This is the Truth Network. Welcome back to another episode of It's Time to Man Up. Hey, how do you go from being a superstar newscaster and just walk away?
Now, I can relate because I walked away from wrestling, right? But with me in the studio today, man, I have the man of the hour, Frank Mickens, with me in studio. Frank, welcome back. Yeah, it's been a while, but this is, I think, my third time on the show. This is amazing. Well, it's always great to have you a part of the show because you're a man.
It's kind of like my dad used to say, son, you don't let any grass grow under your feet. And when I look at you, I feel the same about you. You're always doing something and you've got things going on. And of course, recently, we'll talk more about this. Recently, I was honored to speak at your fundraiser for your ministry. But I think since the last time you've gotten involved in our real estate, is that correct?
Yes, it's so funny. And I resisted this because I was just so passionate about the evangelistic work and God had been putting it on my heart. I even had received a prophetic word from somebody I did not even know who said, the Lord really wants you to start considering doing more marketplace activities. And I'm thinking, oh, no, no, I just want to stay on the harvest field, harvest field.
Let me stay in this lane right here, right? And so let me tell you how that happened is God will show you where things aren't profitable. And I began to see the light and said, all right, well, here's an opportunity. And it's always kind of been in my spirit to do real estate, real estate investment, more or less.
And now I'm doing real estate residential sales and helping people find their real estate dreams, which is a new kind of fun venture, but also very fulfilling, very satisfying. Well, and Frank, I think, you know, obviously I think of Paul making tents. That's right, yeah. Paul made tents to make a living, so to speak. And in a sense, along with others who helped fund his ministry, which, again, we'll talk more about the fundraiser that I was honored to be a part of. And so when, you know, whether it's real estate or me going out doing autograph signings or whatever, it is there's many different ways that God can provide, right?
That's right. Beyond just being maybe on full-time staff with a ministry. But for someone like you and I, you know, called as evangelists, called to be a prophetic voice to the nations, you know, we're not going to be a paid staff member. So we need things like real estate, like autograph signings, those sorts of things, and or others to come alongside us and partner with us to help us fulfill the mission and the mandate that God places on our lives, right? And I think one of the things that is incredible about all of that is it really does boil down to worship and faith, because God will keep you empty. And what the Lord has taught me about myself is when things seem to be easy, then I might lose my trust in Him and my reliance.
And a lot of us don't really like to talk about this a lot. But if I don't have to rely on God to do it, then I'm going to do it my way. And what I've found is God will allow a ministry to bring in a certain amount of revenue.
It's going to get the job done. But He'll put limits on that so that you have to be in prayer, right? You have to be sitting and asking the Lord questions. You have to be getting His plan as opposed to, oh, well, everything's just kind of clicking on all cylinders, so I must be in the perfect will of God and I'm just going to keep doing it my way. But God truly, He desires to refine us and build into us a reliance on Him for resources. Right.
I'm kind of chuckling as you're saying that for this. What immediately comes to mind is a guy – I've read several of his books and we've met in person and have a mutual vision and relationship with each other. His name's Craig Hill. He's based out of Colorado. He's written several books.
He's got a powerful ministry called Family Foundations in about 50 different countries, plus or minus. But what I'm laughing about is he hired a guy one time to oversee the ministry and he said, I was overseas and I get this frantic call from him and he's like, we're going to have to close the doors. He's like, what are you talking about? He's like, there's not enough money in the account to even pay the bills at the end of the month. And he just starts laughing and he goes, dude, there's never enough money in the account to pay the bills at the end of the month. However, without fail, for the last whatever X amount of years it was, he goes, God's always come through.
We've always paid – we've never missed not paying a bill. And the guy goes, oh, I just can't do this. He quit. Like he quit. He couldn't handle the pressure.
He couldn't handle the pressure. He couldn't handle the pressure of doing what you just said, trusting God to where God can come through, even in – let's face it, even in the loveth hour, right, when there just looks to be no way, but he makes a way, right? Oh, there was a time I was in prayer one day because it was a situation just like that.
We had to pay the mortgage. Okay. And I'm in prayer. And I had a promise in my heart when I started to pray. I believed that I heard God say, if you pray, I'm going to bring somebody with a check. And I'm on my face praying inside of this church.
There's no one else around, and there's a knock on the door. Come on. And I said, you've got to be kidding me.
Come on, you're encouraging somebody right now. This pastor walks in the room, and he says, how you been, Frank? How's everything going? And I said, I'm in prayer, and I'll be honest with you, I'm in prayer because – and I've been very transparent with this pastor in the past.
Sure, sure. You know, I'm at a place where we know the Lord needs to show up for us to pay this bill. And he says, well, that's so interesting. It's the loveth hour. And he pulls out a check he had already written and put it in my hand.
Come on. And what we – God loves to reveal himself. So when God says that I am the God who owns the cattle on a thousand hills, or I am the Lord your provider, how does he reveal that? He has to do it in ways where it is unequivocally him. Right.
Because we have the ability to, what, reason and kind of explain a way God did it and put it back on us and say, like a famous king and Daniel did, this is my kingdom, and this is – these are my people, and that's not where God wants us to be. Take ownership of it, right? Yeah. Which there's so many stories in the Bible, Frank, right, where, I mean, a couple that come to mind, again, Gideon's army, right, 32,000. He's like, no, I'm going to narrow you down to 300, because I don't want, you know, the 32,000, all of you to think – You did this. You take all the credit for it, that you get the victory in the battle. No, the odds are 300. The odds are against 300, but when you gain victory, you're going to know that God was in it, the God of the universe. Almighty God is who did it, not you and your own strength, right?
So let me ask you that. Well, the other thing that comes to mind, too, is the wilderness and the manna, right? That's correct. He's providing manna each day, and the instruction was take just enough. Just enough for the day.
That's going to sustain you for today. And, of course, as we in our human nature know, some of them still didn't listen to the orders, gathered more than they should have, and the next morning has got maggots. It stinks.
It stinks, right, stinking up their tent or whatever. They're like, uh, maybe I should adhere to fall in line and stay within the guidelines of what's been told to me, right? But the illustration, Frank, from that, the message, the lesson from that is God will provide. Maybe not the way you think it should look, but the way He knows what's best for us, right?
That's correct. So whether it's manna each and every day to provide and put food on your table, or somebody knocking on the door and 11th hour and 59th minute to hand you a check they've already written, right? And let me ask you this. Before we go any further, I open up the show with, you had a pretty storied career in newscasting, and some of our listeners may not be familiar with that part of your story, beyond being led into ministry and now real estate, but take, for our listeners, take us back for a moment to just a couple highlights from your newscasting days. Well, yeah, I mean, I spent 20 years in television news, and I did pretty much every job you can do in front of a camera and did some things behind the camera as well. I was a main anchor here in the Triad area for seven, eight years, went to Indianapolis, was a morning anchor in Indianapolis.
And over the 20 course years of being in television, won several awards, did all that stuff, did travel, covered national political conventions, covered a Super Bowl, did a whole lot of traveling and saw a whole lot of stuff, interviewed a lot of people. But what happened was at a juncture in my career when I was offered an opportunity to renew a contract, my wife and I both discerned this is not God. And this was right before the pandemic.
And this was also when that particular company was laying people off, and they were offering me an extension. So, obviously, the wisdom would have been, in the natural, hey, sign this dotted line. They want to keep you around, and not knowing a pandemic was coming. But months later, seeing the pandemic and all of that, it just became clear to me, wow, God really is shifting our family.
So I said, okay, well, Lord, what do I do now if I don't sign this contract? It was a wilderness experience. And in the wilderness experience, the idea is God is teaching you himself.
They camped around the presence. He led them as a pillar of fire, as a cloud by day. And so there's this leading and guiding in an unusual way that God is inviting you to, and that's what he invited us to, this lifestyle where, oh, we're starting a ministry. And I had been doing ministry, so it wasn't this foreign idea. But television was my life for 20-some-odd years, and I loved doing it.
So I was not unhappy, but God shifted my heart. And I'll never forget, I had gone to New York, and I had interviewed with some network television stations. And these interviews went really well. In fact, one of the network vice presidents of talent development was walking me around and asking, who hasn't met Frank?
I need you to meet more people. And so all these stars seemed to be aligning. And a month later, the pandemic hit. No one was hiring, right?
But God had already moved my heart, because when I got home from New York, I looked at my wife, and I said, baby, I cannot explain it. But the job that I had loved so much, I had zero desire to do it anymore. End of a season. It was gone.
End of an era, so to speak. You were still in Indianapolis at the time, yes? That's right, yeah. So moved back to North Carolina. You had to relocate back to the Carolinas. That's right. You mentioned the triad for our listeners. That's in North Carolina here, for those of you who may not be aware of that.
So he relocates you back to the Carolinas. And is it at that point now? So you had been a man of faith, even during those newscasting days.
Yes, sir. You'd been a man of faith. So that story probably goes way back, I'm guessing, into some earlier days and how you were raised and by your family. Well, you know what's funny is I was baptized, came to faith when I was maybe 10 years old. But I wasn't walking with God at all. I never really had the heart to follow Jesus Christ. And it was during my career where I'd come to this, you know how you come to the end of yourself, this crisis of faith really where I know the truth, but I'm not living it. And I became heartbroken in a certain moment in my room. And I realized my sins are overwhelming and I'm hurting people. So I just began to cry out to the Lord and say, Lord, if you're real, I give you my life because what I've tried so far is not working. And that is when my life changed.
I began to follow the Lord with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength. How old would you have been at that point? I was... Would you say? That was, gosh, you're making me go back in time. Roughly, roughly.
Oh, man, 2005. Okay. So I was 26. 26 years old.
Okay, so mid-20s. Like I said, I just had to grab a notepad here. I know the truth, but I'm not living it. That's a powerful statement. I would feel confident to say, Frank, there's someone out there in listening land right now who could probably identify with that statement.
I know the truth, but I'm just not living it. And so God impressed it upon your heart, and it was decision time, right? You had a decision maker.
What am I going to do here, right? And, of course, you made the right decision and surrendered your life, right? I'm so glad I did. It takes courage to do that. It takes courage to believe in a God you cannot see, but you have the truth right there in front of you, and it's there for the taking. And what I realized a little later was I was at that moment willing to pay whatever price had to be paid in order to be set free.
Okay. You're listening to the Truth Network and truthnetwork.com. If you would like to support Kolah for Christ Ministries, 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.kolah.net and donate today.
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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. So from there, okay, so you make that decision in your mid-20s. Let's fast-forward.
God moves you back to Greensboro. Is it at that point that you launched Faithfire? That's right, yeah. Okay. Faithfire was launched on Leap Day, February 29, 2020. Wow.
Okay. That was the day of our big leap. And what was crazy was my wife and I sat down, because we're trying to figure out, okay, God, we need to hear you clearly, because I'm walking away from being the breadwinner into launching out into this idea, right, that we believe you've given us. Stepping out in faith.
But, Lord, what does that look like practically? You know, what are we going to do? Right. And so my wife and I actually kind of mapped a lot of that out by prayer.
We wrote some things down that we believe God had us to do. So I moved back to North Carolina, and it was right around the time that George Floyd tension was really taking off. We had had some damage downtown here. And people were very... Charlotte, I think, too, but all over, right? Yeah. Sure. There was a lot of angst, a lot of anger, confusion.
A lot of unrest. Yes. Yeah. And so I, you know, I began to kind of embrace this idea of a unifier, you know, and not unifying around just anything, but unifying around what we know about Christ and around God's will, God's kingdom, God's love. And, you know, I think many of us can remember just how divided we were. You know, we still have great division.
We still have great division. By no means am I under the impression that we're... But I began to call prayer meetings. You know, that's when we were masking up, man. A lot of people, you know, we had the social distancing. So we were getting people outside and praying. We had a prayer walk downtown. We had some revival meetings.
You know, people were gathering at a farm out in the country here on Sunday mornings out in the open air and having worship services. All of these things were still happening. The church did not shut down. Yeah. One enemy tried to shut the church down.
Many churches continued on and the biblical mandate to continue on. Absolutely. So you guys continued meeting together and all of that. So for our listeners out there, Frank, I want you to take a minute, too, though. And, again, let's kind of fast forward from that moment when things are launched to your vision for Faith Fire. Like, you know, I came up and spoke at your fundraiser, you know, because I love your vision. I love what you want to do. You have a heart for the nations.
Certainly for America, but for the nations as well. So let our folks know what your vision is. And then, of course, I want them to know, too, like, you know, how they could either get involved, help support or pray for you, you know, financially give. So give a snapshot of the vision for Faith Fire. So the vision in a nutshell is revival in the church and awakening in the world. Revival in the church means we are purifying the church by the Spirit of God.
Now, that's not my job. I'm part of the message, you know. God wants us to lay our lives down. What does it say in Romans 12 that we should be living sacrifices? God is pleased by the aroma of our lives. And what we have, and we talked about this at lunch, the culture of this world is always seeking to keep the Kingdom of God from advancing. But the church, those of us who are already redeemed by the blood of the Lamb, we have the power of the Holy Spirit.
We are the light of the world. And so to revive us is required before we see the awakening elsewhere in the world. So what I believe God is doing right now, we see it in some of the movies that have been coming out, Christian films. God is setting people free from demonic oppression.
People are getting delivered. We are seeing people finding who they are in Christ, being affirmed in their identity in Christ. And so we're kind of stepping away from religion and into revival. Revival is where Jesus said to the rich young ruler, go sell all that you have.
Give it away and follow me. That's revival. All that you think you own, all that you think is valuable, you put it to the side and count it all loss for Jesus. That is the church Jesus is returning for. And so your vision is to bring that message really to the nations and certainly to America. And I appreciate what you're saying because even across, even as much upheaval and unrest as we're seeing on college campuses, at the same time, I'm seeing revival break out on the University of Alabama campus, on Georgia, in the Bay of Tampa, out on the coast of California and around the nations, Argentina and other nations. The new president, El Salvador, who said his first and foremost mandate is to seek God for wisdom.
How about that for a presidential leader of a nation? And when he was interviewed recently. And so revival in the church. So where can people go? People want to know more about that. What's the website? Where can they go and learn more about that, Frank? Faithfireworldwide.com.
Faithfireworldwide.com will take you to us. And it's very simple. You know, you see our vision there. You actually see the meat and potatoes. You see me in the ministry.
You see me out in the nations ministering to people, doing open-air revivals, open-air crusades, doing ministry and churches. Yeah, where were you at the fundraiser? You showed that video where you were speaking about what?
Ooh. Central America? Where was that? We were in Central America. That one was Guatemala. Guatemala. Okay.
That's right. We were in Guatemala in February. Okay. We're looking to go to Honduras in August. Okay.
And we're going to go into two separate areas, Roatan and San Pedro Sula in Honduras. And what's crazy is I'm sitting here talking about this stuff, and it seems so far-fetched from when I was doing TV news. Yeah, I bet. But it only could be God. Yeah.
It only could be the power of his Holy Spirit, because it doesn't make any other sense anyway. I get that. There was a while back I was checking in for a flight, and the desk agent happened to be a fan. And I'm like, so the proverbial question usually comes, so what are you doing now? What are you doing now? Right?
Right? And I'm like, well, as a matter of fact, I'm an evangelist. And she paused. She just froze. I could see her wheels turning. She looks at me, she goes, professional wrestler evangelist.
I'll never forget her saying, she goes, that's polar opposite ends of the world, Nikita. And I just went, yeah, kind of is, isn't it? I go, but God. Yeah. Amen.
But God. So, well, let me ask you this too. Okay. So marketplace to help fund faith fire and what you're doing there. And I want you to go check out faithfireworldwide.com.
Go check out what Frank is doing. God puts it on your heart to whether it's prayer support, financially support, monthly, one time. I want you to really support this man's ministry while at the same time, the Lord's led you into the marketplace. So to be salt and light out there in the real estate world. And I think you said you do a mainly residential in, in the Greensboro, North Carolina area. What's your kind of your territory.
We're in the triad area and I'm going to share kind of a kingdom principle with folks that might not understand this. So right now the harvest field is white for harvest. Ready for harvest.
It's always has been. So what Jesus did was he found people who were doing their jobs. He went into the marketplace and found fishermen, tax collector, tax collector, right? He's finding people in their daily lives. He didn't say, I'm going to go to the synagogue and wait for people to show up.
Now he did that. He ran any talk, but Jesus was very comfortable out in the community. And so what God is doing is he's reawakening our appreciation for being gospel centered everywhere we are. And so that means I had to kind of let the Lord break my heart again, where I had some stones there where I thought only effective ministry could happen when you're 100% full time doing that and that only, but that is not always how God does it. Now there are certain people that are called to that, but yeah, the real estate portion of what I do is a ministry. There's no question about it. Absolutely. And to your point, I mean, last time I checked, I don't know what the percentage is, but I'm sure there's probably somebody out there who does, but Jesus spent way more time out in the marketplace, out among the people than he did.
Like you said, he did go to the synagogue and did some teaching in the synagogue, but I would venture to say percentage wise, it was a much smaller percentage of his time in the synagogue versus out in the marketplace. At some point they were like, okay, we're not taking what you're, what you're selling. We're not buying, but there you go.
So, all right. So, so for people in the triad area, so where can they get more information on Frank Mickens real estate? You know what? We're all in this digital online connected world. You just Google Frank Mickens real estate. It's literally Frank Mickens real estate. M I C K E N S. That's correct.
You can find me right there. And what people don't realize is real estate is the way that most folks either maintain or gain wealth in America. Oh yeah. Yeah.
Do your homework. A lot of people don't know this. You know, the stock market's great, obviously if you know what you're doing, but that's usually a longterm retirement plan. A lot of people are making money in real estate and getting cashflow and residual income, buying rental properties and doing those kinds of things. Flipping homes, those sorts of things. It's happening a lot. And that sort of thing. So, and you're more than happy to help someone maybe even get in their first home.
Absolutely. I work with a lot of first time home buyers. I work with a lot of relocations. People are moving six, seven, eight states away. And no matter, a lot of folks don't realize this either.
No matter where you live, if you're under the sound of our voices right now and you're in the state of Washington, I don't know where you are. You can find a trusted real estate source or resource. If you call me, I can find you, I will vet, interview and work out people that you can hook up with in your area. And that's really what's kind of cool about it is how many realtors are there?
There's thousands. But if you find someone that you can trust, who can find you someone you can trust, that referral program works out. That's pretty amazing as well.
That's quite an offer if you're in the market and or looking for a new home. And or looking for a ministry to support. I've got the man sitting right in front of me right now, Frank Mickens, and pretty amazing. TV personality, from TV personality to launching you into ministry and now like Paul making tents selling homes. But all that to say, Frank, what I love about your heart is your, one is your heart. And your desire to make a difference.
One in our world, but probably more important to me is the kingdom impacting the kingdom of God. Amen. That's right. That's what our whole family has been set out to do.
We've been set free from doing things our way and we're sacrificing our lives for Jesus Christ. That's amazing. And we referenced your bride. We had, didn't really say a whole lot about your family, but take the last 30 seconds just about the family. Well, she's probably going to be listening. And so I'll first say, honey, you were right. Because she was the one that was trying to nudge me earlier on and saying, hey, Frank, you know, ministry is happening, but you know, you think there's something else God might have for us in terms of another stream of income. But you know, she and I were in prayer this morning last night. She's my prayer partner. She's my pride and joy and my crown. She's the mother of my four kids and she's the homeschool mom of those kids. So she's done wonders to build a kingdom in our family, you know, and her name and Chastity is her name. She's the most forgiving woman on earth, which all husbands should be saying about their wives.
But she's a darling. Amen. Well, their role is critical in the success of any family. Let's just say that. Right.
Yes. They are the mothers of life. Hey, Frank Mickens, faithfireworldwide.com, Frank Mickens Real Estate, go check him out. And as always, thank you for being on a part of the show today, for being so faithful and dialing in. And I challenge you once again, when you go out today, live a God-filled and have a God-blessed day. 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 kolof.net and donate today. If you are enjoying the Man Up Show, would you help us spread the word? Tell your family, tell your friends, tell your neighbors to download, subscribe and leave a comment.
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