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State Of The Ranger Union With Commander Tom Saccenti

Transcript of the show bellow.  (90% Accuracy)

Hey everybody. And welcome to the ranger podcast. I’m commander rainy commander. Wayne, how are you, sir? Good morning. Doing great. All right. Yeah, the wing man really is the most essential part. I’m not sure about the, you ever seen top gun? I have. I haven’t. Um, I’m a Christian one again. Wow. That was you set me up for the day and by the way, so I’m a Christian. So the CA because somewhere in there was a voice that wasn’t your voice or my voice. We’ve given it up. We’ve got an a, we’ve got a, a guest on the show today. So go ahead and welcome Tom. [inaudible] our Southeast regional staff.

Hey guys, listen, I want to say I traveled the Southeast and, um, and when people say, you know, what’s your role? Who do you cover? I say, you know, I cover, you know, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and I get to Florida. And without a doubt, they say Opie one 69. And guys, I cannot tell you how proud I am to have Opie one 69 and in our region, uh, what I will tell you before I was regional coordinator, and I was an outpost coordinator, I listened to, to you guys and pulled from information that you provided to us. And the ministry that you’re doing is affecting our region, affecting the national, rural ranger ministry, um, men across the country. And I don’t think people say this when they come to meet with you guys, it was like, you have brought me in as the honored guest. No, no, no, no, no. Truly we are honored, uh, to come and speak to you and share with you because the words that you’re speaking to the lives of outposts coordinators across the country are making better godly men who are administering the boys and, and keep it up because we’re so proud to have you as an art in our region. So proud.

Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, very, very kind words. And, and, and by the way, so thank you for all those who are listening and we’re just appreciative of, of you and, and what you’re doing and, and doing the arduous work of mentoring feature men. And so commander Wayne and I, we say we’re curators. So we try and put together all of the best content and information and tips and tools that can help you along your way of mentoring, future men and reaching Keech, keeping and teaching voice for Jesus Christ. And you can find a lot of [email protected]. And of course you can find her email address there, which is a great way to contact us. And please don’t hesitate to do that. We have people writing us all the time and sometimes just for simple things and maybe something they’ve heard on the show and wanted to know something additional about it. And there’s also a show notes on the website, which has links to key things we’ve talked about. Sometimes we’ll have books or, um, different equipment and, or maybe even guests that have, uh, content of their own on their own website. So, and commander, Tom, I thought it was interesting, you know, was every time I go and search for you, you have a great presence on the internet.

Don’t know that we can say

That.

I mean, it’s always like just, flowingly good, positive things about Thompson, which is funny because if you ever meet Tom it’s him, it’s just him. I mean, and if you ever hear him speak, it’s just the, energy’s always there. I mean, they really got the perfect guy for the job. And, uh,

Hi, when you, uh, you just connect with someone and, uh, you forget where that journey began, but w w when did our paths cross flags by Micah, that’s exactly what it was on the podcast. And then you were, uh, you were one of the instructors that made it happen for us at the, our commanders retreat. They’re in Georgia and they are you’re right. The podcast, that’s where it all started. Yeah.

And it probably would have, our paths would have probably intersected more had COVID not happened. Right. You know, that was kind of a big thing that really ended some of our projects. Cause that little project that your boys do with making the flags, I mean, it’s, it’s amazing because their initial financial goals just exploded and then they were able to raise tons of money for it. And it was all for Canada.

Right. Uh, so, so, uh, knowing, not Eurasia. So there are there at us, there are 700,000. We got a 10,000 goal for

21 is awesome. We’re hoping to get him taken care of [inaudible],

I’m feeling very humbled, right?

There’s a lot of flags, buddy. Let me tell you one star at a time.

That’s great though. You know, I mean, and they’re really wonderful. I mean, I have one hanging up in the home studio office, so, but, uh, again, COVID kind of redirected some of the recording there, so, but we’re glad to be back in the lodge and thank you for coming to join us here again on the ranger podcast. Well, we wanted to have you in your full capacity as the Southeast regional coordinator and you lead was just a few weeks ago. And so where are we at? Can you, what can you tell us about where ranger, woe Rangers is in the Southeast and where we’re going,

Man? So, so some things I want to say is, is that I have never been more excited to be a Royal ranger than I am right now beyond just what’s happened with the ministry. If you just look at what’s happening in society, I really think this society is realizing the absolute value of, of, of developing the mail. Oh yeah. I mean, when I watch secular news casts, they talk about we’re having this identity crisis with men and, and I’m listening to all the things that they say are the problems and all of a sudden, like Rangers fixes every one of those issues, you know? And, uh, and so I think just in the world in general, they’re really catching on that. We have got to mentor our boys. We have got to put godly men. And, and, and when I talked to P I have not spoken to a single pastor who I say that to who hasn’t a hundred percent agreed with me, every one of them get it, you know?

And, and, uh, so I think that we are positioned and I think the ranger ministry has a history of success in that exact item. Uh, we can point to golden medalist across this nation, uh, that are pastors who are leaders, who are politicians, who are, who are pilots, who are police chiefs, who are in our military, uh, who are living a godly lifestyle, uh, through the mentorship that happened. And so I just think that Rangers is in a great position right now. Um, you know, lead is our national conference. Now it’s not really, uh, where every commander from everywhere comes. Um, it’s, uh, it’s one that kind of is geared towards some of that district leadership to kind of get, you know, to discuss camp Arama. And some of the things we’re doing with camp Harambe and some of the, some of the new program program changes and things like that. And so,

Well, let me jump in here for just half a second, but if you do want to come, you should contact your district leader. Right?

Let me tell you the, you absolutely should come. You don’t have to have approval to be there. It’s great to go and party. Let me tell you something. I’m not mad at a district director who wouldn’t want their outpost coordinators to come, right. Who wouldn’t want to spend a couple of days worshiping the Lord side by side with an outpost coordinator. Absolutely. Right. And also to develop that relationship with that team within your district, I mean, we do district, so, so I’ll tell you one of the things we did as a region, uh, at lead, uh, and it’s never been done. We had a regional dinner, just all the, just, just our region, none of the other regions did, but our Southeast did it. And man, we just, all, we all dressed up in our ranger uniforms and we brought our spouses and we handed out awards, and then we had a time of prayer and we prayed for some of the needs and the wives stood next to their husbands and prayed for their husbands and pray for other leaders. And, and, uh, it was, it is a great, so lead, yes, there’s this, this component where we’re learning and we’re doing two conferences and we’re taking classes, but there’s also this huge component where we bring in some of the best speakers, some of the best speakers out there to really invest in the lives of men in that room. So yeah, it is open to both, both the district leader. Um, but absolutely I’ll post coordinator is welcome to come.

Okay. And by the way, I’ll just say this, you know, when you talk about your excitement level, and I’m glad to hear that you had a lead conference and all this leadership from around the country goes, and there’s this excitement building, but, um, but you’re right. You know, it’s funny when you look at our, how our culture has evolved over the last 20 years. And as kids, when we drove, when we rode our bikes through our neighborhoods, it was trampolines and bike ramps and, and three meter boards at the local swimming pool and things like that. And now it relative to those things, it’s a ghost town. So when we were kids and thought about adventure, it was, you know, Bob sledding or something, some major, you know, looking to jump off something and build our own parachute or something. Right. But today it is just a canoe trip or it is just a simple, you know, we talked, we had the episode, 10 dangerous things every row, and you should do, and Royal Rangers does bring that. And even though the, like you talked about the, the modern, um, cultural voices that, that we unlike major networks, you know, they may be talking about cultural changes that they want to see happen, but I believe there’s still the vast minority that when, when you get away from all that moms and dads want their young men to grow up and be strong, man. Right. And roll Rangers gives him everything. So what’s the highest, what are some of the other highlights? Really? Yeah.

So one of the cool new things that we’re going to do, and we used to have, if you guys remember, I know the commander Wayne does, we used to have good, solid regional conferences.

Hmm. All right. I get two different ways, but I wouldn’t take it. He meant it. Cause you’re smart that way. All right.

He was heavily involved in some of our best regional conferences. And, um, and, and so over the years, we’ve, we, our region is kind of in most regions, I’ve kind of veered away from that regional conference, um, set up and it just really focused on everyone going to lead. And that kind of thing, the truth is a lot of our commanders, you know, lead is one place in the country and they can’t really get there. You know, we want to make sure that we’re giving our commanders information and making sure they’re staying up to date with things as one of the changes that we’ve had is that lead is going to go to an every other year, um, system. And we are going to have, on the opposite years, we are going to have a killer killer, um, uh, regional conference here in the Southeast region.

I’ll tell you, uh, uh, we spent four hours at lead this year with every one of our leaders in the district planning on next year’s, uh, regional conference. It’s going to be next March and it’s going to be an Orlando and, uh, Freddie Vasco as his son’s church. So Friday’s our regional training coordinator and his son just, uh, they just purchased a church building to move their church. They’ve been meeting a lot of the schools. And so they purchased a church building where we’re actually sending some Rangers down to do some, a missions trip, work at that building to help clean it up and get it ready to go. And we’re going to have our 20, 21 conference there in Orlando. So, uh, so that’s what we spent a lot of time working on and planning and preparing that’s when I was going to be in March, uh, second, second weekend in March of 2022.

Yep. And then there’s, I know there was a little commercial blurb in there about the, um, this missions opportunities that’s still available.

It is, you know, and so this one was a quick turnaround. So, so basically, uh, Freddie sons church has basically been displaced three times due to COVID. They were meeting at a school and then COVID hit. And in schools like, Hey, we got to shut down and can’t meet here anymore. So the whole church had moved to another school. COVID COVID outbreak at that church. They all had to move to another location. So they finally got, they’re going to be closed on the Orlando event center live event center as a big event, old events that happened. It has been inhabited for for years and right. They’re paying double rent as a phrase like we got to get him in now. And so we, we did we’re, we’re putting together a quick turnaround ranger, quick, uh, missions trip weekend is, is, is 25 bucks. You bring your boy out of his sleep there.

The church is a great opportunity for him to have missions. And then we’re going to do a few more there. Um, and the reason for that is I want Rangers to invest in the location that is going to host our regional conference. Okay. I want that church to not feel like we’re taking from them by one, that church to feel like Rangers is investing inside of it, into us as a ministry. So we’re going to have a couple of missions trips there to kind of help that church get off the ground and get ready and get ready.

And how can people get in that distribution?

Yeah. So if they go to, uh, to the South East region, Royal ranger webpage, so it’s, uh, Southeast rangers.org. Um, we got our flyers and, and all that information. Huh?

Can they submit their email there? Okay, cool. So how does that work? They’re there? They spend the night overnight.

There’s going to be a Friday and Saturday. I’m going to be a Friday and Saturday, so I can come up either, either day or both days. And, uh, like I said, we’re going to feed them. They come up on a Friday night, we’ll start putting in work. And here’s what I like about this, these, this Mr. Disrepair. I made it very intentional that any ranger of any age can come. So if you’re a dad of a ranger kid, if you raise your kids, you got to come with your dad, but discovery Rangers there is work for them. So this isn’t major construction. We’re not building a church. We are fixing it up. There’s mopping to be done. There’s walls to be scrubbed, there’s painting to be done. And so a boy from acres is so many times we run into, you know, Oh yeah, we’ve got a ranger missions trip.

Where are you going to be 21? Right. And nobody knows how to do that. Listen, I was a cop, right. Like if I’m not shooting a target, I don’t know. I don’t know how to fix that door. You know what I mean? And so, so it really limits us in this, this, this opportunity allows us to bring a boy of any age for 25 bucks, you know, sleeps in the church, eats the pizza that we bring in and works at that church. And just starts that process of learning about missions and learning about giving, learning about that kind of thing

When, Oh, we were all on it. And, uh, but we had a conflict and date, some dates that had already been scheduled for our outpost, but you’re saying there’s going to be other opportunities this year.

Yep. Yep. We, uh, well, I’m, we’re, we’re, we’re going to get in there and really see what needs to be done. And we’re going to schedule multiple trips there for two reasons. One is we just know that that day was a quick turnaround and we know a lot of outposts can’t be there. The second reason for that is, um, we want to make this a bronze Pathfinder opportunity to do that. The boys had to get 40 hours of actual labor time. And so we want to give them multiple opportunities to go out there and total that 40 hours of labor time.

Okay, awesome. So, um, anything at lead that you can share with us? Like any changes in the horizon? Yeah.

I don’t think that there’s. So when we talk about changes, you know what I remember my very first, um, meeting Carl, uh, our national director, he came to our, it was actually the last regional conference we had in Georgia and his, he said, I want to let everyone know that I don’t have a new ranger uniform of the back of my car that I’m going to be presenting. Right. So, so I’m not coming to you with a brand new ranger ministry that we’re laying out here. Here’s what I’ll tell you that we’re spending a lot of time on, um, one of the things that I’ve done as a regional coordinator and the other regional coordinators are now modeling is we are really, really spending a lot of time in the field hearing from, from outpost coordinators. What can we do to make our ministry better and more effective for you?

What tweaks can we do? You know, I often ask this question. It’s a very important question. Is Rangers broken am? My answer is no. I mean, uh, the people I talked to th th th th when I talk to someone who says Rangers, isn’t, isn’t effective and it’s, it’s, it’s not an effective ministry. My first question them a hundred percent of the time is, Hey, what outposts are you teaching in right now? And a hundred percent of the time, they’re not teaching in a local outpost, the men who are teaching in the local outposts like myself and the other leaders in the executive committee, understand that the ministry we are doing is effective and it’s ministering to boys. Our question is how do we make it better for the commander, easier for him to get the access to that curriculum, easier for him to track his awards, easier for him to roll out that information. And so that’s, when you say, are there new changes on the bus? There’s a little bit, so there’s some tweaking right there to make things better, but the general foundation, there’s nothing that’s changing. What we’re trying to do is really connect with those outposts and say, how can we make your life better as commander? So you can effectively minister in a better way.

And I think to commander Wayne and that there’s, there’s probably a lot of commanders out there that are active in the RAL post, and they frequently don’t know how to make their voice heard, or even if anybody wants to hear their input. I mean, is there, is there a place where they can say, Hey, listen, this is what we’re seeing. And I just wanted to share this with you.

So, uh, yes and no. Uh, so, so, so, so I can give the generic answer of, Oh, just send me an email, right. You know, so you go to our web page, you send me an email, hop on Facebook, send me a Facebook messages. But I think that we have an obligation to do more, you know? And so I will tell you, if you go to our Facebook page, you will see, uh, the 30 days leading up to lead, I posted 30 testimonies. And how we got those 30 testimonies was my regional staff has been calling every single outpost coordinator in our region. And just saying, Hey, man, I just wanted to check on you. I want to hear your testimony. I want to hear your prayer requests. And we’re systematically making sure that we’re going to try once a year to make sure every single outposts coordinator once a year hears from a regional staff member.

Um, so that can hear their voice. We can hear what they say. Um, you know, now, now the problem with that is, and, and I was taught, I actually said that to somebody at a meeting. He goes, well, I haven’t gotten a call yet. I saw, okay, we’re working on, we’re going to do that on the list. I said, are you chartered? And he said, no. I said, well, then we don’t know who you are. That’s your point. You’re not going to get a call from me. It’s the only way for me to know who you are. Um, but it is our goal is on the radar, that voice, right? Yeah. And, um,

I was just going to say, I would, I would also just encourage all of the commanders that are out there. Your first step is to go talk to your senior outposts coordinator commander. Um, because he’s the one that’s going to get the phone call. He’s the one that can have that direct contact. And again, it saves a little bit of the, of the effort that it would take to funnel these, eh, just a simple email into those scenarios, because, you know, I’ve got to believe that some of the emails, um, our church level kind of issues, you know, and so that, that kind of helps too. And then of course, uh, um, just kind of keeping your ear to the ground, being on those distribution lists for your district and for your region and for the national, um, you know, if you’re not getting the, the, uh, national newsletter yeah. Um, ranger now, you know, those kinds of things can help you help keep you plugged in and may end up answering some of the questions before you ever ask them.

It is. It’s true. But I do want to say we wanna, I, I wanna make sure that every one of our outposts commanders knows every commander knows we are not such a big organization, that their voice doesn’t matter. We aren’t. And in fact, that’s the role that we have. That’s why we have regional coordinators is because we want to make sure that what is happening within the regions is represented to the national office. And so, uh, don’t, don’t be shy. Um, I believe all of us is way smarter than one of us, you know? And so let’s, let’s communicate, let’s talk, you know what, and, and listen, maybe your idea’s already been said, and maybe your idea has already been tried, and maybe there’s no way for us to do it, but man, I want to talk about it. I want to hear about, I want to hear what you have to say. Yeah.

There’s a great book. Commander, Tom mountain, if you’ve read it before, but it’s called the four disciplines of execution. We’ll get you a copy because it’s a phenomenal book and we’ve both commander Wayne and I’ve read it multiple times. But anyway, there’s a, there’s a little blurb in this book and it says, um, it’s actually by an and, uh, Tim Harford is author of the undercover economist and he says, show me a successful complex system. And I’ll show you a system that has evolved through trial and error. And so a little bit of some of this, you need to get your foundational things and you get your facial material, but even here at OPA one 69, there’s things that over the years, commander Wayne and I have, have tried. And we were like, Oh no, that didn’t work. And so a little bit of the trial and error does get you a much better place. And so I’m curious, you know, uh, are there those moments where at the national level you go, this didn’t work out great. Let’s, let’s back up and do it this way, our, our old way.

Yeah. Yeah. You know, what’s so, so what’s interesting about that. When you talk about it is ranger, commanders are very similar to police officers. You know, I spent my career leading police officers, and I remember doing a background check on an officer. One time I went into his, I went into his chief and I said, I haven’t done a background check on this guy. And, and can you tell me about, she goes, Oh, he’s the most irresponsible person I’ve ever met. I was like, really? I was like, tell me about this. And she tells me about the one situation where he was very irresponsible. I said, really, when did that happen? She goes, it happened 28 years ago for days, six hours. I’m like, okay, all right. We’ll let you know the anniversary of this is next week. Exactly. Right. And so, and so we just remember right.

And commanders in the same way, like, you know, we changed commander. Carl changes to that utility uniform. I’m like, well, I hope you know, that that actually happened like a decade before he took over. And so I think that sometimes I will tell you, the national office is very slow moving in some aspects. They want to make sure that they know that when we roll out this change, everyone’s going to remember it. You know what I mean? And, and, and, and to walk that bad boy back, uh, we are all going to remember that too. You know, I’ll give you an example. I’ll give you a great, your, your question is a great example. We rolled out the swordsmen patch and immediately the field hated it. Right? No, listen, it was rolled out in the middle of COVID. We were getting a push from the F you know, we really wanted to support the assemblies of God and their Bible engagement pro uh, pro it’s a great it’s absolutely foundationally.

Great. Right. Um, it was just, it was rolled out quick. Right. And so after that pushback, the national staff gets together and says, okay, how do we fix this? Right. And so, you know, we have people submit ideas for new past designs, new patch locations, and what we’re doing. So they do that. They are not so boastful. Uh, in my experience, my short time with them has been, they are not so boastful that they’re not there, say, Oh, what we say is, is going in fact, the swordsman pastor is a great example. Carl stood up and said, okay, we’ve had this pushback, let’s fix this problem. Let’s fix it.

And you know, that just, again, reminds us that even at the outpost or the national level, just like your outpost level, they’re still going to be some of that trial and error. That’s going to build the complex system that holds everything together and grows your outpost and so forth. Well, I’m curious, you know, as, as the Southeast regional coordinator and you traveled to different outpost, um, what as, as an eyewitness to these outposts what’s thing that every outpost could do better.

Yeah. You know, one of the things I’ve seen. And so I I’ve had this, this great opportunity over two years to really visit dozens and dozens of outposts. And, um, one thing I’ve seen, I’ll tell you a couple of things. One is so often we forget to exude excellence in what we do. We accept this stat. A great example is uniforms. We have these different levels of uniforms that you can do a vast, or you could do this, you can do these different levels. And I understand the process of why we did that. You know, you know, that maybe the utility uniform or the khaki uniform is an Apple for that specific church. But what I found is that that’s not what they’re assessing. What they’re assessing is what’s the easiest, possible thing for them to do. And then they go with it, right. And that’s not exuding excellence.

Right. And they use excuses, Oh, parents won’t pay for it. Or I don’t have the time to order the patches, or we can’t get them sewn on. They’re all, all these different excuses, but that’s not exuding excellence. Like how do we set that standard and work towards being the absolute best? Listen, we talk about boys want to have that scorecard, right? Boys want to have that award. They want to be the best soda man. Right? So do I, man, listen, I have seen men sacrifice their life inside of a police environment. And when they come out of that river, soaking wet, having saved somebody, the first word to other mothers, you think I can get that metal Valor from the chief now,

You know what I mean? That’s a first thing they think about, right? Because, because, because we as men

And want to display that. And so my encouragement for the commanders is man, be excellence. Right? Be excellent. The second thing I see is I see a lot of us really, truly believe that the senior pastor is the one that is causing Rangers to be successful or not successful. I don’t think that’s true. So people say to me all the time, how are we going to get senior pastors to believe in Rangers, do senior pastors believe in Rangers. They believe in it. They know that boys need to be mentored. They know that here’s their problem. They have a hundred other ministries knock on their door saying, we want your people. We want your people. We want your people. What a senior pastor needs is a godly man to say, I will lead your Royal Rangers. Exactly. That’s what a senior pastor. I’ve never seen a senior pastor have a godly man, walk into his office, say me and these five other guys want to mentor a group of boys.

Can we do that? And him say, no, right. He’s not going to do that because he knows that they have that need, but he also knows he has a limited number of resources, you know? And so instead of, and then the last thing I’ll say, man, you guys nailed this on a, when you recorded it. But I listened to it last week. Um, when we talked about the Holy spirit being your master recruiter, right? That’s the recruiter. And what I want to say to commanders is two pieces. I want all about recruiting boys. And I want to talk about recruiting leaders. And that is absolutely the Holy spirit is going to work on their hearts and open up those doors. But man, you gotta be a man that they want to follow. And when I have a commander, I’ll just tell you, 20 years of leading outposts, I have, and I’ve led multiple churches in multiple cities.

I have never not had men in my outpost. I’ve never walked in and said, I don’t have enough, man. I can’t find men by hearing from commanders all the time and is a really hard conversation I have to have with them. But my question is, are you the kind of man that these men want to follow? You got to ask yourself that if men are leaving and they’re not wanting to follow you and you’re approaching them and they don’t want to be part of your group, are you creating an environment that they want to be a part of? Right. And so that’s a hard, hard question that you have to ask yourself, but it’s one and why would a pass or shut down a ministry that’s successful. Right, right. I’ve never seen a pastor shut down a ministry that, that is leading boys to Christ and mentoring boys and doing activities and growing.

I’ve not seen it, you know? And so that’s one piece. And then the other piece is recruitment of boys. I see these outposts make amazing videos. And they’re so cool. And I’ll tell you, I’ve never recruited a boy off of a video. I, uh, you know, before COVID hit, as I was traveling, I was meeting these boys who, uh, had been displaced from their outposts. You know, maybe a, their outposts had shut down or maybe they didn’t have adventure, expedition Rangers. And, and my sons specifically were displaced from their apples, were traveling the country and they didn’t have an outpost. And so before COVID hit, I actually made a decision to start a virtual outpost, you know, and, and we’re going to bring these boys in, who were displaced that didn’t have an outpost. And so I made this killer video, man. It was, it was, it was awesome.

I had 14,000 views on it, right? Like this is it, baby. Like, this is it, man. Right. You know? And uh, that Thursday night came where we had our first virtual outposts meeting and I had exactly zero boys in that meeting. And the reason was because I did not invite a boy to my outpost. And when I was a nine year old boy and my family had just moved to a new church, how I got started in Rangers was commander Ron Hughes on a Sunday morning, got on one knee and looked at me in the eye. And he said, son, have you ever heard of Royal Rangers? I said, yeah. I used to be a Royal ranger in West Virginia. And he goes, I would like to invite you as my guest to Royal Rangers on Wednesday nights. And I went that Wednesday night. Right. And I say to commanders, who in your church is getting on a knee and looking at a boy in the eye and saying, would you like to come to Royal Rangers with me and be my guest? That’s how we recruit boys. That’s how we get them.

And commander Wayne, uh, you know, w what commander Tom was saying about, you know, these men that, that feel they’re like they’re struggling and some of their outpost and getting men to come in. And he really put his finger on it, in the doing things with excellence. Because when you do things with excellence and you operate an outpost by using that Johnny Barnes vision and you and you, and you crack open that box and you follow that method, you’ll be building something that, that men want to come to it. They want to be part of something. That’s excellent. And I think commander, Tom just really put his face.

You’re right. I think so. And we’ve, you’ve heard me say it many, many times. If, if it’s worth doing it’s worth doing right. If you can’t do it right, you don’t do it at all. And I’ve had a little pushback on that. So you mean, if you can’t do it just perfect, then you guys, you don’t even start. No, we do at our best. That’s the point in that statement is whatever you make the decision to do, then you do your best. It doesn’t mean everything you do is going to be perfect. But if it’s worth doing it’s worth doing right, you can’t do it right. Then just don’t do it. And it speaks to what commander Thomas said, are you, the man that they want to follow is your standard is your example is your lifestyle is your spiritual light, something they want to follow. And, you know, maybe, and I don’t mean to be harsh, but maybe you’re the problem.

And commander Wayne, you know, uh, uh, I’m, I’m proud to share this with the audience that you’ve never shied away from that. Even when it comes to assembling staff for some America camp, there’s a standard that we operate by some Amera camp and a standard of excellence. And during the, um, uh, interview process, commander, Tom will have people from around the district that want to be part of a staff at some American. And we sit with them and we have that interview. And we’ve had times when somebody said, I don’t think I can measure up to that standard. And commander Wayne will say, okay, well, listen, but there’s time between now. And then here’s what I’d like for you to do.

Yeah. We’ve, uh, w we go through the interview process because if you’re going to bring in 65, 68 young men for four days, you just want that, that staff that’s in tune spiritually, everything else would come together. When, when you set them up for success, if they’re in tune spiritually, then it’s all gonna come together. And you’re right. I have, uh, I remember this, uh, particular individual. And when I laid it out said, Hey, here’s what we do. I’m going to mail you a devotion. So we’re all on the same page. You’ve got to read that devotion every day. And I said, then there’s going to be three days of fasting, one mil going into summer camp, going into our staff meeting commander, wanting to ask you to fast, a minimum of one meal. And to spend that time in prayer and also going into, and we start this 30 days into, you’ve got to read the chapter Proverbs every day.

And you end on that 31st, uh, 31 chapter at, at a staff meeting on that day. And I said, uh, you need to talk to your wife about this and what’s expected. And then give me your answer. And you’re right. He called me and said, command Wayne, I’m not there. I’m not at that standard. And we did. We reached out and said, look, I’m going to mail you the devotion book anyway, because you can get ready for next year, or maybe something changes between now and the time that clock of 31 days starts. So you don’t give up on them, but you try to bring them in to that standard. But there are times that they just didn’t hold up to what we expected, but here’s the beauty part of it. You didn’t have to call them out on it. They just knew. They knew when, when they looked at those spiritual requirements and what you were asking of them, they, they know whether they measure up to the standard. And if they don’t, they know you’ll figure it out between now and that time of that, of that staff meeting.

And they know commander Tom, that w what we’re trying to accomplish. And in this particular case, summer Mira camp is deadly serious to us and you. And when you draw that proverbial line in the sand and you set that standard up and you set that standard of excellence, men want to be able to reach those standards. And, you know, they see how S how serious this endeavor is, and they’re going to speak up. And because they realize, and the Holy spirit is going to speak to them, and God wants them to be successful, too. I mean, God’s love is wrapped around a, a standard and a, and an accountability he’s going to hold you accountable. Not for one reason because of his great love because of his great grace, because he wants to see, he wants to open up everything to you. He wants to open up the whole world to you, but he can’t do that unless he knows that you can be faithful with a little. And, uh, and that’s, that’s exactly what you’re talking about. Commander Tom, when it comes to establishing an outpost, it operates this way. And I can’t speak for every buddy out there, but I can speak for commander Wayne. And I, when I say, don’t doubt us about this with the uniform and with the requirements for reading your Bible and devotion, you will chase zero people away with that. You will do quite the opposite. You will have so little room for your team to meet. And that is the beauty of it is really the beauty,

The organizational structure of Royal Rangers. So you have that guy that is like, Hey man,

I’m not to that level. That’s that’s okay. Cause we have this great spot called Lieutenant commander, right? Or assistant commander, assistant group leader, whatever you want to call it. And we can start mentoring you in that process. And we have these trainings that you can go to and you don’t have to walk in knowing everything that this guy knows. You can go to a ranger foundations class or a ranger Central’s class, and then a NRMC and you can grow into that position. And that is kind of the beauty of the structure that we have set up is that we can take that person. Who’s never, you know, I went to an NRM CA so I attended in RMC here in Florida, uh, just as an attendee because I wanted to go through that process and see, and I’m standing there with people who have never camped a day in their life, right? New commanders, never can’t day. And the beauty of it is, is that we can take that person. And we have that foundational calf that we can help teach them. Here’s how you, here’s, how you make an aluminum foil mill. Here’s how you make a Derby car. Here’s how you set up a tent. Here’s how you do a dining flight. And we can walk them through that process. So we shouldn’t scare anybody off by what we do. We should set those standards. And because listen, everybody wants to be part of a winning team.

Yeah. That’s a true statement there. And, and, you know, and commander Tom, uh, even with going through that process, that doesn’t mean that summer Mary camp is perfect. And it doesn’t mean that there’s, uh, mistakes, uh, that are, that are not made or things that happen or things that don’t go according to plan. But it does mean that everybody’s on the same page and everybody’s striving for the same standard of excellence, right?

Yeah. We want to, we want to create an environment where everybody’s set, set up for success and we’re all going to fall short. We are. And, but, you know, I’ve, I’ve often said it commander Wayne and I are going to cross that finish line. I don’t know what we’re going to look like when we do, but we’re going to get there. Right. And then we’re going to S we’re going to set up our next event and next thing, and then we’re going to head for that finish line. And, and that’s what we’re all about. And I love that, that you brought into that, the ranger organizational structure, cause you’re right. There’s, there’s something for everybody. You can give a hundred percent wherever that looks like. If that’s once a month, if that’s once a week, if that’s, you know, 40 hours a week, fine, but there is a place for you.

There’s a seat on the bus that we can find and get you plugged in. And, and, uh, if, if you, as a senior commander feel, operate that way and build that on that organizational, it’s all there for you. Um, and, and sometimes I think as men, and I think you could speak to this, but we kind of want to make our Mark, right? And maybe your Mark is all been a noticeable because you kept you, you assembled the faithful and you operate in the outpost exactly how it should be operated and maintained. Then outputs steady. As she goes, plugging people in growing the number of boys and number of men that are involved touching lives. And at the end of your tour term, there was nothing overly new, nothing land. You didn’t, you didn’t build a new building or anything like that, but that was your Mark. You know, your Mark was to keep on keeping on. Does that make sense?

It does man. So, you know, and I wasn’t planning on sharing this, but man, what, while you were saying that they brought up this email, I got last week. So I opened up the chief of this little, tiny town, little tiny town, 300 students in the whole town. And I started working at this church, no ag church and sites. We start doing Rangers at this Nazarene church. Right. And I met this, uh, you know, as, as a cop, you, uh, I, I recruited a lot of boys through calls for service, right? This is, you know, I did it right as I get this call, this, these two boys, uh, one brother was duct tape, duct tape, and another brother to a tree and, and beat them up. And I get a call. I was a bad nut. Right. And so I get out there and, you know, and they had a tough life, man, mom and dad were divorced and they’re living with mom.

It was a tough, tough life. And so I get these boys coming to church, you know, and doing, doing our thing and, and you know, they never, you know, you didn’t see that crazy, awesome shift. Right. You know, and then I, you know, I get moved to another agency, you know, out of town. And so I never seen him. I’d never see him again. I kind of follow one on Facebook and man, he’s, you know, by the time he’s, he’s, he’s 20, he’s got the tattoos all the way up the face, the face tattoo, all this stuff. Right. You know, and I’ll tell you, last week he sent me an email said, Hey man, this is CJ Laney. I just wanted to let you know, uh, I was that kid with a salt heart, but try to give her a hard interior. And you were a guy who spent time with me and cared about me.

And I was rebellious and trying to show everybody who I was. And because of you, I’ve accepted Christ into my life. Me and my wife are now serving the Lord. I wanted to know if you’d come and speak at my church. Wow. Right. And you look at this picture of this kid, who’s got tattoos going up his eyes and you think I failed this kid. Right. And then 20 years later, you get this email out of the blue. Haven’t talked to him for 20 years out of the blue. This kid, like God’s changed. My life is because of what you did in that little tiny church with a kid who was duct taping his brother to a tree. You know what I mean? And that’s the commanders man. Commanders, you are changed in these boys’ lives. It will never leave them. It will never

Amen. Camina Randy, that speaks to what we say constantly. So one plants, the sea. Yeah. So one waters. Yeah. Yep. And so one harvest and the harvest time doesn’t take place unless someone planted the seed. Yeah. You planted seed. Yeah. Yeah. And sometimes God allows us to see that sometimes you never will and that’s okay. But, uh, I think he rewards us once in a while with those moments where we, we, we hang around enough and we’ll get to see that 20 year moment where live is radically changed. And it’s, it’s amazing commander, Tom, thanks for, for coming to share with us as our regional coordinator. And, and, uh, we’re again, we are so glad you are in that position. Um, because you’re doing a great job and we need you there desperately.

Well, right back at you guys, we need, we need outposts to set that standard of excellence, not to be the best, but to show others what they can strive towards. Keep it up, guys, keep it up. One 69 commanders on one 69, keep it up. People are looking at you as a role model. And, uh, and that’s a good place to be. That’s a good place to be.

Thank you, Lord will. And we’re going to keep doing it till he says something different. Exactly. Yeah. So don’t forget. You can find everything that ranger podcast.com and follow us on Facebook and all of your favorite podcast app commander, Wayne commander, Tom, have a great ranger week. Love you. Appreciate you. Thank you. See everybody.