Q&A with Koloff - #40

Hey, this is Jim Graham from the Masculine Journey Podcast, where we explore relationship instead of religion every week. Your chosen Truth Network Podcast is starting in just a few seconds. Enjoy it, share it, but most of all, thank you for listening and for choosing the Truth Podcast Network.

This is the Truth Network. Not the key to Koloff here. Questions and answers, Q&A with Koloff, the devil's nightmare. Welcome back to another episode of Q&A with Koloff, questions and answers.

And this is where we get to flip it around here. Like on the Man Up Podcast, I'm normally asking the questions and putting my guest on the hot seat, so to speak, but here it's flipped around. This is the guest's opportunity to put me on the hot seat, and these are not canned questions.

They're not even submitted to me in this particular case. Bishop Larry Jackson is with me in studio today for Q&A with Koloff, and I have no idea what this man is going to ask, but hey, we're just going to have some fun. Welcome to the show, Q&A with Koloff Bishop. It's good to be here, and I'm glad I'm on this side of the mic. Yeah, you're like, all right, here we go.

Well, hey, you and I have gotten to know each other over the years, and we've shared platforms together, speaking in ministry, and just breaking bread together, sitting at tables and eating together, and getting to know each other. I didn't realize, but I found out from the Man Up Podcast that you and I have even more in common, that you have five girls, I have four girls, so we've both swam, and I like to say swam in the estrogen ocean forever, right? And so anyway, we got that in common, but hey, enough about that. Today's your opportunity to ask fire some questions at me, and so why don't we jump into that and just roll with your first question that you would have for me.

It's interesting too, because when I was coming here, I was talking to my father, which I let you talk to one night. Yeah, that's right, yeah. He was a big wrestling fan, right? Oh man, we loved you and Ivan. We rooted for the bad guys.

Come on, I love it. So we never rooted for the good guys. They were too soft. That's right.

They weren't tough enough, that's right. I love that. Yeah, so I told him, I said, it's amazing again for us to be looking at that, and in God now, we are friends.

There is no way possible that I would have been able to sit there when I was looking at you in WAA or whatever and go, we're going to be friends one day. There's just a craziness how that happens, but my question to you then is, and the reason why that happened is your conversion. So in all that you were doing in wrestling, how did it switch?

How did it switch? When did it switch that you knew Jesus had to be the answer? How did I get to that point, right? And it's a great question, because I don't have one of those stories of I was in and out of jail, or I got set free of drug addiction. I've never acquired a taste for alcohol. Hey, if that's your deal, so be it, but that's not to say I never drank alcohol, because I did.

College, and that was probably the height of my drinking was in college, but I did it to be socially acceptable, right? And so all that to say, so that wasn't a part of my story, but through my wrestling career and what was a kind of a meteoric rise to stardom, if you will. And thank you, by the way, for loving the bad guys. And Uncle Ivan, rest his soul, would have been thrilled to hear that as well. And so when I made a decision under my own terms at the age of 33 to walk away from wrestling after having the success I had in wrestling, I'm on this path of, if you want to say this quest of what's life hold next for Nikita Kolov.

Right. I've achieved a pinnacle of success in many people's eyes. World champion, travel all over the world, experience all kinds of cuisines, met all kinds of people from different cultures.

So it was a great education, right? And I wrote about this, actually, in one of my, I got a book called, several books, one called Wrestling with Success, Developing a Championship Mentality. And a chapter in there is From Success to Fulfillment.

I talk about the difference there. I was successful in wrestling, Bishop, but honestly, I was still unfulfilled. I'm like, is this it?

I mean, I'm a world champion, but yet something's still missing. And so it was during that retirement from wrestling that I'd met a Christian couple, and I didn't grow up in church, just like I didn't grow up in Russia, I didn't grow up in church. No, no, come on. Oh, man. See, he just messed it up, man.

First somebody's bubble every time I tell him that. Good English tutoring for those who don't know the story. And so I didn't grow up in church, but I was in, and I knew the story. I knew of the man, Jesus, who's crucified on a cross and was buried, died, buried, rose again, ascended to heaven, right?

But the story never made the 18-inch trip from my head down to my heart. And through this Christian couple, they had invited me to their particular church. And in October of 1970, excuse me, 1993, through an invitation from them, I accepted that invitation. And that day was the day of destiny for me. It was a day that I sat in service and it was an aha moment for me as an invitation was given to accept Jesus into your life and as your personal savior. I had never done that. It was like an aha moment.

I'm like, I've never done that. And man, my heart was so stirred and I was the first one to the altar on my knees. And I had a genuine encounter with Jesus that day and everything changed. And what I mean by that is from my motives to motivation, to my thinking, to my speech, I mean, to my attitude, everything changed at that day of conversion. That's amazing.

I love it. So in that time also, I think you were one of the first and then we started hearing about Blanchard, I think Telly became a Christian. So was there somewhat of a movement or a touch back and forth or were you guys evangelizing?

Because I think a lot of people may not even know that. Were you guys evangelizing others even after you come out because you're still friends with those guys? Yeah, like other wrestlers and stuff? Yeah, other wrestlers.

Yeah. So back in the wrestling days, at least in those days, I'm not real engaged with it now other than legends autograph signings. And so I see some of the old schoolers and old timers and it's almost like reunion time when we do these autograph signings. But I can tell you back in the day, there was no... If the name Jesus came up, it wasn't in a good light to say that.

There wasn't much conversation about church or Jesus or anything else. In fact, there was only one guy I was aware of that looking back would have been a believer, a Christ follower, his name was George South. George had been involved in the business for 50 plus years. And we always knew George was on the card, because in the bathroom stalls were these little salvation tracks.

George is here again. You gotta roll your eyes like, okay, there's this thing. I didn't even know it was a...

I do come to be called a track. Anyway, so I think really what happened knowing some of the stories like, of course, I know Sting's personal story, Lex Luger, Road Warrior Hawk, Road Warrior Animal, Magnum TA, you mentioned Tully Blanchard. I... What... Millionaire man?

Ted DiBiase, the million dollar man. What I think the guys came to realize, Bishop, was, again, they've reached a pinnacle of success as well, but yet even with all the... As Lex says sometimes, all the bling bling and all the bobbles and trinkets and the fast cars and women and everything else, you're still empty inside, something still... You're successful, but you're unfulfilled. And all of those guys I just mentioned, Shawn Michaels, HBK, another one, that came to the realization that success isn't all there is. Without Jesus, there's always gonna be something missing.

And I think all of those guys essentially came to the same conclusion. To take it a step further real quick, and so I do feel fortunate that I had a role in, whether it was sowing seed, watering some seed, or in some cases, helping lead others to the foot of the cross, Uncle Ivan. A year and a half after I got saved, I was traveling with an evangelist from South Africa, doing revivals in the Carolinas, and I invited Uncle Ivan.

Knowing his lifestyle prior, I'm like, yeah, he'd be a good one to reach out to. But the Lord really put Ivan on my heart. I didn't know he was at the service the night he was there until I saw him at the altar. And the great part about his story is, from there, from that night, and again, he had a genuine encounter, and what happened that night, I mean, he was steeped into drugs, he was a heavy drinker, a tobacco chewer, so just a pinch between his cheek and gums. He couldn't go without that a day. That slate was wiped clean that night.

I mean, the Lord delivered him, set him free of everything that night at the altar. He went on to become an ordained minister, and then one step further, I've had the privilege of being a mentor and, or you might say, a role in discipling Lex Luger, Sting, Roadware Hawk before he passed. Those are the three key guys that I had a role in helping to disciple after they made their decision.

It's still, I think, a fairly dark industry. There are a couple, in fact, I've had them on the Man Up podcast. His name's Jackson Riker. That's what he wrestles as on Monday Night Raw. He's a solid believer.

In fact, he's part of my Bible study. He goes to my home church, The Refuge in Kannapolis, North Carolina, and then AJ Styles. He's Styles? Styles. Quick story on Styles. Back when TNA was first getting started in Nashville, Tennessee, I was actually living there for a couple of years, and I reached out to Jeff Jarrett, and I wasn't interested.

I made a few appearances for him, but I wasn't interested in putting the tights back on. I was interested in coming in and doing a Bible study before their pay-per-view. Wow. And Jeff was all about it. He's like, sure, yeah, come on in.

AJ Styles came to every single Bible study I did. Wow. And he was essentially just getting started, right? Yeah. We're talking 2003, 2002, 2003, 2004.

Come on. That's a long time ago. Yes.

But AJ Styles attended every Bible study. Awesome. I did not know that. Yeah.

And so he has a genuine relationship with the Lord too. That's exciting. I remember when I found out that Sting was a believer, I sent him a letter.

I know, you probably get a whole lot of stuff now. And I'm trying to encourage him in his walk years ago. When I first found out about it, I said, because I think he was still in Atlanta then. Okay. Yeah.

In 1998, he got saved. Yeah. Wow. I was back there. I was back there. So that's awesome. So see, that's instrumental, and I think people need to hear that story and know that from you. So four girls, I got five.

Yep. Why men, bro? Why men? Because there's a lot of males out there, and men have been in my view, and certainly you've had much more experience when it comes to ministering to men than I have. I know from your background with Promise Keepers and your current ministry with Frontliners and all the different things you're doing, the Lord really put it on my heart. So I get saved in 1993. I'm discipled and mentored for about five years.

Okay. God opens up doors around 1998, and I begin to just go all over the world and show the good news. In 2006, I was invited to a camp in Texas, an event called Quest, an event called Quest, that a pastor had put some information in my hand, and God said, I want you to go. And it was at that camp that my life... For the first time, here's part of the testimony, I was 47... Actually, the day I went to camp, the day I boarded a bus, it was my birthday.

I just turned 47. And Larry, my life was so impacted at that camp, I came back and I asked my pastor, Jay Stewart, I said, can I have five minutes on the platform on Sunday? He said, sure. I go, I just wanna give a quick testimony on my experience at camp. And here's what I said to a thousand people on Sunday morning. For 46 years, I was a male. And for the first time in my life at age 47, I stepped into true manhood. Because at that camp, there was a teaching on biblical manhood. Because even though I was a follower of Jesus, listen, my view of manhood was defined by how the world viewed it.

And that's how a lot of men are operating today. And that's what ultimately led to God giving Lex Luger and I the vision for Man Camp. And for those of you listening out there, mancamp.info, go read more about it, go learn more about it, and you may wanna come and attend. And our goal in this camp, when small intimate groups of men get gathered together in Georgia, is Lex and I combine our years of experience now, walking with Jesus, and we wanna teach men. In fact, Robbie, who's here in studio today, helping us with this broadcast, attended our last man camp in Georgia. And we wanna equip men to be godly men, godly husbands, godly fathers, and walk in their true calling and the role that God defined for them before the beginning of time. And it's so interesting because when I think about that, that's amazing. All of the time that men grow up, they are in teams usually, they're playing literally, they play football, basketball.

Yeah. They go to the military or they go to college, they get in for fraternities or whatever, and they get in games even. And then when they come to church, we put them on their own.

They no longer have the team. And Man Up, a man camp, allows them to now come back into a team mentality. And I think that is amazing because again, you think about the disciples, you got 12 men, that's a team that's all different, that this one man is discipling them. And discipleship is not going to church.

Would you speak to discipleship a little bit? Yeah. And in fact, one of the things of... A dear friend of ours, Lieutenant General Jerry Boykin, another mutual friend of ours.

Which is you're trying to get him saved, but go ahead. Yeah, yeah. Well, he's a military guy.

He has an excuse. Just kidding, just kidding, just kidding. All you military men out there, we love you. We love you. Thank you for serving, for real, for putting on the uniform and protecting our great nation as well as other nations around the world, men and women in uniform.

Thank you very much, sincerely. But he calls it a battle buddy. That's right.

Right? He calls it a battle buddy. And so not only do I try to instill in men that you need a group, a team, a group of men be part of a Bible study.

I like to call it the inner circle, the outer circle and the bigger circle. Yeah, that's good. So the inner circle, Jesus had an inner circle. Yes, he did. There were three that he kind of favored, it seems like more than others. So that's right.

Right? Peter, James and John. That's right. Got to do a few things the rest of them didn't do.

They did not do. There weren't 12 on the mountain of transfiguration. No, there were three. There were three with him. That's right.

In the garden, there's only three. Right, right. So he had his inner circle and then I like to expand on that by saying, you need an inner circle and you need a Paul, a Barnabas and a Timothy. That's right. You need an older seasoned man of God, not necessarily older by age, physically, spiritually older.

That's right. You might have been walking with the Lord for 20, 30 years, you might be walking for two or three years. But a man seasoned and grounded in his walk, that's your Paul to pour into you. A Barnabas, someone up here that comes alongside Proverbs 27, 17 is iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens the countenance. That's your battle buddy. So your Barnabas is your battle buddy. And then as you're poured into, a Timothy would be maybe a brand new convert or brand new believer.

Again, forget about physical age, that you then can pour into. That's the inner circle. I love it. And then the outer circle, Jesus, in addition to the three, had nine more. That's right.

So you had 12. So maybe you get a part, you become part of a Bible study. Yeah. That could be your outer circle. Yeah.

Get engaged in a team. I love it. A Bible study. Yeah. And then the bigger circle is you gotta be plugged into church. That's it.

I'm sorry, you just have to be. Don't tell me, oh, I don't have to go to church, I can grow... Wrong. That's wrong answer. No, you got to be plugged in. Wrong answer. You gotta be plugged, game show. You gotta be plugged into church. And so that discipleship, and I know you probably will agree with, is what I've, in my view, is what's been missing and why men are in the state that they're in currently.

True. We were talking about your son-in-law, your daughter and son-in-law in Maui. I was in Honolulu once, and in Honolulu, as I was there, a guy took me out and I saw an island. It was out in the, just out in the ocean there, and it was an island.

It was out there by itself. And he said, see that island out there? I said, yeah. He said, I'm going to bring you back in the morning.

I said, great. So when we come back in the morning, I go, where's the island? He said, it's out there. You just can't see it no more because the ocean has risen in the morning. You can't see it. And while he said that, when he said that, this is what hit me.

That's a lot of believers. They are surrounded by water, so they can be flooded by it. When you're part of the inland, that doesn't happen because water can't overtake you, or the whole inland might come up on the shores, but it ain't going to overtake it, which is the reason why we need to be connected to a local body, because a local body now makes us not an island. And if you're out there by yourself, you're going to be in trouble. That's good, because no man is an island unto himself. No man is an island unto himself.

And God did not create us to be isolated. Not at all. I mean, obviously, there's periods of time that Jesus drew away. Oh, yeah. You need that.

But he drew away with the Father. That's right. But we're not created to be... We're created for fellowship. We're created relationship with him first and foremost, right?

Needed. And that relationship with others, and men, men, men, men. And let somebody speak into your life, and I love that. So I'm pretty much finished with you. So... Well, that was a great discussion. I appreciate it. Oh, really, thank you for the question. And no wrestling question.

What about none from your dad? No, no, no. But that's interesting. I love that. How did you come up with the sickle? So real quick on the sickle. Real quick on the sickle. How did I come up with the sickle?

So the Russian character, the old communist flag, the USSR, CCCP, hammer and sickle on the flag. And I thought to myself... Because everyone needs what they call a finishing move, right? And for a while, I tried backbreaker, bear hugs, and different things. I'm like, nah, it's just not devastating enough looking. And I knew guys had clotheslines. I like to say now, there's a lot of clotheslines in professional wrestling, but there's only one sickle. And I tell you, if you think about the sickle's shape, kind of a hook to it. So I would intentionally hook my arm or cock my arm in the shape of a sickle and then just charge that guy and make it look as devastating as possible and try to at least make it look like I took his head off. You took his head off.

Well, some... Sometimes you took his head off. David Crockett would probably tell you. David Crockett says yes. That's one of my favorite things.

It had to be reattached. Anyway, so... Well, man, thanks for coming on the Q&A and being in the studio with me today, man. You're such a blessing to so many. And I just want to say thank you. I love you, my brother, and I really appreciate you. Bless you, man. All right. God bless you.

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