In today’s episode, we follow the path of Mike Mobley with stops in DFW, L.A., Nashville, and Austin. We find out that there isn’t any acting when it comes to Mike being vulnerable and sharing how God keeps providing along the way to help him use his gifts in multiple ways. We also discuss Chris’s sexy voice and get a surprise call.
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Before the podcast and before the pastoring, Mike Mobley was a kid from North Richland Hills who went to Mass mostly on Christmas Eve and Easter, whose parents divorced when he was ten, then a SAG-card actor hustling in Los Angeles. In this episode Chris Howard puts Mike on the hot seat, and they walk the whole road: hearing the gospel for what felt like the first time under Francis Chan at Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley, walking away from acting with a peace he calls supernatural, a confusing year in Nashville, coming home to 121 Community Church in Grapevine, helping plant Austin Life Church, and being led back to DFW. The thread through every city is the same: God kept providing, one step at a time. Below: the key moments, the Scripture discussed, and the full episode transcript.
A Christmas-and-Easter Childhood, Then a Divorce at Ten
Mike grew up in a family of four in North Richland Hills. “Catholic” meant Mass three or four times a year (Christmas Eve and Easter were non-negotiable), a God who was “up there” somewhere, and a Bible nobody read. Reading it was almost looked down on. Then his parents divorced when he was about ten or eleven, and family of four became three guys in apartments around Hurst, Euless and Bedford: tubs of meat, sports posters, and no emotional development. He was driving and working by fifteen and working full time ever since. Church only came back into the picture when a girl invited him, and when the girls left, so did he. Nothing about it, he says, was about God or Jesus for him.
Hollywood: A SAG Card and Six Weeks That Changed Everything
Living out the classic cliche, the blonde-haired, blue-eyed kid moved to LA to act, hustled his first year, and landed his Screen Actors Guild card. Then another girl invited him to church. He figured he’d done this before. But for six weeks at Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley, with Francis Chan preaching, Mike heard the gospel as if it were custom made for his brain to understand. The guy on the crucifix he’d never paid attention to was real. He really lived, really died on the cross, really rose from the grave, and Mike’s sins (the partying, the drugs, the alcohol, twenty years of chasing every path but the right one) really had been forgiven. Hands up. All in. He was baptized a couple of weeks later.
Saved, But Not Discipled
Mike is honest that his story isn’t the “life got perfect overnight” kind. The first year or two after following Jesus felt like hell on earth. He knew he was saved, but there was so much to change and nobody walking with him to show him how to follow Jesus. It was trial and error: “I can do this life. Oh wait, I’m not really in charge anymore.” In the middle of that, God made one thing clear. Acting wasn’t his future. A working actor with a manager walked away overnight, with a supernatural peace that it was from the Lord, even while everyone told him he was crazy to leave.
Nashville: Testing the Waters and Learning Conviction
Mike and the girlfriend who had invited him to church picked a spot on the map and moved across the country to Nashville, into a two-bedroom apartment, to “test the waters” before marriage. Looking back, he sees how much was wrong with that: if you have to test the waters, that’s not a foundation to build a marriage on. That year is where he learned what conviction was. With help from a couple of friends back in Texas, the relationship ended and he came home, still asking what it even means to follow Jesus.
A Church That Refused To Be Fake, and a Call to Ministry
He got back to Texas on a Saturday. On Sunday a friend invited him to 121 Community Church in Grapevine. Mike showed up ready to judge it, and told his friend he’d walk right out if he saw ten folding chairs. Three minutes in, it felt just like Cornerstone: jeans and T-shirts, messed-up people moving forward, real with each other and genuinely trying to follow Jesus. He joined a small group that same afternoon and stayed for years. That’s where he met Joelle, married, and had Peyton and Matthew. The same Lord who told him acting was over now told him he’d work there. He laughed it off. Since 2009 it’s been his call to ministry, through seven or eight roles that turned out to be God equipping him for executive pastor work.
Austin, Assignment Complete, and One Step at a Time
In 2017 the Mobleys helped plant Austin Life Church, and Mike found Austin a lot like LA: friendly people in a destination city, chasing a dream or sometimes escaping one. His own years in LA had prepared him to minister to them. After five years it felt like “assignment complete.” They moved back to DFW, his dad passed away two weeks later, and the night before he was set to take another job, 121 called with a new role. Along the way, burnout and a hard season with anxiety taught him empathy, and a simple truth about following Jesus: we don’t get the whole map. God establishes our steps as we take them, so get off the couch and take the next one. That’s why Not Quite There exists: a cup of coffee, a sliver of what they’ve learned, and an open invitation to keep moving forward.
Scriptures From This Episode
Proverbs 16:9, “The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps,” which Mike paraphrases as God establishing our steps as we go · the gospel Mike heard at Cornerstone: Jesus really lived, died on the cross for our sins, and rose from the grave.
Go deeper: Twenty Years of Following Jesus · A Tribute To Francis Chan · What’s Wrong With Living Together Before Marriage? · Why Taking Steps Is A Godly Thing · Scripture on Discipleship · Scripture on Guidance
Full Transcript, Not Quite There, Episode 2: DFW, Hollywood, Nashville, Austin, Divorce, Acting, and Pastoring
Mike: Okay. Okay. Okay. We got quite the feedback this week. A little bit of activity out there. Wowzers, my friends. Y’all came strong. Let’s see. Chris, I was going to share with you a couple of reviews here.
Chris: Yeah, let’s hear it.
Mike: “Excited for the podcast. The humor and pop culture references kept me engaged.” Let’s see. “Great stuff. I can use this for practical encouragement.” That’s great. One in particular says, it’s from a Lauren: “My husband is not quite there, but I’m excited for him to listen to this podcast.” So hard to know how to take that. That’s encouraging, and also a call-out on the husband. So whoever you are out there, pay attention, fella. And then I’ve heard great feedback. We also got someone who called in to leave a message. I don’t know if you knew that or not.
Chris: No, don’t tell me about that.
Mike: Someone sent us a clip. So we’re going to play that clip. So check this out.
Voicemail: Michael and Chris, this is Morgan. I heard you got the podcast launched. Excellent. I want to wish you the best. I hope you reach many men who are looking to take that step forward. As we all know, even me in my career, I know I’m not quite there.
Chris: Ooh. Well, you know what I love about that? Wow.
Mike: What’s that? I was not expecting that.
Chris: Yeah, I love that. You know, he would take the time to reach out. Morgan, with his busy schedule.
Mike: We thank you. Morgan Freeman, everyone. Did not see that this early in the podcast. We salute you, Morgan. And your documentaries on penguins were top notch, indeed, my friend.
Chris: And call anytime, too.
Mike: Yes, yes, please call back. We do want to hear from you. The other hot take we got was the Die Hard debate, that we’re not going to go into again, because this is not a Die Hard podcast. But Chris, can I call you Chris? It did make me think of other ridiculous debates out there. So here we go. Putting you on the hot seat. Hot takes with Chris. Ready for this?
Chris: I’m ready.
Mike: Should toilet paper be hung over or under?
Chris: Over, because under can invite spiders and other things to dwell.
Mike: That’s good. Okay. Okay. Here we go. That was a fast answer. Is a tomato a fruit or a vegetable?
Chris: Definitely a fruit that tastes like a vegetable.
Mike: Should you put ketchup on a hot dog?
Chris: Yes. All the time.
Mike: Okay, all the time. Wow. Even if it’s terrible, you’re like…
Chris: It makes it better.
Mike: Okay, last one. Should you wash dishes before putting them in the dishwasher?
Chris: You should give them a light rinse.
Mike: A light rinse. Oh, you know what?
Chris: I’ve been told. I’ve been told that you should give them a light rinse.
Mike: You’ve gotten that feedback before.
Chris: I’ve gotten that feedback maybe more than once.
Mike: It makes me think: are you a clean-as-you-go while you’re cooking? So Joelle and I… I clean as I’m cooking, because I want to eat and then be done and everything’s finished. She is the opposite. She wants to cook. If dishes are everywhere, that’s great, and we’ll just clean it up afterwards. We have two completely different mindsets on this. So are you a clean-as-you-go or clean-later kind of a guy?
Chris: I would like to say clean as I go, because when I waited tables back in the day, you know, you’re top three busing and kind of getting the table clean as you went along. But that’s just not the case at home. I know a lot of it’s probably just because I’m hungry and I just want to get to eating and then deal with that later.
Mike: Yeah, yeah. I mean, it’s a debatable topic. I mean, you’re wrong on your take, but it’s fine. It’s fine. Everyone can do their own.
Chris: We’re not going to agree on everything, Mike.
Mike: Yeah, I hear sloppy and lazy, but it’s fine. It’s fine, man. Have dishes all over your kitchen. Don’t serve your wife.
Chris: It’s fine.
Mike: I think judgmental is a little strong, but that’s okay. That’s okay. So speaking of judgmental, probably no good segue there. What are we talking about today?
Chris: I don’t know. I heard some comments about my voice, first of all. And you know, that’s always fun.
Mike: That was the number one hate thread.
Chris: Well, I don’t want to skirt around it. We might as well tackle it head on. But what were some of the comments there, Mike, if you could fill me in?
Mike: Let’s see. Comments: “Low Chris voice.” “Chris, speak up.” “Chris, stop talking so low.” “Chris, you’re whispering, I’m going to fall asleep.” And the number one crowd favorite: “Chris has a sexy voice.”
Chris: Oh, man. Tell me more about that.
Mike: Well, I don’t have much more to say besides, it’s not my feedback. It’s just what we hear from the masses. And in particular, apparently you have a Barry White-esque voice, my friend. So congratulations. Can you do Barry White?
Chris: What would Barry say?
Mike: He would just… “Welcome to the podcast.”
Chris: Yeah. “Welcome to the podcast.”
Mike: That’s what I mean.
Chris: Is that a little too… That sounded kind of like Morgan, didn’t it?
Mike: It did sound a little bit. I was actually thinking that was kind of like…
Chris: “I’ve been around the world and I can’t find my baby. I don’t know where, I don’t know why, but she’s gone away…”
Mike: I feel like Barry White is a country singer at this point. And slight Elvis.
Chris: A little bit of it. Yeah. So, Michael, you know, and you with your many years of being in men’s ministry…
Mike: Thank you for saying many.
Chris: …you know that when there’s a men’s small group, or life group, like we are going to call them, it usually takes one guy to jump in, dive in and say, “You know what? This is me. I’m going to be vulnerable here. I’m going to be authentic. I’m just going to tell you how it is.” And they go to that place where it invites the other guys in the group to also share in like kind there. So that’s you today, Mike. You get to be on the hot seat.
Mike: I get to lead with vulnerability. Deepest, darkest secrets. All that. Is that what you’re saying? Congratulations. That’s great. Let’s do this. Let’s just expose everything to the universe.
Chris: I know that you’re walking around saying, “I just can’t wait to be vulnerable.”
Mike: What man doesn’t love to just share everything?
Chris: Yeah. And it’s not going to be like taking a little toothbrush and, you know, brushing a little fossil here and there and see where this is going to be. Take a jackhammer and, you know, try to dig it on out of there, and hopefully not break anything.
Mike: So, jackhammer it up. Have you done a lot of fossils with many toothbrushes, by the way?
Chris: I’ve done no fossils. I’ve seen it done. I don’t really want to do it, but okay.
Mike: Paleontology is not for you. That’s just for Ross.
Chris: Do you want to excavate around the issue of Mike here? I say let’s get down to the nitty-gritty. Let’s find out: who is this Mike Mobley?
Mike: Okay. Nitty-gritty. Excavate. Let’s excavate it up.
Chris: Well, a lot of things start in childhood. So why don’t we go there and see what was it like for little Mike growing up, and take me up until that time where, you know, you saw something was missing in life.
Mike: Okay, childhood. Here we go. So I grew up a family of four. I have one older brother. He’s a few years older than me. I’m taller than him, so we just need to get that out there. It’s clearly not an insecurity or vulnerability. Just want to say that. But one older brother, a family of four growing up. We grew up in North Richland Hills, so shout out to all of you NRH fans out there. There might be one of you listening. And you know, we would have said we grew up in a Catholic home. But, you know, when someone says Catholic or Christian, I mean, frankly, any label these days, you have to ask them what in the world they mean by that, because you just can’t assume anything anymore. So for us, what that meant was we went to Mass every now and then, and pretty much never. Like three or four times a year, and you certainly have to go for Christmas Eve and for Easter. That’s like a non-negotiable.
And so religion, God, anything spiritual, all that jazz, for me as a kid and growing up, that was like a foreign… God is like up there. There probably is a God; that makes sense. But there’s like rules and regulations and phrases, and you kneel and you stand. There’s a lot of squatting, you know, a lot of physical exercise. Really good core as a child. And reading the Bible, that was actually, I don’t know, almost sometimes even looked down on. It was like, you listen to what you’re told, and reading it was foreign to me. So any of that growing up, that just wasn’t existent really in our family. It was, you know, playing outside from sunup to sundown, playing baseball, doing school, acting, performing. Just kind of being a kid and doing all that.
That was up until the time my parents got divorced. So when I was about 10 or 11, my parents got divorced. That kind of changed everything, from family of four in NRH to me, my brother and my dad living together in different apartments all around HEB. And those are not apartments all around a grocery store. We didn’t just live only where H-E-B the grocery store was. That’s Hurst, Euless, Bedford, in Texas. That’s the original HEB. So it was family of four to three guys. Kind of like three guy roommates, you know: tubs of meat everywhere, sports posters up on the wall, no emotional development. I learned that later, after getting married. Learned that the hard way. So, like three guys living together.
And so it was kind of like, go to school, work hard. I started driving and working when I was 15. I’ve just been working full time ever since, kind of paying bills, all that stuff. And that was kind of it. I just wanted to have friends and just have a good time, and work hard and play hard. I didn’t really even get back into the church world at all until I started having a girl or two invite me to church. So that was in middle school and high school. So naturally, of course I was like, “I love church. I grew up in the Catholic Church. I’m full Catholic. Hello.” So who wouldn’t say that if you’re interested in a girl? Obviously you have to, otherwise you don’t have a chance. So that kind of got me back into church for a brief amount of time.
Chris: Okay, so the girl got you to church. But what took you from there?
Mike: So a girl got me to church, and like you said, I was in a youth group, found some friends there. But I was really just kind of there for the girls and maybe some pizza. And, you know, I don’t know, some of the stuff sounded good, but honestly, a couple of years into that, and different girls in and out of there, I just left. It didn’t grab hold of me. Nothing about it was about God or Jesus for me. So I couldn’t tell you I really learned anything. And I’m sure at the time I was taught things, but I just wasn’t interested, wasn’t paying attention. It was really selfish.
So left that. And then, like I said, I was always working full time. I kept doing that, and I always wanted to act. And so by this time I’ve had multiple full-time jobs getting out of high school. I’m getting a little bit of college under my feet, just some basic classes. And it just kind of hit me: if I’m ever going to act, I have to go to California. Have to move. And just…
Chris: That guy that actually goes to California.
Mike: Yeah, yeah. It’s the classic cliche. “I’m going to move to LA and I’m going to go be an actor,” because no one’s ever thought about that before. That’s a brand new concept for everyone. So I’m this blonde hair, blue eye guy going. It really sounds so cheesy saying it now. But I went and started acting, really hustled for the first year, and got into the Screen Actors Guild. That’s when you get this infamous SAG card. That’s what they call it. Very fancy, very fancy SAG card. But that allows you to do, let’s just say, real auditions and go do real acting jobs. A lot of them you can’t do unless you’re inside the Screen Actors Guild. So it’s actually a card that you have to show. It’s an actual card with a membership number. It’s a real thing. Think like the backstage pass on Wayne’s World, walking around, like, “Hey, look at this.” Get this, like, fancy… “Hey.”
You can tell by the acting classes right there how good that impression was. “Hey.” That’s all you have to do. That’s like a 400-hour acting class right there. You just say that.
Chris: He does the alphabet.
Mike: “Hey.” So I got out there. I was blessed to get into the Guild really early, from what I’ve learned about the entertainment industry, and started acting. And as I’m doing that, I had a bunch of odd jobs in LA just to help make ends meet. Met a girl, of course. What a shocker. It’s another girl. And she invited me to go to church. And so I was like, “I’ve done this before. I’ll just do it again, while I’m acting.”
So I went to a church. It was called Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley, and Francis Chan was the pastor at the time. He’s a popular speaker now and leader, and still pastoring, but not at Cornerstone anymore. And I sat there for six weeks, and all I can tell you is that I heard the gospel. I’m sure I heard it before, but it was like I heard it in a way that it was like Francis was talking directly to me. I just don’t know how to describe it, other than it was like the words he was saying were custom made for my brain to understand. And it was hitting me like, “Oh. Jesus. The guy on the crucifix.” Like, I didn’t pay much attention to Him. This was real. He was real. He really did live here and die on the cross, and there was something that happened there when He died on the cross. Like, my sins really have been forgiven. And I’m in my low twenties by this point, so you can imagine a lot of the sins I’ve committed. And there are a lot. There’s a lot of partying and drugs and alcohol in the past too. And just to be with friends, just to be with the community, you know, that was the draw to get into that scene.
And this guy Jesus really did also rise from the grave. And it was just six weeks. Six weeks. And then it was like, how can I not be into this? Not only do I believe in Jesus, but I’m like, hands up. I can’t do this. I haven’t been able to do this for 20 years, and I’m just chasing all these different paths, and some of them are great experiences, but they weren’t it. Which is why I was chasing so many different ones. So I was all in. Decided to follow Jesus. Got baptized a couple weeks later.
And honestly, what’s funny is sometimes you hear stories of people coming to Jesus, and it almost sounds like their life just magically got better, perfect overnight. And sometimes when you hear those stories, it’s hard to relate, because you’re like, “Oh, cool. That’s really great for you.” That wasn’t my experience. I felt like I had hell on earth the first year or two after following Him. And, you know, everyone’s story is different. But for me, I knew I was a believer and I knew I was saved, but there were so many things to change in my life, and I didn’t have someone with me discipling me. All I mean by that is I just didn’t have someone walking with me to teach me, “Okay, here’s how to follow Jesus. Certain things are sin, certain things are not sin.” It was more me stumbling around like, “Okay, I can do this life. Oh wait, I can’t do life exactly the same. I’m not really in charge anymore.” It was just like a trial and error thing.
The girl who invited me to church… I knew the Lord told me acting wasn’t going to be in my future anymore. I had a peace about it. It was kind of a supernatural thing, where imagine a guy hustling for three years in LA, and then overnight you’re like, “I’m good. Moving on.” And I was working in LA. I was a working actor.
Chris: Things were actually coming together there for you.
Mike: Yeah. Yeah. You have your manager, and you have your family going, “You are crazy if you leave.” And it was like, I know my heart’s not in it, and God’s told me I’m not going to have a future with that. But a confusing time, right? So I have that kind of confidence and peace from the Lord, and I know it’s from Him. And then this girl who invited me to church, we assume we’re going to get married, and we move across the country. In our infinite wisdom, we pick a spot on the map. We moved to Nashville for a year, and we pick a two-bedroom apartment, and we think we’re going to live together, but we’re not going to have the same bedroom. But we’re going to live together and kind of, you know, take the next step, so to speak. Kind of like test the waters before you get married.
And looking back, so many things wrong with that. You know, if we have to test the waters, that’s not the best foundation to start a future marriage on. And we can talk about living together and all that stuff probably in the future. That’s probably a whole episode in and of itself. But I learned through that year what was wrong about it, and then learned what conviction was. And it was just, I’m confused on what’s going on. And I had a couple of friends from Texas help me, and ended up, after a year, us breaking up and me coming back to Texas. So it was a really confusing first out-of-the-gate steps on what does it even mean to follow Jesus in the first place.
Chris: Right. So you go to LA. You do end up coming to a relationship with Jesus. And unfortunately, as you moved to Nashville, one relationship, you know, it doesn’t work out. You find that out the hard way. You’re back in Texas. What happens from there? Where are you at with God after the broken relationship there?
Mike: Yep. And so we come back to Texas. I come back on a Saturday, and the next day is Sunday, and I had a friend invite me to 121 Community Church in Grapevine. They just invited me to church, and I’m like, “Okay, cool. I just got back here. Why not? I should plug into a church.” And I just came through a year of Nashville not really plugged into a church, so I think I was hungry for that.
And we showed up, and I immediately judged it from the outside. It’s hard to visit churches, you know. And I literally told my friend, “If we walk in and there’s like ten folding chairs and like two people in here, I’m literally just going to turn around and walk out. I don’t care if it’s rude. I can’t handle that.” And I walked in and I was shocked. It didn’t look anything on the inside like it did on the outside. But what I loved: I was there for probably three minutes, and it felt just like Cornerstone. The people, the atmosphere, the culture. It’s just very much a, “Hey, we’re going to wear jeans or shorts and a T-shirt, and we’re not all put together. We’re not perfect. We’re messed up people moving forward. We’re going to be real with each other, and we’re genuinely trying to follow Jesus at the same time.”
And that just resonates with me very much, because I just, I don’t know, I have this thing on being fake, especially in the Christian world. I just can’t stand that. I would rather just be honest, and as vulnerable as possible, because I feel like we have nothing to lose and everything to gain when we do that.
So I got plugged into 121, joined a small group that same day, that afternoon actually, and stayed for years. In fact, I felt… I call it by what I now know was a call to ministry, but I felt a call. Just like the Lord told me acting wasn’t going to be there, it was like the Lord said, “Hey, you’re going to work here.” And I honestly laughed that off, because it was like, “Okay, I’m sure I’m going to go work for a church. That sounds cool. I doubt that’s going to happen.” And then over the years, I learned, since basically 2009, that was a call into ministry, and things just kind of progressed from there.
Chris: Yeah. And they progressed to another city that’s on a lot of people’s wish list, because you went to LA, you went to Nashville. Those are certainly places people try to get to and make a career. But now you head to Austin. What was waiting for you in Austin? What happened there?
Mike: Yep. So we were in DFW at 121 from 2009 to the end of 2017. I met my wife at 121, and we were married there and had our kids here in DFW as well. We have an 11-year-old daughter, Peyton, and a nine-year-old son, Matthew, and my wife, Joelle. We’ve been married about to be 14 years this year. And that’s just, what an amazing… We’re going to have to do a whole, you and I are going to have to do a whole episode on our families. So we’re going to leave it at that, so the waterworks don’t start happening. But I just feel very blessed and thankful. So, okay. We’re moving forward here.
So here I had multiple roles on staff at 121. They kind of evolved seven or eight different times: administrative roles, financial roles, running communications, helping with life groups, helping with facilities, helping with planning and operations, future work, things like that. Those were all different roles I had. And I now know it was because God was equipping me for, let’s call it, executive pastor kind of work. So executive pastor, just think of that in the corporate world as maybe a COO. So it’s just a guy of many hats. You have your hands in many different things. You’re running different things. You’re just wired for that. Some people are wired for one sector or one ministry area, and some people are wired for the whole gamut.
So I did all that prep for then helping plant a church in Austin called Austin Life Church, in 2017. Kind of mid-2017. And for five years after that, living in Austin and helping plant a church there. It’s still going strong, still going great. Corey Johnson’s the lead pastor there, doing awesome.
And we learned when we landed in Austin: Austin and LA are very, very similar. And what I mean by that is, obviously, one’s the coast and one is Texas. Some differences there. But the people are very, very similar. They’re friendly on the outside, and they’ve all moved to these destination cities, and they’re typically chasing a dream. You know, they’re starting side hustles, businesses, chasing dreams. They’re doing something. But sometimes also they’re escaping. And if you peel back, if you basically go beyond pleasantries besides, “Hey, how are you?”, if you’re more like, “So, what are you here for? And what kind of family do you have?”, you just start peeling back the onion with people, and you find out really fast. They’ll either really shut you off really quickly, or they’ll open up. But I think it prepared me. I think looking back, it was the Lord preparing me to be able to minister to people in Austin.
Chris: Yeah. I love how He prepared you for that. Just being able to experience that for yourself, and then give you that empathy for those who are also seeking that out for themselves too. That was part of your interactions with people down there. So what leads you back here to the Dallas-Fort Worth area?
Mike: So we were there for a handful of years, and we felt the Lord spurring us on. It sounds weird saying it like this, but almost just kind of like, “Assignment complete.” It wasn’t really even “come back to DFW.” It just felt like the next step was to go to DFW again. You know, we had family members here and things like that. And parents. Both my parents have passed away over the last couple of years, about a year apart from each other. And some of it might have been that, and the timing of their health and things like that. I couldn’t tell you exactly why.
It was just, imagine, similar to acting, you’re planting for five years, and that’s like a startup mentality. That’s exhausting and exhilarating and amazing and terrible, and every emotion you can think of, to get to a point to go, “Oh, we’re supposed to move to the next thing,” and have a peace about that, when we thought we might be there forever. There’s something to be said there about, “Okay, I think the Lord actually might be doing this.” And we get here, and my dad passes away about two weeks after we moved back. And so the timing… we’re supposed to be back here. You know, we can already see that.
So we came back, and we had no idea what was going to happen. Didn’t know really what I was going to do for a job yet. You can’t just walk around and go grab a job these days. And things transpired where I get a call. I’m on the night before taking a position with another ministry, kind of being a COO for them, and I get a phone call from 121. And some things transpired where there was an opportunity on the table for me to rejoin them in a new, kind of different role, in a way that we were like, “You can’t be serious. There’s no way this is happening.” And we just prayed about it, and the Lord led us back to that. So we’re back on staff, actually, at 121 in Grapevine today, and it’s been going great. Been back here for, I think, a year and a half.
Chris: So we’re glad to have you. Selfishly, we are very excited to know that the Mobleys would be coming back to the DFW area, knowing exactly what you bring to the table. You know, not just you, but your whole family, sweet as they come. But you in that role at 121, just how you help make us a lot stronger as a body, with all the different things you’re able to not just do, but the way that you think. And so we’re grateful for that. And so why Not Quite There? What leads you to want to do a podcast like this? I know we have a little bit in our teaser episode, but taking all that you’ve just shared tonight, how would you summarize that toward this mission?
Mike: Now, I like how you said tonight. This is the late-night edition of Not Quite There, as far as when we’re recording this. Oh man, the behind the scenes of a podcast would be fun to talk about someday. Well, you know, and thank you for what you said. I appreciate that. That’s just encouraging, on us being back. And it doesn’t come without tons of trials and errors. You know, the man-of-many-hats role. I’ve learned the hard way over the years: when you go too far, when you burn out, when you take on too much, when you deal with mental struggles. You know, I had a big bout with anxiety before moving to Austin, and I might save that for a talk in the future. But I’ve had to learn a lot on how our bodies and our minds are just broken because of sin. And it really does help explain the kind of world we live in, and why there’s a lot of issues, if we read what the Word has to say about that.
And so I’ve had to learn how to have empathy. Not only when getting married, but learning how to emotionally invest in someone, and tears are fine, and saying “I’m sorry” over and over again is a good thing and a healthy thing. Some guys are like, “I already said it once. Why do I have to say it again?” It’s like, you’re missing the point, fella. But learning about anxiety, mental struggles, how everyone’s at a different place, I’ve just grown in my empathy. And that happened in Austin too, just to really try to connect with someone where they are on that day.
You know, God only calls us to kind of go one step at a time. He says He’ll establish our steps as we go. Meaning, sometimes we sit on the couch and we pray, “God, will you show me what to do next?” And we don’t do anything. And I feel like very often the Lord’s like, “Get moving, and I’ll establish your steps.” You’ve got to take steps for them to be established, kind of a thing.
So we come here and feel like the Lord’s impressed some things on our family to do, and a podcast… You know, Chris, you and I have talked about it, and you’ve had quite the vision for it as well. I just think it’s a good fit. We’re on the go. People are going from left to right and listening a lot more these days, to books, and I think podcasts like this. It just seems like a great ministry opportunity. You know, we talked about where we are in our age, and just ministry experience, and just to be able to share. I mean, man, if we get to share a sliver of something that we’ve learned, frankly, it’s like we’re having a cup of coffee, and that can help minister to anyone and help them progress. I mean, why wouldn’t I want to be a part of that? And we get to tap into a little bit of tech. I’m a geek. I’m a nerd. I like tech stuff. I like web stuff. I do websites. I like the hardware, the software, all the little nerdy things that other guys would fall asleep about. So I get to tap into that realm doing something like this too.
Chris: But would you say that you still love technology?
Mike: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. I’m definitely a tech geek. Now, I am getting a little bit older, so I can’t keep up with all the youths of America these days, with all of their TikToks and things like that. But I still like it. So it’s a passion.
Chris: Well, I’m glad that you’re handling a lot of the tech here. That’s definitely helpful. And it’s also definitely in your skill set. So thank you. I know the hot seat’s pretty hot sometimes, and I can feel mine warming up here, because I feel we’re going to dive into mine coming up in a soon-to-be episode.
Mike: Oh, that’s what you meant by feeling the seat getting warmer. Okay. I don’t know if you did anything over there. You broke wind? You didn’t break wind.
Chris: Oh, we’re going there. Oh, what?
Mike: You said it. You said, “I’m feeling the seat warming up right now.” I don’t know what you meant by that.
Chris: Never mind. Never mind. I got you right there. But yes, as this seat warms up…
Outro: Thanks so much for joining us. Please consider rating and reviewing our podcast and hitting subscribe on whichever platform you prefer. Remember to keep moving forward, because we’re not quite there.
