BraveMen S3E62: Pat Morley - The Man in the Mirror Talks Back

Pat Morley has been a friend of mine for decades. I've respected him, admired him. But most of all, what I appreciate about Pat is that he is faithful, he's steady, he's there, he's brilliant, he writes great books, and he answers my phone calls. So you can't beat all of that. The man in the mirror was the landmark book that Pat wrote that really put him in front of everybody. It was right after, around the same time, and my father wrote Maximized Manhood. And between my dad, Ed Cole, and Pat Morley, and a number of us, right there at the start of the modern day men's movement, and then following that up with Coach McCartney and others. We all became great friends. And today, I'm brave men. We're going to talk to Pat Morley, executive chairman, man in the mirror. With me today, as always, is my partner in crime on this season, Chris Shields. And Chris, you've looked at, now you looked at his most recent book. Yes, his most recent book, The Christian Man. The Christian Man. Yes, The Christian Man. Is the one he wrote about you? Yes, exactly. The one he wrote about. Yes, he called me and called at me, Chris. I need somebody that I can write about if you're the man. Yes, the Christian Man. But I love this. You're going to be writing the book, Humility, and how I achieved it by Chris Shields. Sitting at the footsteps of Paul. The footsteps of Paul. Pat Morley is, Pat Morley really seriously is a legend. I mean, this organization, Brett Klimmer, heads that up now as executive director, Pat is the executive chairman. And then David Delk headed it up, great friend for many years, who's now pastoring. And you know, these guys, Chris, you've been, I mean, they've been actually in the ministry to men longer than you've been alive. Wow. I mean, think about that. Man, you make me feel so young. Yeah, no, because you were feeling old. So, you're like, 27's coming up. Oh, my God. So, yeah, I am starting to feel, I'm like, 30 years almost there. I mean, think about it. I mean, getting to some of those best stuff when he was like 18. So, wow, you're already way past that, Chris. Pat was, you know, Pat Morley was a very successful businessman. Yeah. I actually had some reversals in his business, which caused him to then begin to reflect on his who he was. And that started like looking at yourself in the mirror, which became Man in the Mirror, which of course, then what was the guy's name, did a great song out of that? Oh, I don't, the Man in the Mirror. What, I can't think of the artist that wrote that, the Man in the Mirror. Oh, man, you put me on the spot. I'm young, member. I know exactly, which is why I should know the artist that wrote this song. This is why you should know this. I'm not going to tell you. Okay, give me a second, don't tell me. It's okay, give me a second. Famous artist, Michael Jackson? Yes, sir. Man. Come on, man. I thought you would go like, I thought you'd actually get out and do the thing. Hey, you know, I can't. That was probably written about the same time you were born. No, actually, I think it was way before I was born. Man in the mirror. Yeah. Was it one of his first hits? Yeah, it was one of his, let me see. 1988. Yeah, I was born in 94, give me a break. Yeah. Oh, give me a break. Man, 94 of my yesterday, bro. What's not for me? Come on, man. God, this gap is getting bigger all the time. All right, so man in the mirror was not just a song by Michael Jackson and he didn't write it from Pat Morley's book. Well, there's a chance that you made about a point. 1986 is when Patrick Morley dropped the book. And 1988 is when he dropped the song. Oh my gosh, there's a link. Yeah, somewhere. Let's ask him cosmic link. Yes. Hey, but this is a great conversation. What's it a Godwink? But this is a great conversation with really one of the worlds, most respective authorities on the unique challenges and opportunities that are facing men, Chris. And that's why I appreciated him taking the time. And really walking through some deep issues. And I hit him with some questions. Yeah. And it was like, hey, Pat, let's talk about real stuff. Yeah. And I'm thankful for a man like this that over almost 30 years now, he's had the same Friday morning Bible study with a number of men. That has touched their estimating that they've had over 10,000 churches that have been impacted by this ministry. Millions of men. And so they are an ally in the ministry of men. They are ongoing, faithful, deep, dedicated, and strong. And I appreciate them. And so pleased today on Brave Men to have Pat Morley. It's Brave Men with Paul Lewis Cole, wisdom and courage for the journey. I'm with my friend Pat Morley. Pat is so good to see you, man. Such a blessing. And Pat, you wrote a book called Man in a Mirror years ago, helped usher in what we would call the modern day Christian men's movement and started an organization called Man in a Mirror. And you've touched literally thousands of churches. You've had a Friday morning Bible study there in Orlando area. How many years have you done it? I mean, consequently you've gone every Friday morning had a Bible study with men. Yeah, we started in 1986. And that's remarkable, brother. That's called faithful. I think that would be called faithful. I hope so. Yeah. So well done. You know, it's one of the things that you've always been, you've talked about, aspired to in your own life as being faithful. How does a man navigate faithfulness in a shifting world where in the middle as we tape this, we're in the middle of the coronavirus crisis? Right. And I want to be a faithful man. How do I navigate that? Yeah. Well, you don't have some ideas, of course, of your own. The first thing I would say to the guys who are listening here is notice my demeanor and my tone of voice. I'm not rattled. I'm not afraid. I am concerned, but I'm not frantic. And that's because we are in a crisis, but everybody else is in the crisis too with us. I think it's important to remember that the rules for normal life do not apply when you're in crisis management mode. And so the idea of trying to maintain or recapture exactly what was there three or four weeks ago for us sitting here today, that's not really the objective. The objective is to figure out how to navigate through this. And then hopefully we get back to something, maybe it's a little different, but back to a more normal situation, a few months down the road. Well, it's going to be different, isn't it? Yeah, Jeremiah, Jeremiah 29, we always quote that 11th verse which says, God has a future and a hope, not destruction. But we forget the context that was written to people who had been taking captive into Babylon. And Jeremiah said, you know, plant, plants, build houses and the word that I love right in there and the translation I was reading the home in this morning is it says multiply, multiply. So I've got to adjust my attitude to work through the crisis. You said the rules are different. I want to expand on that. But the core values are the same, is that right? Yeah, what we believe in our values, what's important to us, those things don't change the priorities change, the short term priorities change. So we still want to, if we were to be able to talk to Jesus today and like the lawyer that asked him, Jesus, what's the most important thing a man can do in his life? Now he actually asked a different question. He said, you know, what's the most important commandment? But it's basically asking, you know, what's the most important thing a man can do in his life? And Jesus says, oh, well, that's easy. You know, love God with all your heart, so mind and strength. In other words, the totality of your being, every ounce of your energy, the sum of your strength. Oh, and by the way, the second thing is just like the first thing. You know, I want you to love other people as well. So a month ago, if you or I had been able to sit down with Jesus and say, Jesus, what's the most important thing a man can do in his life? He would have said exactly the same thing. Exactly the same. And now in the middle of the crisis, guys, if you're listening, if you could sit down with Jesus today and say, okay, Jesus, in the middle of this coronavirus, tell me, you know, what is the most important thing that I can do in my life? What do you think he would say to you, man? He would say, I want you to focus on me. Love me. I am the visible image of the invisible God. I am the exact representation of his being. He who has seen me, has seen the Father, the Father, and I are one. And so look at me. Love me. I'm your shepherd. I will guide you through this, number one. And then number two, in the chaos of the moment of the crisis, I want you to remember that even if you're right, you're wrong if you don't say what you say in love because loving one another is the main thing after loving me. And so then everything else will flow out of that. Hey, the golden rule is still the golden rule today. You're gonna do under others what you've had and do under you. And so it might be for us, for Patsy and me. So our priority right now is not giving our financial resources away to organizations who are because my sense is I'm gonna need some of those, I have the potential of needing those exact same financial resources to help in our own family. So love God, love other people. I think priority number one is making sure you take care of your own family, your immediate family. And then also the people that you work with. Now at Man in the Mirror, we've had a payroll cut. We had to let some people go, a couple of people go in headquarters, none of the field team, of course, because the field team basically raised their own support. So their income will go down, but they still have a job. Right. But we also cut the payroll salaries by 20%. And so the point is that the old rules don't apply in crisis management. Matt, just tell one more quick story. Yeah, please do. So my background guys is business. I was a real estate developer for a long time, 18 years. And successful at it. Yeah, I was. And then so I had a, that I was part of, there were lots of them around today. It was that one was called tech, the executive committee. And basically 12 guys like myself that have businesses and we would meet once a month, one day we had a, and we have a special speaker come in. So we had a guy who was in crisis management. So we're in crisis management now, right? So this guy teaches, comes in and teaches us. He said, this is how crisis management works. It works on a different set of rules, the normal management. That's why when the group that made the loan that goes into default is not the same group that does the workout because of different set of rules apply when the loan is in crisis. And then he said something guys that I thought was fascinating. That I've used it a few times myself since. He said, when a company is in crisis, and let's just say it has a hundred employees, the existing management is ringing their hands and trying to figure out how to meet the crisis. And how, and they feel like they need to cut, you know, 10 people, 10% of the payroll. And they're just devastated and frustrated and confused and just don't know how they'll be able to go on with only 90 employees. Well, then they hire a crisis manager to come in. You know what he does? He takes the company from 100 employees down to nine and it returns the profitability within 30 days. So it's a totally different set of rules. And so thinking outside the box is really important during this time, but also keeping your, but never losing sight of living out of your values and then the priorities that result from those values. Yeah, so keep keep the core values. So you wrote a book called The Christian Man Came Out 2019. And when you wrote that, you had a couple different things I want to hit in that in just a second. But first I want to ask you about your own personal discipline because one of the things I find in shaking times like this in crisis is that is that people have a tendency to lose their rhythm. Yeah. And they lose the things that have perhaps helped them become stronger or better or more excellent. And then the other thing is there's an opportunity, if you will, to start a new rhythm. Yeah, or some who haven't had one, who basically hadn't done it. So tell me just, I want personally from you Pat, how do you keep your rhythm? What is that rhythm? Do you study the Bible in the morning? Do you study about once a week? Is it, you know, how do you keep your faith in rhythm? Yeah, you know, I think so rhythm is an interesting word. Our son and I, we have a weekly phone call, which was yesterday. And we were talking about this crisis. And I, what I said to him, I'm not saying it's right, but what I thought was is that, okay, last week and maybe the week before, that was the stumble of the handoff of the baton and the relay race. You know, it didn't go well. So everybody fell down. But, but now this is the week where everybody's going to be picking themselves up and getting their emotions back under control. And then rejoining the race. So there will be a new rhythm that is coming, you know, this week, everybody was out of rhythm last week and we fell down. This is the week where we pick our cells back up again, dust off and get back in the race. And so then there's this piece about the spiritual part. Frankly, I think most guys know that the spiritual part is important, but they feel like I don't have time for that. I have these other things that are more important. Let me just remind everybody, Martin Luther once said, I have so much to do today. It's going to take me three hours of prayer to get it all done. Yeah. Yeah. So I do think spending more time in planning and thinking about what you're going to be doing rather than less times planning that you're about trying to be doing. You know, that reminds me of the someone I heard years ago and there's a lot of stories on that. And I put them in a book was the man who told me he said, I can get 11 months of, let's see, I can get 12 months of work done in 11 months, but I can't get 12 months of work done in 12 months. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, I like that a lot. I like that a lot. Burn yourself out. So tell me about your personal discipline. What's the rhythm for Pat Morley's life? Yeah. Okay, so if I need to spend more time thinking through how that's navigated these times, then where would the best place to do that? Well, I've always found that my own devotion, devotion life, it's the place where the Holy Spirit speaks to me most powerfully. So my rhythm, I have a couple things. Of course, I do have a daily time of devotions. When I was a younger guy, I was staying up late watching TV. It was, let's just say, titillating TV. And I was having to fight off temptation, thoughts, and so forth. And then it just occurred to me, you know, look, you want to have more time with God. Why don't you just go to bed two hours earlier and get up two hours earlier? So I've been doing that for decades now. So I spent a couple hours with the Lord every day. I don't really have a clock. I'm a, my wife said me one day, she said, I sure hope they have numbers down. I said, what are you talking about? She said, well, because if they don't, you're not going to be a very happy person there. I love numbers, and so I love to count. But I, well, I don't try to put a clock on it, but I spent a couple hours with the Lord every day. And my main scheme is this. I have six set road prayers, six kinds of road prayers that I try to rotate through almost every day. And just to keep me on track, keeping myself on track. I love this called a personally developed liturgy. But I think the idea of having some specific things that you'd come back to over and over again, guys, I think it's a smart idea. Yeah. Then the second thing I do is I read through the Bible. I'm reading through the Bible for my 31st time right now. And so my goal is to read it, cover it, cover it in a year. But I don't worry if I miss a day here or a day there. There, you get up late for whatever reason. You have rough night. You didn't have an early appointment. Maybe you have an argument with your wife, not me. Well, that wouldn't happen to either one of us. No, no, although I, hey, look, I have the spiritual leader, right? That would never happen to me. We have amplified discussions. We do whatever. So, yeah, so I'm doing that. Another thing that I do, too, so different people worship God, you know, they're different worship languages, you know. And I enjoy worshiping God in the majesty of His creation. God speaks to me. And so I hike, I like to hike alone. I do hike with other people from time to time. But when I do, they all like to talk. So I really like to hike alone and just let the Lord speak to me. And so actually, I take more notes on a hike in my, you know, I'm speaking them in my iPhone. I take more notes on a hike than almost anywhere else because God speaks to me. And so I think just having some alone time is good. And everybody goes in a different way. Yeah, you've got to find that place where that does come alive in you, don't you? Yeah. Yeah. I know some guys who can sit in a cafe. In fact, I know one man, Gene Getz, you know, Gene. Oh, yeah, I know Gene. He wrote most of his books longhand in an IHOP, International House of Pancakes, because he loved the buzz. And so he would just tip the waitress, triple whatever she would have gotten in that booth. Yeah. He loved that buzz. I know others, it's the long walks. I know some, it's different things. And we have to find that place where we come alive. And so what you're saying is really a man has to pull himself, literally discipline himself. Focus isn't about pushing harder. Focus isn't about greater intensity. It's about greater intentionality. And so you've got to have those places where you carve out those times. And so it's like, remember Coach McCartney one time who said, gentlemen, I'm going to give you an extra 180 hours in your year this year. How many want an extra 180 hours? That's over a full week. It's like, I'll take it. He said, I'll give you extra 180 hours in your year this year, 100 extra years. He said, get up a half hour earlier every day. Well, here's a thought to, I love that, by the way. Here's a thought. The idea of just what threw it right through my mind. So it's right through my mind. And a great, no, here it is again. So the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. And so I had a guy call me on the phone. I put this in the book, the Christian man. I had a guy call me on the phone one day. He said, Pat, please pray for me to have more patience. I said, well, you don't need me to do that. And he said, yeah, yeah, no, I really need more patience. I said, well, actually, there's an easier way to get it than to have me pray for, because if I pray for you to have patience, then you're gonna have to go through some trial that delivers patience. But the fruit of the spirit is patience. So why don't you just pray to be filled with a Holy Spirit. And then that's that. And so on this idea of self-control, self-control, man, it's a discipline, this discipline of self-control. It's a fruit of the Holy Spirit. And so you don't need to man up, get yourself jacked up, amped up, ramped up, go to some big rally, and get all fired up. The problem with the big getting all amped up is what do you do on Tuesday? You know, when the water's returned to normal, and where do you find the below the surface, motivation, inspiration to do it? That's the Holy Spirit. So when I do my devotions, by the way, I wait for the moment of humility. I wait for that moment when I feel that overwhelming sense of the power and presence of God. And basically, I try not to leave my chair until I have that sense of the presence of power of the spirit. And I would just encourage you to guys think about that. If you sit down and read the Bible for 10 minutes, honestly, reading the Bible for 10 minutes is like eating one potato chip. I mean, so you've done your duty, right? You've done your duty, if you read for 10 minutes, but has it really changed your life? Well, unless you really had a sense of connection with God, probably not, probably doesn't mean that the word doesn't still get planted in your heart. So I'm not throwing out the baby with a bath water here. But God, if you want that full or rich, deep meaning for a relationship with Jesus, then don't just try to check a box, okay? Read my Bible, and you know, now I'm going to go to work. Hey, this is Chris. I want to take a moment right in the middle of this great conversation to let you know the Brave Man podcast is a production of the Christian men's network worldwide and the Global Fatherhood Initiative. Christian men's network has helped pastors and leaders disciple men for over 40 years. You can find all the resources for mentoring and fatherhood at cmman.men. That's the Christian men's network at cmman.men. We have tremendous resources for churches with special discounts for groups on that website. Everything a church needs from A to Z to mentoring disciples men of all ages and backgrounds. And cmman has created a 12-part training course on how to create a successful men's ministry for pastors and leaders. Check it out, majoring in men.com, which is the solution to men's discipleship. Because of the generous sponsorship of the Christian men's network partners, what would normally cost $100 is now free. That's the majoring in men.com. Now, let's get back to this powerful interview between Paul and Patrick Morley. By the way, spiritual growth is still in this book, Paul. The way, most of my books, I've written, this is my 21st book, we got like 7 million books in print. So we've done, this has been a major thing for us. But all those other books were written from the perspective, I've done my homework, you can trust me here's what you need to know. But this book is different. What I wanted to do is I wanted to write a book for the next generation of guys coming along. For those guys, let's just say 35 plus or minus 10 years. And so what I did was, as I pulled together 24 men, I've got it on my iPad. Hey, I like that. Yeah, that's great. That's great. Well, and then here's the actual... There's a book. I actually have a physical one. I just didn't want to get up and go over and grab it. I should have grabbed it a little bit ago. Well, I reloaded this stuff off the iPad. Well, I got these 24 guys together. The six of them were 33 years of age, and then they spread out in a bell curve distribution on each side of that. And I asked them, okay, what are the most compelling issues that you're facing right now? And we did a storyboard. I know you're familiar with storyboarding, but I'm betting that a lot of the men who are listening to this are not familiar with storyboarding. What storyboarding does is basically it democratizes brainstorming. So it gets everybody an equal voice. So in brainstorming, one charismatic person like Paul Cole has a good idea, and everybody gets on board. But meanwhile, there's a person over in the corner. There's a little more shy, a lot of more research. We had a really great idea, a better idea. He doesn't speak up because he sees where the train is going. And so a good idea gets acted on, but a great idea he gets left behind. So what storyboarding does is it removes that. So I asked these men to each write on a little yellow post. You know, yellow post. With big fat black sharpies. One issue per post it. And then all the issues that you find compelling for you right now. Right. One per posted hand on the me. And then I put them up on the board on the wall of our training room. And when we were done, we had 40 issues. And I was, as the moderator, I was grouping the issues together. Being a better dad or how to be a good father. That's two ways of saying the same thing. Then men. When they had these 40 issues up on the wall. Okay, that's brainstorming, right? But now what are the most compelling of those 40 issues? So what I did next. Very important is I gave each man five little round sticky dots. And I said go vote your top five issues. So they went up and each picked their top five issues. And then we backed away. And as happens in every story board and that done dozens of them. As always happens. What's really important then bubbles to the surface. Because the men vote. It's that's the democracy. And so in this particular case, there were 10 issues that clearly stood out above the rest. And Paul guessed what was the number one issue. It was spirits of growth. What we're talking about here. Right. Interesting. So it's actually very interested in this. Yeah. And chapter five. I thought was really good. It's about dad's make a difference. Yeah. And, you know, in most of our culture, you know, we live in a culture path that has. It's prioritized. If you will, the calorie content of our children's lunches over the character content of our children's hearts. Yeah. And so for a dad of father. We have a tendency dad. I think sometimes dads feel like. I really don't know how to do this. So I'll just, you know, the school is doing a good job. You know, this person, I'll take him to church. I'll drop him off. You know, and, and in a sense, we feel like we're doing okay. And of course, then there's the fatherless issue, which has to do with the inventory of men. But tell me what you were driving at there on the chapter five of the Christian man, the, the book you wrote last year. Yeah. So a lot of this comes out of the brokenness in my own family. So my father was abandoned by his dad when he was. Two years of age. My father went to work when he was six years of age. Had two jobs at six. When he became a man, he had a decision to make. Would he follow in his father's footsteps or try to be a cycle breaker? And I'm grateful, obviously, that he wanted to be a cycle breaker. But he had never felt the scratch of his father's whiskers. He never heard his father's soothing voice, reading him a bedtime story. He'd never wrestled on the ground with his dad and had his hair tussled, never tossed the ball on the background, all those things. And so he basically was left to guess at how to be a father to me and my three younger brothers. And he did the best he could. And I think he did a, he did a great job. But he was the most moral man that I've ever known. He taught me how to treat a woman. He had a great 56 year marriage to my mom before they both. Before he passed away. She actually passed away first. And then he died. She died on the memorial day weekend. And then he died on the library day weekend of a broken heart. So wow. So. But the thing was is that you can't give what you don't have. It didn't get very familiar saying. And so as my wife said, I think your parents gave you too much say. In other words, my parents let me have what I wanted and do what I wanted and go where I wanted to go. And I really went off the rails. I was like, okay, it's a preteen. But when I became a teenager, man, I was, I was a, I was a mess. As I said in the book, I got, I was brought home or had law enforcement encounters for drinking on three different occasions. Wow. Fights, lots of fights and everything. And so I kept fighting because I kept winning, but if I, you know. Maybe that's why I quit fighting early. Never thought of it that way. That explains a lot. Where I was, I went surfing. You guys ended up going racing and stuff. Well, I'm, so I quit high school in the middle of my senior year. My dad drove me down to the Army and Listman office. And the army was one of the best things that ever happened. Wow. Because in addition to having a very excellent fine tune system to protect our nation from enemies, they also have that very fine tune system to knock the chips off the shoulders. And so that discipline was really good for me. And so in this age, I, what I wanted to do is, there's a text that I heard from Larry Krab that a parenting summer that my wife and I went to in our kids were young. And it's based on the text. Folly is bound up in the heart of the child, but the rod of discipline drives it far from him. And so the idea is that, that, that, yes, I love you. And no, you can't have your own way. These are the two most important. If you guys, if you don't take anything else away, take away these two things from this interview. That the most important things for your children to know are, yes, a lot of you. And no, you can't have your own way. Yeah. And almost pretty mix up. And your parenting is going to be, I'm goofing up. And your parenting is going to be, I'm goofing up one of those two ideas. Yeah. Most, most issues that where we see young men acting out, I kind of put it this way, Pat, when you see an undisciplined child, you see a child who's usually unloved. Yeah. Yeah. Because true discipline always comes out of love. And the issue for a lot of us, as men, is too often our discipline comes out of being embarrassed in a crowd, being angry for something that they're acting out that's an issue in our own life. And then we overcompensate by, yeah, you can't do that because I've got that issue in my life. So I'm not going to let it be in your life. Yeah. We over and we over dramatize that. And but true discipline comes out of love. And it is a father's love, as you've described, it always desires to help grow the child. Yeah. Right. Yeah. I agree. 100%. You know, so back to the loving God and loving other people. So yes, I love you. The most important place to focus that is in the family, but it's not most important to focus it in the family on the child. And as I say in the book, the most important way that you can love your child is, it's not my idea that the former president of Notre Dame University said this. And my wife and I went to a Catholic marriage encounter, our first year of marriage. Yeah. And it was great because the priest that was leading it, of course, he wasn't married, I think. Yeah. What's this about? And he was a smoking, cussing, drinking, Catholic priest. But Paul, he was brilliant. And he quoted the president of Notre Dame University. He said, the most important thing a man can do for his children is to love their mother. Yeah. And so, and now, you know, I'm a trained in the social sciences. I've got a PhD in leadership and organizational change. And so I've studied systems theory. And part of that was I've studied family systems theory. And the number one rule in family systems theory is that if you get the marriage right, and I'm over simplifying, but if you get the marriage right, you'll get the family right. Yeah. But if you don't get the marriage right, it's almost impossible to get the family right. So, man, if you're listening to, remember, yes, I love you for your kids. They need to know, yes, I love you. No, I can't, you know, you can't have your own life. But then, then the idea of loving their mother. And then, that just releases just all the downstream things that come out of that are beautiful. So, these are like Uber ideas. These are like big ideas. So, instead of trying to remember a list of the 10 things you need to do, the big, big chunky things that if you keep them in mind, will guide behavior. I had a man ask me, Pat, one day, a number of years ago, he said, what's the most important thing I can do for my children? I said the most important thing is hug them. Hug them. You know, it's good. And there's certain, this is so basic. You know, he wanted a list of 10 things. Yeah. And it's like, well, hug them. Okay, what else? Well, I don't know. You could kiss him on a cheek would be a good thing. And so, it was too simple. It was too simple for him. And so, my thing, in the beauty of that phrase, my dad said that quite often. The most important thing a man can do for his children is love their mother. And what that does, Pat, is that goes outside of the bonds of whether you're married still or not. Yeah. We have so many people who are on second marriages. And many of our dear friends who no longer with the mother or the father of their children. And yet for a man, that phrase says, the most important thing you can do for those children, even if she's living across town is still love their mother. Absolutely. Now, now we're talking spiritual disciplines through the spirit. Yeah. It's like a guy said to me one day, we were talking about forgiveness and the power of forgiveness. And we'd pray with a bunch of guys about forgiveness and forgiving their dads, forgiving their ex business partner, that kind of thing. And the guy came up and said, I can't, I'm finding it hard to forgive my ex-wife. I said, well, why is that? He said, you don't know what you put on Facebook. That's it. I said, man, it's not about what she did. It's about you and it's about your heart and about getting your place right. And it's, when you talk about getting the marriage right, Pat, that is so good, man. It's about, you know, so for him to forgive her wasn't about her. She might still write stuff. It's about the attitude of his heart. And quite often we have to take obedience as a, as a shroud of discipline and just say, okay, regardless of my emotions or whether or not I get a response, I'm going to be obedient and I'm going to love the mother of my children. Yeah. That doesn't mean, you know, we're not talking about sticky, gooey sort of, you know, kumbaya thing love. We're talking about a copy of love, which prefers others, which desires for the benefit of others. Yeah. It's been for myself. So, man, that's brilliant. I want to recommend everybody get the Christian man, great book and 21 other titles that you've done. And man in the mirror and, and what was what are you holding up? So you heard about it. Yeah. Yeah. So I want to tell the guys about this. It's all right, because it's free. It's free. So, Zanaven has allowed me to take. Okay. So what I've done in the Christian man book is I've taken all of these ideas of, you know, several decades enough, and I've distilled basically everything that I think is worth saying about these 10 issues. And into one book. Right. But then, Zanaven, Zanaven gave me permission to take everything that's, that I've learned that's in that book. And distilled it down to a little embarrassed to say this about 30 pages. And everything I know that I think as an evaluator could be distilled down to about 30 pages. But anyway. So, and, but then Zanaven is agreed to give it to allow us to give this away for free to any man who wants it. And not only that, to make as many copies of this as they want. That's my district. Districts of others as they want. And so you can go to manonmier.org slash mentor. And learn how to, well, personally, you can just download it from that page. Right. And then there's also a mentoring experience or a coaching experience that you can, you know, do this with another guy who want to or a small group. But anyway, the coaching guy is absolutely free. And you don't actually have to buy the book to get the, the essence of it. I will say that I've got enough feedback now that people are telling me it works. It works. It can even better with the book, but that's. Well, I'm sure it does because he gives you some death and background. You know, you talk about everything. You know distilled into 30 pages. So that would be like Gettysburg address, you know, with Lincoln. You know, or Winston Churchill's speech about never quit. Or the life of Christ. We see in the gospels. We only see about 30 days of his life. And including the 12 year old piece. And, you know, so 30 to 48 days, I guess, with theologians tell us. And so, you know, so I can understand that. I can see how that, you know, because words have such great power path. And you're, you're really an eloquent writer. And I thank God for your gift for everybody of Christ. So thank you for being with us on on this. And the different places will put this interview. I'm very excited about it. And then I just pray that the Lord would bless you as you go forward. And blessed man in the mirror and Brett Klimmer and all your team. And that everything you put your hands to, it will prosper. And every place you put your feet will be holy ground. And I pray blessing on you in expansion. And in the middle of crisis, I thank God for men like you. Who provide us a center to keep us out of place. Where, as the Lord said in Psalm 46, be still. And know that I'm God in the middle of the storm. Thanks, Pat. God bless you. Well, I love, I love you Paul Cole. I love your ministry. And could I offer a nice open prayer for your men? Yeah. Have a great. So in, dear father, in this time of coronavirus crisis. A plague, if you will. I go back, Lord, to the plagues of Moses. And remember how you made a distinction between the believing community and the Egyptians. And Lord, I don't even know if this is theologically correct or not. But Lord, I pray that you would create a spiritual ghostion for all the men. So you hear this broadcast and all the men who are involved with our ministries, our two ministries, the different ministries. And all the people we love and care about and all those people for whom we are responsibility. Lord, would you create a spiritual ghostion, a safe zone where we are protected in that spiritual distancing space and that social distancing space. Would you keep these men safe for your glory, for your praise, for your honor, Amen. Amen. Love you, Pat. Grace and peace to you and Joyce and your whole family and your whole crew and the ministry also. I'll see you again soon. Okay, brother. We love you so much. Yes. Paul, I really love the Christian man. A conversation about 10 issues men say matter most. Yeah, you know, and I appreciate Pat, you know, relating some of those things to us in this interview. And, you know, I mentioned it to you before we started, but 12 years ago, just over 12 years ago, November of 2007. We relaunched my father passed away, Dr. Ed Cole, who our family launched, the Christian man's network, basically at his kitchen table in 1977. Wow. And I've actually got the little paper because, you know, I had a job and I've been, I was in business most of my life, but I went down and paid the fee to actually launch the file of the paper work with the court. But when, when we relaunched the ministry, my father passed away in August of 2002, we relaunched the ministry in November of 2007. When we did, I called Pat, and I said, Pat, would you come down and be with us? We had probably 50 friends who gathered in the room and prayed together and talked and Pat came down and gave a really inspirational message about what it meant to do ministry to manage. And he used his own testimony, it was remarkable, but I'll never, never be able to thank him enough for doing that. And that's just the kind of man he is. Yeah. He's just there for his friends. And I mean, you can kind of tell that by, you know, quote, he likes to say, no man fails on purpose quite the opposite. When our feet hit the floor every morning, we are looking for a win. Yeah. And that just speaks of him, you know? Yeah, that does speak of him. And he says that in personal conversations, you know, like we just had, you know, no man wakes up in the morning hoping it'll fail. Yeah. And he lives that way, he lives strong and he lives inspiring other men. I can't, you know, here's the deal. I can't see the ministry to men in the world today, having the full texture that it has, the dimension it has. And I know there's some great guys doing some new stuff and whatever. But I don't think it would have the depth it has without a man like Pat, who actually took time to dig into some deep areas, Brian Doyle with Iron Sharp and Zionist the same way with his studiousness. Yeah. And Pat would, Pat is such a focused guy that he would literally just sit in his office for days and study things and study them out and work on them. And thank God for men like him. Yes. Yeah. Thank God for friends. I'm just thankful, you know, for the example, you know, and just being able to learn the reality of what it takes to make something great, you know. You don't just wake up and say, oh, it's going to be great because I call it great. Yeah. And the only way the world changes is that men are discipled. Yes. And that's why you talked about it at the mid break, majoring in men.com. Exactly. majoring in men.com is a 12-part series that we did. It was, it had a paywall on it. It was $100, I think. Yes. And now it's because of the generosity of our partners that it's free. Yes. majoring in men.com. And so tools, cmn.men, our website, tools you need for discipling men. Everything's there. C-M-N, Christmas Network. C-M-N. men. Yes. Everything you need to decide for men within the matrix of the local church, which is what we are. We're church people. Exactly. And, you know, I pastored, planted a church. It's still thriving today. Yes. My son Brandon is a pastor of that. All of my sons are in ministry. Niles is an associate pastor with gateway church. And associate minister, he's the pastor of their campus that's in the prison. Which is a great story. We should have him on a podcast. We should. Maybe it's a great story. He's got a lot of stories about guys there and story about how they did baptismals within the prison. Wow. And then my son Bryce is the music director right now for a church called Cross Timbers in Argyle, Texas. Huge and powerful church. Pastor by a great man, Toby Slough. And Bryce is a fantastic worship leader and minister there. And then Brandon was C-34 at Worth. Yes. Niles is my son-in-law, Mary, my daughter, Lindsey. And they have four amazing kids. Brandon's got two kids and Bryce has three strip children. But they're in ministry. And they're in ministry out of not just, you know, not just out of legacy. Yeah. It doesn't just happen. They're in ministry because they have a deep commitment to the Father. And that's one thing that I do admire, you know, about your family Paul is the fact that they're not just doing the business. Or they're not just following what they've known. They're actually shaping culture. You know, they make a difference. People know them and they know that they stand for, you know, truth. And that's what I love about being around Niles and Bryce and Brandon. You know, you don't see them just, hey, I have a legacy. You see them walking it out. Yeah, they're walking it out. And that's huge. Yeah. And they're discipling others. Yeah. And that's how the world changes. Exactly. Disciple men. So that's why I appreciate Pat Morley, the other men who are in ministry to men. I could go through a whole list of great guys. Some of them will have had on the podcast. Yeah. And some of them are coming up. Yeah. Some of them are coming up. But thank you to Pat Morley for being on Brave Men. Great friend and great legacy that he's passed on to millions of men in faith. And thank you. Thank you who are listening right now for being a part of the Brave Men podcast. Tell somebody what they do. They click on something. You want to subscribe. You want to share. And you want to write a review. Okay. Here we go. So you subscribe. But you click on something. Yes. Yeah. Wherever that is. Yes. Spotify wherever. And then you. You're going to click to the right. You share it. And you can share it. Okay. Share it on your Facebook. Show them. Share it on your Instagram. Share it through message to one of your friends. And then you want to write a review. Only if it's going to be good. Only if it's good. It's going to be four and a half or five stars. Yes. No, no, no. We don't do four and a half. We do five stars. Oh, five stars. Okay. Five stars. You're giving you a quality show. So we want a quality reason. Now if somebody didn't give us like if they went to two stars or something. You would personally go to their house. Is that right? Yeah. And you always have the right to be wrong. You know, it's okay. But I will discuss it with you guys in Indonesia. Two stars. You knock on the door. Hey, bro. Yes. What's going on? This is Chris. Help me understand. Let me understand this. Two stars. Why? Why? I don't understand. Is that cultural? Is that mean something I don't know? Oh, man. Hey, thanks for being with us today. Hey, Chris. What else? Hope is what? Hope is alive. And hope has what? Hope has a man. And what is it? What is it? You almost did that right. And hope's name is. Jesus. Come on, somebody. Thanks for being with us today. I'm brave man. Youth just experience. Brave man with Paul Lewis Cole. Paul is president of the Christian men's network. Connect with Paul at cmd.man. Or write to him at Paul at cmd.man.