Q&A With Koloff- #139

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Share it. But most of all, thank you for listening and for choosing the Truth Podcast Network. This is the Truth Network. Welcome to another episode of Q&A with Koloff, the Devil's Nightmare. Today, today, today, Andy Thomas joins me.

Andy, welcome to the Q&A show with Koloff. Hey Nikita, glad to be with you. Got to hang out with you at a recent bootcamp recently and it's good to be on the phone with you. Well, we did get to hang out recently.

We can talk a couple minutes about that. And so, certainly great to have you. Now, you are located, where are you living? Where are you at? Where do you call home? I live in Boone, but I'm from the Triad, so all my community and friends and family are down there, but my daughter went to App State a few years back and I had wanted to live in the mountains, so I got a place up here and she lived with me while she was going to school and I just stayed.

I'll probably eventually come back, but I'll probably try to keep a place up here. I love the mountains. Okay, so for our listeners who wouldn't know, because people all over the world listen to the show, so explain, take a second and explain the Triad to people. Right, so the Triad is Winston-Salem, Greensboro and High Point, kind of the central part of North Carolina, a little bit to the west. And then Boone is about another hour and a half west. It's pretty low in the Triad, but you probably have an elevation gain of about 3,000 feet up to the mountains where I'm at in Boone. And Boone, correct me if I'm wrong, but that area up there, like Blowing Rock and there's some other communities up there, that is a bit of a tourist attraction, wouldn't you say?

It is. There's a lot of outdoor stuff, a lot of fly fishing and hiking. There's Grandfather Mountain, which is one of the largest mountains around and it's kind of iconic, actually, if you go see Forrest Gump. It's actually on Forrest Gump as Forrest is running up this big hill, you'll see. But yeah, it's a beautiful area, the Blue Ridge Mountains. I'm 10 minutes from the parkway.

As Robbie's heard me talk many times, the adventures up here are just incredible and it's a place I never want to lose touch with. And is there, in the wintertime, is there, or at least in the area, like skiing and snowboarding and that sort of thing as well, right? Yeah, it is. It's not Colorado skiing. In fact, I probably have done my best skiing in Colorado and went out with some guys there. Haven't done a lot of skiing here, went out a couple times, but there are. They say if you can ski on the East Coast, you can ski anywhere because it's more of ice and it's not this big fluffy pack or whatever, but it is. It's a ski destination as well and there's three main ski locations that they have up here.

You know, some probably wouldn't picture that. We're piquing somebody's interest right now. I'm just saying, whoever's listening to this show, they're like, man, I've never heard of Blowing Rock, never heard of Boone, North Carolina. So somebody's going to go visit, especially if you're a snowboarder or a skier or you just love God's creation. I just want to tell you right now, this is a beautiful area. And of course, the parkway that Andy is referring to is the Blue Ridge Parkway, which that thing runs. I don't even know. You may know like from where to where and how many miles.

Any idea? Yeah, it's probably mid-Virginia. I mean, you get to the Skyline Drive and then it kind of turns into the Blue Ridge Parkway and it runs 450 miles southwest all the way down to somewhere in Georgia.

So, well, maybe I'm getting that and the AT confused, but it's basically that. I know it's like 450 miles and it runs primarily through Virginia, North Carolina. It may hit into Tennessee. Yeah, it hits into Tennessee down near the edge of North Carolina and Tennessee as it gets further southwest.

But just a beautiful drive. Every time I have family visit, we go to the parkway, usually go to Grandfather Mountain, another place is Linville Gorge, which is like supposedly the Grand Canyon of the East. So we should get some kickback from North Carolina tourism for this promo here. You know what?

You just read my mind. I'm like, hey, if you're with North Carolina tourism, you better contribute to the Man Up Radio Show and Truth Radio Network right now, like for real. Well, okay, last but not least, you mentioned family, so just take a minute and just tell us about your family. Say your daughter was up going to school or something up there. Yeah, she was up here. Me and my wife have been separated for a while, but we're good friends, parent well with each other, and my daughter is just a blessing.

She came back there and got a master's from Wake Forest, getting her teaching master's next. She's going on a mission trip to France this summer and God has blessed us. We all three took a trip last year for one of my daughters, kind of like an internship or research spot over in England, and I got to go to Scotland and all. But that's my family. I'm originally from Missouri.

Most of my other relatives are there, and I'm getting ready to go back and see them in May, I believe. But that's my family. I'm blessed, and God, the family in the past, kind of where God has grown me is I wasn't always the man that I was supposed to be, and I didn't have some things in their proper order. They don't feel like sometimes I understood what I do now, and God has come after my heart and really recovered a lot of those things, so I'm in a much better place. I've actually been able to reach out to my family in Missouri as well and just really kind of sow into them and just let them know what it's like when God comes after your heart and you get your heart back.

So what I'm hearing is you've got your priorities in order, what it sounds like, to summarize that. Yep, and I got my heart back. I lived a Christian life for a long time, but there was a lot of it that was disconnected from my heart. And then this connection comes to a lot of frustration because you love God, you want to serve him, but there's a lot of things, and there's a lot of wounds and stuff from the past, and there's things that get in the way of really allowing you to live from a free heart. But to me, the heart is the priority, and that's where I always try to tend to focus on because you can a lot of times try to do this thing.

When you just read Scripture at a surface level and you just try to do those things, sometimes you do them, you don't stay connected to the line and you really don't lean into Jesus and the Father to do those things. Well, that's a whole other show in and of itself, which you just teed up right there, so we'll have to set that up here sometime in the future. And you just made me jealous saying you went over to Scotland. I have some Scottish roots, not a lick of Russian in me for the record, not a Russian bone in me, or I don't think a blood cell in me. But there is some Scottish roots, and I've only been just across the border into Scotland. My mom was born on the English-Scottish border, a little town called Haywood. So anyway, I one day want to get over and tour more of Scotland. Real quick on that, if you don't mind, as part of that, Braveheart, which we use quite a bit on our boot camp, that movie really, it's the story of William Wallace and it's been embellished a bit, but there's so much to the history of that and what he actually did in standing up for freedom for the people, and I kind of took a tour along the spots where they shot that and some of the real-life stuff. They've got a monument to William Wallace and stuff, but there's that, there's a history that Scottish people are fascinating to me. Actually, they came and they settled up here in the mountains of North Carolina when they came from Scott, the Scott-Irish, as they migrated over, but it's just an unbelievable place to go. And that really, most of all of our heritage comes from England, Scotland, Ireland, so just a fascinating place for people to go there. I guess we'll get tourism.

That's exactly right. United Kingdom, as you're listening to the Q&A with Koloff, we anticipate a check showing up in the mail to Truth Radio Network, so there you go. Alright, well let's transition. This is the Q&A with Koloff where you get to ask me questions, so let's transition and fire away your first question that you might have for me. Okay, the first question is, as you know Nikita, one of the talks at Bootcamp, we talk a lot about men getting their heart back to fulfill their calling, their purpose, and you're really never going to feel alive until you do that. So, when I talked about it this time, I've done a different talk on calling, just the basic stuff, but this was more of like, alright, say you don't find your calling early in life. If you look in the Bible, a lot of the men got their calling or their focus on who they were, how God saw them.

A lot of times he renamed them mid-life, Abraham, Paul, but speak a little bit about how your calling changed from being a wrassler to a warrior for Jesus. Well, I appreciate that, yeah, and for those who are listening who, let me just say right now what Andy's referring to is the masculine journey bootcamp. And I went about a year and a half ago to my first bootcamp and then just recently went back to what they called advanced bootcamp, because God's kingdom is always advancing. Even in my own camp, Lex Luger and I do a man camp, we don't call it a retreat because I'm not retreating for anything. No, I'm not retreating. I'm advancing God's kingdom. So anyway, hey, by the way, I appreciate you throwing out that good southern vernacular of wrasslin'.

I just want you to know. Yeah, so anyway, all right, back on track, back, focus, focus, Nikita. Okay, so yeah, when it comes to calling, because there's a lot of listeners that may not even know, Andy, what we're even talking about when we say calling. I know when I first gave my life to the Lord, this elderly man, his name was Buddy, came up to me after that service, literally the day I went to the altar and shared with me what God had laid on his heart five years prior. He was watching television, surfing through the channels, wrestling was on, he's watching it, he goes, I'm not even a wrestling fan.

I thought, why am I watching this? And the Lord said, he said, Nikita, the Lord said this to me, pray for that man, meaning me, I was doing an interview, and said, I have a, pray for his salvation, I have a call to ministry on his life. And truthfully, you know, I understood the salvation part, because I knew the story and the man Jesus who sacrificed his life on a cross, you know, but I didn't fully understand really honestly what he meant by a calling. I would come to realize and find out, and I would just translate it this way for those listening, you know, God has a plan for every one of our lives. And we can pursue our own plans, you know, he gives us the free will and the liberty to do that, so we can pursue our own plans or, especially once you give your life to Christ and realize, oh, somebody else has a plan for your life. Which happened for me at the age of 34, that I figured out somebody else had a plan for my life, that being the creator of the universe. All that to say, I come to realize what a calling, quote, calling meant, and it just meant for me the ultimate plan for my life. And so, looking back on my wrestling career, you know, that wasn't even something I was necessarily planning, but a door of opportunity opened up, I took advantage of it.

Now I can look back, Andy, and go, wow, the last 30 or so years, wrestling, or shall we say wrasslin', was just a training ground for me and setting me up, if you will, for the ultimate call on my life. Which was evangelism, and actually I had a spiritual father prophetically speak over me that I was called to the fivefold ministry, and those who are familiar with that, go to your Bible and you'll see the fivefold ministry is prophet, evangelist, teacher, pastor, and apostle. And I can say, without getting into greater detail, because I want to get to your other questions before we run out of time, I can say that I have now, over the last 30 years, as that word was spoken over me, I can see how all five facets of that have been implemented into my life.

And over the course of those 30 years, it's kind of shifted some as far as what was, you know, in the first position versus the fifth position, for me personally anyway. And so, you know, those listening out there, no matter what your age is, maybe you don't know what God's plan is for your life or what your, quote, calling is. And I would just conclude this question by saying this to you listening out there, if you'll open up the Bible, go to your Bible and open it up and begin to read, I'll just distill it down to say this.

God will reveal through His Word what your calling is, what your purpose is, and what His plans are for your life. Would your company, business, or you personally like to partner with me in supporting Koloff for Christ Ministries, the Man Up Show, and Man Up Minutes? Go to koloff.net and click the donate button.

You can give monthly, annually, or one time. God bless you for making a difference around the world. You're listening to the Truth Network and truthnetwork.com Nikita Koloff here, and I am excited. Did you hear the huge announcement, the big announcement?

Well, maybe it's a minor announcement. Anyway, Facebook, go look up my new fan page, Nikita Koloff Fans, and like it, and follow today. For a gift of $25, Nikita will send you his two CDs, Adoration and Declaration. For a gift of $50, Nikita will include his book, Wrestling with Success. And for a gift of $100 or more, Nikita will include a signed copy of his newly updated life story, A Tale of the Ring and Redemption. Go to www.koloff.net and donate today. You're listening to the Truth Network and truthnetwork.com.

Great question. Thank you for that opportunity to share some of that. What else you got for me, Andy? So, at boot camp, you were advertising your trip to Israel, and that really is something that makes my heart come alive. I work with a company, Cybersecurity Sales.

It's an Israel-based company. I've had the fortune of going over there three different times, and the Bible just came alive to me. And I know you're excited about going, and I think you said this was your first time, but speak a little bit about that and what you expect out of it.

Yeah, thank you. Well, this will be my first tour group that I'll be hosting. I went one other time with the Million Dollar Man, Ted DiBiase, for those who might be wrestling fans out there. And Jason Sanderson, who is also a professional wrestler.

Interesting. I always get confused by vocation or whatever. So, he's a blood-washed, born-again, spirit-filled, on-fire believer, a Catholic priest who loves Jesus. That's his main trade, if you will, his main calling.

But he also is a professional wrestler known as the Wolf Man, and he actually looked like the Wolf Man from the old movies. But anyway, the three of us went on our own pilgrimage, and I've always wanted to go back. In a church out of the western hills, the foothills of North Carolina, I did a men's conference and preached one weekend there for them. And the pastor sent me down and he said, man, we would really love for you to partner with us and host some of these tours to Israel. And, man, that got me excited, Andy, because you said things come alive. My pastor, Jay Stewart, says it this way, the Bible goes from black and white into full living color. He phrases it that way. One of the pastors, Sean Porter, who leads the worship there in Israel and does some of the teaching, said if you remember as a kid, so some of you are old enough or young enough to remember the books when you opened those books, and little things would pop up, like each page you turn, right?

There'd be the pop-up, and that's how he described it. He said, man, it's like you open the Bible and things just pop up and, as you said, come to life. So I think for some, if you've never been, man, I would encourage you, you go to Koloff.net and you can click that link and learn more about our, at the end of the year, the tour. I'll be hosting the Holy Land Tour, and, man, as you know, it's life-changing, I believe, for anyone and everyone who comes, no matter what your age. It is life-changing, right?

It definitely is. You see the scripture where it says Jesus went down from Jerusalem to Galilee. It's like, okay, that would be a good afternoon walk. No, if you drive it and you know that you don't pass through some of the areas of Samaria or whatever, that's like a three-day walk. Dusty, nasty and all, and it just, you have an idea about where these places are, and then the one that gets me is just, the Mount of Olives is, and then right across the Kidron Valley you've got Jerusalem and you've got the Temple Mount and all that.

You can see right over from one to the other. I used to read that Kidron Valley. I had no relation to, or no understanding of what that meant when I read the Easter story and coming in on Palm Sunday and that kind of thing. Now I can totally visualize that. I can visualize it like I was there the day it happened almost, because it's not changed that much.

Well, that's the thing, right? So to your point, when I sailed the Sea of Galilee, I don't have to try to visualize what the Sea of Galilee looks like. I sailed it. I've been on the Sea of Galilee. I've been in the empty tomb. I've walked the streets of Jerusalem like you.

So you've been to these places now, and now you have a visual picture of that in your mind. And so I just encourage anyone out there listening, if you've never been to the Holy Land, consider going with the Russian nightmare over to the Holy Land and touring. I'm telling you, you'll never be the same. You'll never read the Bible the same.

You'll never be the same. And we'd love to have you join us at the end of this year. And again, coloft.net, you can click that link and find out more about the Holy Land tour. What else you got for me? We got time for at least one more question anyway.

What you got for me? Alright, so you know, going back to the Advanced Boot Camp, part of what we did, we kind of went off script and did this a little bit different than what the original Advanced Boot Camps are. But we walked through the stages of the masculine journey, and there's six stages, and I'm just going to say them real quick. There's boyhood, there's cowboy ranger, there's warrior, there's lover, there's king, and there's sage. And they kind of help you understand and get a context for the seasons of a man's life. So we spoke a lot about that, and there was a lot of introspection that happens on each one of those stages. You know, as you went through that, did it help you understand any of the things, did it make you go back and think about any particular stage and resonate with you? Well, it just, what it did is it helped me identify, it was a great way to identify all the stages I have been through. I would say, you know, if I kind of do an assessment of my own life, you know, at my age, I like to think I'm in the sage stage, where I'm able to take young men now under my wing.

You know, you might say as a Paul, not comparing myself to Paul, he's a spiritual heavyweight, you know, wrote about two-thirds of the Bible. But I've had a life, a lot of life experience. In fact, that's what we do, Lex and I do at our man camp, take our life experiences and sow and pour into men of all ages who come.

18 and up, I should say. And so it really helped define those stages for me. And as you're listening out there, you know, whether it's a masculine journey boot camp, man camp, A camp, if you've never been to a camp, you know, as a man, I encourage you to consider attending one of these camps and or more of these camps. You know, I don't ever want to stop learning.

I don't ever want to stop growing. That's why, Andy, I wanted to come to your guys' camp and just be able to take off all the hats and sit, you know, and receive, right? And, you know, we're doing something this summer, June 15th to the 17th down in Fort Mill, South Carolina, just outside of Charlotte. In fact, two of the speakers at this man up conference are Robbie Dilmore and Stu Epperson, Truth Radio Network. And in addition, as many other, Perry Tuttle, who won a national championship with the Clemson Tigers in the Orange Bowl, is going to be speaking. And Sean and Krista Smith, a power couple out of California, are both going to be speaking at the man up conference. And we're going to do live radio there with Truth Network, and it's going to be an amazing weekend.

But more than anything, I want to highlight and emphasize this, is that whatever stage you're in, you know, you mentioned boyhood, ranger, lover, warrior. We're inviting all grandfathers, fathers, sons, grandsons. We're praying and believing for three generations, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to attend June 15th to the 17th down there, because we're going to do a special workshop. I had a meeting just earlier this week with the guys who are going to facilitate this workshop and what those relationships look like or should look like, and then we're going to have a special ceremony that's going to really solidify those relationships.

Father, son, or, you know, maybe you don't have the best relationship with your dad, you know, or your granddad or somebody in your family. You're still going to come. You're still going to want to be there.

Again, you can go to coloff.net for that as well. And let me mention this while it's in my brain, masculinejourney.org. So whether you want to find out more about Man Camp, the Man Up Conference in Fort Mill, South Carolina, the Masculine Journey Boot Camp, go to those websites and we hope to see you there, man. Andy, any last thoughts or comments before we wrap today's show up? No, just thank you for having me on.

You did what you said. When you came to the advanced camp, you came and you came as a learner and just soaked in something, you know, maybe a little bit different, but that you enjoyed it and you just received what the Lord had for you and that's what we encourage other people to do. But I love what you're doing. I love the ministry you have. May see you there in June, but I just love what you're doing and how you've taken, you know, your life story, going through wrestling law. I mean, it's touching a lot of people's lives and I appreciate it. Thank you for coming to our camp.

I appreciate you and your staff. And, you know, you threw that May word out there. That's pretty noncommittal, Andy, just for the record. I'm just throwing that out there. I got to check my calendar.

So yeah, you got several months to check it. So, uh, I'm intrigued. Definitely just going to put that challenge out there and he pretty not could, you know, try to pick a chair up. No, you're going to pick it up or you're not right. So hey, you're calling me out to be a man.

Man up. Come on, but on a last note, let me just say this about your camp and I appreciate what you just said. And for the record, you probably don't know this, but now you will 19 pages of notes. That's how many pages of notes I took at your boot camp that you and Robbie and Sam and all the guys have facilitated there. 19 pages of notes.

Cause I never want to stop learning. Um, Andy Thomas, a Q and a with Koloff. Thank you for tuning into another episode. And until next time, have a God-filled God blessed day. Thank you. This podcast is made possible by the grace of God and your faithful prayers, support, and generous gifts. May God bless you for your continual contributions. Go to koloff.net and donate today.

Hi, Nikita Koloff. Be sure to check out The Man Up Show now available on television, broadcast, and podcast. Go to MorningStarTV.com or the Truth Radio Network. Check out your local listings or better yet, download the Truth Network app today. If you are enjoying Q and A with Koloff, would you help us spread the word? Tell your family, tell your friends, tell your neighbors to download, subscribe, and leave a comment. Are you looking for the perfect gift for your pastor?

Well, look no further. Bless him with a trip to the Holy Land with yours truly, Nikita Koloff, the Russian nightmare. I'll be hosting this once in a lifetime trip, December 27th, 2023 to January 5th, 2024.

Your pastor will never be the same. Go to koloff.net to get registered today. Nikita Koloff here.

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