Man on a Mission: Joe Phillips - Part 1

Hey, this is Mike Zwick from If Not For God Podcast, our show. Stories of hopelessness turned into hope. Your chosen Truth Network Podcast is starting in just seconds.

Enjoy it, share it, but most of all, thank you for listening and for choosing the Truth Podcast Network. Step into the ring with the Russian nightmare, Nikita Kolov. Well, Pastor Joe Phillips did. Pastor Joe from the City of Angels.

Wait till you hear his story and the outcome. Well, let me welcome to the show Joe Phillips, a long time friend. In fact, I made a little list here.

Pastor, evangelist, author, actor, director, producer, screenwriter, comedian, husband, dad, granddad. Joe, welcome to the show. Have I missed anything? Thanks a lot, Nick. I appreciate it. Well, what that list means is I can't keep a job.

I don't know. I might have to argue that point. I think there would be many out there that would want to hire you just with that laundry list of accomplishments and things that you've done and are doing. You're very kind. So like for real and well, this is just a special blessing for me to have you here. And our relationship goes back, I was trying to calculate, you might be able to help, but it goes back.

What I calculate is about 25 years, about the mid 90s, when you became youth pastor to my older girls, Taryn and Tawny, way back when. Yeah, wonderful, wonderful time. That's exactly right. And wonderful memories, because I know how much those two girls love you and love your family and so many things that, of course, our families have done together over the years. And I had somebody on the show a while back promoting his book called Well Did, someone you might know, a mutual friend of ours that has even more history with you, Jay Stewart.

Right. Oh yeah, we go back. You and I go back to a marriage conference we were attending and I was looking at you and I had this crazy idea. I don't know if it was the Lord or the devil. I should wrestle that guy for a gimmick.

And man, I kind of live to regret that a little bit. Well, that's interesting. Yeah, was Jay conducting that conference? I think so.

Yeah, him and Melanie, right? Because you guys go back to your college. He was probably the first Christian I met when I was 18 and I became a Christian. That's how far back we go. And you went to school together, Florida. Yeah, we went to college together, played on a basketball team a year or two in college. Okay. Well, and it's been a blessing. I've known him a little over two years longer than you, I guess, but both these relationships have been a huge blessing to me. You mentioned the wrestling.

This is kind of it. So here's a memory I have when you came to me, because our listeners probably think he's kidding, right? But when you came to me with that idea and you said, hey, can we do this?

Just see right now, some of the buildup for that. I remember on a Sunday night, you were preaching in the big sanctuary and I snuck up kind of from behind and picked you up like I was going to body slam you. Unplanned, all your pencils and pens in your pocket went cascading down the stairs.

And the look, the expression on your face was priceless. But if I fast forward to that, here's what I remember from that night, because we built up and we said, hey, you got to have, I think, like 300 kids or we're not having it. We ended up having, if I remember it, if I remember it, like over 500, including adults who got wind of what you were doing. Fact. That's a fact. Yep.

Over 500 adults. And I'll never forget, I was in the dressing room getting changed. And your lovely bride, Cecilia, who was going to be your valet that night, Pastor Joe from the City of Angels versus the Russian nightmare, Nakina Kolovshetoita, right? But I was in, I was dressed in the little room we were dressing in.

And if you remember, you may not remember this, she walks in and she looks at me and she covers her eyes and she goes, oh my gosh, oh my gosh, I am so sorry. I did not know you were getting dressed. And I said, Cecilia, no, like, I am dressed. This is what I wear to the ring. And she was like, what?

She had no clue, right? And I had my wrestling singlet on just for the record. But man, my girls were so embarrassed that their dad was in the ring with you. 18 and a half minutes of sheer terror, picking me up and body slamming me, putting my head in the ropes, which are nothing but steel cables wrapped in black electric tape.

Yeah, that should have taught me, but I did it two more times and once in Atlanta and another time in Charlotte, then I retired. Yeah. So you had the trifecta of wrestling for you. Yeah. I beat you like a borrowed mule. And then I hung up my singlet.

Hey, that's the way to, similar to my career, walk out on top. Yeah. Cause I remember the next year we had, we did a tag.

We're like, I'll give you a little break here. And we did a tag, had George South, I think is your partner and, and Ted DiBiase, the million dollar man in your corner. And over a thousand people that night, over a thousand came that night. So maybe we're onto something there, but now you're, I respect your decision to decline any future matches. So, but, um, fun memories, man, fun memories as, as, uh, in those days with, with you as youth pastor and a couple other things I remember too, Joe is you, you were, you honored me. I felt very honored to, you invited me to be a chaperone.

I think probably more security guard than anything, but to be a chaperone on several youth trips, one being Moldova, right? Yeah. We went to Moldova and here's, I was sinking on the drive to the studio today. Here's one of the fond memories. I'll never forget him, little Henry. He was about 10 or 11 years old. And, and I began to engage in, you know, with him over the days that we were there, little, little round wire rim glasses. I still can picture him and, and Joe, what blew me away was as we got to talk and I'm like, I don't know why, but I just go, Henry, how many languages do you speak?

He's 10 or 11 years old, right? And he looks at me and he goes, uh, five. I go, five, like, like for real. And he goes, yes, sir. I go, what language?

He's like, right. Like of course, Russian, German, French, Spanish. English. Of course. Right.

Cause I, cause I don't know any of those, including Russian, just so you know, the Russian nightmare, who knows? But so, so I'm like, I'm going to test this kid. So I'm like, all right, Henry, tell me this in French. And like, I threw something out there. I mean, it just flowed from his tongue.

Five languages fluently. Amazing. It was, but, um, and you, of course you put together sports camps and stuff in Moldova. Man, we saw, we saw people save. We saw kids save. Unbelievable. Yeah.

And we ate a cucumber sandwiches every meal. Here's the deal. I remember you handed out tickets for lunch and their entry into lunch was they had to, they had to listen to the gospel message. Yeah.

Yeah. And I remember the very first time, cause you had me share, and I remember the very first time, like I gave like a, an altar call, if you want to say, or an invitation. And like just about every hand went up and I looked at the interpreter and went, um, I don't think they understood what I'm asking. Let me ask that again in a slightly different way.

And, and how many, you know, basically want to give their heart to Jesus and just about every single hand was blown away. But, um, kudos to you for, for Moldova. Um, Singapore, I know you and I were talking. I could, I thought for sure you were there, but you had wrote a, a play called The Switch, right? Yeah. And what inspired that play? Actually, Jay and I wrote it together. Your friend, Jay Stewart, my friend and Terry Fur, we kind of collaborated on that. I think they gave me the yeoman's job of, uh, putting it together, but it was just, just doing something out of the box that would get people in a seat that would not normally come for a quote unquote revival service.

They'll come for production. And that's, I've been doing that kind of stuff ever since, but, uh, it was just, uh, based on getting people in to see a dramatic presentation of what the gospel means. And, and we did it, I really wanted to do it, uh, overseas, which you and Doug, after I left a few months earlier, you guys still went over there and did it and had great success with it.

We, we, we did. And you, you hit, you factored me in as Jesus. If, if, if you guys out there can believe that I'm Nikita Kolov, the Russian nightmare playing Jesus. I wasn't the first time that I played Jesus actually, but you, you had given me that opportunity and, and, Well, you had the body for it. I had the body for, to play big boy from the old restaurant. They won't even know what that big boy, big boy means.

You'll have to, you know, in the modern day, go Google, Google, Google that, Google that. But, um, well, and, and, and you're exactly right. In fact, I'll tell you, I, here's one, one incredible memory from that. Cause we did chapel services at the Christian school that was attended by mostly, mostly Muslim students, actually. And, and I'll never forget my oldest daughter, Taryn, and a friend of hers had befriended this, this, this young Muslim girl who couldn't come to the chapel, but they, you guys would go up to the, they go up to the lunchrooms. And anyway, they invited her to see the switch. Well, she came, but she, she informed her, she goes, now, when I come there that night, you're only going to see my eyes. Cause she had to wear, um, I'm not, what do they call that? I'm not even sure.

A lot of burkets, a high job or something like that. Right. She goes, so please, she goes, please, she begged my daughter and her friend, please remember my eyes. And while she came and, and, and at the end, she came down to the altar and I'll never forget Taryn gave her her personal Bible and said, can you take this? And she said, I can take it as a gift that's allowed.

Wow. That's allowed. And so Taryn gave her her personal marked up Bible. I didn't know that. That's cool.

That she took home as a gift. Well, I remember Columbia and you more than anything. I, I was thinking of the way up here. Well, here's, let me tell you what I remember first and tell me what you remember. Cause what I remember is you gave me one of really one of my very first ever opportunities to preach. You come to me and said, Hey, I feel like you're supposed to do one of the services here. And lo and behold, the Lord had been dropping a message in my spirit. And, uh, uh, you know, and so, so I did, that's kind of my memory is, is one of the first ever times. And you gave me numerous times or number of times after that at youth services and different things, but that's, I was one of the very first opportunities I ever had to preach was in Bogota. What do you remember about that trip?

Lots of things. One thing we were driving in a city of 8 million people and you were driving a speed, the light car, like a maniac, because you had to, to survive. I remember so many things, but we didn't have any assemblies. The day we arrived, we had the best missionary I've ever worked with Mike and Naomi Balder.

Uh, I can't even remember his last name, Mike and Naomi. They were fantastic, but they couldn't get us any assemblies. But by the time we left, they were literally chasing us down in the street. Administrators were chasing our vans and please, one more. We did a reform school and that was the smallest and I thought the worst assembly we did, but it turned out to be the best. It was in the room that was so tiny that not any of us could get in except the performers, but they shut the reform school down to come to, they, they love that assembly so much.

They shut the reform school, which is the worst of the worst of Bogota. And they brought them to church, 300 students that night, you were speaking and we had a problem. We'd been inviting people all week to come to that service and it only sat 300. And so I had a guy named Tim Caskey that still works with us to this day.

He was a 16 year old boy. And the missionary said, uh, he kind of saw, he brought us some equipment. I don't know if we can use it.

I don't even know how to use it. I said, I got a kid on his team that could build a space shuttle with a ceiling fan and a roll of duct tape. Let me get him to look at the box. He go, crack it up, put closed circuit television on the side of the building to hear you preach city buses were literally stopping like a drive-in movie and watching that go on. And, and when I remember praying before I walked outside the church, we're going to pray. And I look up and not one person in that audience is praying because they'd never even heard of prayer. And I think 300 people gave their heart to the Lord that night.

When you preach. Yeah. I can't ever forget that. Wow.

That's wow. I, I didn't remember. I mean, I remembered some of it. I did not remember some of those details. You remember we had a girl that had a cast on her foot and she got lost in a city of 8 million people. She separated from the group somehow. And we were praying fire down, driving around, looking for that girl.

We found her, thank God. Oh man. Well, I remember you may remember this too. At least I'll never forget it. It was, it was because, you know, I wasn't that far removed from, from the days of my active professional wrestling.

Right. And, and I remember we were, we were, the kids got wind of, I guess, as we were there that I had been a professional wrestler. And so kind of everywhere we started going, I was surrounded by them. And I'll never forget you at one point, you're like, like, Hey, like we got to go kind of thing. You know where I'm going with this. And at one point, I don't know that I really can live up to this, but you're like, dude, I feel like Colonel Parker trying to get Elvis out of, out of the building. I mean, Oh my gosh, this is crazy. You remember, you remember that?

Get away kid, get away, leave Elvis alone. I mean, they were going, and I have found that to be true. And like many of the foreign countries that I've gone to, I mean, wrestling, whatever reason, it has a universal appeal. People all over the world just love it or, you know, for whatever reason, but they do.

And certainly the kids of Bogota gravitated towards that. And, but I'll never forget that. You're like, Hey yo, Elvis, like, come on. Like we got, we got to go time to leave the building. Right. Elvis has left the building, but great memories, man.

Great memories there. If you feel you're receiving value from this show, it's time to man up and you'd like to support the show along with Koloff for Christ Ministries, go to koloff.org, koloff.org and make a donation of any amount. A note.

You want my latest book and you receive a personalized copy of Nikita, a tale of the ring and redemption. You, you would go on though. You would eventually go on to, I know Georgia and, and then eventually, I think to Florida, right.

In other youth positions, like kind of, right. Yep. Well, it was an absolutely agonizing decision to leave Concord because of all the relationship, like with your daughters and you. And, but I knew the Lord was calling us to Atlanta. We went to Atlanta, uh, to a church right there on 285 for 11 months. And then the state of Georgia elected Cecilia and I to be the state youth directors for 230 churches, which is the largest land mass east of the Mississippi.

So from Chickamauga near Chattanooga down to Kingsland near Jacksonville, it was a pretty big territory. And we did that for two and a half years. And it was really taxing physically on my wife. And, uh, we left there to go back into youth ministry, which is really what I am at heart is just an old grizzled youth pastor. I love youth ministry. Did that for a few years.

And then we fell to call a pastor, a church in Appalachian mountains, West Virginia, West Virginia brought you up for a wrestling thing, but we didn't have you wrestle that night. We just had you kind of work in the, and it was phenomenal. Yeah. Yeah. And you taught me how to lift at the YMCA and I've been doing it, including last week in Columbus, Mississippi, yesterday in Birmingham, Alabama, the same little routine you taught me in Huntington.

I continue to do it three times a week. That's amazing. Cause what I remember about that particular trip, cause we spent several days up there with you. And I think some of the younger girls with me, I think Colby and Kendra were with me then if I remember right.

Cause they loved hanging out with all your kiddos. And, but what I remember partly about that, cause you, you spent about five years up there, I think. Three years.

Three years. Okay. But I do remember the Y cause you're like, ah, you're kind of like hesitant, you know, I'm like, oh, come on dude. And I don't know if I told you then or, and I may have, I go, dude, don't you understand that you're going in there as pastor of this community?

What, what, that's an evangelism, that's an evangelism field there, man. And it became one. I remember you told me that, but I think that's initially what maybe kind of either encouraged you or prompted you to do that. Plus we had a radio show at a studio about like this, and you parked your Cadillac and you were walking across the street. And I remember standing there thinking that's how a grown man should look in a dress shirt.

I mean, I didn't want to take you to prom or nothing, but I'm like, that's what a man, and I, I looked down at my, myself and said, this ain't what a man is supposed to look like in a dress shirt. And that kind of also was a motivating factor. Well, that that's, uh, I have encouraged it to know, cause that was a number of years ago that you were pastoring up there.

16, 17 years ago, 16, 17. And for you listeners out there being inspired by that, you know, just something inspires you to do something inspires you to do it and then stick to it. Don't stop.

I mean, here he is just yesterday, day before 16, 17 years later, still in there. I mean, something's better than nothing when it comes to taking care of your temple. When it comes to taking care of your physical body, something is better than nothing.

In fact, I'll, I'll just put this plug in right now. I know you've been on some of the camps and things I've done in the past and currently Lex Luger and I are doing man camp and that's what man camps about. It's helping people get physically well and healthy or, or stay that way spiritually, emotionally, mentally. And, um, I've lost 38 pounds since that YMCA workout. That's amazing. And, and kept it off.

I lost 38 pounds and I found, found 10 of it, but I'm still on the right side of the equation. Yes, you are. You're, you're still on the positive side of things. So that's phenomenal. Well, so I remember those trips to the Y and, and I remember you sharing with me later how that really did kind of become an evangelism field for you, how you built a number of relationships, met a number of people there.

So, well then you, if I, and you can help me out, kind of come full circle and, and you work your way back to Concord. Yeah. The irony of that is I was gone for eight years. And in that eight years of time, I lived in Atlanta, Macon, Fort Lauderdale, and West Virginia in eight years, just pulling up stakes all the time. And so I have had my, my roots in, uh, Kannapolis now for going on 15 years. And I'm so thankful for that.

Yeah. We had a whirlwind time. And in, in, in West Virginia, I lived in Ohio across the river from Huntington and the Lord began to deal with me about the evangelistic field. It took me a year to pray through on that. And then finally, when I decided to do it, it was miraculous. Uh, I had tried to be an evangelist 10 years earlier and it just crashed and burned so bad. So when God was dealing with me, I'm like, Lord, I blew it the first time. It cost me so much. It took 10 years to pay. I just didn't know what I was doing.

Yeah. And, um, so when I decided to do it, I told my board on a Wednesday and I told my church on a Sunday on the Friday in between a man I'd had coffee with one time in Concord, North Carolina called me and said, Hey, we want a staff evangelist. Would you come back? And he said, we'll set you up at an office and with a base salary and a credit card to get you started. And on that day, a man who had stopped while I was cutting the grass said, I've always wanted to buy your house. You ever want to sell this house?

I said, next Thursday would be fine. So I sold a house without ever putting a sign in the yard. So I just knew God was in that and on that. And I have no regrets. And that was 15 years ago, approximately? Almost 15 years ago. Yeah. Since that time, give our listeners one or two stories.

I mean, hard to condense it down. You've done so many. I mean, and you're an amazing evangelist and I say that with all sincerity and really, really mean that. Give us a story or two in those 15 years and stepping out in the world of evangelism. A story or two that just kind of comes to mind like that with some. Well, I don't want to get ahead of the agenda here, but we're going to talk in the next segment about a movie.

And here's a story that pops in my mind that's similar to that story of the guy stopping me when I was cutting the grass. I just had this missionary email me and say, Joe, I'm going to Thailand to set everything up for you, which we'll talk about all that. I'm going to go. I've bought my ticket. And I remember thinking, God, I can't let this missionary be on the hook out of his pocket for a trip to Thailand, but I don't know how I'm going to get there, let alone a film crew. How are we ever going to pull this off?

And I need your help. That was on a Sunday morning. I prayed that.

Nobody heard me pray that. I was in a little country church in Georgia, maybe had 45 people that morning. I preached that morning. I preached Sunday night. And I just shared with the congregation, please pray for a project we're working on. And an old man walked up to me and said, preacher, God done told me to help you with that movie.

He ain't given me a figure yet, but when he does, it'll be substantial. Can I get your email? Gave him my email, got his, went straight to the pastor, said, pastor, that old man said he wanted to help me and I just want you to know about it. That encouraged me. He said, if that guy said it, you can take it to the bank. The next morning at 11 o'clock, I'm looking at my phone and I get this email. Preacher, God done give me a figure to help you with this thing.

And that don't make no sense to me. If it ain't right, just tell me $28,235.53. And that was on a Monday. On Wednesday, that check was in my box.

It was in the bank on Thursday and all of my actors and staff, all of their plane tickets were bought on Friday. And God has been doing that kind of stuff over the last 15 years. It just blows my mind. Well, and I know you have so many stories. And so here's the deal, because you have so many stories and so much more to talk about. We're bringing you back for another show because for the listeners, you heard Joe make a reference to a movie. We're gonna talk about that.

But there's some other things too. You talked about writing the switch, but when we come back on the next show, I wanna talk about the Scrooge play. I wanna talk about that.

I wanna talk about the Clergy Collar Comedy Tour. And so for the listeners out there, I'm telling you, you are going to want to dial back in to hear what Joe Phillips has his hands in right now, because it is amazing. As you've already probably figured out in listening to this show, that he's a very gifted, a very talented man in many ways. Just by his introduction, you can tell.

He was joking, saying that just means nobody will employ him. However, the main employer, God Almighty, had a plan for his life and gifted him with many talents. And so we're gonna talk about all those things. We got maybe just a minute or so left, Joe. That story is certainly impacting. You said there's so many stories like that. Can you give us, in 60 seconds, one more story?

I think just the origin of my life. I was conceived to a woman who was unwed. In the 60s, she had two severe mental illnesses, borderline on the third. Was on her way to get an illegal abortion. And my grant, her sister, Glenola Sue Mills' sister, Zephia Madonna Phillips, said, don't do this. Let's just see what this kid might become.

She had me, didn't want me, gave me away to my cousin after three years. And so the whole beginning of the thing is miraculous. And I give God all the credit and glory for anything he's done in our lives.

Wow, that's powerful. And maybe you're out there and you're listening today and you're like, man, does God have a plan for me? And I want to encourage you that, I hope by Joe's story, you're encouraged to know that he does. And even if you maybe initially weren't wanted or didn't feel wanted or felt like you were a mistake, I want you to know you're not. I myself had that feeling at an early age when my dad left when I was three. You may have heard on an earlier show how I talked about my story with my dad and how God redeemed all that.

And I know Joe has so many more stories to share, even in relation to what he just shared about his humble beginnings. And I just want to encourage you as you're listening, God has a plan for your life. And if you don't have a relationship with Jesus, let me just encourage you with this today.

Maybe you pull over, if you listen to this while you're driving or you're listening to it on a podcast or something. I mean, now's a good time to pause and not just reflect on your life, but where it's been, but where it's going. And if you don't have the Lord in your life as your personal savior, today would be a great day to make that decision. It's ABC, just accept the fact of what Jesus did for you on the cross. Believe that in your heart that he lived, died, and rose again.

And he's at the right hand of the father. Believe that in your heart. And just confess, God, I'm a sinner. I'm a sinner. I repent.

And I open my heart, the door of my heart to invite you in. We're going to come back with Joe Phillips. Amazing story. See you next week.

Joe Phillips. Men, I would like to challenge each of you to consider spending five days with Lex Luger and I at Man Camp, pursuing the heart of God. Ladies, if you're listening, we'll send your men home better equipped to be men of God, godly husbands, and godly fathers. That appeals to you. Give them your blessing and encourage them to sign up today at mancamp.info. Pastors, if you would like to bring Koloff for Christ Ministries and Man Up Conference to your community, go to koloff.org and email me. Remember this, it's time to man up. This is the Truth Network.