284: On this special episode of Pastor Plek's Podcast, Pastor Plek is joined by his wife Adrienne and special guest Joey Kelly from CG Victory. Tune in to hear more about Joey's story and struggle with his faith from bodily injuries and a near death experience that brought him face to face with his faith. Their exchange reveals the challenges of harboring anger towards God and the redemptive path that led Joey to fully embrace his spirituality in college.
For more Info about CG Victory email joey@cgvictory.org
Or go to https://www.cgvictory.org
Check out Joey’s I am second video
https://www.iamsecond.com/film/joey-kelly/
Got questions? Text us at 737-231-0605!
Like, share, and subscribe! We love seeing and responding to your reviews and comments.
Support the show: https://wbcc.churchcenter.com/giving
284: On this special episode of Pastor Plek's Podcast, Pastor Plek is joined by his wife Adrienne and special guest Joey Kelly from CG Victory. Tune in to hear more about Joey's story and struggle with his faith from bodily injuries and a near death experience that brought him face to face with his faith. Their exchange reveals the challenges of harboring anger towards God and the redemptive path that led Joey to fully embrace his spirituality in college.
For more Info about CG Victory email joey@cgvictory.org
Or go to https://www.cgvictory.org
Check out Joey’s I am second video
https://www.iamsecond.com/film/joey-kelly/
Got questions? Text us at 737-231-0605!
Like, share, and subscribe! We love seeing and responding to your reviews and comments.
Support the show: https://wbcc.churchcenter.com/giving
And welcome back to pastor Plex podcast. I am your host, pastor Plex, and joining me in studio is none other than my lovely and very sweet wife, adrian Plec, and Paul Adrian. Welcome back. A new intro.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:And then also here from CG victory, none other than Joey Kelly.
Speaker 3:Glad to be here.
Speaker 1:Joey, I have known you for about forever, like really since 2011. I think, when we got married.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, that was when our whole life exploded.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, and we I remember that. Remember we had to hang out with Ben Meadows, holland, greg, all at your parents house. Do you remember that? I think we're. Yeah, we were just barely remember you came down. We're all talking about your future. Yeah, all of you were just graduating from A&M.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you have an incredible memory.
Speaker 1:You know, I just thought of that.
Speaker 2:Well, he doesn't always, but occasionally there's a shiny moment which isn't normal for guys.
Speaker 3:I feel like the wives always remember everything.
Speaker 1:Everything.
Speaker 3:What I remember is a mission trip in California.
Speaker 1:Yes. Prison ministry was yes, yes, you were on that with us right, yeah, it was awesome. That's when we saw Graham Cowgirl. Did you know?
Speaker 2:Graham, yeah, yeah, I think that was a complete coincidence, like someone had hooked us up with, like an Airbnb and air. It was somehow the place where he lived ended up being the home that was willing to like host us, anyway, and we didn't know that there was going to be this connection. And I think he saw Joey sitting outside of the house and he was like wait, what? And then I was that was fun, that was a fun trip.
Speaker 1:That was a fun trip. That was one Prison ministry.
Speaker 3:It's so great it was so.
Speaker 1:It was insane to. Were you part of that moving back and forth in the trunk? Do you remember we were trying to get every all the guys back and I had put, so I think I put Ben in the trunk.
Speaker 3:Oh man, I can't remember that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I put Ben in the trunk of a Mustang.
Speaker 2:I remember that and we were like is this safe?
Speaker 1:It's like listen, we need to get back. Gospel, that's right, we do things for Jesus around here.
Speaker 3:All right.
Speaker 2:Well.
Speaker 1:Joey, you know, since then you become an IM, second dot com, infamous person and for more than just your story talk. Give me real quick Some of your athletic accolades of recent years Wow, athletic accolades. You like that.
Speaker 3:Everyone lower your expectations.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like this is amazing because you've done some pretty fun things.
Speaker 3:Yeah, let's see. Let's see, I played basketball in high school. Yeah, but recent years, let's see, I was on a game show called Spartan Race Team Challenge.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you like separate your shoulder in the event.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah and this on the second heat I separated my shoulder like completely came out and came in and out about five, six times during the race, but we still won. That heat that was what we pushed through went off of adrenaline and we ended up getting second place in the whole whole game show tournament. This close to the top. The winners got a quarter million. Oh, and guess what? Second place gets what? Nothing Zero.
Speaker 3:So zero I went home with nothing. We think we could have won if I didn't hurt my shoulder because I had to sit out the very last.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I remember that, and you brought in I don't always say some scrub, but you had to bring in somebody else Pretty much, pretty much the show has like substitutes ready to go, yeah, when injuries happen.
Speaker 3:So it was a bummer.
Speaker 2:Oh, what a wow. Oh, I do. I forgot that. That is that you guys had to bring in a cell.
Speaker 1:I remember going down for the watch party domain.
Speaker 2:That was super fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I got, yeah, had to get major surgery on my shoulder, so still still worth it. It's still super fun. My family just tries out for game shows.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, you guys are the family feud, truly.
Speaker 3:after that I thought, yeah, we've been on three episodes of family, three episodes of Spartan race. My sister was on three episodes whatever of American gladiator. That's how the whole CG thing started. Yeah, Some people didn't catch that camp gladiators because she won American gladiators which is really funny because it's such a dated name Like yeah.
Speaker 1:So now, like camp gladiators stands alone without American gladiator, but you're still stuck with the gladiator thing, which is actually kind of works for you yeah, yeah, or really it's kind of rebranded to CG, cg fitness.
Speaker 3:No one calls it camp gladiator, right? You know, it almost sounds a little cheesy.
Speaker 1:It totally does, but that's fine. And now it's CG. It's way cooler.
Speaker 3:It's like community group there you go, yes, yes, so many churches call it community group.
Speaker 1:Okay, so, so your story is pretty powerful that you can go see on. I am second, but give us like the two minute version testimony story.
Speaker 3:Yeah, two minutes. I'll do my best.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's pretty wild, so I don't know if you actually can do that I get full C.
Speaker 3:Oh man, my, a big part of my story centers around a traumatic event when I was in sixth grade, so 12 years old. I grew up kind of in the church or a little bit of background, totally missed the gospel, yeah, somehow, and kind of just went to church as like a favor, to make my mom happy and to get off my back.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know your mom's a lawyer, so that's good you got to get her off your back Totally, totally.
Speaker 3:I do think I was saved at a young age, around seven years old. My sister went to camp Travis. Your oldest sister yeah, oldest sister Amanda, came back. She came back from that with the gospel on the edge of her tongue. She had the gospel with me and I remember it clicking. It's what about? Jesus did for me Nothing I can do to earn it Right and feel like I accepted that at a young age. But yeah, fast forward, 12 years old still wasn't living for the Lord or didn't know what that looked like.
Speaker 1:I mean, you're in sixth grade. How, how bad can it be Right?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I don't know. Who knows running drugs on the side of school, not so much, but yeah.
Speaker 3:So the kind of crazy part of my story is I'm spending the night at my cousin's house. He's my best friend, mikey. His parents aren't the process of getting a divorce, so she had, I kicked him, my aunt had kicked her husband out of the house and I'm about to drop a bomb on people is what I always say. It's. This is maybe not for all viewers or audiences or whatever quasi graphic stuff here, but the night I happened to be spending the night a pretty common occurrence. He breaks into the house and he I'll give you the short version he murders his wife in asleep.
Speaker 3:My cousin wakes me up and I can. I can hear my aunt screaming for help. I'll actually never forget Mikey, joey, help please, anyone, god, help. Over and over and over again. And Mikey grabs me. I'm like Mikey, what's going on? What's going on? What's going on? He's just saying come help, come help, come help. And he slips away from me. My cousin Mikey and his dad comes out of the master bed and it's like a middle of the night, middle of the night, maybe 3am, and he's coming out of the bedroom. He has a butcher knife and blood all over him.
Speaker 3:And he looks at me and he looks at Mikey this is the graphic part for sensitive viewers and he he proceeds to tackle his nine year old son and stabs him in the chest and slips his throat multiple times in front of me. And I swear I wanted to help. I think I was in shock, couldn't move, and he just, he just kind of slowly gets up off of Mikey, walks over to me, slams me against the wall and I have this moment like All right, this is how I die, right, even like maybe maybe spoke to God in that moment like, oh man, I just hope it's quick. Yeah, like God, make it quick. And then he tries to stab me in the chest and my arm is just up like this, right in front of my chest If you're listening on audio, I haven't been on a party podcast where they do the video too and he stabs me through my arm and it just the tip of the blade just scratches my chest.
Speaker 3:I've, I've completely given up on my life. I'm a chubby little 12 year old guy and this is a six to big, big, strong guy and he's just trying to stab me multiple times in the chest really quick. I gave up on my life and this is like the supernatural part for me. This is why this is a big part of my faith, why I believe in miracles. Yeah, I, I just like open. I open my eyes. I expect to see my uncle like on me with a knife in me, but I'm, I'm like, I'm removed from the situation, I don't know eight to 10 feet. I remember vividly a thought how did I get over here? Right, I can't explain. I understand and I feel crazy when I say this story, but it's, it's just what happened. I like it's as if, like, god like just got him off me and got me out of the way. Just enough, right, I remember looking down at my arm. We're way over two minutes, but I'll just keep rolling if that's cool.
Speaker 3:I look down at my arm, my muscles literally falling out of my arm. I can like see the striations on my muscle.
Speaker 3:I put it back in. I'm like, oh man, better squeeze this and hold it over my heart. I remember this much. And yeah, to try to wrap it up, I run downstairs and it's kind of straight out of a horror movie. He chases me around the house Couldn't tell you if it was a few minutes or 30 minutes. I remember thinking like man, I'm going to bleed out soon probably. And I hear him go back upstairs. I exit the house. I make a break for it. I knew the neighbors ring the doorbell 50 times at 3 am. Whatever they come out, joey, is that you and I'm like John went crazy. He killed Phyllis and Mikey. A few minutes later they call 911. A few minutes later the house goes up in flames. The house like explodes and he accidentally lit himself on fire and, but he survived. Right, he survived. He's in Huntsville prison, yeah, and he accidentally burned some of himself and yeah, that's my, that's my like epic, tragic moment.
Speaker 1:Right. And then so, like when you cook, like because at moment coming like, obviously you were just traumatized from that, when did you like make a decision to follow Jesus all in? Was it that point, or was it later?
Speaker 3:in college. Oh yeah, good question. So so, yeah, I think I was saved at a young age. I would say I remember after that I was so mad at God I I remember going out into my backyard and just I would cuss God out. I couldn't understand how evil could win in such a big way, like a father murdering a wife and a son trying to kill me. I felt and I felt like a piece of trash.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I felt like why, piece of?
Speaker 3:trash right there, because I just felt like God doesn't care about me. If he's going to, let me go through this.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:Right, like how could this happen? How could I witness my best friend and cousin be murdered? Yeah, and how could? How could I almost die? And it's like why? Why didn't God protect this? Or like stop this situation from happening? Yeah, even though I do feel like he intervened for me, sure, right, so it's like I'm like holding that in one hand, like God, you saved my life. Yeah, like thank you. But like why didn't you say Phyllis and Mikey's life?
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:Like why did you let this happen? So I was very, very mad, very upset with God, random tidbit, I don't know. I used to. I used to like country music in fifth grade. Yeah, I came out in sixth grade and I was all Eminem, yeah, and just like like I don't know, like I eight mile I identify with, like hip hop now and went through a whole phase, right, but but yeah, just it was. It was like a dark time in my life for sure, was very angry and bitter pretty much throughout high school. Yeah, a little bit more on that I was. I was also kind of balancing that with. I come from this amazing family, right, baby, if baby of five.
Speaker 1:But no one tell you how to tie your shoes like that.
Speaker 3:Yes, there was that there, that's a, that's another story and for third grade. But they like, adrian went to school with my brother, daniel and just like everyone's, just like epic and awesome and like.
Speaker 1:Dr Daniel.
Speaker 3:So it's like I have this really high standard to live up to and that was actually a lot of pressure, yeah. And so I kind of like gave up at some point and it's like, man, if anyone has the right to go crazy, it's me. So I was acting a fool in high school and definitely chasing anything and everything but God Right, and unfortunately doing the hypocritical thing where I was like probably like the vice president of the FCA, which is just the worst looking back on it.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Being such a hypocrite. But yeah, turned around in college.
Speaker 1:And A&M. You went to A&M and what was it, a&m, that really moved you, and it's the promised land.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it really is.
Speaker 1:I mean like there's one place we want to send our kids.
Speaker 2:We want to. I want our kids to go there, so bad. Yeah, I'm like trying to be a little bit low key about it, so I don't turn them off already. I'd say go for it, be high key about it.
Speaker 3:No, I'm half kidding, but no, great place, great people. I'm like, all right, I should probably go to church, kind of deal. Da, da, da, da, da da. Now it's my own decision. Yeah, like go, and I got to drive myself there my parents not going to bug me about it Right Later and I just like broke one Sunday, sure enough, amazing grace, it's like the worship song and I was like totally living for myself, chasing anything and everything but God and partying whatever, chasing relationships, and I just felt super broken and empty.
Speaker 3:None of it was fulfilling what I was doing and I was like I've struggled all these years I've been in various areas with various things, from PTSD survivors, guilt, probably depression, here and there. I never like processed any of the grief right, and they actually tell you like it's going to hit you again when you're 18 and you're probably again when you're 24, 25 and almost like clockwork. Yeah, it did those things when you have trauma as a kid. So hit me like a ton of bricks. I tell people I wept. You know, it says Jesus wept. You haven't wept before. It's, it's wild, it's like actually uncontrollable for hours and it's like you don't realize your body can produce that many tears and just I was super broken.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:It was. I was a total mess and it's like man, I need help. Yeah, I need help. I can't. I never process this grief. I can't do this on my own. So I was like I got to go see a counselor and it's got to be my decision. This time let's get, let's get a faith based counselor.
Speaker 1:And that was here in Austin.
Speaker 3:That was, that was in college, that was called station. This was in college. This was kind of on my on your journey.
Speaker 3:Got it Totally so went to Christian counselor. That was super helpful to process some grief and some things needed to get unpacked for sure and and got a community of guys who who love the Lord and really built me up and made like a huge total 180, started living for the Lord, experience way more joy, happiness, satisfaction, all the things like legit good friendships that were uplifting and really haven't like looked back since man that's powerful.
Speaker 1:So you, you leave college station loving Jesus. You come to Austin. Do you immediately start working for your sister? You know, because your sister, ally Kelly, becomes Ally Davidson. She had one gladiator American gladiator. And she like then from that starts camp gladiator. Like, was it right away that you like, was it right away that you Started with her, or did you like I'm gonna do my own thing?
Speaker 3:Yeah, sure so. So she won American Gladiators at no nine. That was my freshman year.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Her. Her goal has always been to start a Christian sports camp right.
Speaker 1:So even like when she won that her thought was I'm gonna start Christian sports camp. How can I do that?
Speaker 3:Well, she, she actually I'm telling Ali story a little bit for her. She went to Camp Travis as well. She got saved there, probably seventh grade, right, she walked out. She actually felt a calling walking out of the auditorium where she got saved. I'm gonna start a Christian sports camp one day. Wow, she thought it was when she was gonna be 55, right, when she, like you, probably have to make money first to like launch a camp, she ends up winning American Gladiators on her wedding day, I think right um it was.
Speaker 3:It was just after her wedding. Yeah, it's like her honeymoon. Yeah, it's like.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:The audition, like her wedding day, though, she auditioned on her wedding.
Speaker 2:Story where, like her hair was sweaty or something and they were making it work.
Speaker 3:Yeah, no, it was. It was gross for sure. No American Gladiators audition tryout was at a golds gym or like a LA fitness something. Yeah, 2000 people in line wrapped around the building. We show up like the whole family. She has her wedding veil on and we're like okay, we got a wedding to get to. Can we cut? We really have to. Like get to this wedding soon. So 2000 people like let us cut them. Oh, that's huge.
Speaker 3:She, she did like 17 pull-ups, cuz she's just like a freak like that and like beat the guys in the wind, sprints. And she had a good story that she was trying out on her wedding day. So she like was a shoe in to be on the show? Nice, she, she looped Jeff in to be on the show, so he was on the show. He did really well as well. Yeah, but yeah, that was their American Gladiator story. They had five seconds of fame.
Speaker 3:It felt like, yeah, and they're like all right, like it's time to launch the kids camp. But the show didn't air until the end of the summer and they're like dang it, we missed our window. Like they don't, people don't know that we won, right, they're so camp gladiator, the adult fitness boot camps was a Consolation prize. They're like well, I guess, I guess what if we start like a little fitness boot camp business To hold us over for the next 10 months until we get to next summer, and then we'll do kids camp next summer, right? So CG from the get-go was always a consolation prize, which almost nobody knows right now.
Speaker 1:You know, now I know, okay, so then you come to Austin. What year?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, so I'm back.
Speaker 1:2011, 2011, okay and then you move back and you say, hey, I like give me a job, or what do you see?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah. So I've always been involved with CG victory, since year one, oh fun.
Speaker 1:So talking about CG victory year one, then so like, so she did start camp gladiator, but then she went straight to CG victory.
Speaker 3:That's that first summer, the following summer, so probably 10 months of camp. Gladiator, she probably remembered about summer camp in like April and and Hired this, this girl, maria Bonafetti, yeah, who, who was the first director ever?
Speaker 1:Oh fun.
Speaker 3:I was recruited as one of the first counselors. I got like eight Aggie friends to come be council. Oh, they were bears. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that was like where was the camp?
Speaker 1:was that?
Speaker 3:Dallas that our Hill Country Bible church? No, was it? This is like a that's a. Wells branch a plant.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, we're a plant of Hill Country, hill Country, there you go. Wow, I'm seeing that work.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so yeah, the original Hill Country Location. That was our first ever 70 kids. And then we called it. I think we called it camp gladiator kids in year one and year two, we called it kid gladiator You're two and three. And then finally, cg victory in year four nice, Okay.
Speaker 1:So then tell me the heartbeat behind CG victory.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so the mission is to share the joy of Christ by laughing, loving and living adventurously fun, and I feel like there's a little. Maybe Miss conception misunderstanding, we're not like a hardcore sports camp right, I'll give it.
Speaker 1:Let's say one of our kids was not into sports. Would they be comfortable coming if they didn't know how to play basketball or football or something?
Speaker 3:Totally. It's not sport or skill specific. We're not out there like training kids on basketball and soccer.
Speaker 1:Right right.
Speaker 3:We're playing things like dodgeball, yeah, and Gator ball, which is like a fusion of soccer and handball Fun. We're like any kid can really jump in and get it and like feel hold on Gator ball.
Speaker 2:Like chair sky ball hey hey, so we probably got it from a name?
Speaker 1:Is that where you line up like six folding chairs or something and you take a ball, dribble it down and you chuck at the chairs and if you get one, oh, they have to carry it back to the other side? No, not at all, but that sounds awesome.
Speaker 3:It's like um soccer, but if someone click like kicks it up to you and you catch it, it becomes handball, yeah, kind of like ultimate, so that is this game, except you know what?
Speaker 2:So we had a youth pastor that came from a yeah, he probably brought this game to our church, but he maybe he added the chairs.
Speaker 1:He might have had the chair the concept of soccer to handball.
Speaker 2:That's the same, but then at the way you score is by knocking out a chair. Yeah but if you think about it, it's funny that you say anyone can jump in, because I'm just here to say the amount of ACL surgeries at our church as a Result of chair skyball way better Gator ball.
Speaker 1:That's why.
Speaker 2:That's why you guys did not, that's why you didn't morphine about a grown adult especially that's over 40 shifting from Handball to soccer and back.
Speaker 1:We had so many that's not what this is, because it's far superior Gator ball.
Speaker 3:This is Gator ball, way different than chair skyball the things about kids man, they're, they're, so they feel unbreakable. You're resilient they don't, little kids don't tear ACLs Right their ankles like adults do right right, right, they're so flexible.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah okay, so fun, fun games that are Getting you to use your whole body. The fun part is you're still using some of the American gladiator names, like Torch, and you know, like I don't know like Torpedo, yeah, yeah, yeah, the counselors have like crazy goofy names. Yeah, that's fun. Tell me about that, yeah.
Speaker 3:I'm Crash. The co-director has been Thunder all these years. Nice Allie's name. She's changed it a few times, but I think it's Chaos. Now she's four kids. Hey, y'all have four kids? Yeah, we do. Yeah, y'all need gladiator names we do so, I want y'all to pray about that. I will, We'll pray about it. So yeah, but we have stolen some of the concepts from the TV show American Gladiators.
Speaker 1:That is fun Side swipe. Oh fun.
Speaker 3:Oh man, gauntlet is like another game from the show, where we've done our version of it, which mainly has little hit flags.
Speaker 1:Oh fun.
Speaker 3:But any kid truly like you don't have to have like a superstar athlete to enjoy camp and honestly we do lots of like crazy chants and cheers, yeah.
Speaker 1:Talk to me about, like what tell me how that builds motivation, team work, all this stuff.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, oh man. So it's so cool to see we're like, we're really, we're really into these chants and cheers. Maybe it's an A&M thing, oh, totally. Because you know the guys are the cheerleaders there, yeah, and we get into it, but some of the kids are like a little bit unsure about it on the first day.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:By the end of the first day or the second day, the cheers and the chants are their favorite part. Right, it's like they have to come together as a team and like, get loud, proud and rowdy for their team and it's just something to get excited about.
Speaker 1:It's like a mini Texas A&M. It's like prep to go to A&M.
Speaker 2:Well, so we showed up. So Austin, our oldest son, went last summer and the teams are like it's red and blue and I think red is veritas and blue is.
Speaker 3:Kalida.
Speaker 2:Kalida, that's right, so I forget that I registered him for this camp and you know how Google calendar reminds you 10 minutes before, so like.
Speaker 3:Amazing.
Speaker 2:In mid morning the Monday that camp started. I got a notification that camp was had already started.
Speaker 3:I haven't heard the story.
Speaker 2:This is good I was like oh wow, that CG camp started and Austin was not excited. Like he's not into, like somehow we raised four introverts. I'm not really sure how it's probably ever want to leave our house. They would just like to always stay there, and so we have a hard time moving. We're going to like a carnival. They don't want to come six.
Speaker 1:They're like I'm not going to that.
Speaker 2:I'm not going to that camp and I'm like, well it did, it had the days halfway over by the time. We get all your brothers in the car and take you there. It's fine, and so we get there.
Speaker 3:You were late the first day.
Speaker 2:We were hours late and but they were still in chant time. And I was looking at my clock and I was like they have to have been after this for like a while because it was. It was like and the kids all knew the chance already and I was like this is the first day and so I start asking some cats. I was like this is the first day, right? They're like yeah, yeah, and everyone was super friendly and they helped me find.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And Austin, like, his favorite color is red. So he was like I just you can leave if I can just get on that red team. So I told one of the guys. He was great and they hooked him up and he had a great time.
Speaker 2:And he is kind of our. He is an athlete kid Like. He does love all the organized sports and so he loves it. There was some of that but he liked, he loved everything about it. He loved the cheer that he's not a cheers kind of kid but he got into it and he never would do the face paint. That was not. That was a bridge too far.
Speaker 1:Okay, he also didn't do dress up for Halloween until about fourth grade. Wow, interesting.
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 2:I was dressing up on his behalf.
Speaker 3:Yeah Cool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, before he came out of the womb, anyway. So it's just it was a great. It was a great experience for somebody who kind of is hesitant, but they, he loved it and I was super impressed with the counselors.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So how do you find all these counselors?
Speaker 3:Yeah, A&M is a great spot. Ut we got love for UT too. Yeah, Listen they're not evil. I don't want the audience to think like I'm a hate non UT.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, we love UT.
Speaker 3:We have a lot of great folks from UT that actually might be our primary school now just because we're Austin based. Yeah, hey you listen to the bomber. But so yeah, but yeah. Baylor, UT, the schools we're on college campuses recruiting, do these, these?
Speaker 1:events Is CG victory only here in Austin.
Speaker 3:No, no, we're. We got locations in Dallas. Yeah, we got a week long sessions in different areas like different suburbs, whatever it may be in Dallas, and we got a Houston location. Oh nice and San Antonio as well.
Speaker 1:Oh, wonderful.
Speaker 3:So we got the major Texas markets.
Speaker 1:That's awesome. So yeah, so okay. So tell me how the gospel is shared. How do you guys get you know you got your. What's the transition point from like we will destroy them on the field of battle? To now everyone is time to bow, and receive Jesus?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah, no good question. So, yeah, we, we definitely have to cool off. Texas summers are hot, yeah, so we're in the gym every day like kind of hottest time of day where the sun's right above you, and, yeah, get them, get them fed, and we do like a short little talk, like 10 to 13 minutes probably, or a counselor's sharing their story, or we have these like themes we build around that they can go like spiritual or or like personal, just like life, like perseverance, trust and like spirit, like being spirited for your team. We even like connect that, even like we make a bridge somehow to the Holy Spirit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, nice.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah. So yeah, we're like kind of building each day, like breaking down maybe aspects of the gospel, like who is Jesus on day four trusting, and and like total gospel presentation where we'll even bring in an awesome pastor, local pastor such as yourself.
Speaker 1:Man, that would be awesome, like awesome pastors like that, because we had one with like a little energy. Yeah, you need someone with a little more energy. I think, yeah, yeah, has Adrian actually talked to you about coming in.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I would love to come.
Speaker 1:I am totally pumped for it. So yeah, I'm, I'm all in.
Speaker 2:So he is all in yeah, and he's even got so we've. Chris has been entered into his first year of. After 10 years of being a father to boys, he is finally entered into the world of dad coaching.
Speaker 1:I know it's bad because I'm I knew this would happen to me.
Speaker 2:And he loses his voice after just about every game, so I'm still recovering my voice.
Speaker 1:And so it does affect Sundays that I get so into the games. It's because my voice is, but he does have a following there's a fifth grade parent and child.
Speaker 2:Following that will come Chris. Oh, yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I will have I do have a little bit of influence on my basketball and football teams. Cool, cool, and I do get a little passionate at the game.
Speaker 3:I love that.
Speaker 1:I love that little competitive edge comes out. It's not pretty, I'm, I'm, in fact, I feel like I need to repent almost weekly.
Speaker 2:My favorite part is he starts out this season with sending an email telling him he's a pastor and he's going to be praying for their kids. And then the first game. He's like yelling at the ref.
Speaker 1:No, I don't yell at the ref no. No, no, I I do challenge the children to run on the court. We do not walk on a basketball court we run Okay, and so just simple things.
Speaker 2:Like you know, motivational. And sometimes we need to. We sometimes ask the ref question. Yeah, I do ask the ref question, I do, I do.
Speaker 1:Loudly, sometimes loudly.
Speaker 2:Because I want to make sure we have the rules.
Speaker 1:Rules straight. I want to make sure that we know the rules.
Speaker 2:Knowing the rules is always how the questions are being.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm just making sure I know the rules, because sometimes the rules change and I have to help out the ref and clarifying what the rule is yeah. And then the question is what exactly it is? You can steal the ball from their team because in a recent game they did change it from the volleyball line to the half court line back to the volleyball line. So I did go into the middle of court to explain to everybody the rules.
Speaker 3:The middle of the court during the game. Yeah, I did. I did pause the game for everybody.
Speaker 1:I said pause and I told everybody fresh pause. This isn't a timeout, because I was out of timeouts, but this was a pause and so I just we just need to do a quick rules explanation.
Speaker 3:That's rich, that's good, oh man.
Speaker 2:It is quite it's. Something is what it is, and there was a football game in the fall that I don't know what went wrong, but it was so intense. Not only was Chris loudly asking questions to the ref, but so was the other coach, yeah, and the game went on for like an hour and a half. There's just to be like 50 minute games. It was like they weren't ending it, and the longer it went not being ended, the more angry our parents were getting because we were barely winning. And that was scary.
Speaker 1:Anyway, it was the most it was like an hour and a half. I didn't realize it was like almost nine o'clock by the time that game ended, because I was just so into the game.
Speaker 2:And so were the refs, and we kept the moms on the sideline. We were like hey, how much longer are we? And they kept saying they said 10 more minutes for like 40 minutes and I think what was happening is they wanted the number of possessions to be even Because it was such a tight game and it was so wild and we should have told two kids it was super intense. It was super intense, but you know it is all the same.
Speaker 1:Anyway, to the point is, I get a little bit intense, so he would love to come to camp.
Speaker 2:is what we're saying? Yes, yes.
Speaker 3:And I'll tie back to that. Like the cool thing about bringing a pastor out to camp is like ultimately, it is cool if we can plug these kids or these families into a local church that's nearby, Because it's obviously about taking the next step in your faith, whatever that may be for you.
Speaker 3:And some of these families aren't plugged into a local church. Or some of these families are coming and we don't hide that we're faith-based, but we're not church camp, if that makes sense. So it will draw people who are there for the sports or the cheers or the chants or the friends, whatever it may be. But if we can get you plugged in, we think that's just a win, win, win, so great.
Speaker 1:Man well, I'm so excited to partner with you and I'm hoping we can make this a yearly thing where we get a bunch of our people to go and participate, so we're excited.
Speaker 2:So one of our missions in our summers, with our great adventure, is what we call it For a while, forever. We've done Backyard Bible Clubs and this year we're doing one big Backyard Bible Club. But we're doing we're going away from that a bit and channeling our families to CG Victory for the purpose of giving parents an option to like. Granted, you're paying for it, but you guys are hooking us up with a really sweet deal, and so we're excited to take advantage of that deal and allow parents to then have a whole week.
Speaker 3:It's the hours are like nine to three, eight to three, right Eight to three, right Eight to three, right Eight to three.
Speaker 2:So it's a long day. So for parents that are trying to get work done in the summer, this is a great week where, if you're already planning on some kind of child care, opt out of that other child care for this week and come join CG Victory. Or if you just need a week where you're going to have extra time, this is a great opportunity for parents To invite friends.
Speaker 2:Yes, so we're getting to like Back your Bible Club was tricky in that way because we would often be competing with camps that kids were at that were offering, that were kind of a child care for their kids, and so this solves that problem while also giving us a chance to invite our friends to something where that is gospel heavy, where they get to like connect, hear the gospel and connect, and I'm planning to come and kind of be around during at least a couple of the days and then, if Chris gets to be there speaking, it gives us a huge opportunity with our families, to have a presence there, create some community with some of the kids that are coming, that are a part of our church.
Speaker 1:And Adrian's kind of like a mom magnet. Everybody thinks Adrian's hysterical. I don't know if you knew that, but they love you. Oh, they absolutely do. It's pretty funny. I think you're funny. Oh thanks, she's really funny. All right, so what's the ages? I think, that's one of the things that like the ages.
Speaker 2:So talk to us because there's a lot of. So you know how public school like you have to be five by September 1st. So I don't think you guys operate that way, so talk to us about that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, good question. So we used to be a half day camp a little history and we were for third through eighth graders. We since made it full day camp To make it more doable for parents, because parents have a hard time picking up their kids in the middle of the day. So we're a full day camp, 830 to three, and it's for ages six to 12. So we're pretty tight on that. Like, if you're six by, I think camp is. We're talking about camps in mid mid July.
Speaker 2:Mid July.
Speaker 3:So if you're six by mid July to 12.
Speaker 2:So we have three boys there. Yeah, we signed up, three of ours. The baby's going to really have a hard time. He might have to just tag along with me for a little bit.
Speaker 3:The babies are great. I like to tell people or like address some concerns. Like we know, it's like blistering hot in the afternoon in Austin, so we have indoor access.
Speaker 1:Because you're at the Quarries. Is that what we're doing here? It's a beautiful location.
Speaker 3:It's at the Hyde Park.
Speaker 2:Is the Hyde Park school meets there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yes, so it's Hyde Park Baptist High School, hyde.
Speaker 1:Park Baptist High School. It's a great campus right near the domain, really close to our church, which is really convenient, and so when I went on the campus I was like man, this is awesome. I mean, you got like was it Ashtor Turfield or no?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like a sweet Ashtor field.
Speaker 1:You got a sweet gym. Everything is really first class as far as equipment, environment, facilities. And then I loved how just professional and fun it was. Professional, but mainly fun the staff and team.
Speaker 2:Well, and you guys had great ratios too, like the number of kids per counselor seemed manageable enough, which I liked that a lot. And Austin just really our oldest son is. He was definitely saved before last summer and so coming into it he was enjoying, I think, some of the opportunity to have deeper spiritual discussion and he would share. He would come home and tell me how some of the kids, the kids, the peers that he was with weren't necessarily engaging in deeper spiritual discussion but the counselor was, and the counselor was sharing some of his own story and that really that was like Austin kind of came home.
Speaker 2:I was telling Joey this when I first talked to him about the potential to partner with them is for us as a pastor family, it is tough to feel like your kids are kind of inundated with this Christian message that's from you guys and from the church, and as a parent I'm always desiring to help offload our kids to a place where they can feel some independence but also have respect for other Christians, and so this was the first time that that really every maybe second time there's a family camp we get to go to in Pennsylvania. I would say that happens there. That's been an answer to prayer, and I think this was an answer to prayer Of like there is another, there's something separate from our church that is as passionate about Jesus dying for them as we are, and it was a young guy that was fun and cool and had some weird name and it was like this whole spiritual thing really. He was excited even more to own that as something he wants and that was a huge answer to prayer for us.
Speaker 1:So the big question everyone wants to know how much, like Joey, you drain our banks over here. What's the story and what's our discount? Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:We got to. Can't leave without the discount. Yeah, you got to have a discount.
Speaker 1:What's this going to? Run somebody and talks about that and we'd love to like. This is where, like, supporting our church, getting there is huge, but like, thank you for that. So what is the cost to the average camper?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah. So the full price of camp is even still competitive, at 325 for the full week from 830 to 3 every day. Yeah, yeah, but right now, in February, the price is 300. But it gets even better. If I can be a cheesy commercial, please be cheesy, but with code WB50. Oh, it's an additional $50 off what and I'll make it WB75 when the tiered pricing goes up in March. So it's always going to be 250 for Wells Branch Community Church or anyone listening to this podcast.
Speaker 1:Yeah, wow, that's a big deal, man. Thank you so much, joey. So 250.
Speaker 2:That's a great deal.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And for other moms. I've had a few mom friends that have never done summer camps before kind of be like oh man, isn't that a lot of money? It is a lot of money. $250 is a lot of money, but for a camp that lasts from 830 to 330, it's not. It's a super great deal. And to sign up multiple siblings, I believe when you get subsequent siblings there's a little bit off too.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 2:And so that is helpful. So it's a great deal. And if you even compare it to the camps that the public schools offer, a lot of those are are like 300 for like an art camp. So this is way better than art camp.
Speaker 1:I'm here to say yeah, I don't want to tear down. Hey, we're not disparaging art camp. You're an aspiring artist, go draw something.
Speaker 3:Totally. I don't want to tear it down anyone or anything. Yeah right, but like we're like a thousand times more high energy than YMCA camp.
Speaker 2:Whatever those?
Speaker 3:camps are or I got love. I'm sure they're great, but these college students are super hyped, super fun Again for all like ability levels, people who are new to sports, people who are like star athletes. It's like it's actually kind of cool to see those kids come together and team up for like a game of dodgeball which anyone can kind of like jump in and kind of figure out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I'm excited. So for those, for everybody with our part of our church, give this the coupon code, the WB 50 coupon code. I have been sending out to all of my friends to like sports teams friends.
Speaker 1:We'll put in the show notes.
Speaker 2:Show notes.
Speaker 1:That's how you know your professional podcast right there, so cool, you felt so cool saying that I totally did. Go ahead.
Speaker 2:So anyway, I do. We are wanting to like invite friends and kind of have an opportunity to have community with each other but also reach out to friends, and we're excited about it. I'm excited to see what could happen. This is obviously a first time and I think that it could take a summer or two before we have a culture of getting to participate, but I would love to see what it could look like long term, with even having some of our moms that are volunteers in the, in the mini children and our children's and youth ministry, to kind of come be a part of of making camp really great. So we're pumped about it and my kids are super excited. They all got to be a part. The last day there's this last day battle where, like, the parents are invited to come see the, the battle between the red and the blue.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, there's. There's like grand finale obstacle course which we're going to invite parents out to, and a grand finale spirit battle where it's like four to five minutes of like organized cheers, chance formation, changes like music, like a step clap routine. It's like it's out of this world.
Speaker 2:Yes they. We left and the boys thought it was just the coolest thing ever. So thanks for for coming and sharing with us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, anything else you want to add before we roll out, let's see.
Speaker 3:I guess I should plug there's. There's two weeks at the quarries, which I know is convenient for our audience.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:I think we're rallying around week one at the quarries man. I should have the dates off the top of my head.
Speaker 2:Hang on, I have the dates. Let me the dates matter. This is important, this is very important.
Speaker 3:I think it's like second and third or We'll put them in the show notes.
Speaker 2:Third man, can I say that once?
Speaker 3:Also, my email is joey at cgvictoryorg. We'll put it in the show notes if you want to email me. I don't know why my voice had to be deeper, so we're week 20. Yeah, deeper helps helps?
Speaker 2:Oh, absolutely, you can pull this Okay, 22 through 26 of July is the week. I'm not sure if that's which number that is on the, on the on the website, but it's the 22nd through. The 26th is when we hope to have Chris come out and it's when we've signed up our boys and some. There's some friends. There's at least four families in the church that have already registered kids, and so we'll continue to register. This is a global show.
Speaker 1:So do you know we're? You know Dallas, san Antonio. We have people listening in from Germany and the Netherlands, south Africa, amazing yeah.
Speaker 3:It's wild. No, no locations in Europe yet, but but yeah, we are in Austin, dallas, houston, san Antonio, so so let your folks know, let your friends know, we're in those areas as well. Yeah, and just the website is cgvictoryorg. Quick plug we have an overnight camp for high school students. What so that's for the 12 year olds can actually go either way, or some some do the day camp and the overnight camp as well. So that's for 12 to 17 year olds. Is that during that same week?
Speaker 1:or is that a different, specific, like overnight camps, a specific week?
Speaker 3:Yeah. The day camp there's so much branding going on here. There's, there's camp gladiator, there's CG victory. The day camps are called Ignite, which is such an awesome church word. It is so awesome Every church has had a program called Ignite 1990.
Speaker 1:just comes back and just it's right here.
Speaker 3:But you know what Our men's retreat.
Speaker 1:this year is going to be called Ignite and Of course it is and and, because it's like we're having people that weren't around in the 90s, If you were unsaved in the 90s.
Speaker 2:Ignite is cool. Yeah, it's very cool yeah.
Speaker 1:Otherwise it's like oh, I've heard that one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, sorry, it's just. Ignite has been our, is our, men's, retreat thing.
Speaker 1:We've been making fun of it for a while now.
Speaker 3:I knew I knew your church would have something called Ignite there's like five cool words that work for these programs and then our overnight camp. This, this is different, though it's called legends.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, Men's retreat legends next year way better. Okay, yeah, Just just take what we have.
Speaker 3:I like it. No, there's nothing new under the sun in the ministry, but so that's the first week of the summer. June 1st through the 6th is the overnight camp for older middle school high school students.
Speaker 1:Oh, very cool. Yeah, oh, awesome, all right. Well, hey, joey, thanks so much for being here today. Joey, thanks so much for being here, thanks for sharing your testimony, thanks for just really being a part of something so special. Tell your sister, we said what's up and we're excited about really helping a lot of our kids get excited about sharing their faith by just simply inviting their friends to a CG victory camp. So, hey, listen, thanks for watching. If you have any questions, if you want us to bring Joey back, I need your questions 737-231-0605. You can text us or just go to pastorplekcom, drop a line right there. We'd love to bring Joey back and make him answer some questions and I'm sure he'd be thrilled to come back at some point. So, hey, listen, thanks for watching. From our house to yours, have an awesome week of worship.