Ladies and gentlemen, the following contest is set for one flaw.
Introducing first, from another episode, Q&A with Koloff, The Devil's Nightmare. We're on the top end of Virginia, 36 miles from the White House. From Quantico Marine Base, which is a big area.
From Quantico Marine Base. So Montclair is an actual city or township? No, it's more of a development. Okay, okay.
But it's a big development. Yeah, yeah. And of course you mentioned the church. You pastored at Montclair Tabernacle there in Dumfries, tech slash, Montclair, for how many years? 38 years. 38 years at Montclair, and you might say you're technically retired, handed off the baton to your son-in-law, Brad Lewis, but you're not retired. You're still engaged, involved in ministry, right?
No, no. They gave me the title, Pastor Emeritus, and I looked that up. It means holding a former position. It's a kind way of saying you're a has-been, I think.
That's a very nice way of saying you're a has-been. It sounds awfully professional. Yeah.
Wow, sounds very impressive, actually. Pastor Emeritus. There you go. Yeah.
I'd never heard that term before. Yeah, I said I'm Pastor Emeritus, whatever that is. Oh, I love it. Well, and I know you still fill in when Brad is gone, you know, out of town or traveling and ministering and or you're still involved. You've been a chaplain for many, many years as well, right?
Yeah, October 1 of this year will be 34 years. I'm a chaplain with the Prince William County Police Department, and I'm also a chaplain, which is for a shorter duration, with the United States Park Police in Washington, D.C., too. Wow. So you're still involved and engaged, and of course, you know, you have not only attended Man Camp, but you've been back several times volunteering on staff, teaching, loving on guys, and just sharing your many years of experience and ministering to guys at our camps.
Gary? That's right. Yeah, I probably staffed, I'd say, four, maybe five times and enjoyed every one of them. Well, and you have been incredible, and I know I can speak for the rest of the staff. You have been incredibly invaluable, meaning the value of what you bring, not only to the staff, but all the guys who come to camp are greatly impacted by, really honestly, and I'm not just saying this, by your presence there.
And so I'm very, very grateful that you're part of Man Camp. And take a minute and tell us about Miss Brenda and the rest of the family. Well, I've been married to Brenda for 53 years, and we met at what is now Lee University when we went there. It was Lee College.
It's Lee University now. And we have two children. I have a son and a daughter. In fact, my daughter is married to the present pastor, which is Brad Lewis. Brad was with us for about 25 years. He started out part-time as a youth pastor and became full-time youth pastor and then became executive pastor. And then when I retired in January the 5th of 2020, he became the lead pastor, and he's done a great job. The church has grown and reached a lot of young adults, and it's a vivacious, growing church and vibrant ministries of all different kinds.
He's brought a lot of creativity to the plate, and I'm just excited about what's going to happen in the future. Well, yep, go ahead. No, go ahead. Well, I was just going to say, and I've been fortunate to be a part of some of the things you guys have done over the years. It didn't take me long to fall in love with you and Miss Brenda, for the record. I just want to say that, put that on record, put that out there on the airwaves.
It didn't take me long. And of course, Brad and Erica, their family. How many grandchildren do you have? Okay, Brad and Erica have three. They have two sons and a daughter. And one of the sons, Dylan, he's been to man camp and he said it's the best thing he's ever been to in his life. And he got married a little over a year ago.
He is now the youth pastor and praise and worship leader in the church. Then we have another son and he's a very hard worker, got a great work ethic and he does low voltage installations of cameras and other things and done a great job and just elevated in the company that he works for. And then we've got a granddaughter that's nine years old and then my son, who lives in Tennessee, McDonald, Tennessee, between Cleveland and Chattanooga, he has three children, one daughter and two boys, the dynamic duo. So we're really excited about our grandchildren. You are indeed a blessed man, 53 years of marriage, a milestone in today's day and time.
So congratulations on that. And you mentioned the church. I'm reminded of in all of my trips up there. And we go back, our relationship goes back to the mid 90s. We met at the Brownsville Revival in Pensacola, Florida, standing in line for the bathroom. And of course that conversation led all these years later, almost 30 years later, roughly plus or minus, to this great friendship. And Gary, I want to say over the years, I've been up there at least a dozen different times with a variety of different outreaches, school events and outreaches. And of course we've done some man up conferences. We more recently did a man up dinner there. And of course quite a number of your guys, including one of your key guys, Tom Stewart, who also comes, right, and staffs now, have attended man camp and been impacted by man camp. And of course, you know, the conferences I think have been, hopefully have made a difference for your congregation, right?
Right, yeah. Well, we had two men at the last man camp. Both of them dramatically touched. And one of them was a real young Christian. And it really, it was a transformation for him and a real turnaround in a lot of different areas in his life.
And it's had lasting fruit in his life even now. And it's great to hear, and of course that's our hope. You know, Lex Luger and I put these camps together a number of years ago, and it's always our hope that we bring these small groups of men, you know, try to limit it to maybe 20, maybe 25 guys max. And an incredible season of staff with guys like Gary, like Tom Stewart, and others that are apart. Some of the other guys, Josh Gillum and David Graham and Todd Davis, Jeff James. Between the four, Gary, I don't even know if you may or may not know this, between those four guys I just named, they have staffed, come and volunteered collectively over 100 camps with me.
It's crazy. Yeah, I know that they've been really resilient in their ministry with the man camp. Yep, very involved and very committed to coming and serving and seeing other men, you know, just encounter Jesus in a very, very special, special way. And if you're listening in and you want more information on Montclair Tabernacle, I want you to go to MontclairTab.org.
That's Montclair, Tab, T-A-B as in boy.org, and check out, maybe watch them online some weekend or you're passing through Northern Virginia through Dump Freeze. You can jump in on a Sunday service and I don't even have to be there. You can just go and hear Brad Lewis or one of the other many phenomenal, phenomenal men of God that they have ministered there. And I want to say this too, how diverse Montclair Tabernacle is. I know, Gary, you and I have talked in the past 20 to 30 different countries represented there in your church in Northern Virginia, incredibly diversified.
Of course, you said God gave you a vision for that back in 1981, right? Yeah, the church should reflect its community and we have a very diverse community and I never did like the whole concept of people talking about white churches and that kind of thing. So even though I was raised in the South, because I felt like if God sent you somewhere, then you ought to be able to reach people that are in the community and that's what, and it really works for our church. Our people really love one another and have really gelled.
It doesn't make any difference where they're from, what color they are, what kind of culture they come from. They've really just, it's like a melting pot in our church. Yep. And I can diddle that and say from personal experience, as I said, having been there, ministered there numerous times, Sunday morning services and meeting the whole entire congregation to the outreach of community, to our men's conferences. I'm telling you what Gary is saying is true.
If you'd ever like to have that kind of an experience, dial into MontclairTab.org or pop into Montclair Tabernacle on some Sunday morning if you're passing through Dumfries, Virginia. 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. If you are a business owner and would like to advertise your company or product on the Man Up show and or Q&A with Koloff, contact me directly, nikitakoloff.com at koloff.net. The Man Up show is honored to have Dr. Johnny Gaten as one of our longest running supportive sponsors. Dr. Gaten is regarded as one of the world's leading elite eye surgeons. He is motivated by his faith in doing all things heartily as unto the Lord. His desire to do his best has contributed to success in his eye care practice, performing over 70,000 eye surgeries. In addition, he's a world-renowned speaker, writer, and author.
Go to eyeassociates.com for more information. And well, Gary, great to have you on the show today. It's Q&A with Koloff, so of course we've had a great opening conversation. But let me go ahead and shift gears here and give you the opportunity to ask me a couple questions.
So what do you have for me today? Well, I was – there are two things. One of them happens to be about your conversion experience. Okay. Because I've heard your testimony a number of times, and it is very profound how God reached down and touched your life and drew you in, and you got saved on – I believe it was on a Sunday morning.
Yes, sir. And the one part of the story that always amazed me was a man that didn't even know you and prayed for you. And I wonder what relates to that experience. What role do you think that man really played in your salvation? So what Gary's relating to – and if you want more – I'll put a shameless plug in here for Nikita, A Tale of the Ring of Redemption, my life story, both in book form and now in Audible.
You can go to Amazon and pull up Nikita, A Tale of the Ring of Redemption, get the full story, did that in my own voice, my life story in my own voice. And he's referring to the day I surrendered my life to Christ, 17 October 1993, when this elderly man named Buddy came up and introduced himself, and he's like, hey, you don't know me. I'm not a wrestling fan, not here to get an autograph.
I got to tell you this story. I'm like, okay. And so he begins to proceed – proceeds to tell me how five years prior he was surfing through the TV channels, and he stops. He's watching wrestling. He goes, I don't even like wrestling.
Why am I watching this? He goes, but you were on. He goes, you were on doing an interview. He goes, the Lord spoke to my heart, Nikita, and said these words, pray for that man's salvation. I have a call of ministry on his life.
And I'll never forget him saying that, quote, unquote. And he said, you know, I have faithfully prayed for you every day, every day for the last five years. And he goes, I didn't know you were here today. I wasn't going to come today. I didn't feel well today. He goes, in fact, I hadn't been in church for several months.
And he didn't – Gary, he didn't even look healthy that day, and didn't live much longer than that conversation, actually. And – but he said, you know, I kind of argued with God, right? You know, we argue, you know, God, I'm not going to go to church for this, that, and the other reason. He goes, but I gave in, and I came, and I sat, but when you walked across the front, I was like, oh, my gosh, that's the guy I've been praying for for all these years. And he started tearing up, and he goes, it hit me out of all the churches and services that you could have attended.
God blessed me to witness with my own eyes you and Nikita Kolov surrender your life to Jesus. And, Gary, I didn't feel – you know, I understood the salvation part of it, you know, but, you know, the, quote, call to ministry part, you know, wasn't fully clear to me at the time. It became more clear over time as the Lord began to, you know, as I pressed in in my new relationship with him and was being discipled of what that call was, and I guess looking back, all that to say looking back, what I want people to take from this story and your question is, don't give up on praying for people. Even if you don't know them, if God puts somebody on your heart, like, God put me on this man's buddy's heart to pray for my salvation. And so don't give up praying for people. You just never know whether it takes five years or 50 years.
Who knows? But the takeaway I want you to have out there in Listening Land is don't give up praying for people even though it feels repetitive at times or like it's not doing any good. God, you're not answering my prayer. You're not listening to me. God, just keep praying.
I guess that would be my biggest takeaway, Gary, and for all the listeners out there as well. Well, God loved you enough and trusted him enough to put you on his heart to pray for you, and God honored his prayer. To me, that's an amazing story. Amazing story. Yes, sir.
Yeah, how fortunate am I? The second question that I would have as it relates to Man Camp and you and Lex, and if I heard you right in some of your conversations when y'all were in the wrestling world, y'all were not the closest buddies then. Right. But God put y'all together, and then Man Camp came up, and as I've been to Man Camp, one of the things, again, and I'll try to hurry here, is that I appreciate Man Camp. There's no fluff there. It's very straightforward.
It's very definitive. You don't mix words as it relates to sin, but at the same time, the other thing I really appreciate about Man Camp, that it's such a safe and compassionate environment for men that have crisis in their life. And that always amazed me, and men that come appreciate that. But my question is, you have a very disciplined approach to Man Camp, how what we do and how it's handled and how it's operated. How did you and Lex come up with that kind of structure for Man Camp?
That's a great question. I don't think I've really ever been asked that one before. And so just a quick little back story for those who may not know. Yeah, Lex and I had just a working relationship back in the wrestling days. And in fact, when he heard that I was, quote, retiring, and speaking of retirement, retiring and leaving wrestling, he said, I don't know if I called you a moron or an idiot or both.
It might have been both. Does he have any idea how much money he's leaving on the table? Of course, in those days for him and for many guys, it was about the money, as it is with many people, even in today's world. But all that said, he said, but little did I know that God had a calling on his life and that he and I would be reunited in 2006 when he gave his life to Christ. So 1993 for me, 2006, 13 years later, we're reunited under the banner of Jesus Christ and covered by the blood. And that re-engagement developed a brotherly love and friendship for each other.
And then in 2015, I got him out of Atlanta and he came and lived with me in little Kannapolis, North Carolina for 10 months. And Gary was during that time of just hanging out with each other, traveling some, doing some ministry together, praying, times of prayer, just conversations. And he had even said leading into the launch of Man Camp that one day, you know, we'd have a camp because he knew I was involved with another ministry that did something similar. And so where I volunteered, basically volunteered for 12 years with that other ministry and did about, I don't even know, maybe 60 or 70 of their camps and gained an incredible amount of experience, Gary, from those camps. And then when he and I started honing in on what it would look like for us to do a one-day conference.
So we do that. If you're a pastor out there listening, I do the conferences. Lex comes in and does some of the teachings at the Man Camp that we do in Royston, Georgia. But if you ever want to bring the one-day conference into your community, into your church, I'll give you that website here at the end. And so we just prayed.
What would that look like? And so piece by piece, the Lord began to put the puzzle together and give us the curriculum, Dr. Edwin Lewis Cole, and give us that curriculum and what that would look like and the emphasis. As he says, Gary, you know, many of these, you know, some would call them retreats. We don't call Man Camp a retreat. We say God's kingdom is not retreating. It's advancing. But when God began to give us the picture of what this would look like, how it would be formatted, he gave us the curriculum and then he fine-tuned it with input from other guys, you know, like yourself, like Josh Gillum and Jeff James and other guys who had some input. And then when we come in and do that one-day conference, you know, kind of an appetizer and encouragement to come for the entree and come to camp, it just kind of all honestly, Gary, kind of all fell into place.
And then, you know, we have over the years kind of fine-tuned it, if you want to say. And I say all that to say we also are strategic in giving room for the Holy Spirit to, you know, call an audible, to use a football term. You know, that even though we have an agenda, if you will, or kind of have a structure to what we do, we're going to always give room for the Lord to direct us to change up the schedule if need be. And the last thing I'll say, what I wrote down were these two words, safe culture. God made it very clear, I appreciate what you said, because God made it very clear that we were to develop an atmosphere at our camps and develop a culture through our staff of men who were like-mind and of one spirit, the Holy Spirit leading and directing us, walking in unity.
To love on these guys who come in, you know, in many cases, as you mentioned, hurting or broken or just traumatized, not always, but many of them, and create a safe environment where they can thrive, meet and encounter Jesus over the course of the time we're together. So, yep, there you go. All right, do we have time for one more? Squeeze it in, come on, we can squeeze in one more. What you got for me?
This should be a quick one. I know that you pray and seek God and you don't move until you hear from God, but in your prayer and seeking God, has the Lord given you another expanded vision of what's next with Kolal for Christ? Yes, because I've been spending some diligent time asking the Lord for the next five years. What's the next five years look like? And so we've got the man up intensive, a one-day intensive, and kind of how that has grown and expanded, which you guys did at Montclair earlier this year, is coming back around in the second year as I develop relationships with these local churches and communities, is bringing the man up dinner. And now he's shown me come back around year three and do a man up breakfast that will be more focused on evangelism, encouraging guys to bring their unsaved friends, treat them to breakfast. All different content in terms of messaging between the five, six-hour conference to the three-hour dinner to the two-hour breakfast, and all of it encouraging guys to consider coming and experiencing man camp for themselves. And then, of course, I started these virtual reunions with guys who've all attended camp. Next year, 2025, we'll have our first face-to-face reunion with guys that have attended from over, at that point, seven plus years. And then there's something else on the horizon, which I won't let out, something else coming and related to men and related to man camp that he hasn't released me yet to really talk about, but so there's something else coming beyond man camp that I'll be sharing with sometime down the road as the Lord releases me to do that. So, yeah.
Yep. So, I appreciate you, Gary. I appreciate you. And Ms. Brenda, thank you so much. I appreciate you and I appreciate your friendship and being a brother in Christ and look forward to the future. Thank you, Gary.
All right. And all of you out there in Listening Land, we thank all of you for tuning in week in and week out. Go out today and live a God-filled and have a God-blessed day. Hi, Nikita Kolov. 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&A with Kolov, 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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