord always," and I'd lost my joy over this.  "Oh, God," I said, "I'm so sorry," and it was just like I raised the knife, and I believe Abraham, when God told him offer son, I think probably at the time God knew he really would do it.  He stopped him and said, "Okay," and I finally got a point, "Okay, God, if you want the eyes, too, that is okay.  I really do mean it."   But that really was a big struggle for me.  I should have been stronger, but I wasn't. Dennis: John, I was told when you were going to come down here that just from an illness standpoint and battling all that you're battling, you might not have the stamina.  You've done remarkable. John: Thank you. Dennis: I mean, you're hanging in there with Bob's tough questions, and … Bob: Any headaches?  You feeling okay? John: Yes, I do have headache, and my pain level each day, Bob, is around 5 or 6, between 1 and 10.  When it get to 7, I have to medicate it a little bit; 8 and 9 I can live with.  If it gets 10, I have to go emergency room.  I getting stronger, but I not quite able handle 10. Bob: So where are you today right now? John: I about a 7. Dennis: Wow, wow. Bob: I don't know many people with a 7 … Dennis: Who would be doing radio. Bob: Or smiling or laughing or talking about how good God is. Dennis: And I think what our listeners don't see is, really, the smile on both their faces. Donna: That's what I appreciate about him, is he can be hurting so bad, but he still keeps going, and he complains some, yes, but, no, not like I would.  I know why the Lord didn't give me the headaches. Dennis: Not like he could, because of what he's going through. Donna: No. John: I try to be good to her.  She's been so good to me, and I love her. Donna: He's very good. John: I want to make her happy.  There are two big goals in my life.  Number one, make the Lord happy, number two, make my wife happy, and I love to be able to do that and get her things.  When I learned I supposed to love her as much as Christ loved church and gave Himself for – I remember when I heard that, "Wow, that a lot of love.  I got to work a whole bunch on this."  There is nothing world I wouldn't do for her, and she wouldn't ask me to do something wrong or bad, but I think how good the Lord been to me.  He's given me so many things. Dennis: I know there is one other thing you love to do, too, though. John: What's that? Dennis: You love to introduce people to the King of the Universe. John: Mm-hm. Dennis: Undoubtedly, there have been those who have heard your story, who don't know Him and who need to.  Would you like to take their hand in yours and place it in God's hand, explain to them how they can come into relationship with Jesus Christ and with the Lord God Almighty?" John: Yes, yes, thank you so much.  The Bible says the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance, and if people could just stop, and even if they've been through hard times, difficult times, God in His goodness gave us Son, Jesus, for us, that we might be saved and forgiven and be with Him one day.  You see, when I die, all my suffering over.  I read in Book of Revelation where John said, "in that city no more pain."  And, boy, howdy, am I looking forward to that – no more pain. The God that wants to give us that place of no more pain is Jesus Christ.  He gave us life, He shed His blood.  It took a good God to give His Son.  It took a good Savior to give His life so that if a person realizes they're a sinner, puts their faith and trust in Jesus Christ, He'll save them the moment they turn to Him.  And that's a good God, and I just beg people not turning away.  I have had atheists saved, Dennis.  I had one atheist get saved, and he said to me, he said, "John, I couldn't argue with you.  You just kept saying God good, and he said I finally one day I realize why have I turned down such a good God all these years?" And he gave his life to Christ.  I would love to know somebody give their life to Christ.  He's a good God. Dennis: And I would say to that person right now who is listening, why don't you take the offer that God is making on behalf of you?  The good God we've talked about who gave His Son, Jesus Christ.  You don't have to get down on your knees.  You can do it right where you are, driving in a car, listening on an iPod or computer.  But if you want to, it would be a good idea to get down on your knees and just surrender your life to Christ.  It is the greatest decision you'll ever make. And, John, I just want to thank you and Donna for telling your story and for allowing us the privilege of – and, Bob, I know you and I have worked together long enough, I know you feel the same – it's just an honor to be in the studio with you.  Thank you. John: It's been an honor for us, too. Bob: We want to make sure that those listeners who are interested in establishing a relationship with God through Jesus Christ, and we want to invite you to get in touch with us.  There's a book we'd love to send you that's call "Pursuing God," that explains what it means to have a right relationship with God through Christ, and this book is available to you at no cost.  All you have to do is call 1-800-FLTODAY, and when someone answers the phone just say, I am interested in becoming a Christian, and I'd like a copy of that book, and it will be our privilege to send it out to you, and we trust God will use it to help you begin to establish an ongoing relationship with God through Christ. Again, the title of the book is "Pursuing God," and you can request it when you call 1-800-FLTODAY.  You can also request a copy of the CD of our conversation with John and Donna Bishop.  We have that in our FamilyLife Resource Center, and when you contact us, we'll let you know how you can receive that CD.  You can either order it online at FamilyLife.com, or you can call us at 1-800-FLTODAY, and we'll make arrangements to send a copy or to send multiple copies to you, if you'd like. Again, the details of how you can order the CD are found online at FamilyLife.com or simply call 1-800-358-6329.  That's 1-800-F-as-in-family, L-as-in-life, and then the word TODAY, and someone on our team will let you know how you can get the CD sent to you. I don't know how many times, Dennis, I have seen you turn in your Bible to Matthew 7 where Jesus concludes the Sermon on the Mount by talking about two different builders.  One builder who built his house on the rock and the other who built his house on the sand, and you have reminded us that when storms come in life, the kinds of storms like John and Donna Bishop have experienced, it's really a test of our foundation on what is our life and our marriage built? And each day we have an opportunity to strengthen the foundation of our marriage as we spend time with God together as a couple.  A few months ago, you and your wife Barbara wrote a book called "Moments With You," a daily devotional book for couples to encourage them to spend time praying together, looking at the Scriptures together and talking about their marriage relationship and about their family. And this week we are making that hardback book available to listeners who support the ministry of FamilyLife Today with a donation of any amount.  We are listener-supported, so your donations are critical, they're vital, to keeping us on the air in this city and in other cities all across the country, and when you make a donation either online or by phone this week, we want you to feel free to request a copy of the book, "Moments With You," as a way of saying thank you for your financial support of this ministry. If you're donating online, there will be a keycode box you'll come to on your donation form, and we just need you to type the word "You," y-o-u, in that keycode box, and we'll know to send a copy of the book, "Moments With You" out to you, or call 1-800-FLTODAY.  You can make a donation right over the phone and just mention that you'd like a copy of the daily devotional, "Moments With You."  Again, we're happy to send it out to you as our way of saying thanks for your financial support and for your partnership with us. Well, tomorrow we're going to meet another very remarkable couple.  A couple that has weathered a significant storm in their marriage.  We'll introduce you to Charlie and Lucy Wedemeyer tomorrow, and I hope you can be back with us for that. I want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, and our entire broadcast production team.  On behalf of our host, Dennis Rainey, I'm Bob Lepine.  We'll see you back tomorrow for another edition of FamilyLife Today.  FamilyLife Today is a production of FamilyLife of Little Rock, Arkansas – help for today; hope for tomorrow.  _______________________________________________________________We are so happy to provide these transcripts for you. 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God is Good (Part 1) - John & Donna BishopGod is Good (Part 2) - John & Donna BishopGod is Good (Part 3) - John & Donna BishopToday® Radio Transcript  References to conferences, resources, or other special promotions may be obsolete. Forgetting What Lies Behind  Guest:                        John and Donna BishopFrom the series:       God is So Good  Bob: There are moments that come along unexpectedly – moments where the foundation of our life or our marriage is rattled.  John and Donna Bishop experienced one of those moments 15 years ago. Donna: Everything was just great, we were just having a great time serving the Lord.  Our boys and our families and then, all of a sudden, that night he got sick, and the pain in the back of his head just got severe, and he said, "You're going to have to take me to the hospital," and so I took him to the hospital and … John: When I woke up from meningitis, I did not know her.  I really didn't know anything.  I had a very unusual case of amnesia that I didn't just forget names and people, I forgot everything. Bob: This is FamilyLife Today for Monday, August 4th.  Our host is the president of FamilyLife, Dennis Rainey, and I'm Bob Lepine.  What happens to a marriage when, all of a sudden, all the memories, all of the past, is gone.  Stay tuned. And welcome to FamilyLife Today, thanks for joining us on the Monday edition.  This is going to be a powerful week for our listeners. Dennis: It is.  In fact, Bob, you and I both talked about this interview that our listeners are about to hear.  It's a top five broadcast – you and I have been doing interviews for – well, coming up on 16 years – that's a few people.  I'm kind of looking across at you, and I'm kind of going, "That's a long time." Bob: You're an old-looking guy. Dennis: We're kind of getting to be codgers in here.  But, I'm going to tell you, pull up a chair, get you a cup of coffee or a Coke or a glass of water.  This week you are going to hear an incredible compelling story of the goodness of God and the love of God.  This is another one of those love stories, Bob, that Hollywood just knows very little about.  This is a love story right from the pages of Scripture. Bob: Yes, you're going to meet John and Donna Bishop today.  They were married back in 1974.  John is a pastor and an evangelist.  They live in Rosebud, Arkansas, which is in north central Arkansas. Dennis: It's just near Hopewell, which is a suburb of Heber Springs. Bob: Oh, now folks have got it perfectly in mind.  They know exactly where that … Dennis: They know exactly where that is. Bob: John and Donna have three sons, and, as you are about to find out, their story is a remarkable one. John: All I remember is from 1995 to this day.  I remember nothing before that, so everything about my life that happened beforehand is what I've been told.  And my wife, her name, Donna, but I called her "my Donna."  When I woke up from meningitis, I did not know her.  I didn't know me, my name, I didn't know – I really didn't know anything.  I had a very unusual case of amnesia that I didn't just forget names and people, I forgot everything.  I didn't know how to eat, I'd forgotten how to chew food, and I had to eat baby food, and I don't blame babies being grouchy, if you had to eat that long. Dennis: So, okay, I'm going to stop you right there. John: Okay. Dennis: Since Donna does know what was taking place in your life up to 1995, I'm going to turn to her.  Describe your lives in the 1990s, Donna.  What was John doing and what were you up to? Donna: Okay.  We were pastoring a church there in Heber Springs, and we had a good church.  We enjoyed everything was going great.  We had three sons, and they were growing up. We also worked on our youth camp there, lived on the campgrounds and started the youth camp, and were just – I would say it was a perfect life.  You know, everything was just great, we were just having a great time serving the Lord, our boys, and our families, and then, all of a sudden that night he got sick, and the pain in the back of his head just got severe, and he said, "You're going to have to take me to the hospital."  So I took him to the hospital and … Bob: So it came on in an instant like that.  One night? Donna: No, he had been a little sick, just having headaches and so forth, and then it just started getting severe that night, and we just took him to the hospital. Bob: Were you scared? Donna: In a way, you know, because the pain just kept getting worse, you know, so – but, you know, you always think, "Oh, we can take him to the hospital and they'll be fine," you know, "be home tomorrow." Dennis: Right. Donna: But he was there about five days, six days, and he got to feeling better and, of course, once men start feeling better, they want to get out of that hospital, and so he got out of the hospital and came home, and it was almost one month to the day, he got out of the hospital is really when I believe the damage was done, or that's when something happened that he was sitting in his rocking chair, had his devotions over in a rocking chair, and he just kept sitting there and sitting there, and I thought, "Okay," you know, "let's get on with things," and he just kept sitting there.  And so I went over and shook him, and he couldn't wake up, he couldn't – he was just kind of staring off. And I said, "John, what's the matter John?"  And I was talking to him, and he just couldn't answer me, and then, of course, we took him back to the doctor, and it was just from there on it's been slow go. Bob: Now, the diagnosis was aseptic meningitis? Donna: Yes, sir. Bob: And this response, a month after the initial diagnosis, this is not what usually happens to people who have meningitis, is it? Donna:  No, sir.  You know, I don't know, I'm not a doctor, but I don't know if we didn't give him the medicine long enough or exactly what it is, but I know the Lord has a reason for it, and so – because that was when everything started going down hill, you might say, to us, you know, because he couldn't walk, and we had to help him around, and his eyes were distorted, so he couldn't drive, and he couldn't – well, he didn't know how to read, he forgot how to read. Dennis: And, ultimately, he lost all of his memory prior to 1995? Donna:  Yes, sir.  And I kept thinking, "Okay, now, he'll get it back," so he didn't remember marriage or wedding, and so I get our photo album out, and I said, "Don't you remember" you know, and I'd try to trick him to say, "Okay, now, I know he can remember something," and I just kept trying to go back and – but he just doesn't have anything. Dennis: In 1995, you'd been married how long? Donna: Twenty-four years. Dennis: Twenty-four years, had three children, you were pastoring a church, and you'd started a ranch? Donna: Yes, sir.  It's a youth camp, a church youth camp for boys and girls that come there. Dennis: All right, John, back to you.  How do you develop a relationship with a wife that you don't remember marrying? Bob: Well, you didn't even know what marriage was, did you? John: No, I didn't.  When she began to teach me, she said, "You're John, I, Donna, we're married."  And the way I learned to talk, Bob, in those early days, I'd watch people's lips move.  I wasn't blind then.  I've only been blind about eight months, but I would watch people's lips move and put the sound with it.  I said, "Marry?  Marry?" and she said, "Oh, okay, you forgot that.  That means you belong to me, and I belong to you."  I looked at her, I'd say, "You my Donna?"  She said, "Yes."  That's what I call her ever since – "My Donna." It was so easy to love her.  She loved me so good.  I'd tell people she taught me everything I know – every woman dream come true.  Her husband forget it all and she get to teach him. [laughter] Everything I know is what my wife taught me.  But I tell everybody she taught me reading, writing, and kissing, and my favorite subject kissing, that's my favorite one. Dennis: So that didn't change? John: No, that didn't.  I didn't – I had a hard time finding her lips, but I kissed until I find them, that's what I do. [laughter]  Dennis: Donna, what kind of student was he? Donna: He worked hard, he really did.  He's a pretty good student.  Sometimes when he's done, he's done, you know?  Sometimes he'd tell me, he said, "Remember, I'm the husband." Dennis: Oh, so he did find out what that meant? Donna: Oh, yes, it didn't take him long to have that man thing, I guess. Bob: It's one thing to take your husband to the hospital and maybe he comes home with a physical disability, and now life is going to have to change because he has to use a walker, or he's got to be in a wheelchair, or he's got something physically that's an issue, but to have a husband come home – I had a friend describe your husband's condition by saying, "It's like a computer that had the hard disk completely erased.  There is no data left there."  To have that be the situation and to be a wife and go, "This is the man I went to Bible school with and raised my kids, and he can't remember any of it.  Our shared history is gone." That had to be – I can't even imagine the discouragement that you must have felt. Donna: It was very discouraging, and that's why I kept trying to do those tricks, trying to think, "Okay, he's got to remember something," you know?  It was hard.  It was almost like I had four boys instead of three. Dennis: Was there anything to prepare you for the kind of commitment this was going to take?  I mean, marriage is a covenant, but your commitment was challenged to the core, wasn't it? Donna: Yes, sir, it sure was.  I thank the Lord.  I think the main reason was because I had a good home church when I grew up, and I went to church faithfully, my parents loved each other, and I was always taught that when you're married, you're married for life.  And when you say "For better for worse, in sickness and health," you're in for the long haul, you know?  And so I never even thought about divorce – that never even crossed my mind.  In a way, I guess I just busied myself into fixing the problem, you know?  Okay, we've got a problem here.  We need to start working on it, and, Lord, you've just got to help give me wisdom to know – because, also, all the decisions that he made as the husband now were put on me as far as my children and how many doctors to go to and who to go to and who not to go to, and I always tell ladies now, I say, "Listen, you need to thank the Lord for your husband's leadership." I mean, I was always thankful for my husband to make the decisions and so forth, but when I had to take that role, it was just something that made me appreciate the position that God has given me to be under my husband so that he could make those decisions for me.  And so I'm just very thankful that I was taught those things, and God's just really helped me through these things. Dennis: How old were those children at the time? Donna: My youngest was 10, the next one was, like, 17, and my other one was, like, 22, I think. Dennis: Wow, there was a lot going on in your life just raising them. Donna: Yes, sir. Dennis: Now, John, I want you to know we haven't forgotten you. John: Okay. Dennis: We know you're here, but we have to get a little bit of the drama that's taking place. John: Yes. Dennis: You came out of the hospital and arrived back home, and you were in a state of – was it almost like paralysis?  Or were you just – you couldn't walk, you couldn't talk.  You could see – you had eyesight, right? John: Yes, uh-huh. Dennis: You could hear. John: Yes. Dennis: But you didn't know how to eat? John: No, and I didn't know what words were.  That's why I couldn't read or write, and my Donna taught me phonics, finally, and my 10-year-old son would come home from school, sit on the couch and help Daddy learn to read.  And my oldest son was in college, the other just finishing high school, been going college, but my family just so good to me, people were just so good.  My church was so – I remember, even, when she brought me home from hospital that one time, and they opened the door of car, my dog, golden retriever, came over put head in lap, and I said, "Even my dog loved me."  It wasn't really a bad world to wake up to, because everybody in it loved me.  And, you know, my first memories of anything about life was my Donna rubbing my hand, telling me, "I love you, it will be all right, everything will be all right," and … Dennis: You knew what those words meant? John: In some way I did.  She would have to been sort of point out to me what, like, words "good" and "bad" meant and it's hard to really explain.  It was just a blank, and so she would begin to do – teach me these different things, and then as I began to pick up concepts is what it was, and the way I picked up on reading, I couldn't figure out what letters on books – how are they reading.  Until one day she got me dressed for church and set me in the living room and on the coffee table was a kindergarten book she going to teach that morning Sunday school and big pictures, Bible story, and what I did, Dennis, I would listen to the Bible every day on tape, because I couldn't read, and I would listen to two tapes a day, three hours, and I remember when she told me what the Bible was – see, I didn't know what I was, either?  I said, "What am I?"  She said, "You a preacher."  I said, "What a preacher is?"  And she said, "Well, that's somebody tell others what God what them know."  I said, "Wow, I couldn't be thing better that.  You reckon Lord let me keep doing it?"  And I began to learn concepts, and when I saw those pictures and the big words underneath it, "Moses" and "Red Sea," then I knew that was what I'd been listening to in Bible, and I hollered, "Donna, I can read, I can read."  Then I knew what words were, and so that's how I began learning. Dennis: Yeah, how did you know who God was? John: You know, I knew I knew God but I didn't know how I knew God and, matter of fact, in the hospital, one of my doctors said this – I would mumble things, because I knew I supposed to say things, but I didn't know how to.  So my doctor said the only word we could make out was the word "God," and it was, like, Dennis, I forgot everybody and everything but God. But I didn't know how I knew Him until through the Bible listening.  Of course, my family telling me, "You're a Christian," but I didn't know what that was, and, you know, my church told me, and they loved me, and so forth, but it was a process of me learning and listening to the Bible and what gave me the great assurance was Romans, chapter 8, where he says, "His spirit bear witness with our spirit that we're children of God."  And I'd gotten a little worried.  You know, it was – when I'd listen to the Bible, Judas Iscariot scared me, because I thought, "Here a preacher that didn't really know or love the Lord."  So I thought "Just because I preacher doesn't mean I really know the Lord and just because people tell me," but when I listened to that verse, it was like God said, "John, it my job tell you you're my child.  That's my spirit witnessing and after that I never had doubt after that I had that assurance in my heart from this word.  That's how I know you, God, but I can't remember praying a prayer. I wrote it in my Bible as a teenage boy, and I've still got that, and some people, Dennis, just put a date.  I wrote a whole page, and I treasure that.  God knew I'd lose it all one day, and I had a whole page.  I was brought up in a lost home.  My dad and stepdad had died before my illness, so I don't have any memory of them, but my mother was still alive.  She with the Lord now, and Mama told me that I from an alcoholic home.  She said, "John, I'm glad you forgot your childhood, it was real rough," but she said I led my dad to the Lord before he had died, my stepdad, and I led her to the Lord.  You know, I told my family, "Don't tell me everything, just what I need to know," because you don't really want to know everything sometime," so when I went to Mama's funeral, my aunt came up and said, "John, you used to send your mom a rose every year for she was sober after she got saved."  And I said, "Stella, what would this be?"  She said, "It would be 12."  And so I bought 12 roses and put there, and my aunt and I knew what it was.  And so the Lord has been good to help me, and I so glad Mama got to – she'd one day telling me about childhood.  I said, "Boy, Mama, I didn't know I was such a good boy."  She said, "Remember, I just tell the half of it." [laughter]  Bob: Well, we've been listening today to part 1 of an incredible story as we have talked to John and Donna Bishop about what the Lord took them through.  This is more than a decade ago, now, Dennis, and, you know, all of us, as we shared our vows with one another getting married, we pledged for better, for worse, in sickness and in health, and we may have stopped to think, "Well, how bad can it be?" or "How sick can somebody get?"  Who could imagine a scenario like this, like what Donna faced?  It's remarkable. Dennis: It really is, Bob, and I just want to let our listeners in on a little secret – don't miss the rest of the story – just the love story that we've heard of Donna Bishop hanging in there with her husband.  I know we're talking to some spouses right now who are hanging in there with the person they pledged through sickness and in health, for better, for worse, and right now it's sickness, and it's worse. You needed to hear the story to give you courage, and I just want to read you Paul's great writings about what love is, because the world cheapens what love is, and the Bible speaks so clearly.  I'm not going to read all of it, but 1 Corinthians 13, verse 4, "Love is patient, love is kind.  It's not jealous, does not brag, and is not arrogant."  Verse 7 – "It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things" – now, listen to these last three words – "endures all things."   The only way you get that kind of love is by knowing the God – the God who redeemed John and Donna Bishop and who put that kind of love in their hearts for one another. Bob: And that's the – as they used to say, "That's the genuine article."  Dennis, right after we had finished talking with the Bishops, I asked if I could get a couple of copies of the CD of the interview, because I meet with a group of guys on Wednesday night, and I wanted them to hear the conversation, and those guys came back the following Wednesday, and they said, "Can we get more copies of that CD?  We've got friends we want to send it to.  There are people who need to hear this powerful story." And we do have CDs of our conversation with John and Donna available in our FamilyLife Resource Center.  If you are interested in getting a copy or multiple copies to share with friends, go to our website, FamilyLife.com.  You can click on where it says, "Today's Broadcast," on the right side of the home page, and that will take you to a part of the site where there is more information about how to order the CD of this conversation and how you can get multiple copies, if you'd like. Again, the website if FamilyLife.com, and you click on the right side of the home page where you see "Today's Broadcast," or just call us at 1-800-FLTODAY, 1-800-358-6329, and someone on our team will let you know how you can get a copy of the CD sent to you. You know, when you pull back a story like this, and you hear from a couple like John and Donna, you know that the storm that they faced, they endured, and they stayed strong, because they had spent years building a foundation in their relationship that kept them pressed close to God and close to one another. Dennis: That's right. Bob: I know when you and Barbara sat down and began working on the devotional book for couples, "Moments With You," your hope was that couples all across the country would establish a regular discipline of building their relationship with God and with one another by spending time together looking at His Word, considering the dynamics of a marriage relationship and then praying together each day for their marriage and for their family. And there have been thousands of folks who have contacted us and asked for a copy of this devotional book, "Moments With You."  This week we're making it available to our listeners who contact us to make a donation of any amount for the ministry of FamilyLife Today.  If you go online at FamilyLife.com, or if you call 1-800-FLTODAY, and you make a donation of any amount, we want you to feel free to request a copy of the hardback book, the 365-day devotional for couples called "Moments With You." Now, if you're making your donation online, when you come to the keycode box on the donation form, just type the word "You" – y-o-u.  And we'll know to send a copy of the book your way.  Or call 1-800-FLTODAY, that's 1-800-358-6329, make a donation of any amount over the phone and just request a copy of the devotional guide for couples, "Moments With You."  We're happy to send it to you.  We trust that you can use it to begin a regular habit in your marriage of coming together each day, taking a few minutes to read the Scriptures and to pray together, and we trust that God will use this tool in your life. And we appreciate your financial support for the ministry of FamilyLife Today as well.  Thanks for partnering with us. Now, we want to invite you back tomorrow.  We're going to begin to look carefully at what it took for John and Donna Bishop to rebuild their life and their marriage together after John's memory had been completely erased.  I hope you can join us for that. I want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, and our entire broadcast production team.  On behalf of our host, Dennis Rainey, I'm Bob Lepine.  We'll see you back next time for another edition of FamilyLife Today.  FamilyLife Today is a production of FamilyLife of Little Rock, Arkansas – help for today; hope for tomorrow.   ________________________________________________________________We are so happy to provide these transcripts for you. However, there is a cost to transcribe, create, and produce them for our website. If you've benefited from the broadcast transcripts, would you consider donating today to help defray the costs?Copyright © FamilyLife. All rights reserved. www.FamilyLife.com                 

God is Good (Part 1) - John & Donna BishopGod is Good (Part 2) - John & Donna BishopGod is Good (Part 3) - John & Donna BishopToday® Radio Transcript  References to conferences, resources, or other special promotions may be obsolete. For Better or For Worse Guest:                        John & Donna BishopFrom the series:       God is So Good  Bob: More than a decade and a half ago, John Bishop was experiencing headaches that took him to the hospital.  He was diagnosed with meningitis, and then a month later, unexpectedly, his memory was gone.  What happens to a person, to a marriage and a family, when everything about the past has been erased?  John Bishop says you have to start back at the beginning, learning to walk, to talk, learning to love. John: When she began to teach me, she said, "You're John, I Donna, we're married."  I said, "Married?  Married?"  And she said, "Oh, okay, you forgot that.  That means you belong to me, and I belong to you."  I look at her, I say, "You my Donna?"  She said, "Yes."  That what I call her ever since – "My Donna."  It was so easy to love her.  She loved me so good. Bob: This is FamilyLife Today for Tuesday, August 5th.  Our host is the president of FamilyLife, Dennis Rainey, and I'm Bob Lepine.  What would happen to your marriage if, all of a sudden, you were starting from scratch? John: I tell people she taught me everything I know.  Every woman dream come true – her husband forget it all, and she get teach him.   [laughter]  Bob: And welcome to FamilyLife Today, thanks for joining us.  In our years of interviewing folks, we've met a number of couples and heard some remarkable love stories, but the story our listeners are hearing this week is an all-time classic, isn't it? Dennis: It may be the best.  I mean, we've heard some great ones here, but we wanted to bring this story to you, as a listener.  John and Donna were married in 1974.  They had three sons.  He was an evangelist for a number of years, pastored a church, had a ranch for young people that he helped staff and give leadership to. Bob: It was back in 1995, though, that he was diagnosed with aseptic meningitis and had to be hospitalized, and normally you recover from aseptic meningitis and life goes on. Dennis: But what happened was, it was like someone erased the chalkboard.  All the memory, all of his understanding of all the basics of life were gone because of this disease. Bob: This is a month after he's had his meningitis that he loses his complete memory.  He doesn't know that he's married, he doesn't know what marriage is, he doesn't know how to talk, he doesn't know how to eat. Dennis: He doesn't know who God is. Bob: It's like starting from scratch and, obviously, that leads to an incredible stress on a marriage, on a family.  I mean, what do you do from there, right? Dennis: It's one thing, Bob, to have a life-threatening illness and live through that valley, but the story you're going to hear is all about how they picked up and began to live life on a daily basis. Bob: Donna, it's almost like when you brought John home from the hospital, you were bringing home a newborn baby who had some adult-level functionality but some very baby-like qualities.  Was he ever like a bad boy?  When he was home from the hospital, were there ever times when you thought, "I'm going to have to" … Dennis: Let's put it the way it is, Bob – did he ever pitch a fit? Bob: Or a tantrum? John: I can answer that – yes. Bob: Did he go through the terrible twos with you? [laughter]  Donna: Yes, he would – especially when it came to eating.  He wanted to eat his dessert first.  "Why do I have to" – you know, he was always asking questions, why he has to do this and do that, and it was funny, one time I came home, and he was trying to help me, so he was washing the dishes.  When he washed the dishes, he broke a plate or a glass or something, and so he hid it in the trash, buried it in the bottom of the trash so I wouldn't know that he broke a plate. So, you know, he was hiding things from me and sneaking around behind me when he was doing things he thought I didn't want him to do. Bob: Now, here's your husband. John: [laughing] Yes … Bob: … acting this way, and you feel like you have to paddle him, spank him, for how he's behaving?  How do you handle that, as a wife, when … Donna: I'd be glad to spank him. [laughter]  John: She never spanked me, but she had to get after me but, oh, she has been so patient. Bob: When did you – when did it dawn on you that you had a sin nature – that deep inside of you is this rebellion that you want to be selfish, and you want things the way you want them.  When did that register for you? John: Once I began listening to the Bible on tape, I – for instance, Bob, I can remember first lie I told, and at least after the illness.  In the hospital the nurses had asked me if I had taken something, and it was something I didn't like, and so I had thrown it away, and I told her I had taken it.  Now, I didn't know what a lie was, but I felt guilty.  But later on I learned what lying was. Dennis: I'm sitting here thinking when you hid the plate – that also had to result in some guilt. John: Yes, mm-hm. Dennis: So here is God convicting you of your need for forgiveness, your need for Savior.  And yet you've already made that commitment as a young lad growing up.  You don't happen to have that sheet of paper do you? Bob: The page in your Bible that shares your testimony? John: No, I didn't bring it.  I sorry, I didn't bring it with me. Dennis: Basically, what does that sheet of paper say? John: Well, it tells about that Saturday night in September.  I was brought up in Bristol, Tennessee, over in east Tennessee, and there was a citywide crusade, and the preacher was C.E. Autry.  He is with the Lord now.  As a matter of fact, I've got a book.  I have his name down.  I can even tell you the song they sang that night.  On my testimony CD I have some people sing it – "It is no Secret What God Can Do." [music – "It Is No Secret What God Can Do"] Evidently, that song meant a lot to me, and so I even put that down – they sang that song that night.  I was a 15-year-old teenage boy and lost home, and Mama was telling me that none of the family was saved at this point.  And I even wrote that I brought a Gospel tract home from the stadium, the Tennessee High football stadium, it's still there, and with John 3:16 on it, I can tell you it was a Saturday night that September, I got on my knees, and I put my name where "whosoever was" – "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him," and I put my name – "whosoever" there – "should not perish but have everlasting life."  I know all those details but can't remember a bit of it, but I wrote it there, and I'm just so glad that I received the Lord as a teenager. And then Mama said I surrendered to the call to preach, and preached my first sermon a month after my salvation, and I've been preaching ever since.  The Lord has just helped me and, matter of fact, she said able to be interim pastor of a little country church when a senior in high school, and this is true now – it's Goose Pimple Junction, Virginia.  That's where it was – population 29, and so … Dennis: Hold it, hold it, Goose Pimple … John: Yes. Bob: Junction? John: Mm-hm, Virginia, and it is there.  You've been there, haven't you, Donna? Donna: Been there, yes, sir. [laughter]  Bob: Donna, did you ever have anyone come alongside you after the illness, while you were trying to care for raising your boys and care for John and say, "You know, there's a place he could stay where they'd take care of him, and you shouldn't have to bear this burden?"  Did you have folks suggest that to you? Donna: Yes, sir, I had somebody suggest that I could do that, you know, if I got tired and so forth, and I would get tired of taking care of him, but I thought about it.  I thought, you know, I could, but just go on.  I just was never tempted to do anything like that. Dennis: Now, what our listeners don't know is the length of time this story took.  I mean, we're not talking about 30 days in rehab back to John getting to normal.  John, give our listeners an idea here of the timeline we're talking about here. John: Well, for several weeks, Dennis, she had to do everything for me, and you know what I mean, I say everything.  I was like a baby.  This went on for weeks and weeks.  Like I say, it took me near two years to where I could walk, and I had to work at it, work at it, and so forth, but it was just incredible how good she was to me. I remember one day she finishing cleaning me up again, and I look at her, I say, "Donna, why so good to me?" And she said, "Well, two reasons."  And I said, "What that?"  "Well," she said, "one, I promise I would."  I said, "Promise?  I don't remember promise."  And she went and got our marriage vows, and she brought them, and she said, "John, we got married."  I said, "In sickness and health, better or worse," and I remember I said, "Donna, I am so sorry it this worse, but thank you keeping promise, thank you."  And then she said, "But second reason is" – and she gave me a big hug and says, "I love you."  And I got an award back a couple of years ago.  A college had asked me to come and they surprise me, they asked me give testimony, and they were giving me an award, and so I was so scared I was going to have to say something and right at last minute, and I thought, "What I going to say?"   And here is what I said – I got up, I said, "I'm going to take this award home to my Donna, and will get on my knees, put in her lap, and I'm going to say, 'Donna, if it wasn't for God and you, I wouldn't even be alive much less getting this."  So I said, "This yours."  I said, "One day I get to heaven, and I'm going to say 'God, why you been so good to me?' and I think God going to give me two reasons.  He going to say, "One, I promise I would," and He might remind me Roman 8:28, "All things work together good them love the Lord," and maybe say "John, I told you you love me, everything all right," and then I believe God going to give me a hug, and I believe God a good hugger, and He going to say, "But, John, main reason I love you," and I sure hope I have something put at His feet and say "Thank you, God."  But I can't describe how good she's been to me, and God and everybody been so good to me. Dennis: How does that make you feel, Donna?  I mean, I'm over here crying. Donna: I'm thankful that the Lord gave me the strength and that I was taught those valuable lessons that my family taught me and my church taught me when I was young, that it's worth it.  It's worth it in the end.  Don't ever bail.  Just stay with it, God will bless you. Dennis: For two years it took you to learn how to walk? Donna: To walk good, you know, without stumbling and up steps.  He has a real hard time with steps. Dennis: But even beyond that, John, you've suffered incredible headaches. John: Yes. Dennis: I mean, and just times of just feeling lousy. John: Yes. Dennis: And that's continued on for how long? John: All 12 years.  Immediately, because of the brain damage, I began having seizures, and I still have those.  But I gladly not quite as bad, and then cluster migraine headaches is what I have, and that's what actually caused my blindness.  They change nature, they're sort of what they call "ocular" cluster migraine.  But those have been big struggles for me, and I got very depressed, very discouraged.  I wish I tell you I got sick and just said, "Oh, everything be fine," and went on.  I didn't, Dennis.  I got very depressed and went through some very dark times, and I even prayed, "Lord, please take me home, please, because I hurt," and I felt burden for my Donna.  She never tell me I burden, but I felt that way, and depressed people do. And I got so depressed, I begged the Lord, "Please take me home, please."  I tell people when I talk audience, I said, "You never life seen person want to die and pray harder than man looking at," and then I say, "But now you never in your life want to see – ever seen anybody want to live more than man you're looking at."  God turned that around and helped me through those dark times.  But that was mainly because of the pain issues and the seizures. I called them issues instead of problems.  They just become problem if I let them, but I've had a lot of issues, you know, to go through, but the Lord's given me grace every time. Bob: You know, the name of your ministry … John: Yes? Bob: "God is so Good" Ministries. John: Yes. Bob: John, some of our listeners are going to hear this and say how can you, with all you've been through, testify to the goodness of God.  If God was good, why would He allow all of this to happen to you? John: Yes, and, you know, Bob, that was the struggle I was going through.  Those questions were going through my mind, and I needed to get hold of something, and the truth I got hold of, I was listening to Bible on tape, but I really loved the Book of Psalms because David been through some trials, too.  So I listened to it over, over, over.  Matter of fact, I wore that tape out and had to get another one.  And he kept saying, though, "The Lord is good."  He kept saying it, one psalm after other, other – "God is good."   And I'm not saying that all that God is – He is also holy, and He's just, and He's righteous, but the two things that stand out to me is He is good and He's right no matter what happens.  He's always good, and He's always right.  Our God put Himself through pain.  I am able to read now, Dennis, and I'm not smart enough to be able to know a lot of general information, so I focus my reading on people who are hurting, because that's my whole life now, is helping hurting people. The one thing I can tell people is nobody is hurt more than God.  When He gave His Son – they say one of the greatest pains a person can go through is the death of a child, but yet He let Him go through greatest pain anybody ever through because something better and – now, I don't have to know what all the better is, but I know I can trust this God because He let Himself hurt.  Jesus suffered more than any of us will ever know, and if God love His Son and let Him go through that because He knew something better for everybody, I'm going to trust Him that He got something better for me and everybody, too.  You can trust a God like that.  He's not like many other religions have gods that are above pain and above suffering.  Oh, God put Himself right in middle of it, and I can't always tell people I know how something feel unless I'd been through it, but I can tell them the Lord does because His Son went through the most incredible pain ever been and the reason we're here today is because He did. So I know good going to come from it because He's a good God. Bob: Well, we've been listening today to part 2 of a conversation with John and Donna Bishop and, Dennis, as I was listening to John talk about responding to his own trials, his own pain, I thought of 2 Corinthians, chapter 1, where Paul says, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of all mercies and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves have been comforted by God."  He is a living application of that verse.  Rather than being consumed by his own pain and suffering and saying, "Why me?"  He is comforting others in their affliction. Dennis: He is, and, you know, as we've talked here today, it just occurred to me – there are two groups of people that are listening to this broadcast.  One group, who is in the midst of suffering, and they're going through the valley right now, and they know exactly what John is talking about, and they have been comforted, as you've talked about.   But I want to remind that group of people where John's comfort came from, and to do that, I want to quote Dr. A.W. Tozer.  He said, "The most important thing you think is what you think about God."  And the key to John's faith was he had the right thoughts about who God was.  He got them from the Scripture – that God is a good God.  No matter what happens to us, He is still good.  No matter what befalls those we love, God hasn't changed.  "The most important thing you think is what you think about God."  There's a second group, though, and it's a far larger number, I think, Bob, even though we have a ton of listeners who are hurting who listen to this broadcast, and it's the larger number who need to be reminded of what they promised.  They promised, "'Til death do us part," and they needed to hear this love story.  I needed to hear it.  Who doesn't need to hear of a compelling promise that two people have made to each other to go through such an incredible ordeal as what Donna and John Bishop went through. Maybe you just need to take your spouse's hand before the day is over, and you just say two things – "I promised" and "I love you," and that's a great place to begin to build a family. Bob: You know, I think about the listeners who, over the next couple of weeks, are going to be off on a trip somewhere, a vacation or headed somewhere in the car.  They ought to get a copy of this CD and listen to it together as they drive wherever it is they're going together.  In fact, if the whole family is along, this would be a great story for the whole family to listen to. We've got copies of the CD in our FamilyLife Resource Center, and if our listeners would like to receive a copy, they can contact us online at FamilyLife.com or by calling 1-800-FLTODAY.  If you go online, when you get to the home page, on the right side of the screen, you'll see a box that says "Today's Broadcast," click where it says "Learn More," and you can find out how to order a copy of the CD that features our complete conversation with John and Donna Bishop.  We've had to edit parts of it for time purposes here on FamilyLife Today. Or you can call 1-800-FLTODAY and ask for a copy of the CD with John and Donna Bishop.  Again, the toll-free number is 1-800-358-6329.  When you contact us someone on our team will make arrangements to have the CD sent out to you. You know, on Friday nights at our Weekend to Remember Marriage Conferences, Dennis, we talk about the inevitable difficulties that will come to every marriage.  Very few folks will receive the kind of trial that John and Donna have had to experience in their marriage, but all of us will experience challenges and trials in a marriage and in a family.  The question is – are we ready for those trials when they come?  Are we building the foundation of our relationship each day so that when a trial comes, we are ready to face it because we can stand strong together on our relationship with Jesus Christ. You and your wife, Barbara, wrote a book several months ago, a devotional book for couples called "Moments With You," that is designed for a husband and wife to read through together each day, to spend some time in prayer together, to look at a passage from the Scriptures each day, with the hope that those few minutes invested together will strengthen the foundation of your relationship.   And this week we're making copies of your devotional book for couples, "Moments With You," available to our listeners when they contact us with a donation of any amount for the ministry of FamilyLife Today.  We are listener-supported.  Those donations are what keep us on the air in this city and in other cities all across the country, and so we appreciate hearing from you. If you go online to make a donation at FamilyLife.com, and you'd like to receive a copy of the devotional book, "Moments With You," just type the word "You" in the keycode box that you see on the donation form, the word, y-o-u, and we'll make arrangements to have a copy of the book sent to you. If you call 1-800-FLTODAY to make a donation over the phone, just request a copy of the book, "Moments With You," and, again, we're happy to send it out to you as a way of saying thank you for your partnership with us and for your financial support of the ministry of FamilyLife Today.  We appreciate you. Now, tomorrow, we're going to hear about how John and Donna Bishop can continue to call God good, even after all they've been through, and I hope you can be back with us for that. I want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, and our entire broadcast production team.  On behalf of our host, Dennis Rainey, I'm Bob Lepine.  We'll see you back next time for another edition of FamilyLife Today.  FamilyLife Today is a production of FamilyLife of Little Rock, Arkansas – help for today; hope for tomorrow.   ______________________________________________________________________We are so happy to provide these transcripts for you. 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Don't Waste Your Life (Part 1) - John PiperDon't Waste Your Life (Part 2) - John PiperDon't Waste Your Life (Part 3) - John PiperFamilyLife Today® Radio TranscriptReferences to conferences, resources, or other special promotions may be obsolete. Don't Waste Your LifeDay 2 of 3 Guest:                          John Piper From the Series:         Glorifying God From Your Wealth ________________________________________________________________Bob:                If you really understand and embrace the realities of the Christian faith, it will change your life.  Here is Dr. John Piper. John:              It seems to me that in this global village of ours, those who have any sense of reality at all know if Christianity is real, it's worth dying for.  If it's not real, then let's not even talk about it.  So, absolutely, I think we need to be straight up with young people and say, "Look, are you going to give your life and lay it down for Jesus or are you just going to play games?"  And nobody is out there saying, "What I really want to do with my life is play games." Bob:                This is FamilyLife Today for Thursday, July 27th.  Our host is the president of FamilyLife, Dennis Rainey, and I'm Bob Lepine.  Is your Christian faith worth dying for?  Is it worth living for?  Stay with us.                         And welcome to FamilyLife Today, thanks for joining us.  A couple of songs I remember from the 1960s.  You know, I always kind of – we talk about a program, and I always think of a song – you remember the song, "Alfie?"  Do you know that song? Dennis:          Well, I couldn't sing it, but I remember it. Bob:                "What's it all about, Alfie, is it just for the moment we live?  What's it all about?  Wouldn't you sort it out, Alfie?  Are we meant to take more than we give or are we meant to be kind and if only fools are kind, Alfie" – it keeps going on and on.  That was kind of an existential, philosophical – Burt Bacharach and Hal David wrote that.  They were – and then there was this other one – remember Peggy Lee?  She had this song about life, and she'd experienced the house burnt down one time, and she looked at the ashes, and she looked up, and she said, "Is that all there is?"  If that's all there is, my friend, then let's keep dancing.  Let's break out the booze and a have a ball, if that's all.                          You know, they were talking about some pretty heavy themes back there in the '60s.  They needed John Piper who could have told them what's it all about and that this is not all there is. Dennis:          Well, you know, you're going to like John Piper, Bob, because in his book he quotes a Bob Dylan song called "Blowin' in the Wind."  "How many times must a man look up before he can see the sky?  Yes, and how many ears must one man have before he can hear people cry?  Yes, and how many deaths will it take 'til he knows" … Bob:                [mimicking Bob Dylan] "that too many people have died?  The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind, the answer is blowin' in the wind."                         I thought I'd throw in a little Bob Dylan. Dennis:          And those who know him can make their own judgments about that. John:              It was pretty good. Dennis:          Was it good, John?   Bob:                [as Bob Dylan] Thank you. Dennis:          But as John points out, you know, think about that – the answer is blowing in the wind?  I mean, what a great place to look for a solution to life, huh? Bob:                In the wind. John:              Well, there are two ways to take that.  I took it both despairingly and hopefully because he said "the answer."  I mean, today, nobody believes there is such a thing in this post-modern age, there is no "the answer" blowing anywhere – wind or Bible.  And the fact that he would say "the answer is blowin' in the wind," held up to me, as a young person in those days, I'm hungry for the answer.  I'm hungry for the answer.  And so there was at least an echo of confidence, of objectivity there, and in those existentialist days, and our days are not any different, even moreso, anybody that believes in there is "the answer" is in a minority.  He's in a minority, and I want to get around him and say, "I believe that, too."  That's my only hope.  If there is no "the answer" then life really is empty. Bob:                You don't think he'd been reading John, chapter 3, where Jesus says, "the wind blows wherever it will, and the answer is here, and the spirit moves" … John:              I would like to think that. Dennis:          He would love to believe that.  Well, the author of this book, don't waste your life, is John Piper.  He is the pastor of Bethlehem Baptist in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and, John, increasingly you are writing for a generation of college students and young professionals, I believe, who drink deeply from your writings because I think they're fed up with the culture of tolerance and political correctness and the lack of absolutes, and you're talking about absolutes here that rock their world in your book, "Don't Waste Your Life."                           In fact, in your book, you actually call these young men and women and all of us to be ready to give our lives for our faith.  I mean, that's a radical absolute that we would be willing to give our lives for our faith in Jesus Christ. John:              You know, it's hard not to issue that call where you read, as I read an article about the Christians in Sudan.  Choose life or choose Christ; that is, you're going to be threatened and perhaps killed for just talking about mobs of people who circulate in Southern Sudan, take people and say, "Are you a Christian or are you not?"  If it's a woman, if she says, "I am," a gang rape happens.  If she says, "I'm not," fine, go on.                           And so you know that around the world today the persecuted church is dealing with these things at the cutting-edge level of life and death.  I can't see going around the country today or standing in my pulpit and talking another language and saying, "Well, we really have an easy life, and Christianity doesn't mean the same thing to us here, it's just a nice way to get healthy and wealthy and prosperous," blah-blah-blah.  If I can't call young people to be a Christian in Sudan, I can't call them to Christian anywhere. Bob:                Well, and here's the challenge, even as I hear you talk about this, because you're absolutely right – to call people even to modern, suburban, evangelical Christianity, that's not a radical call, and yet that's kind of what I'm living, you know?  I mean, that's where I am, and so I read your book and go, "Do I have sell my house and move to the inner city and do I have to do radical things like that?"  Or can I live in the suburbs and still not waste my life?   John:              My approach in dealing with wealthy Americans, which we all are, is not to dictate the particulars of a lifestyle but to hold up Christ who calls people to follow Him when he has no place to lay his head, who says it's hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom, who says, through John the Baptist, if you have two coats, sell and give to him who has one."  Who says, "Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven and not on earth."  Through His Apostle Paul, He says, "Those who desire to be rich pierce themselves with many pangs and ruin and destroy their soul."  I just hold up these challenges and say, "You decide whether your house is too exorbitant.  You decide whether you need as many cars as you have.  You decide whether you need a cabin by the lake.  You decide whether you need five suits and 18 ties.  You decide" – and what I want to do is just push us towards a wartime lifestyle.                         Now, here is the reason I use "wartime" instead of "simple."  Simple lifestyle might mean go live in a cabin in northern Minnesota, plant carrots, eat organic foods, and they are no good for anybody. Dennis:          Could we go to Montana instead of northern Minnesota? John:              Yeah, you can go to Montana if you want to do that. Dennis:          Okay. John:              But here's the reason I'm not into that – I'm into blessing the world with my life as much as I can with Jesus Christ flowing out from me.  You might need to buy a computer and have e-mail access to be maximally invested for Jesus with your calling.  That's not a simple lifestyle.  It will cost you a couple thousand dollars to get set up with that.  If you want to win a war, you might buy a B-52 or a rocket launcher, but the people back home might be on austerity lifestyle so that the army can have its B-52.  So when I say, "Well, what about the people who are at home in America and the cutting-edge people?"  Well, I'd say probably the people back home need to streamline their life for two reasons at least – one is to maximize their resources for kingdom purposes, and the other is because the world is watching.                           It says in 1 Peter 3:15 that they're going to ask you a reason for the hope that is in you.  When was the last time they did?  Not very often.  Why?  Because we look like we're hoping in the same stuff they do – same car, same insurance policy, same retirement plan.  So why would they ask us what are you hoping in?                           But if you do something radical with your life, if you take a chance, if you do some risking, if you let your children go, you know, or you go yourself, or you're around someplace where you might get malaria or AIDS from the orphans, then they might say, "Isn't a little bit risky for you and your kids?"  We say, "Yeah."                         I want to breed a kind of Christian so that the world will look at this life and say what is your hope in?  My hope is in money and good retirement and 911 and health insurance.  What's your hope in?  And I hope the answer can be "Christ." Dennis:          You know, you can tell how close you are to the battle lines on the basis of what you're complaining about.  The guys who are complaining about the lack of ammo and artillery and air support and fuel and additional troops – those are the guys who are on the front lines.  The guys who are taking the R&R are complaining about how hard the cot is or the bed that they're sleeping in; that their accommodations generally are less than satisfactory.  Those are a long ways from the front line of battle.                         And what we've sought to be about here on FamilyLife Today is to call the listener to say, "You know what?  I'm not going to live an R&R lifestyle."  Where it's rest and relaxation.  Instead, I'm going to press in to the battle and the cause and the war that is taking place right now, whether you're a part of it or not.  And it is a kingdom war, and the reality is the results, the result of this war are lasting. John:              They're eternal. Dennis:          They're eternal, and for most of us I think that war and that battle begins in our marriage and in our family.  That's where it starts, but it wasn't meant to end there.  It was meant to spill over and impact our neighborhoods, our schools, our communities, our states and our nation. John:              Yes, it is so clearly a family issue, this issue of wartime lifestyle and kingdom orientation and eternal perspective, because your kids are watching big-time what your values are, and if you buy from the finest restaurant and the finest department store and drive the finest car and insist on having the finest cabin, that's exactly what they're going to live for.  But if you buy your clothes at Saver's down the street for 50 cents a bag, and you have a one-car family, and you don't have to have a new car, and if you live in a neighborhood where you choose it for ministry and not for safety, they're going to pick it up.                         So, for example – I'll give you a concrete example.  We haven't had a television in our house in America for 30 years, and I used to think, "Oh, dear, I'm going to raise these boys, and they're going to be out of it," and yet I was choosing to take that risk because mainly time and banality.  I wasn't worried about sex and violence.  I mean, who cares about sex and violence, the Bible is full of it.  I care about the silliness of it all and dragging the soul down into such small, empty, insignificant junk that fills that screen every day – how can anybody have a capacity for glory and greatness and magnificence and chivalry and beauty?                         And so we've done this for 30 years.  My boys have never once – they're grown now – and they've never once complained in my hearing that we didn't have a TV because their lives were full.  Instead of saying, "Oh, they've got to see reality, they've got to see suffering, they've got to see life as it really is."  I say, "Look, why don't you just take them and live where life really is."  So we live in the poorest neighborhood in Minneapolis, Phillips Neighborhood.  They've seen people do drugs, they've seen prostitutes, they've seen me pull a guy off of a woman trying to rape her in my front yard, they've heard the gunshots.  They don't need a TV, just go there.  Really, come on, parent, if you're serious about wanting your kids to see life as it really is, do you really think TV is the answer?  It's not the answer, it's an escape hatch when you're tired at night, and you're most vulnerable, and you're letting the world infect your brain.                         So I've got an orientation on family for wartime lifestyle that I hope embraces and says "Amen" to everything you stand for, because if we don't get it at the home, we won't get it anywhere. Bob:                John, if the idol of Mammon is the dominant idol in American culture, why has not God stepped in and destroyed it?  Why haven't we had the next great Depression where God says, "I will not allow you to worship lesser things?" John:              God is always doing more than one thing, and we must be very careful to judge ahead of time what any given season of life in America is.  If things are going really well, it would be a mistake to say, "This is all blessing from the Lord," because it may be judgment.  I mean, the worst judgment America could get would be for all people to become prosperous and forget God.                           And when things are going really bad in the culture, we better not jump to the conclusion, "This is all judgment," because what could be better than for a father to discipline his children, including the church?  And so the short answer to your question is grace, sheer, undeserved grace that has been poured out on America.  Not because we have the right governmental system or have the right forefathers or have the right anything, but because God is merciful.                         I would say, though, that probably the presence of many, many God-exalting, Bible-saturated, Christ-centered Christians, according to that principle in Genesis where Abraham says, "Won't you spare if there are 50, 40, 30?"  And God seems to say, "Yeah, I will."  And so I think there is an element of that as well – that God does spare America because there are such remarkable ministries and churches and Christians of faithfulness here.  But I wouldn't make that absolute, because God could wipe us off the scene in a minute and do us no wrong. Bob:                Do you think we're seeing a generation emerge that is less materially centered than our own? John:              It's a mixed bag.  I couldn't say that for sure.  When I watch, say, kids who don't seem to be as bent on dressing up as I was with my bleeding madras shirt and my penny loafers and yellow socks … Bob:                You were a prepster, weren't you? John:              Yeah.  I look at them today, I see nothing better because I think they put as much time and thought and effort into their kooky, kinky, twisted, messed up, half-blond hair as I did in my "Kooky, Kooky, lend me your comb hair" back in the '60s.  I don't really see any basic difference.  You can spend as much time and as much money on looking down as you can looking up, and so maybe, maybe not, I'm just not a sharp enough assessor of culture to know what the majority is like right now.                         What I'm interested in is harnessing the good that I do see and transforming the bad that I see, because I think there are tens of thousands of young people on the edge of their chair saying, "Tell me how to die for Jesus." Dennis:          Yeah, and, frankly, that's where I'd like to go right now.  Let's harness some of the good who are listening to this broadcast – that person who has listened to you and to us, and they've resonated with what you're saying.  So you know what?  I've had enough of the toys.  I've had enough of the games.  I'm tired of the R&R.  I want a life characterized by being near the front lines of battle, by being in the war about what God's about, which is displaying His glory, changing people's lives, transforming them through the Gospel.  There's a person listening right now, what would you say to them – how can they engage in that battle? John:              The number-one issue is treasuring Christ above all things.  Before you do anything you must be a lover of Jesus, which means you must see – I've got this book called "Seeing and Savoring Jesus Christ."  We must see Him.  So I would say to the person, labor to see Jesus for the glorious person that He is.  Which probably will boil down to some pretty basic and simple things.  Get your Bible, get a pad of paper, get alone with God, open it up, and pray that He would open your eyes to see wonderful things.  In other words, mull the Bible, meditate over the Bible, read the Gospels over and over until you see Christ as inimitably and self-authenticatingly glorious, worth dying for, because until you see Him, your lifestyle is not going to change except legalistically.  But once you see Him, and He is your treasure, then things will start peeling away, and there will be a straight-arrow kind of living for Him.                         So I think the real battle is fought in what do we see and what do we savor? Dennis:          But after we've seen him, there needs to be that fruit in our lives, where there is that peeling away, as you described.  John:              Right, and I think it helps tremendously at that point to get alongside other believers and help each other in churches, small groups, recognize the challenges before us, the sins remaining in our lives, so that we can renounce the sins and embrace the challenges, and I think reading some good missions literature would be great, because most young people are so insular in America, we don't even know what's going on in the rest of the world, especially we don't know what's going on at the kingdom level. Dennis:          And I think today, as Jesus said, "The fields are white into harvest."  These are days to engage in the battle, and if what John has been saying here resonates with you, I want to give you a challenge.  Either right after this broadcast is over, or tonight before you lay your head down to go to sleep, I want you to pull out a sheet of paper, and I want you to sign over the very title deed of your life to Jesus Christ.  Barbara and I did this our first Christmas together in 1972.                           Now, I'm not saying there hasn't been struggles since then, because there has.  But you know what?  It's one thing to operate from a commitment where you have said, "I will pursue you and your agenda for my life."  It's one thing to operate from that, it's another thing to have never done that. Bob:                And here is what's happening – you are essentially trading in your cubic zirconia for diamonds.  You may look at your cubic zirconia and go, "But it's so pretty.  I don't want to let lose of this cut glass, it's so beautiful."  And that's only because you haven't seen the diamonds.  That's the essence of what John is saying in the book, "Don't Waste Your Life," and not only do we need the message, but we know people who need this message.  I'm going to ask John to sign a copy of this book for my kids, because they need this message but so do their parents, you know? Dennis:          I agree. Bob:                In fact, when the book first came out, my son, Jimmy, went through this book with a group of his fellow classmates, and we were thrilled that he was reading John's strong exhortation to make your life count.                         We've got copies of the book in our FamilyLife Resource Center.  If you'd like to get a copy for yourself or for someone you know who could profit from reading this book, go to our website, FamilyLife.com, and in the center of the home page you'll see a red button that says "Go."  You click that button, it will take you right to a page where you can get information about this book.  You can order online, if you'd like.  Again, our website is FamilyLife.com or you can call 1-800-FLTODAY, that's 1-800-358-6329, and someone on our team can let you know how you can have a copy of John's book sent out to you.                         You can also order a copy of the CD of our conversation with John Piper, or if you're interested in it as an MP3 file, that's available on our website as well.  Once again, our website is FamilyLife.com, and the toll-free number is 1-800-F-as-in-family, L-as-in-life, and then the word TODAY.                         My daughter, Amy, has had the opportunity to hear you speak on this subject, John.  She attended the Passion Conference back – I think it was in 1999 and maybe again in 2000, and both times Beth Moore was speaking at that conference with you, and I think both of you were really pouring out your hearts to students on the same issue, and that is making Christ central to everything you do, having Him be the consuming center of your life.                         Not long ago, Dennis and I had the opportunity to sit down with Beth and to talk with her about her 25-year marriage to her husband, Keith; about some of the challenges they've experienced.  She was very open, and she spoke with us during that interview, and many of our listeners contacted us asking for a copy of that CD.  In fact, many of our listeners who have gone through Beth's studies were very interested to hear what she had to share about her marriage and her family.                          This month and next month, we are making that CD of the interview with Beth Moore available as our way of saying thank you to any of our listeners who can make a donation of any amount for the ministry of FamilyLife Today.  We're listener-supported, and those donations are what keep this ministry on the air, and if you can help with a donation this month, we want you to feel free to request a copy of the CD from Beth Moore.                          You can donate online, if you'd like, and if you do that, as you're filling out the donation form, you'll come to a keycode box – just type the word "free" in the keycode box, and we'll know that you'd like the CD from Beth Moore sent to you.  Or you can call 1-800-FLTODAY and make a donation over the phone.  Again, it's 1-800-F-as-in-family, L-as-in-life, and then the word TODAY, and just mention that you're interested in the CD with Beth Moore, and we'll be happy to send that out to you as well.  Again, it's our way of saying thank you for your financial support of this ministry, which we not only need, but we very much appreciate your partnership.                         Well, tomorrow Dr. John Piper is going to be back with us, and we're going to focus our hearts and our minds where they ought to be focused – on the cross of Christ.  I hope you can be with us for that conversation.                         I want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, and our entire broadcast production team.  On behalf of our host, Dennis Rainey, I'm Bob Lepine.  We'll see you back tomorrow for another edition of FamilyLife Today.                          FamilyLife Today is a production of FamilyLife of Little Rock, Arkansas, a ministry of Campus Crusade for Christ.    We are so happy to provide these transcripts to you.  However, there is a cost to transcribe, create, and produce them for our website.  If you've benefited from the broadcast transcripts, would   you consider donating today to help defray the costs?   Copyright © FamilyLife.  All rights reserved. www.FamilyLife.com      

Alex Charfen is one of the very select few coaches I continually plug into...    I have wanted to get this individual on here for quite some time, and Alex Charfen has been one of the reasons why my stuff is blowing up so much.    I have learned that I need to listen to less people, and I'm very, very picky on those that I choose to dive deeply with…   So for marketing and sales, I've really dove deep with Russell, (obviously) and you all know that.    For systems and business systems, I've dove very deeply with Alex Charfen... he's the other coach that I pay a lot to and listen to as well.    ...and I have other various ones that are very carefully selected... and I don't listen to ANYBODY else!    I'm extremely careful about the content that I consume - so that I can spend most of my time just moving, rather than gathering MORE information…   ... which I don't think many of us need more of.    So anyway, I'm excited for you guys to understand more of why Alex Charfen, for me, has been so key…   So I asked him to come on the show and to teach a little bit more about the systems that all businesses need, regardless of whatever you're in.    A lot of these are the systems that a brand new entrepreneur needs when they finally get that revenue coming in.    ...and then there are systems that he creates for those who have an existing business and are ready to scale.    Alex answers the questions…     How do you know if you should be scaling or not?        What are the five reasons why most companies fail to scale?     If you guys like this interview, please reach out to him, (he did not need to do this) and say “Thank You!”    At the very end, we have a special little thing for you, and so we're excited!    Boom, what's going on everyone? This is Steve Larsen, welcome back to Sales Funnel Radio - we're really excited to have you guys here.    I'm with one of my good friends, who's become an amazing friend and definitely a mentor... I would call and consider him a brother as well.    I want to introduce everybody to Alex Charfen.   Before I really bring Alex on, I just want you all to understand, Alex Charfen was one of the guys that helped me understand why I am who I am... and that, it’s okay… and helped me lean into that.    I talk to you a lot about leaning into your obstacles, leaning into those things that have been crappy in your life…    … because they end up becoming your superpower.    You all know my story of going to the first Funnel Hacking Live, Alex Charfen was one of the first speakers, and I took so many notes…    I ran back home, I showed my wife and she goes "That's why you act the way you do?" And I was like "YES, it's because of this guy!”    He had a crazy deep gravelly voice and I loved it. He was the man!" ...and I'm so excited to bring him on the show here:   Guys, please welcome Alex Charfen, “How you doing, man?”   ALEX: Steve, it is so good to be here with you, man. Thank you, and I echo your sentiments completely, and I consider you a brother as well, man.   STEVE: Oh thank you so much, thank you so much.    You know it was like two weeks ago;  me and my wife were chatting about your material and going on through it, and she goes "Oh yeah, I have to remember this is how your brain kind of works."    I was like, "Really naturally, yeah! You should really know that" so we'll go back through your stuff.   You know, I've got that Capitalist Pig shirt that I wear all the time, but I really want one that just says, "Charfen will explain," or something like that, you know what I mean?    That should be the next shirt…   So much of what I do in this world just is NOT explainable without you.   ALEX: Yeah, it's unique, you know, Stephen…    I think when you characterize it that way, so much of what you do is different than what anybody in the world would ever expect... and that's what I've found from the day I met you.    I think I walked up to you and said something like:    "Hey man, I think we should talk. You're a really unique entrepreneur and I don't think you understand just how unique."   STEVE: I remember you said that.   ALEX: Or something like that.   STEVE: Yeah I remember, and I felt like, you know in the Matrix when he's talking to that lady with the spoon bend... I felt like I was talking to her, and I was like:    "What does he see in me? What are you looking at?" You know, and "Please dissect me!"    So anyway, I really am pumped for you to be here and just massive incredible love.    You have to understand, your name; it's NOT just a noun, it’s a verb in my vocabulary.    People are like "How did you do that?” "I just Charfenized it, baby!"    I say ‘Charfenation’ all the time.    I was hanging out with the other ‘Charfenites.’    I'm going over the ‘Charfenation.’    "How did you do that?" “Oh, I ‘Charfenized’ it, baby!”   Anyways, you're very much a verb in my vocabulary, and with my family... so it's really quite an honor to have you on, it really is.   ALEX: Thank you Stephen, it's an honor to be here man, this is awesome.   STEVE: This is really cool. Well hey, I wanna just start right out and just, I wanted to ask…    My audience has heard a lot about you. I've talked about you a lot because there’s so much that ‘veI learned.   Just recently, I was going through some of my old notes, from two years ago, from one of your events, and I was like "Gosh, you're so right, this is so cool!"    It really has created additional leverage for what I'm trying to do.   It works, it's real, and I want everyone to listen to this and listen to what Alex has to say here.   Understand that *this* is how I've been doing what I’m doing.   I learned marketing and a lot of sales from Russell... but how to have a life, systemize, and make my business an asset from Alex Charfen.    So, anyway, could you just tell us how you got into this? 'Cause I know you weren't always…   I mean I call  it entrepreneurial optimization, I mean it's really what you do - it's not just the systems, but like:    I'm wearing glasses now   I'm drinking more water than I ever have in my life    I'm doing all sorts of stuff I never would do, because of you    How did you get into this?   ALEX: - You know Stephen, I think if the question is, "How did I become an entrepreneur?”    I didn't find entrepreneurship, it found me.    This was really the only thing I ever felt comfortable doing in my life.    Ever since I was a little kid, I was always the kid that was different than everybody else, crazy socially awkward, like what you see today…    I don't try to be socially awkward, it's just natural.    I was always different than the other kids   I didn't really get along   I had trouble in school   All the systems in the world told me I was broken.    … and then, when I was eight years old, my family went through kind of a financial downturn; my father lost a company.    He didn't go bankrupt, but he went really close, and to make money for the family we were selling stuff in a swap meet on the weekends.    I remember going to the swap meet for the first time and standing behind a folding card table, and a woman walked up, and I sold her a pen that had an LCD clock in it…    (Like that was big time for 1981 or whatever or '78 or '79, or whatever it was).   Stephen I can remember thinking at that moment, "Holy crap, I'm good at this. This is something I'm NOT terrible at."    … because up until that point, I really hadn't found anything where it was like, "Hey, that was good."  It was always’ "Almost got it, kid. You don't suck as bad as you did yesterday."    I was the kid who consistently got *MOST IMPROVED* all the time, 'cause it's the award you give to ‘the kid who sucked the worst!’   And when that woman walked up, it was like "Hey, this is something I can do over and over again."    And the more that I worked with my Dad, and the more that I experienced business, I loved it.   The world is so random, but when you get into the world of business there are rules.   …. there's an outcome.    People are in it together, and you actually have to work together to accomplish and achieve.   …  if everybody cares about the outcome, it'll happen.    And so *this* is where I feel comfortable.    You know, it's funny, when I was a kid I used to create businesses, create business plans,  write out time cards and all this other stuff, and as an adult, I thought that was like ‘the weirdest thing.’    I would reflect back and think like, "Man, I was such a weird kid."    Now, that's exactly what my daughters do.    My daughter this morning was at the kitchen table for three hours writing out a schematic for a water park she wants to build one day.   STEVE: Wow!   ALEX: And you are who you are, and I think, from the very beginning, this is who I've been.   STEVE: That's amazing, and when did you decide to make a business around this and go actually help other entrepreneurs, like myself, who need these systems?   ALEX: Well, the business that I have today, we started…    So let me give you a little brief history.   So in my twenties, I was a consultant, and you know, a lot of people ask about that.    I did some consulting at a very high level at the Fortune 500 level...    I built a very large business that almost killed me.    And so I can tell the story really good...    I can give you all the highlights and make it sound great:   $250,000,000 company   I've worked with Fuji and TDK and Memorex and Logitech, and all international business.    Or I can tell you the other side of that coin…    I had a $250,000,000 company   I made less than $2,000,000 a year    my margins were razor thin   I had a bleeding ulcer   I was probably over 300 pounds    STEVE: Wow.   ALEX: And so when I got out of that business, I wanted to do something completely different.    So in my early thirties, I got into real estate, and we were taken out by the real estate market in 2007.    Cadey and I introduced our first information product, and that's how we got into this world.   We created a product called the Certified Distressed Property Expert Designation.    In 2007 we were bankrupt, we introduced our product at the end of the year:  In 2008 we did $500,000 in sales   The next year we did $7,000,000   The next year we did $10,000,000   Over the course of the life of that product, we did about $70,000,000    We went from bankruptcy to liquid millionaires in a year.    In 2013, the US Treasury came to our office and did a broadcast with us, where they said that, according to their research…    Our company had pulled forward the foreclosure crisis five to seven years   ….so it was intense.   STEVE: Oh, yeah...   ALEX: Really intense!   And what happened was, right around 2011…    A lot of our clients who were buying our product wanted help growing their business; so I took all of the stuff that I used to use as a consultant; the systems and structure Cadey and I used to run our business, and we started training it.    And so since 2011, we've been training it in classes/ courses.   In 2017, we started the products that we have today. So now we have :   An entry-level coaching program called Billionaire Code Accelerator - for people who are doing over 300k a year   A high-level coaching program called The Billionaire Code Grow and Scale - for people doing over 3,000,000 a year.    STEVE: That's awesome! That's so cool.   ALEX: Yeah it is the most fun I've ever had, Stephen…   It's like every day, I wake up and here's what I get to do:    I get to play in this playground with game-changing entrepreneurs that are starting businesses that are doing things that are just unreal.    ...and our systems, our structures are kind of the backbone for how they're doing things.    So on a daily basis, me and everyone on my team, wake up knowing that we are helping the game-changers change the world, and we recruit people who want to do that…    We recruit for people who are passionate about our mission…   Everyone on my team feels like their life's mission is being fulfilled through being in this business right now.    It's the greatest thing I've ever done.   STEVE: That's incredible, and I can tell everyone else who's listening and watching this now, it's exactly as he says it.    I think I've been to three of your events now, and they have just been life-changing.    I go through and it gives structure to the idea, but then, also, how I behave against the idea. So I can actually go in and breathe; I can live.    I watched my Dad create this awesome company when I was a young boy, but it took him too.   But everyone does that, it's super natural - so you to go in and…    Remove the entrepreneur   Create systems    Create processes and procedures, and people that actually push forward their vision even further.   ... it's incredible.    I know it's not magical, but it feels magical, to me! I'm like "Oh my gosh!"    I've actually had a tab open with your course open for like the last month and I'll just dive into another video, and I'm like "Oh my gosh! Back to the drawing board, that was so good!"    And I go back to it again and again and again... it's just always up, everybody who's listening to me, it's always up.    That's really what's teaching me how to run a company, rather than ‘me’ being the company, and I've loved that.    *Just so powerful*    I wanted to ask you kind of a key question here, and it's a question that I get asked a lot...    People come through my programs, I'll help them make money. They go and make a lot of cash, and it's awesome... but then after that, like what do you do?   What are the first systems that you find that new entrepreneurs with a sizeable amount of cash should actually go create first?    What are those first few moves?   ALEX: You know I think I definitely want to share a couple of systems Stephen, but first, I want to just share a thought process. ..and this is a tough thought process for most entrepreneurs to take on, and it's interesting 'cause I've watched you go through this shift too, right? '   Cause at the beginning, (and I just want everyone to know)...    When I met Stephen Larsen, he was ready to take on the entire world solo!   STEVE: Yeah.   ALEX: Like all alone, right?    And here's the thought process…    After you start making money, the next thing to ask yourself is:    How do I sustain this?    How do I make it real?    How do I make it last a long time?   How do I make it so that I'm not the only driver here?   when you get to the point where the momentum you're creating on your own isn't enough, and believe me, we all get there...    Like I know that if you're watching me, watching Stephen, you're one of those entrepreneurs... and in the back of your mind, you have this crazy voice that has always told you:    You're meant for more   You're gonna do more   You're gonna change the world   You're gonna make a massive impact   ... and if you've always felt that, then there's a shift you have to make in your thinking.    Because here's the issue for people like us; I call it the Entrepreneurs Dilemma.    For people like us…    We need far more help than the average person to reach our full destination, but any request for help or support that we have to make, leaves us feeling vulnerable and exposed.    Stephen, you with me?   STEVE: Yes, yes, yes, yes, 100%!   ALEX: And so here's the shift…   We have to realize that if we're gonna change the world, that is a group activity, and leadership's a contact sport.    So we have to wake up to the fact that when we start to:    Build a team   Create a structure   Pour into the people around us    Invest in those people   Make them important   Build relationships with them   …. we will build the company that we have always wanted.    That's the only way it's ever been done.  The myth of the solopreneur who's changed the world is a myth - it's a joke.   STEVE: So true   ALEX: It's one of the most damaging things out there in the entrepreneurial world today.    Because the fact is…    Show me anyone that looks like they changed the world on their own, and I will show you a massive team behind them.   STEVE: So true!    There's this idea that gets pushed around now, and it's like, “I'm gonna go and be this person that does all this stuff. I'm the gift to the world...”   ...and it's like “Okay….” but you can't do that on your own.    In the last six months, I have begun to experience and feel burn-out.   ALEX: Yeah.   STEVE: I have never in my life experienced that, and it's been hard.  The only way I've been able to create leverage is by listening to what you say and create those teams.   ALEX: Yeah. Well then, Stephen, that's the thing…    Here's the deal I want everybody to understand this:   If you're an entrepreneur, you have a job, and that job is to…    Stay out of burn-out   Lower pressure and noise in your life   Increase the protection and support that you have around you.    Because if you don't work with that equation to constantly lower the noise and increase the support, lower the noise, increase the support…    Here's what ends up happening…     You are in an equation that doesn't work.    … and it's not like anyone can come and argue against me here because this is like gravity.    This is like you know the facts of life, this is like taxes. We're all gonna pay 'em. There's no way to argue against this, you're going to lose.    And so in that situation, as an entrepreneur, you have to be really cautious about doing too much yourself, and about loading yourself up, because here's our instinct…    (You know you have this, I have this, we all have it.)    If there's something to be done, the first thought we have is, “How do I just get it done without telling anyone else,” right? Oh yeah!   STEVE: Yeah   ALEX: And it's like "I'm gonna conquer!"   STEVE: Freedom baby!   ALEX: We forget that humans are tribal animals, man.    We are all terrible at most things. Let's get real…    If you're good at a lot of things then you have a liability because you're not gonna be able to choose what you shouldn't do.    I'm very fortunate, I suck at most everything, and that's like an honest reality.    Anyone on my team will tell you like "Oh man, don't let Alex fill out a form, use the calendar, "send emails. We keep him out of all of our systems."    Seriously my team actually knows when I have a password for a system and they monitor me using it, 'cause I'm so bad at that stuff.    But on that same token, I know what I'm good at.    I'm good at vision    I'm good at where we're gonna go   I'm good at putting the frameworks together    I'm good at assembling a team   … and by doing those things, we can grow a massive organization and have a massive impact.   So for every entrepreneur, the key is to figure out what you're good at and do that to the exception of everything else   ... and it's the hardest thing you'll ever do as an entrepreneur.    Here's why…   The second you start doing that you feel like you're being egotistical. You feel like you're being self-serving.    But here's the fact:    When you drive your business to get easier for you it will grow like crazy.   But driving your business to get easier for you will feel like you're doing the wrong thing.    It happens all the time.   There's a discussion right now on our Facebook group, one of the CEOs in our group made a post, and I'm paraphrasing, but she said something like :   "As I offload and reduce discomfort and get a team around me, I'm feeling less and less significant, am I doing this right?"   And my answer was "Yes! You're absolutely doing this right. That's exactly how it's gonna feel!"    Because we need to attach significance to the total contribution, NOT to your day-to-day activities.   STEVE: Mmmm, that's powerful.    You know it's funny I was It reminds me of …   You know when I first got to ClickFunnels, it was just he and I. There wasn't like a copywriter, a videographer... it was just he and I!    So we did every single role in getting these funnels out, occasionally there was an exception where he'd go "Oh someone's really good at X, Y, and Z,"  but then, by the time I left...   ALEX: - Probably design or something… but everything else was you guys?   STEVE: Yeah, yeah, yeah, right! I knew enough Indesign and Photoshop, I was the one doing it most of the time... and doing first copy rounds, and it like, it was nuts!    But by the time I left, it was funny because he had started implementing these types of things.    I remember watching him during these funnel launches just laying on the floor, bored out of his mind.    I've never seen him like that in my life, and he was almost going to a state of depression. He was like "I'm not needed in my own thing now. Ah no-one needs me anymore."    It's a funny thing to realize, we're just the orchestrators. We don't play all the instruments.   ALEX: We shouldn't, we shouldn't.    And so, you know, back to your question about what systems should an entrepreneur start looking at?   Now, I'm gonna talk high level, and I wanna share...    You and I are really close friends, and I wanna share the most critical content we have for entrepreneurs with your group.   STEVE: I appreciate that.   ALEX: This is what we normally share internally once somebody joins our program…    We share the five things that keep companies from scaling.    The reality is, there are really five things that keep companies that should scale, from scaling.    And here's what I mean ‘companies that should scale…’    You know, if you go talk to most consultants, venture capitalists, investment bankers, accountants, lawyers, whatever, they'll give you this laundry list of why companies don't scale:    They didn't have enough money   They didn't have the right people   They didn't do all of these things   The reality is, if you look at most companies that should scale, there are five clear reasons why they don't…    So let me share them with you, but let me give you this caveat…    Here's what I mean by "should scale..."    If you've got a market    If you're capable of selling   If you could do more    If you know you're leaving money on the table   …. you should be scaling.   If those things aren't there for you right now, go resolve that and then start scaling.  Far too many people try and scale before they actually have all the steps in place.    Then you just build infrastructure that does nothing.   So let me tell you what the five things are...    #1: So number one, first and foremost, absolutely most crucial, is…      Most businesses don't have any type of strategic plan.     So as a result, there's no go-forward strategy, and here's what happens in a business when you don't have a go-forward strategy.    If you don't know where you're going, neither does your team   ... neither does anybody around you   And so you will, by virtue of math, become the biggest bottleneck in the company.    Here's why…    If there's no forward plan where all of us can point at and go get it and help you chase it down, every time we want to know what to do we have to ask you, and we have to go to you... and it's a death of a thousand paper cuts.    You're literally in a place where you're:    Telling people what to do   Checking that it got done   Telling them what to do again.    And if you've ever been in that situation as an entrepreneur, you know that somebody only has to ask you twice before you're ready to flip out and lose it.    Am I right Stephen?   STEVE: Yeah, yeah, usually once.   ALEX: Once, right, right, but by the second time you're like "Are you kidding me?"    And so the way we get past that is we create a clear strategic plan, we share it with our entire team…   ... and if the team knows where they're going, here's what happens.    I want you to understand something about the people coming to work for you.  If you're in a small business, you're hiring entrepreneurs.   I know that there's this saying in the market, "You're either an entrepreneur or you work for one."    I call complete and total BS - don't even bring that crap around me.   STEVE: Yeah!   ALEX:    Every person on my team is an incredibly talented, hyper-motivated, world-changing entrepreneur, they just choose to be part of a team.   And so you're gonna hire entrepreneurs, and the way you keep entrepreneurs absolutely and totally focused and excited, is you show them what they're hunting, you give them the kill.    You say:    Here's our plan   This is what we're doing   This is how you win.    And if you hire the right people, they will walk over hot glass to get to that destination for you.   STEVE: Yeah.   ALEX: But if they don't know where it is, you're gonna demotivate them and completely de-leverage them.    So number one, you have to have a strategic plan.    In my experience, less than 1% of businesses do. Also, less than 1% of businesses ever hit $100,000,000. In fact only 3% ever hit 1,000,000.   STEVE: Jesus. ALEX: So when you look at that, it's not 1% of businesses that hit 100,000,000, 0.01% of businesses ever hit 100,000,000,  and the reason is...    Most businesses don't know where they're going.    And Stephen, by you having the tools to build a strategic plan in your business, hasn't it changed how you approach things?   STEVE: Oh gosh, you guys remember when I tell you those stories of I left my job...    I created 200 grand of revenue really quick but there were no systems   I was the…    Support guy    Fulfillment guy   Sales guy.    I did every role, and I voluntarily, very painfully, had to turn down revenue to go build these structures.    And I want you all to know, it was Alex Charfen's stuff that helped me go in and actually set those systems in place... and so, please understand my affinity for this man and what he does.   About halfway through the year, I was only at like 300 - 400 grand, which is pretty good, but that last huge sprint came in because of the things that Alex Charfen and his team were teaching me.    All those planning things that I use, and all the things that I've just lightly mentioned, they've all come from Alex Charfen, and it helped scale me.   ALEX: That's awesome Stephen... Man, that makes me so proud.   This is so cool! Like there's only one Stephen Larsen in the world, and I told you that the first day I met you…    I'm like, "Dude you are completely and totally unique and I think I can help you build the company you really want."   STEVE: Yeah, you said   ALEX: And for us to be sitting here, and for you to say that, I got chills Stephen, that's so awesome. Thank you, man!   STEVE: Oh man, I'm so jazzed about what we do, but it's because of what you teach I'm like "I can do it... "    The first time I ever saw Stephen at an event, I did not leave the event until I'd cornered him and told him what I needed to tell him... because I knew you were gonna be exactly that type of person.    ...and here's why it's so important to me, Stephen.    I could tell the first time I saw you,  that you were gonna have a massive effect on the world.    But here's what I know about entrepreneurs; you're gonna have the biggest effect on the people closest to you - the people who are most proximal, your team.   And when I see an entrepreneur like you Stephen, I'm like:    "Man, if that guy builds a team he's gonna change hundreds of lives internally in his company. They're gonna change millions of lives externally, and I know those hundreds of people will build your legacy."    And when I see somebody like you, I'm like, “Man! That is the path, let me show you how to do this.”    The fact that it's working, is like, “Ah, it makes me so excited every day.”    This is why I get up out of bed every morning and do what I do.     STEVE: Ah, it's so fun man, feeling's mutual. You walked up, it was from that FHAT event that you were at.   ALEX: Ah ha.   STEVE: And you walked up and said, "There's a huge company in you and I don't think you know it, and I'm gonna help you pull it out of you."    I remember when you said that, I was so scared. I was like, "There's no way that this is real! I know who you are, are you kidding me?"    It freaked me out, and I had to own my own vision for a while. It actually took me a while to practice that.    Anyway, so much has gone on in mental clarity and development from what you've taught, not just these systems and things around, it's really cool.   ALEX: - So let's give the second one, Stephen   STEVE: Yeah, sorry, sorry.    ALEX: oh don't apologize, shit I love this part.    So first you have a strategic plan…    #2: Second, the thing that you need to have is      A system to communicate that plan.        Let me tell you something about us as entrepreneurs…    We think we're good communicators, but we're lying to ourselves.    The fact is, we are haphazard and emotional, and we're pumped one second and we're not the next, and we're all over the place…    Here's what happens…    When we have a team that has to deal with a personality like ours, and there's NOT a system for communication, it's random and haphazard and overwhelming... and it comes from all angles, and they're waiting for word from on high. Here's the fact, if you're the entrepreneur in charge, you're the MOST important person in the building all the time.    You're the most important person on the team, in the tribe, in the group, and they're all waiting to see what you say.    And if they're waiting for days and nothing's happened, they start thinking:    Is something wrong?    Did something go bad?    Did we do something wrong?    So you need a system.   As an example:    My team knows every Monday at 4:00, we're all gonna be on a weekly meeting together.  They also know every day at 9:27 a.m. we're gonna be on a daily huddle, and I'll be there.    They know that once a month we're gonna have a meeting where we show our strategic plan.    They know once a month we're gonna have a meeting where they all get the results.    So they all know when they're gonna communicate with me and how.    From the first day you're on our team there's a system that  controls how you hear from me.    Not just me pumping stuff out there haphazardly.    As a result, my team knows they're gonna hear from me, they trust it and here's what happens.    I set the expectations, I meet the expectations, we create trust. I create trust with my team every time I do that.    And here's the fact:   If your team trusts you, you get way more out of them.   If your team trusts you, they will do more for you.    If your team trusts you, you'll get discretionary effort   ... which means when they're driving, when they're showering, when they're doing something else, they're gonna be thinking about your business.  Why?    ...because it gives them momentum.    So if you have a strategic plan and a system to communicate it, you're ahead of 99% of companies out there.   And Stephen, same thing for you with the system, the structure?    Like…    We all fight structure, but once you put it in place, isn't it incredible?   STEVE: Oh, it's amazing! Stuff's getting done right now, that we set in place once. and then, I'll be like "Oh, podcast episode just launched,!Oh, what day is it? Oh, that's sweet! Everyone just put it out, all right, cool!"   ALEX: Right, I remember when I started getting messages like, "Hey, I love the new podcast!" And I'm like "Oh, we put a podcast out? Nice!"       STEVE: I didn't do that, what are you talking about?   ALEX: So you have  #1: a strategic plan, then #2: a system to communicate.    #3: Here's the third one, now this is BIG, really big, and most business owners just, they don't look at this ever and it's the biggest struggle is, or one of the biggest struggles is;      You have to have a system to consistently document the right processes in your business.     And by documentation, I mean having:    A flowchart   A process document   A checklist   Something that shows you how the important things in your business are done over and over again.    For example:    If you walk into a McDonald's, and you look above the fry cooker, there is a process to cook fries above that fry cooker.    Anything that happens in that McDonald's, there's a process for literally every single thing, including:    Unlocking the door   Turning off the alarm   Sweeping the floor   That's why there's a consistent experience at McDonald's; I'm not saying it's a good experience, I'm saying it's consistent.   In most businesses, in most entrepreneurial businesses, there's no process.    In fact, it's even scarier than that...    The process lives either in the owner's head or in an individual's head - so you lose a person, you lose the company.    You lose a person, you lose a big chunk of what you're doing.   STEVE: Hmm.   ALEX: So you have to have a system in a business to consistently evaluate what processes are in the company, and then on a monthly and weekly basis document the right ones.    The way that I would suggest you start, is you look at your customer experience:    What is the customer experience in your company?   What process documentation do you have to back it up to make sure that is completely consistent?    If you do that, you're gonna beat most people out there...   99% of entrepreneurial companies have little to nothing documented in any type of process.   STEVE: They're just shooting in random spots 24/7.   ALEX: Or they're doing stuff like, "Here's how we do our customer on-boarding…”    I trained Suzy   Suzy trained Annie   Annie trained Bob     John does it now   ...and you're like "Oh, cool! Let's go and see what John's doing?"    Well, John's doing nothing close to what Suzy and Bob and everybody else was originally doing, and so you have these degrading processes in your business.    And here's what happens…    When you look at entrepreneurial businesses, they tend to…    Go up in revenue   Come back down in revenue   Go up in revenue   Come back down.    If you're inside those companies, hundreds of times like I have been, here's what I can tell you…    Revenue goes up as the process is working, and then when it breaks, it comes back down.    *PERIOD*    That's why businesses don't continue to go forward - there are processes breaking in the business.    Whether it's marketing, sales, delivery, whatever it is there's a process breaking.    When you document your proceses, you make them bulletproof.    So in our business, we actually use:    Lucidchart Flowcharts   Sheets in Google Sheets    A new product called Process Street  -  a distributed, automated process document system, which is incredible.    So we have all of our processes in Process Street, and we have a distributed team around the world.   We have somebody in Ireland who can do their part of the process, as soon as they hit the last button it transfers to somebody here in the US who can do their part of the process.   STEVE: That's awesome.   ALEX:    Documenting your processes + Putting them in place = Game-changing   STEVE: Holy cow, okay I wrote that down.    I'm taking tons of notes so everyone knows, I hope they are as well…. And I'm not sharing! ;-) Process.st is the company, and we are so happy with it because... Stephen, here's what I want everyone to know,...   Cadey and I have had five businesses get over $10,000,000 a year, and all five of them ran them with paper checklists.   This is the first time we have automated checklists in Process Street.    The last information products business that we had, we literally had three-ring binders that we would carry around the office and check stuff off.    Having a three-ring binder with a process was so much better than having somebody trying to do it from memory.    Now with Process Street, we can distribute that three-ring binder, and I can get reporting on who's doing what.   STEVE: That's amazing.    Yeah, I've actually seen the three-ring binder and I've thought, "Holy crap, that really is how he's doing it.”    You would teach it and then I watched you actually do it.. 'cause you would record your stand up meeting calls in the morning   ALEX: Yeah.   STEVE: And I was, "Oh my gosh, that's so cool! I'm NOT doing that, interesting."    Then I’d go back and take notes and start it.   ALEX: And then implement.    Well, and you know, there's this phrase in the entrepreneurial world. Ah... I kind of get a little triggered, right!   STEVE: Let it out, baby!   ALEX: You know the thing that people say from stage:   "Here's what I want all of you to know. All you have to do is stop working in your business and start working on your business."    And I'm always like:    "Oh, good, thanks. Thanks for solving it all for us dude, that was awesome. You just solved all my problems with that really cliched BS thing that everybody tells entrepreneurs."     When I was in my twenties, my instant thought was like, "How do I get on stage to punch that guy in the face?"    And my then my second thought was like, "What a load of crap!  If I don't work in the business nobody's answering the phones, sucker."    Like, what's going on here? I don't know how to make that change.    And so the way you make that change is…    Working on the business means documenting processes.    By making it:    Clear   Repeatable   Real   And so you have…    A strategic plan that everyone understands   A communication system everyone knows is gonna happen    A system for documenting processes so everyone can repeat what's going on with your clients   #4: The next step,(and this is BIG), is..    A consistent system for identifying, documenting, and then prioritizing the right project in the business.   STEVE: Ah, this changed my life. *HARDCORE*   ALEX: Whoa, Stephen, you know how game-changing this is because, here's the problem in most businesses…    Projects are selected emotionally.    Period, I can't tell you that they're done any other way - they're emotional.    You go to an event and somebody says "I'm doing this thing," and then, the next day, you're doing that thing.    You listen to a podcast or you hear a webinar, and the person says "Hey, I added this thing to my business," and the next day, you're trying to do that thing.    In our business, if I have a really great idea that I want to implement today…    If I'm like, "Man, this is a really high sense of urgency, we should get this implemented."    It'll probably be somewhere around 45 days, and I'm totally okay with that.    That's the timing it should be in my business.    Now if there's an emergency we're gonna fix it that day, but if I'm like, "Hey, I see an opportunity here with something," it's probably a 45-day event…    Why?    I have a team and a structure, and a plan, and we have a system that's moving forward. We're already hitting our numbers, why would I mess with anything?    I actually protect what's going on in the business   I add things gently   I add things carefully   I make sure my team's into it too    I make sure we have consensus    In just in the last 60 days, we've gone from two million recurring to two point three million recurring,   STEVE: That's awesome!   ALEX: So why would I mess with what we're doing?   STEVE: Yeah.   ALEX: Yeah, so when somebody's like "Hey Alex, I got this "great idea for your business." I'm like "Awesome, get in line."    And we'll put it into our system to see if we want to actually do this…   Because the fact is…    If you're getting sold as an entrepreneur on what your next project should be, you're probably in the wrong place.    STEVE: Yeah, that's fascinating. I really agree with that.    It was your planning system for figuring out which projects, I still do it.    Top of every three months and it has guided everything we do.    And while I do follow a few rabbits and I'm practicing bringing it back in, we still largely follow the plan as to what the business needs, and that's ‘grow and scale’ rather than this impulse of like:    "Yeah, oh shiny object, shiny object, "that looks good, that looks good!"    And it's been that discipline, that's the other thing that's always up is my waterfall...   ALEX: Yeah, yeah, always! I mean mine's up right now. I mean I could share it right now.   And the reason is I always have my strategic plan pulled up in front of me, I'm looking at it every single day.    I'm asking myself:   Is the team doing what we need to do here?   How do I support people more?    How do I help them do this more?   Because when you look at our strategic plan, here's what it's made up of.    Our one-year outcomes   Our client-centric mission - which is our Superbowl, our hall of fame, the long term   The 90-day projects we're focusing on right now    What we're doing this month to hit those targets . So that waterfall of long term, to one year, to 90 days, to 30 days, I can see it all on one document and it tells me EXACTLY where I should be supporting the team and what we're getting done.    And so here's what happens…   I went to an event a couple of weeks ago, and I had an idea that was like "Oh man, we have to do this."    Then I come back to the office, I look at the waterfall and I'm like "What do I want to kill in order to do this thing over here?"    And you know what the evaluation was? *NOTHING* I'm not going to take anything off this, that would be crazy.   There's no way I'm gonna go to my team and say, "Hey guys, in addition to all the other stuff you're committed to, here's a hot potato."    I just backed down and I waited till the next time we had a planning meeting and I said, "Hey, there's this thing I think we should do."    We evaluated it   It went into the system   It went into the plan    There is very little knee-jerk reaction in our company because we are going so fast in a forward direction, that for me to challenge that in any way it has to be game-changing at a different level - so it rarely even happens.   STEVE: Yeah, black-ops right? Call them black-ops?   ALEX: Black-ops.   STEVE: No black-ops!   ALEX: No black-ops, baby!  If it's NOT on the plan, you don't do it... or it's black-ops.    And usually, the biggest creators of black-ops are guys like Stephen and I.    So my team has an open license to tell me if I'm doing black-ops.    They will actually call me out in a huddle, in a meeting, they'll be like "Ah, this sounds like black-ops," and then we'll make a note, we'll put it in a parking lot and do it later.    STEVE: Oh, that's so cool, okay.   ALEX: Yeah,  that's one of the most important things you can do when you have a team Stephen…    You train your team to criticize you and then you congratulate them when they do.   STEVE: That's really cool, then they have a license to actually flex their brain instead of feeling like they're in a box.   ALEX: Absolutely. You know I heard a story once about Larry Page, who runs Google,   He was in a meeting and he really strongly stated a point. and one of the team members got emotional about it and started yelling at him.    She was like, "I think you're wrong and this is why you're wrong," and Page was smiling…   Afterward, she asked somebody "Hey why was he smiling?"    ‘Cause she backed him down, and he actually said "You know what, I think this deserves more investigation. Let's do this."    She walked out and she was shaking and all adrenalized up, she had just yelled at the CEO of Google, like, “What the heck's gonna happen to me?”   She turned to somebody next to her, and was like "He was smiling, is that because he's gonna come down hard on me?"    And the person was like, "No, he was smiling because you confronted him, he loves it, he wants it.”    He knows that if people aren't confronting him, he's in a bad place.   So I look at it in my team and I'm like, "Hey, if my team's not challenging me a little bit, then we're all just marching behind a duck."    You know, I don't wanna have ducklings behind me. I want people who are saying:    Hey, this might work   This might not work   We might have a better idea   So you give your team license to criticize and license to call you on stuff.   STEVE:  Gosh, I love that.   #5: So here's the fifth one...    So we have:    Strategic plan   Communication system   Selecting and documenting the right processes   Selecting and achieving the right projects,   ….and then, this is *BIG*   Finding the right people     It's NOT just finding the right people, its…    Evaluating the company   Understanding what the company needs right now    What can you offload that is going to create the most momentum, not just for you, but for the team, for everything that you're doing together?    What is the position that you need to put in place next - so that the company moves forward the fastest?    And unfortunately, just like everything else I've named, planning, projects, process, all of those... people also become emotional.    An entrepreneur wakes up one morning and says, "I'm doing too much, I'm gonna hire an assistant."    Then they have the assistant sit next to them for three weeks, and they wonder why this doesn't work out?    It's because you had the thought to get help, (which by the way I congratulate you on), but there was no process there to actually make it work.    And so here's the process you need…   Evaluate what's going on in the company   Understand what the company needs   Turn it into a job description    Then you use it to recruit   You do tons of interviewing   You drive it until you have three people that you can select from    You hire one of them and then you do at least a 90-day onboarding, high-intensity onboarding.    When I'm onboarding an executive team member, I meet with them every day for the first month, three times a week for the second month, and two times a week for the third month.    People tell me, "Hey man, doesn't that "feel like overkill?"    I'm like:    You don't understand what it means to have an executive team. Your job is to build relationships with those people.    You want to know how you build relationships?    There's one commodity that builds relationships. One!    *TIME* - that's it.    And so when I'm onboarding, when I'm bringing somebody on, (whether it's on my executive team or anywhere in the business), somebody is doing that high-intensity onboarding with them…    Up close and personal every single day for the first 30 days making sure we have no drift.    And so, when you have a system to select the right people, bring them on and then onboard them the right way…    Here's what you avoid, (and Stephen this is like, Ah, this statistic drives me crazy)...    In corporate America, I know because I used to be a consultant there.    In corporate America, they would say things like, "Well we just hired so-and-so in that position so they'll probably be productive in four to six months."   The first time I heard that I was like "Did he just say four to six months? Does he mean four to six days, or does he really mean four to six months?"    Because in my business, even way back then), if I had to wait four months for somebody to be productive I would have been, “They're gone”!   STEVE: Yeah, yeah, they're gone!   ALEX: And so in our business, we actually have this experience right now.    We recently brought on somebody else, a new person to help us in marketing, and with our onboarding process, he was actually achieving products within the first five days of his first week.   STEVE: That's so cool!   ALEX: And that's how it should be.    You want somebody to come in, be effective and start contributing and creating momentum.    Because here's what will happen…    As an entrepreneur, if you're wired anything like I am, (and I know Stephen is), if you have somebody on your team that starts to feel like they're not carrying their own weight, you won't sleep.    You won't sleep, it will rip you apart, Stephen am I right?   STEVE: Yeah! ALEX: It will destroy you…    And so here's the question though…   Are they not carrying their own weight because:   They're lazy? They don't want to?   They aren't the right person?    Or is it because it's not clear what they’re doing?   STEVE: They have no idea what they're doing. They don't have confidence...I didn't help them!    ALEX: Right, 'cause here's the thing.    Your team needs three things in order to ultimately be effective and to be the type of team you want.    And here's what I mean by that…    As an entrepreneur here's what you want, you want a team that just does stuff and asks permission later.    You want a team that achieves and lets you know how things worked out.    That's it!  I just know this is how entrepreneurs work.    You want people who make really good decisions.    You want people who move things forward.    You want people who don't stand around waiting for stuff.    And if you want to have a team that actually moves things forward as an entrepreneur…    You gotta spend the time with them and let 'em know what your ethos is, and let 'em know how you make decisions…   That's how you duplicate decision making.   STEVE: Hm, gosh I love that. Okay, so…   Strategic plan   System to communicate   System to document processes that can be shared inside the whole biz    Documenting projects and the ones you're gonna work on   Finding the right people   ...and I actually personally just went through your onboarding training and it's so awesome!    'Cause it goes through and it's like this, you basically create a runway for 'em, right?   And if they don't land, don't worry you've got parachutes and there are jumpy cords all over the place...   - you're doing everything you can to help 'em win fast and lots of small tiny wins that build that confidence, and I was like:    "That is brilliant. 'Cause that is not the way you're taught anywhere else.”   ALEX: So Stephen, check this out, man.    We recently fell out of the lucky tree on recruiting and we hired this guy named Greg Duby and he is, ah, amazing.    He's like, he's just one of the most exciting guys I've ever worked with because he's so solid and so centered, and just so good at what he does.    Greg is a former nuclear propulsion tech in the Navy, so you know what that is, that's the guy who rides the bomb around in the submarine, okay?   STEVE: Yeah, that's amazing!   ALEX: Yeah, you have to have advanced degrees in Physics, advanced degrees in Math.   He's literally a rocket scientist.    So he worked in the Navy, then he worked at NASA, then he worked for some of the larger consulting firms out there…    I mean, he's done incredible stuff in his career.    He's just one of the most solid people I've ever worked with, and within about two or three weeks into our company, in one of our daily huddles, we said, "Who got caught being awesome?"    It's where we call each other out, and he said:    You know, I just wanna call this company out for being awesome.   “ I've been here for three weeks, I've never had an experience like this getting on-boarded anywhere...    I'm up and running, I'm excited. I feel like I'm really part of the team. I feel like I've worked here forever and I'm three weeks in."    And this is somebody who worked at some of the best consulting firms in the world, NASA and the Navy!    And our little tiny company has impressed him so much because we did onboarding because he knew what he was supposed to do.    And as a result, Greg, I think we're about three months in with him, and dude, there are projects that I thought were gonna take a year or two that are getting done this week.   STEVE: That's so cool!   ALEX: It's crazy.   STEVE: It's just a completely different way to do it. One thing I hated in the military, I love the military, but you know, some things that are rough and that is that there are no clear guidelines on how to win ahead of time.   The way you're instructed is by hitting barriers and then you get punished for it, and you're like:    "Just tell me ahead of time and I wouldn't do it! But all right, let's do more push-ups."    Anyway...   ALEX: Something tells me you did a lot of push-ups, Steve!   STEVE: I just want to say thank you so much for being on here.    I asked for 30 minutes and you just completely over-delivered, and I just really want to say thank you to you.    My audience already knows very well of you.    Where can people go to learn more about you but specifically also get your help inside the business?   ALEX: So the best place to learn more about us is to go to our podcast.    I publish a podcast four days a week, which is essentially a one-on-one conversation with an entrepreneur growing a business.    And the way that I create each one of those episodes is when a question or issue comes up in our coaching groups, I create an episode around it, we distribute it to the group.    But then also we distribute it to anybody who's listening, so you can get the same coaching that I'm giving my high-level clients right on our podcast…    It's called Momentum for the Entrepreneurial Personality Type, and you can check it out at momentumpodcast.com.    And then, if you want to understand more about our products, about our coaching groups you can go to our website charfen.com, but better is to just reach out to me or to one of my team members through Facebook.    The easiest thing, is just reach out to me, and I'll connect you with the right person in our company, and we'll go through a process with you to help you understand if we can help you.    You know Stephen, we're pretty neat, we don't sell everybody. We actually get on the phone with a lot of people who we sell later, but we won't sell you unless it's time.    We know exactly what solutions we provide, and if you have those issues and they link up, then we'll work together... but we go through a personal inventory in order to help you do that.    So if anybody's interested in getting on a call with a member of my team, you can also shortcut the entire process by going to billionairecode.com…    Answer a few questions and you can just set up a call link and you'll be on a call with one of my team members and they'll help you qualify and understand where you are.    And just so you know, we don't do sales calls, they are all consulting calls.    When you get on a call with my team, you won't ever feel like you're being sold, you'll feel like you're being helped.   STEVE: Which is exactly what I have felt when I started doing that as well.    Just so you all know he's very serious about that - that's very real.    I always feel like I'm being helped by anyone on his team.    ...and come to find out later, "Oh that was the sales guy!"    ...You know what I mean?    They dare to go in and actually they want to change the world and they're very serious about it.    So thank you so much, appreciate it.    Check out Billionaire Code.    The Momentum podcast is a goldmine, it is one of those gems on the internet that is actually worth all of your time and attention.    Thanks so much for being on here, Alex, I really appreciate you and love you, and thank you for being on here.   ALEX: Stephen, dude, this has been an honor.    I hope to be able to get invited back again, and as a Sales Funnel Radio listener, this is really cool. I appreciate you, man!   STEVE: Thanks, I appreciate it!    Hey, awesome episode right?    Hey, once I figured out the simple patterns and formulas that make this game work, I had a new problem…    Back when I eventually left my job and launched my personal business, I sold about $200,000 of product in around three months-ish…    And while I thought I was King Kong, a new problem started.    I was the business, there weren't any systems...   I was support   I was fulfillment    I was the one in charge of getting the ads around   I was the sales department    I was the marketing department    And I knew I wouldn't survive it alone…    Better yet, I knew I'd never seen a rich solopreneur.    This game takes a team.    Contrast that to now, and my company does tons of stuff that I don't know how to do...    What changed?    His name is Alex Charfen, check him out at charfenrocks.com.     So I usually don't bring tons of people on Sales Funnel Radio, but you should know that his programs, combined with my marketing skills, are why my business is killing it in revenue today, and NOT killing me personally.    Alex Charfen's programs and training have been life-changing for me and my family... and taught me who I really am and what I'm meant to be.    So when you're ready to build an actual business, an actual asset and NOT just make this another job…    When you're ready to keep the role of entrepreneur but learn the role of CEO, go get started with Alex Charfen at charfenrocks.com. That's C-H-A-R-F-E-N rocks.com.

Episode 2 of the Wisconsin Great River Road Microcast features Raptor Resource Project execuitive director John Howe.Bob: Why are we all fascinated with the bald eagle?John: It’s our national symbol. I think the thing that draws people in and they’re so interested in the details of the eagle is that people typically see bald eagles and you see them flying way up in the air, you might see a nest or you might see them perched along the river. Bob: John Howe is the Executive Director of the Raptor Resource Project. John, what is that? What is the Raptor Resource Project?John: The Raptor Resource Project was started back in 1988 by Bob Anderson, and primarily started to captively bred and raise peregrine falcons to help repopulate falcons after the devasting effects of DDT across the country. The work actively monitoring the peregrine falcon population up and down the Mississippi River from northern Minnesota down to Illinois, at about 50 sites that we band peregrine falcons. We’ve got nests. We’ve got nest cams and ways that we share that and help educate people.Bob: John, why is the Wisconsin Great River Road the home to such a high number of eagles nests and raptors in general?John: It’s the river that brings them. The Mississippi River is a national flyway for raptors and other waterfowl. It’s amazing. They congregate along that flyway, and it’s part of their instinct to follow that flyway. It’s a major food source for them. It’s a pass way for their migration. It’s a home. It’s being along the Wisconsin boundary of the river and the river floodplain along the Mississippi and the tributaries that come in. That’s where you’re going to find the tide populations and the congregations of these raptors that we love to watch, [including] the bald eagles. We were talking the other day a little bit about the peregrine falcons. At different times of the year there are great opportunities to hear them and see them and watch them in their home territory.Bob: Where’s the best place on the Wisconsin Great River Road to watch the eagles and the raptors?John: Right in the season of Bald Eagle Days up and down the river – Ferryville, Prairie du Chien. A lot of the little towns along the river have their Bald Eagle Days celebrations. Really, the way to get hooked into that is seeing it. Up until about this point where we’re watching, for example, bald eagles, we’re watching them grabbing sticks, breaking sticks, perching, and they’re pair bonding and they’re getting ready for egg laying. When that comes up, we’re going to be looking at egg laying. You can’t see that kind of stuff when you’re driving on the highway or even if you’re along the river. We were talking earlier about that fascination with eagles, and the wild popularity with the Eagle Cam is we actually get to see those details about what’s going on.Bob: Let’s just jump into that right now and ask a little bit more about the Eagle Cam. If we don’t have the opportunity to be on the Wisconsin Great River Road, how can we check out and find out more about eagles and watch them be born and kind of see their habitat?John: We manage a number of different cams in the area. For bald eagles, the premier eagle cam is the Decorah Eagle Cams. Going to our website, www.raptorresource.org, our cams are there. We also stream them through explore.org.Bob: Where along the Wisconsin Great River Road is the best place to view eagles and raptors?John: Between La Crosse all the way down to Prairie du Chien, there’s some great viewing areas. You’re right along the rivers, so it really depends on timing. [There also are] lock and dam areas. The lock and dams typically … That disturbing that happens right at the downstream where you always see the boats and the fishermen, that’s where the eagles are going to be congregating to fish also.Bob: John, earlier you were mentioning about the Mississippi River Flyway. Are there any cameras you have in the Great River Mississippi Flyway area?John: One of the original peregrine falcon cams – and probably the best one we have – is the Great Spirit Bluff peregrine falcon cam. That’s also available on our website, as I mentioned before. When you move away from the bluff and look down and see the tundra swans and the pelicans and the eagles during the great migration along the flyway in the Mississippi River. It was a dream, and we ended up putting up a cam down there on an island out on Lake Onalaska. It was a collaborative project with the National Wildlife and Fish Refuge and the Raptor Resource Project. We started that up last fall, and we have one season of watching all the waterfowl and the eagles. We’ve caught falcons, and we’ve caught great horned owls out there. [There is] a lot of neat waterfowl and raptors right out in Lake Onalaska. The audio on the camera, it’s almost like you’re sitting right down there in the middle of the flyway. Birds will do things out there without a human there. You’re going to get to see and hear some things that you would not see or hear if it wasn’t being brought to you by a camera.

Bob John, PharmD hosts PPAG Conversations, the official Podcast of the Pediatric Pharmacy Association. Dr. John speaks with experts in the field of pediatric pharmacy to discuss current issues in pediatric pharmacy, including pediatric and neonatal critical care, general pediatrics, and hematology/oncology.   During this Podcast, Dr. John and Dr. Diana Yu discuss this year's flu season About our Guest   Diana Yu, PharmD, BCPS, AQ-ID is a Pediatric Infectious Diseases Pharmacist at the Doernbecher Children's Hospital at Oregon Health and Science University in Portland, Oregon.  Previously to her current appointment Dr. Yu was an Adjunct Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City (UMKC) and University of Kansas Schools of Pharmacy and Clinical Infectious Disease pharmacist and member of the Antimicrobial Stewardship Program at Children’s Mercy. She completed her pharmacy degree at University of California-San Francisco School of Pharmacy. After graduation, Dr. Yu completed a Pharmacy Practice Residency at University of Kentucky Medical Center followed by a HIV Care/Infectious Diseases Residency at University of Illinois at Chicago. She achieved board certification as a Pharmacotherapy Specialist with added qualifications in Infectious Diseases in 2015. She currently participates routinely in the Antimicrobial Stewardship Program at Children’s Mercy Hospital and is a preceptor for both student pharmacists and pharmacy residents. Her current research interests include the role of antimicrobial stewardship in decreasing antibiotic resistance and clinical outcomes, non-occupational HIV post-exposure prophylaxis, and the role of rapid diagnostics and antimicrobial stewardship        About the Host of PPAG Conversations Bob John, Pharm.D., BCPS, BCPPS, a member of the PPAG Board of Directors, is currently a NICU Clinical Pharmacy Specialist at The Children’s Hospital at Saint Francis and the Residency Program Director for his institution’s PGY1. He completed a PGY1 residency at Saint Francis Hospital and a PGY2 residency at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. He spent his first two years after residency working as the Pediatric Pulmonology Specialist at Children’s Mercy Hospital and Clinics, after which he worked as a Clinical Assistant Professor of Pediatric Pharmacotherapy, Department of Pharmacy at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. Dr. John has been involved with the development of a pharmacy-driven pharmacokinetic monitoring service, NICU dosing weight protocol, and served on the evidence-based medicine committee, in which he has helped develop clinical practice guidelines at his institutions. Dr. John has been an active member of PPAG since 2007. In addition to being a member of the education committee, he has served as the chair of the webinar committee, and the education committee where he organized the educational content provided at the 2016 PPAG annual meeting. In 2015, he and his colleagues were recognized by PPAG with a Best Practice Award for their development of an outpatient on call service. He was awarded the Presidential Citation from PPAG in 2014 and 2016. He currently chairs the web-based competency committee, working to provide additional educational content in new ways to PPAG members. In addition to his work in PPAG, he served as Chair of the Pediatric PRN for ACCP.   Introduction music credits: "Reverie (small theme)" by _ghost 2010 - Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution (3.0)

The show is 6 months old, and Bob the Producer had an idea, tell the story of how we got here, so Bob turned the tables, and interviewed John on how the show came to be, how it's evolved, and where it might be headed in the future! Then, in the spirit of turning tables, our past guests then come back to ask John some off the wall questions of their own! John also recaps all of the previous episodes and why you should go back and check them out. facebook.com/WhatsThatLikePodcast youtube.com/atanetwork

Bob John, PharmD hosts PPAG Conversations, the official Podcast of the Pediatric Pharmacy Association. Dr. John speaks with experts in the field of pediatric pharmacy to discuss current issues in pediatric pharmacy, including pediatric and neonatal critical care, general pediatrics, and hematology/oncology.   During this Podcast, Dr. John hosts Dr. Jamie Miller, who highlights a newly published article in The Lancet, titled, "Effect of early low-dose hydrocortisone on survival without bronchopulmonary dysplasia in extremely preterm infants (PREMILOC): a double-blind, placebo-controlled, multicentre, randomised trial." About our Guest Jamie Miller, Pharm.D., BCPS, BCPPS is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pharmacy Clinical and Administrative Sciences at the University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Dr. Miller received her Doctor of Pharmacy degree from Southwestern Oklahoma State University College of Pharmacy. Following graduation, Dr. Miller completed a PGY1 Pharmacy Practice Residency and PGY2 Pediatric Pharmacy Practice Residency at the University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. Dr. Miller currently practices as a Clinical Pharmacy Specialist in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at the Children’s Hospital at OU Medical Center in Oklahoma City. In addition, Dr. Miller is the Residency Program Director for the PGY1 Pharmacy Practice Residency at the University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy and OU Medical Center.         About the Host of PPAG Conversations Bob John, Pharm.D., BCPS, BCPPS, a member of the PPAG Board of Directors, is currently a NICU Clinical Pharmacy Specialist at The Children’s Hospital at Saint Francis and the Residency Program Director for his institution’s PGY1. He completed a PGY1 residency at Saint Francis Hospital and a PGY2 residency at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. He spent his first two years after residency working as the Pediatric Pulmonology Specialist at Children’s Mercy Hospital and Clinics, after which he worked as a Clinical Assistant Professor of Pediatric Pharmacotherapy, Department of Pharmacy at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. Dr. John has been involved with the development of a pharmacy-driven pharmacokinetic monitoring service, NICU dosing weight protocol, and served on the evidence-based medicine committee, in which he has helped develop clinical practice guidelines at his institutions. Dr. John has been an active member of PPAG since 2007. In addition to being a member of the education committee, he has served as the chair of the webinar committee, and the education committee where he organized the educational content provided at the 2016 PPAG annual meeting. In 2015, he and his colleagues were recognized by PPAG with a Best Practice Award for their development of an outpatient on call service. He was awarded the Presidential Citation from PPAG in 2014 and 2016. He currently chairs the web-based competency committee, working to provide additional educational content in new ways to PPAG members. In addition to his work in PPAG, he served as Chair of the Pediatric PRN for ACCP.   Introduction music credits: "Reverie (small theme)" by _ghost 2010 - Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution (3.0)

Bob John, PharmD hosts PPAG Conversations, the official Podcast of the Pediatric Pharmacy Association. Dr. John speaks with experts in the field of pediatric pharmacy to discuss current issues in pediatric pharmacy, including pediatric and neonatal critical care, general pediatrics, and hematology/oncology.   During this Podcast, Dr. John hosts Dr. Nicholas Fusco, who highlights a newly published article in the New England Journal of Medicine, titled, "Shortened Antimicrobial Treatment for Acute Otitis Media in Young Children." About our Guest Nicholas M. Fusco, PharmD, BCPS, is employed as Clinical Assistant Professor, Department of Pharmacy Practice at the University at Buffalo School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences (UB-SPPS), since 2013.  Dr. Fusco earned his PharmD from UB-SPPS (2010) and completed his PGY1 Pharmacy Practice and PGY2 Pediatric Specialty residencies at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy (2010-2012). He received his Board Certification in Pharmacotherapy (BCPS) in 2011. Dr. Fusco practices and teaches in acute care general pediatrics. Very active in PPAG, Dr. Fusco has served as Chair of the Fall and Annual Conference Planning Committees, and the Education Committee.       About the Host of PPAG Conversations Bob John, Pharm.D., BCPS, BCPPS, a member of the PPAG Board of Directors, is currently a NICU Clinical Pharmacy Specialist at The Children’s Hospital at Saint Francis and the Residency Program Director for his institution’s PGY1. He completed a PGY1 residency at Saint Francis Hospital and a PGY2 residency at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. He spent his first two years after residency working as the Pediatric Pulmonology Specialist at Children’s Mercy Hospital and Clinics, after which he worked as a Clinical Assistant Professor of Pediatric Pharmacotherapy, Department of Pharmacy at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. Dr. John has been involved with the development of a pharmacy-driven pharmacokinetic monitoring service, NICU dosing weight protocol, and served on the evidence-based medicine committee, in which he has helped develop clinical practice guidelines at his institutions. Dr. John has been an active member of PPAG since 2007. In addition to being a member of the education committee, he has served as the chair of the webinar committee, and the education committee where he organized the educational content provided at the 2016 PPAG annual meeting. In 2015, he and his colleagues were recognized by PPAG with a Best Practice Award for their development of an outpatient on call service. He was awarded the Presidential Citation from PPAG in 2014 and 2016. He currently chairs the web-based competency committee, working to provide additional educational content in new ways to PPAG members. In addition to his work in PPAG, he served as Chair of the Pediatric PRN for ACCP. Introduction music credits: "Reverie (small theme)" by _ghost 2010 - Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution (3.0)

Bob John, PharmD hosts PPAG Conversations, the official Podcast of the Pediatric Pharmacy Association. Dr. John speaks with experts in the field of pediatric pharmacy to discuss current issues in pediatric pharmacy, including pediatric and neonatal critical care, general pediatrics, and hematology/oncology. During this Podcast, Dr. John hosts Tara Higgins, who highlights a newly published article in the Journal of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology, titled, "Retrospective Evaluation of Palifermin Use Nonhematopoietic Stem Cell Transplant Pediatric Patients," By Liu and colleagues. About the Guest Tara Higgins is an active member of PPAG, where she has served PPAG through numerous leadership positions. Tara, currently serving on the PPAG Board of Direcctors, was membership committee chair elect and chair (2013-2015) and chair of PPAG Fall Specialty Conference- Hematology/Oncology Planning Committee (2016). Currently, Tara serves PPAG as chair of hematology/oncology Special Interest Group (SIG) (2012-present), section lead for hematology/oncology section of PPAG board prep (2016- present), member of PPAG membership committee (2009-present) and member of PPAG BCPPS Recertification Committee (2016- present). Tara also helped start the PPAG student group at the University of Florida and continues to serve as the faculty advisor for PediaGators. Tara is Co-Director of the PGY-2 Pediatric Pharmacy Residency and is a clinical specialist in pediatric hematology/oncology/BMT at UF Health Shands Children’s Hospital. In addition, Tara serves as clinical assistant professor at the University of Florida College of Pharmacy. She received her Doctor of Pharmacy from the University of Rhode Island. Tara completed her PGY1 pharmacy practice residency at Massachusetts General Hospital and a PGY2 pediatric pharmacy residency at the University of Kentucky Chandler Medical Center.     About the Host of PPAG Conversations Bob John, Pharm.D., BCPS, BCPPS, a member of the PPAG Board of Directors, is currently a NICU Clinical Pharmacy Specialist at The Children’s Hospital at Saint Francis and the Residency Program Director for his institution’s PGY1. He completed a PGY1 residency at Saint Francis Hospital and a PGY2 residency at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. He spent his first two years after residency working as the Pediatric Pulmonology Specialist at Children’s Mercy Hospital and Clinics, after which he worked as a Clinical Assistant Professor of Pediatric Pharmacotherapy, Department of Pharmacy at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. Dr. John has been involved with the development of a pharmacy-driven pharmacokinetic monitoring service, NICU dosing weight protocol, and served on the evidence-based medicine committee, in which he has helped develop clinical practice guidelines at his institutions. Dr. John has been an active member of PPAG since 2007. In addition to being a member of the education committee, he has served as the chair of the webinar committee, and the education committee where he organized the educational content provided at the 2016 PPAG annual meeting. In 2015, he and his colleagues were recognized by PPAG with a Best Practice Award for their development of an outpatient on call service. He was awarded the Presidential Citation from PPAG in 2014 and 2016. He currently chairs the web-based competency committee, working to provide additional educational content in new ways to PPAG members. In addition to his work in PPAG, he served as Chair of the Pediatric PRN for ACCP.   Introduction music credits: "Reverie (small theme)" by _ghost 2010 - Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution (3.0)  

Bob John, PharmD hosts PPAG Conversations, the official Podcast of the Pediatric Pharmacy Association. Dr. John speaks with experts in the field of pediatric pharmacy to discuss current issues in pediatric pharmacy, including pediatric and neonatal critical care, general pediatrics, and hematology/oncology. During this Podcast, Dr. John hosts Dr. Peter Johnson, who highlights a newly published article in the Journal Critical Care Medicine, titled, "Delirium in Critically Ill Children: An International Point Prevalence Study." About our Guest Peter Johnson, Pharm.D. is an Associate Professor of Pharmacy Practice at the OU College of Pharmacy and Adjunct Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the OU College of Medicine. He also maintains an active practice site in the Medical and Surgical Pediatric ICU’s at the Children’s Hospital at OU Medical Center in Oklahoma City precepting PGY1/PGY2 residents and students. In addition, Dr. Johnson serves as the PGY2 Pediatric Pharmacy Practice Residency Director at the OU College of Pharmacy and The Children’s Hospital at OU Medical Center. Dr. Johnson received his B.S. in Pharmaceutical Sciences and Doctor of Pharmacy degrees from the University of Mississippi School of Pharmacy. Following his tenure at Ole Miss, Dr. Johnson completed his PGY1 pharmacy and PGY2 pediatric pharmacy residencies at the University of Kentucky Chandler Medical Center. Among his professional affiliations, he is a member of the Pediatric Pharmacy Advocacy Group, Society of Critical Care Medicine, American Society of Health-System Pharmacists, American, and American College of Clinical Pharmacy. Dr. Johnson is board certified in pharmacotherapy and pediatric pharmacy. In addition, he was inducted as a fellow of PPAG in 2016. His research/scholarship focuses in pain management, sedation, and drug withdrawal in critically-ill children.     About the Host of PPAG Conversations Bob John, Pharm.D., BCPS, BCPPS, a member of the PPAG Board of Directors, is currently a NICU Clinical Pharmacy Specialist at The Children’s Hospital at Saint Francis and the Residency Program Director for his institution’s PGY1. He completed a PGY1 residency at Saint Francis Hospital and a PGY2 residency at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. He spent his first two years after residency working as the Pediatric Pulmonology Specialist at Children’s Mercy Hospital and Clinics, after which he worked as a Clinical Assistant Professor of Pediatric Pharmacotherapy, Department of Pharmacy at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. Dr. John has been involved with the development of a pharmacy-driven pharmacokinetic monitoring service, NICU dosing weight protocol, and served on the evidence-based medicine committee, in which he has helped develop clinical practice guidelines at his institutions. Dr. John has been an active member of PPAG since 2007. In addition to being a member of the education committee, he has served as the chair of the webinar committee, and the education committee where he organized the educational content provided at the 2016 PPAG annual meeting. In 2015, he and his colleagues were recognized by PPAG with a Best Practice Award for their development of an outpatient on call service. He was awarded the Presidential Citation from PPAG in 2014 and 2016. He currently chairs the web-based competency committee, working to provide additional educational content in new ways to PPAG members. In addition to his work in PPAG, he served as Chair of the Pediatric PRN for ACCP. Introduction music credits: "Reverie (small theme)" by _ghost 2010 - Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution (3.0)

Bericht vom fünften Tag der Berlinale mit Beiträgen zu den Filmen „Sister - L'enfant d'en haut“ mit Léa Seydoux, „Jayne Mansfield's Car“ von Billy Bob Thornton mit John Hurt und „Die Blumen des Krieges“ mit Christian Bale.

Bericht vom fünften Tag der Berlinale mit Beiträgen zu den Filmen „Sister - L'enfant d'en haut“ mit Léa Seydoux, „Jayne Mansfield's Car“ von Billy Bob Thornton mit John Hurt und „Die Blumen des Krieges“ mit Christian Bale.