Teens Discipling Teens?

The following program is recorded content created by TheSteveNobleShow.com.

And now here's your host, Steve Noble. How do we get started? Well, leadership program at the high school level is pretty much just been in a traditional school, a student council, and a school president, and some class officers. There really hasn't been a mechanism at a public school or traditional school for having leadership go across the entire network. And at Iron Academy, the focus has been, if you're going to develop leaders, it's not just taking a few people in the class.

Let's try to expand that to include everybody. So this program is something that's been evolving at Iron Academy. It's been in the making for about three or four years. It started off as what we call the Shepherd Program. And that was when we would have high school students meet with middle school students at their locker, kind of help organize their life, kind of look at a young man's locker.

And you could kind of see a lot about that young man if you have stuff crawling out of it or things like that, and just kind of get that squared away. Then we said, you know, that worked pretty good, but we could do more with that. And then we started, okay, let's just pair them up and have a few minutes during lunch once a week where they get together and talk.

And we tried that and we found it got even more engaged. And we learned that not only the young students were getting something out of it, the older students were too. And so now we've expanded it this year where we have a keeper program that's dedicated.

They stay together during the day. We have a class where they're actually praying and learning together. And so it's been a lot more intentional as we've gone on because we've seen the benefits of developing leaders rather than just talking about it. Why is it called the Keeper Program? Well, it's called the Keeper Program because just like Iron Academy is iron sharpened iron, we have a responsibility to one another, to be there for one another.

We are not good alone. And so you're going to have a keeper, which is a older student that is going to be looking after a younger student that we'd call a keepee. And together, we're going to be able to keep each other on that straight and narrow road. Which reminds me of, I was just actually reading in the book of Genesis the other day with Cain and Abel. And Cain in his attitude is, am I my brother's keeper? And the answer to that, obviously, if you're going to call yourself a Christian, is yes, I am my brother's keeper and my brother is my keeper as well. But there is a discipleship relationship, just like we see with Paul and Timothy.

That's right. There is a partnership in there. And yes, there is a mentor mentee or a keeper keepee, but that doesn't mean that it just goes one way. Because we can learn from young people as well as young people learn from us. That's such a great point.

What do you say to all the people listening, Bob, and then we're going to get Sam and Julian in here after the break. But what do you say to people that might struggle with the idea that you can actually empower high school students, in this case, a senior in high school, to disciple a seventh grader? Because a lot of us would just think that's not even possible. Well, you know, people will generally rise to your expectations. And if you can set a high expectation, you more often than not can get high results.

It's when you limit them before they even get out. And you know what? Do they make mistakes? Yes, we do. And we learn from those mistakes and we get better. In fact, the best lessons that you can learn is when you can make a mistake and you can learn from it.

To not make the mistake, it's a lot cheaper to make a mistake as a young person than as an older person. Sure. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

The costs go up as you move into it. So this is pretty much a daily thing, the keeper program. Oh, yes. They're interacting every day.

Every day. Every day, they're going to do work together. They're going to pray together. They're going to talk together. They're going to have a relationship together.

Yeah. And that's the important part of this. So when we come back from the break, which we're going to hit in about 45 seconds, we'll talk to Sam. Sam's a senior at Iron Academy and actually going to be following in your footsteps, Bob, getting into the military world, which is awesome, Sam.

Excited about that. And then Julian's in seventh grade. He's here as well. And Sam is discipling. He is the keeper for Julian. So we're going to get it from their perspective, these two young men, and hear from them what this is like for them, and especially for Sam to have to try to disciple somebody that normally you wouldn't have any contact with, because what contact does a senior have with a seventh grader? And then, Julian, I'm going to get into your head a little bit.

And what's that like to receive that kind of discipleship and leadership from a senior in high school? We're going to keep unpacking this, the keeper program today on The Steve Noble Show. IronAcademy.org is the website, as always, if you're in the Triangle area and have a young man in your life, you need to check that out. IronAcademy.org. We'll be right back.

Welcome back. It's Steve Noble, The Steve Noble Show, today talking to our friends at Iron Academy, IronAcademy.org. If you have sons or grandsons in the sixth to 12th grade range and you're in the Triangle area of North Carolina, Raleigh-Durham, Chapel Hill, do yourself a favor, do your sons and grandsons a favor. At least check out Iron Academy, IronAcademy.org.

Pray about it, look at it. Whether you're a homeschool family like we have been, and we're about done now, our youngest is a senior, so we're going to be out of that world personally, but I still teach high school homeschoolers myself. So the homeschool world, the private Christian school world, private secular school or public school, there is nothing in North Carolina, in fact, probably nothing in the country like Iron Academy. And today we're talking about one of the things that is one of the big, big issues that separates Iron Academy apart from everybody else. And that's discipleship. In this case, the actual program itself is called the Keeper Program, which is all about discipleship.

And in this case, younger men discipling even younger men. So Sam Fletcher is in his second year at Iron Academy. He's a senior and Julian's here as well.

He's in his second year at Iron Academy, his seventh grade. So Sam and Julian, welcome to the show. How are you guys? We're good. How are you? I'm good.

Thank you very much. So Sam, when you're being introduced to this, that you're going to disciple somebody, a seventh grader, what was your initial reaction to this as a formal thing that, hey, Sam, we're going to assign you, you're going to have one of the younger men at Iron Academy. You're going to be in charge of discipling him. What was your reaction to that? My initial reaction? I thought I was gonna be a babysitter. I wasn't looking forward to it at all.

And because your assumption was you're just dealing with somebody's behavior. Is that what you were thinking? Yeah, I thought he was going to be immature. Yeah, just to kind of keep him going closer to the mic.

I thought I was going to, you know, just have to get on him every three seconds. Yeah. So not excited about it?

No, not excited at all. And then Julian, what was your reaction that you're going to have in this case, a senior in high school, that's going to kind of be this person that's going to disciple you? What was your reaction to that? I was a little confused.

I was like, wait, this is a thing that we can do. But it was pretty good at the start. And then we started getting more used to it. So then it all became like, part of like your daily schedule. Was it a little intimidating for you, Julian, to have to, I guess, I'll just use the phrase deal with to just kind of deal with, relate to, interact with, become friends with somebody so much older than you like Sam? I wouldn't say that much really. Because we it was it's a relatively small school.

Yeah. So you essentially know everybody. So just learning, learning more about someone a little more isn't unheard of.

Which is a really interesting point, Bob, I'm going to pull you back in here because that's not normal. Like at a high school, seventh graders would have nothing to do. If you have a high school, middle school, they're not going to have anything to do. Sure, there's some schools where they're kept completely isolated. Completely segregated.

Yes. But in a smaller environment, you could say that about a small school in general. But in this case, it's even more intentional in Iron Academy that these guys all know each other.

Completely intentional. It is something that you'd have to work to not be involved. The whole school is organized. First, the school is split into three tribes. And then those three tribes incorporate students from each grade. Then within each tribe, you have the older students that mentor one or two younger students. So it is intentional from everything that Iron does to have younger students and older students working together.

I mean, look at what happens in life. You work in the workplace and you can have people from 20 to 70. That's right. That are all working together. Well, why can't we start doing that in school?

Yeah, that's right. When we made the decision to homeschool, my parents were worried about socialization and all that kind of stuff. And I'm like, so do you think raising a 12-year-old in a room with 30 other 12-year-olds and one adult, do you think that's representative reality out in the world?

No, of course not. And that's why the beauty of homeschooling, where they're dealing with people of a lot of different ages at Iron Academy, even though you got sixth through 12th grade, it's one group of young men who are walking down this road together. So Sam, is Julian the only person that you're discipling or do you have multiple people? I have two others that I discipled.

One, he has a new keeper now. So it's just Julian and I right now. And so what's that been like for you and what have you learned from that process?

It's been great. I've got to know these guys. I literally, I really see Julian as a little brother. And what I've learned from it is that I really need to work on myself in my leadership skills and being able to listen to people and really understanding their lives from their eyes, instead of seeing it from my point of view. So just listening to him, being able to give him advice, help him out, and then in discipleship, being able to just let him talk to me, it's just opened up to me. It's really eye-opening. And Julian, for you, what's it been like?

How has it impacted you? I'd say it was going pretty well because we got to like talk to each other about our lives. So it's not completely like, you're not telling anyone about what's happening or like what's been going on with your life.

Like say you went on a really fun vacation, but you haven't been able to tell anyone anything, then the keeper program is good to tell someone about whatever's happening in your life. Because we guys have different conversations between the two of you than you would with old people like me and Bob. Yeah. Sometimes. Yeah, sometimes.

And your perspective is totally different. Yeah. Like Bob and I, God bless you, Bob, neither one of I can really totally relate to you guys anymore.

Right. Because it's been a long time since we were seniors in high school. And you guys, even though seventh grade Julian and twelfth grade for you, Sam, you're a lot closer together. So I would imagine that's been helpful that you have that kind of perspective. Yeah, it has been very helpful. And then, yeah, it's been helpful. Do you guys think that this will have an impact on who you're becoming?

Like as you grow? Absolutely. How so? Julian, go ahead. Because when you're growing up, it's good to have input from someone else that's older than you, that's already gone through the same things as you. So if anything unexpected happens, you can go to your keeper and ask, hey, do you know how to do this? So instead of worrying on how to do something, you already know how. Yeah, because Sam, you've been at Iron Academy and you guys have been there same amount of time, but you have more life experience than Julian does.

Right. And now do you ever see yourself as being responsible for Julian? Do you feel that weight on you?

I wouldn't say I feel, Julian, he's very mature for his age, so I wouldn't say I feel weight and I'm responsible for him, but I'm always there for him, if that makes sense. It does. It makes perfect sense. Bob, listening to these guys at such a young age versus your experience in the military, were you skeptical at all when you first came to Iron Academy? Like you're used to real high-level leadership and people that are all in, these are mature young men and women in the military environment.

And then at a school like Iron Academy with 6th through 12th graders, I would imagine perhaps at first you think, well, this is an apple and an orange. But is it really in a sense? Well, it is a unique place and it is one of the reasons that I was willing to come out of retirement to be a part of it. You know, when you talk about leadership, you're talking about an influencer. You're talking about somebody that can speak into somebody's life. You know, before you can lead somebody, they've got to know that you care about them. This is a way to start building those relationships of caring. And then that leads to the leadership portion. For example, as Julian was saying, if he's worried about something, he can go to Sam and Sam's a safe person that'll be there to help him out. And he can then feel a sense of comfort. They can then develop a partnership from that.

And that helps both of them in the long run. Yeah. And then from I want to talk to you guys and we come back from the break.

We're going to hit commercial break in about 30 seconds. But I want to talk to you about kind of the quote unquote biblical side of this. Like, how are you growing as Christians?

And I know that everybody at Iron Academy is making a proclamation of faith. We're all Christ followers, but we're all at a different point in that journey. So I want to ask you how that's affecting you guys, how the Keeper program is affecting you as young Christian men. How is that moving you forward?

And how do you see that in comparison to who Christ calls you to be? So how have you grown as Christians? We'll keep talking about that.

Some more questions for you, Bob. We're going to continue to talk about the Keeper program at Iron Academy, ironacademy.org, sixth grade through 12th grade. If you're here in the triangle and you have sons or grandsons, you better check it out. We'll be right back. Welcome back.

It's Steve Noble, The Steve Noble Show. Great to be here today with our friends at Iron Academy. Alan Hahn is usually here. He's not here today. I actually don't take this personally, Alan.

I love it when Alan's not here. And I really like it when students, when these young men show up, because I'm always impressed and encouraged and energized by what I see every time students from Iron Academy come in here, because as you're experiencing this today, if this is the first time you've ever listened to students from Iron Academy, they are definitely a different group of people, young men, than you're used to hearing or you expect to hear. And that's just because God's doing an incredible and a unique work at Iron Academy. And it's unique in terms of the world. It's not unique biblically, because that's the way it's supposed to work. You understand that young men need to be raised up as iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another. And they have to be raised up to become godly men. It doesn't just happen.

It needs to be intentional. And so Iron Academy, one of the other things I love about them and appreciate with Alan and Bob's here today and the whole staff is this isn't, they're not outsourced. You don't outsource your sons to Iron Academy because this is a partnership.

They work together with the family. We all have our place on the wall, but oftentimes when you send your sons off to school, even if it's a private Christian school, they can get a good Christian education there, but it's not going to be nearly as specific and tailored as it is at Iron Academy for young men. They do learn differently. That's why these guys move around a lot during the day.

They have a lot of physical breaks, right, Bob? Because young men don't sit in a classroom the same way that young women do. It's kind of rigged that way in the regular school system.

Certainly we have to understand that men need breaks and we have brain breaks frequently. We also structure the curriculum. We do a lot of dissection. We cut up lots of frogs, lots of fish. Yes, boys being boys, so to speak.

That's because God made us different. Then the women talk to us, Bob, and then I'm gonna go back to Julian and to Sam about spiritual development in the Keeper program, just biblical spiritual development, prayer, and Bible study. Talk about that.

That's right. Well, you know, the Keeper program could be used in any school that would want to develop young leaders, but when you talk about eternal consequences, then you have to get into the Word. And what we've started this year is we have started a discipleship class where we get the keepers and keepees together, and then we'll work on scriptures together. Right now we're going through the Sermon on the Mount, and so you'll have the keeper and keepee, and they'll both be reading the passage, and then they're going to be reflecting, okay, what does it mean in my life today?

How do I use this? So there has to be an eternal component to this because just a good program for people is one thing, but we're talking about impacting the world for Christ, and so you have to understand the Word. So it's a very intentional program where we're working together as we say, iron sharpening iron.

Yeah. So, Sam, and dealing with that and time in prayer and time in Bible study, especially when you're trying to help Julian down that road as well, what's that been like for you guys? It's been good. You know, oftentimes when you read scriptures, somebody else might interpret it differently, so we're able to bounce those ideas off of each other, and then we pray on it, and it's just been really eye-opening, again, to see things through someone else's perspective. What's that done for you, or has it impacted your own growth as a Christian to try to help somebody else in their growth?

Definitely. It's made me more confident to talk to somebody else, especially another Christian, about certain scriptures or the Bible in general, because before I wouldn't really want to talk to another, before going to IAEA, this is talk to another Christian, because I felt as if I didn't know enough to talk to another Christian, so it's been very informative and helped me grow in that way. But do you know a little bit more than Julian, and that's no disrespect meant to Julian, but odds are you do, and because you're several years older, you have more life experience than Julian does, and all that stuff's going to factor in when you expose yourself to the scriptures, but oftentimes, like you, I would have thought before, I'm not capable of teaching anybody else about the Bible, because I don't know everything, but odds are pretty good that you know a little bit more than Julian, and then the Holy Spirit's involved.

It's not like it's just the two of you. It's the two of you and the Holy Spirit, and I could go to scripture and just say a quarter three strands is not easily broken. Well, that's you and him and the Holy Spirit.

That's the third strand. So, Julian, what's it like for you in terms of your growth as a young Christian when you guys are studying, in this case, like the Sermon on the Mount? It helped me learn more about scripture and how I can apply it to my own life, but also seeing other people talk about how it could apply to their own life as well.

It's definitely thinking like, okay, so these people understand the scripture in this way, so if I meet anyone who understands that scripture, I can understand it as well. Is this significantly different when you're doing this at Iron Academy than when you go to church on a Sunday? Like in terms of your own growth as a Christian, when you're doing this discipleship, and you're in the Word, and you're praying, and you're studying scripture at Iron Academy versus going to church, being in youth group, and then hearing a message. Are those things different? Does it affect you differently?

I'd say they're different because it's more personal when it's one-on-one and with somebody that you trust. So, for me and Julian, I'm able to help him understand things from a different perspective maybe or understand things if he didn't understand in the first place. So, I'd say it's different than if somebody's preaching to you.

They're up there just going and going. It's not a dialogue. You're not working through it together. There's a passage in the Old Testament that says, come let us reason one to another. So, there's a really healthy environment.

Again, back to iron sharpening iron. When you sit there and you chew through it together, and you work through it together because not any one of the four of us knows everything there is to know about scripture. I know a lot. I don't know everything. And so, you're going to have a perspective as a young person, Sam, or even you, Julian. If the three of us are sitting on talking about the Sermon on the Mount, there's a decent chance that I'll learn something from you two. It's like a big diamond, and on a big diamond, there's a bunch of different facets.

There's all these different angles, and you have one, and you have one, and I have one, and Bob has one. Bobby, you want to add anything else about the discipleship part? I do want to understand. It's important to understand that as you're teaching, you're also learning. You can't teach what you don't know, and as you're teaching, you're growing too. I'm amazed sometimes in talking with these discipleship groups, as you said, a younger person's perspective or a different perspective. The scriptures speak to us today.

We live in a world where we have students that go through some very difficult things, and leaning on the scriptures at those times are just so important. Yeah. And you can relate to somebody. Let's say you've had a tragedy in your family. Let's say one of your grandparents passed away or something. You can go to school, and you can talk about that, and you can get comfort just from knowing that there's people there that will support you.

Yeah, that's awesome. And then let's talk about just Iron Academy in general. Jillian, I know you wanted to talk about that. Why go to Iron Academy? What would you tell parents and grandparents that are listening? I'd say it's a really good environment that everyone knows each other, so that even if there's bullying, it's handled accordingly, and it doesn't go on. And also, you get a sword if you graduate, so... A sword when you graduate, which is so cool to see that, which I'm glad you brought that up.

But Sam, what about for you? I'd say coming to Iron Academy is good for biblical growth. It helped me a lot. And if you feel as if you have a son or a grandson, that you feel as if they're still lacking, or you want them to grow more, or even if you're proud of them, but they can... Everybody can grow. You can always grow.

It's a good place to send your son. Lifelong learner. How is Sam Fletcher different today than the first day you were at Iron Academy? I'd say I'm more of a leader. And I'm just... I don't know.

That's a good question. Different... No, when you say you're more of a leader, how do you... Based on what, how do you know that? Well, my interactions with my... I have younger siblings at home, so my interactions with them, I can definitely see a difference between now and then. I used to be a little more harsh, but now I'm more understanding and more... I'm more patient with younger people, I'd say.

Yeah, that's a big one. I probably need to talk to you more about that to learn some of that myself. What about you, Julian? This is your second year at Iron Academy. How has it changed you? I think I've grown with responsibility, because even though I wasn't necessarily a bad kid, I definitely have grown in that, because I definitely slacked off on chores. So say someone said, do the laundry.

I didn't do the laundry until the next day. So you're just more on top of being mature and being responsible. Yes. It also helped with the accountability days, which are days to help you stay accountable for who you are. Which is awesome. And I appreciate Julian talking about, you know, they kind of, Bob, they kind of deal with issues themselves. You have the honor code there at Iron Academy, and it's not just the teachers disciplining these young men. I mean, they discipline one another, right?

No, as you said, it's a real partnership. Any decision at Iron is not just made by the staff and administration. There's a process where the students are involved in the decision-making. There's a process where input from the parents are involved in what's taught and how it's taught, and what are the consequences. Because we just don't want young men that are one way at school and then another way at home. We're not trying to have a generation of hypocrites.

We want to see young men that can impact the world for Christ at home, at school, in the workplace, in their family. Yeah, and that's such an obvious aspect when you learn anything about Iron Academy. ironacademy.org is the website, as always, ironacademy.org. One of the best things I could tell you to do is to schedule a tour. Go see it for yourself.

Meet these young men. Don't just listen to a show. Watch something on Facebook. You know, just go there yourself and go check it out.

It's one of those things that you have to kind of see it to believe it. But you can go. You can schedule a tour. You see it for yourself. You meet the young men, and you can walk around and see what's going on.

Class sizes at Iron Academy are limited to 15 per grade, so this is very intentional. And there are some tuition scholarships out there for full-time ministry workers, so that's important as well if it applies to you. But if you love your sons and your grandsons and you're in the Triangle area, do them a favor. Do yourself a favor. Bring glory to the God that we all say we love and we should follow.

Check out Iron Academy, ironacademy.org. Bob, always great to see you. Julian, thanks for being here. Sam, God bless you, and I'm excited for your graduation. But it's great seeing you guys today. Thank you. We'll be right back. Welcome back.

It's Steve Noble, The Steve Noble Show. Always so encouraging to have our friends from Iron Academy on and to see what God can do with young men utilizing these older mature men like Bob and Iron Academy and Alan Hahn. And it's just so cool to remember everything is possible when God is involved. So don't give up on our younger people, these men, and our young ladies as well. Don't give up on them.

I know it can be very frustrating, but I'm telling you as somebody that teaches high schoolers myself that there's incredible potential there. But we have to believe that, and then we have to act on it, okay? So that's always a great reminder when we're talking to our friends at Iron Academy. Speaking of friends, our good friend David Fisher, back as always with the Money Monday update. Hey, Steve, it's Wednesday. Yeah, I know, but markets were closed on Monday, so we're just rolling with it.

And then next Monday, we're going to do a full Money Monday update. There's a lot to talk about, so we'll get to that next Monday. But happy new year, David Fisher. How are you, my friend?

I'm doing great. Thanks for having me on your program, Steve. Happy new year to you and your family. And I think we're going to have another roller coaster year, unfortunately, but we'll get into all those details a little bit later throughout the year. Yes, that's for sure. So before we jump into looking at 2022, which is in the books and what's maybe ahead for us in 2023, let's make sure we get our compass set correct and start with a passage of Scripture this time, Matthew chapter 2.

So let's start there, and then we'll dive in. Yeah, this is a we talked last time in December about the wise men coming and giving bearing gifts, gold, frankincense and mirth. And so this is the verse after that verse 12. It says, And having been warned, warned in a dream, that's the wise men being warned in a dream not to go back to Herod.

They return to their country by another route. So obviously, if you read through if you read through the Scriptures, we've come to the place that King Herod, he's an evil guy. And he wanted to use people to for an evil plot. And the wise men didn't know about this. So they were warned by the Lord sovereignly in a dream to go a different route back to their country. You know, life has its way. In fact, this morning, this morning, there was a wreck on the way to work. And there's a wreck on the way home last night. And it's almost like there's these detours that that happened in our life.

It's just a normal part of life. They veer the traffic to another route. And the Lord knows sovereignly our life better than anyone. And he wants to reroute us sometimes. But sometimes, you know, when we get rerouted in traffic, we don't like that.

Why is this happening? But that is how life works. If they're the police, they have our best intent. I don't want to say the Lord is the police, but He's all-knowing, all-loving. And sometimes we just need to yield to that rerouting in our life that it is His good will and the love for us that He does. Yeah, and we haven't been given a spirit of fear when it comes to change and curveballs and things like that. God's around every corner.

He's on the other side of every hill. And we have to remember that. So when you really understand God's character, David, as you know, it makes it easier to deal with His sovereignty. And that's why, you know, when it says, hey, you haven't been given a spirit of fear, that's because we haven't. And if God is changing your season, if He's changing your direction, you can rest in that.

God knows what's going on and He loves you and has a great plan. So always be willing. Like Joseph and Mary were, you know, they got warmed in a dream. Don't don't happen to the Magi. It happened to them.

And if God's going to change your direction, be willing to go along with that. 2022 is in the books. So not a very pretty year. So what were the actual numbers?

And then let's compare that, David, to what you thought was going to happen last year. So the Dow down 8.8 percent, S&P 19.5 percent down, the NASDAQ bloody 33 plus percent down. You know, the S&P 500, just all the 11 sectors, 10 of the 11 were down. You know, think of these some of the stocks that I don't get into individual stocks, but just to name a few. Apple down 31 percent.

These are household names. Alphabet or Google down 38 percent. Amazon down 50 plus percent.

Meta down 63 percent. Tesla down 74 percent almost. So, you know, I talked to a lot of investors last year, not one investor.

This has never happened in 28 years. Not one investor said they made money in any position in their IRA, 401k. You know, they trade and some were seasoned investors. They traded their own portfolio and still didn't do that.

So it was a really bad year. My predictions. Well, I said the Fed was going to be behind the curve in inflation and probably even deny there is inflation.

And that completely happened. And I said this in December of 2021, by the way, I said the government's going to massively spent because they massively spent the year before that completely happened. I said it was going to be probably a roller coaster ride in stocks that was happened. As far as my prediction in stocks, I said it would be down 10 to 20 percent, possibly 20 percent.

So we're right in there. I said gold and silver would be up 10 to 20 percent. I was not right in that by index. So the index for gold was slightly down a quarter of a percent.

So I said it was going to be up. But the physical market in gold, called the Men's State Gold Index, was up 21 percent. The silver market was up 8 percent, 8.5 percent, while the paper market in silver was up 2.8 percent. So I was a little bit aggressive in that because I didn't factor in all a ton of money, the trillions of dollars going to the sidelines, putting the money in a money market, which bought the dollar. And the dollar had the biggest move that I've ever seen in 28 years.

It was up 7.8 percent. And if that would cause gold to be down 20 to 30 percent. So this tells you how strong gold was, the physical market being up 21 percent in the face of that huge headwind. Yeah, there was so much buffening going on on the upside on the dollar and the downside and everything else to see gold be as stable as it's been for the last 12 months has been great and very helpful. And that's the great thing about having it. I always know when I'm looking at the market, when I look at our own accounts, I always know that I've got this other thing out there called gold and gold and silver and coins for us sitting in a safe deposit box. It's nice to know it's there. I've got that ballast. I've got that. It's real.

I can go see it if I want to. And that's been a great comfort for us as the market's been crazy. So now that we're in a new year, is this kind of like wiped the whiteboard clean and now we're going to have a stock market rally in 2023? So what do you see the stock market doing?

And then what do you think gold and silver will do this year? So here's where the investor has to adjust his mind and not think about wiping the slate clean. Only until the Fed wipes the slate clean. What I mean by that is they stop raising rates. The notes for the Fed meeting just came out and it was unanimous. All Fed board members said they're not going to lower rates in 2023.

They said it's not in the best interest. So with that, high rates and rate hikes historically, and it was proven last year, are not good for stocks. So you have to think this way. This is just a new day. It's not a new era of investing.

It's just a new calendar year because the same fundamentals that are in place on January 4th are the same fundamentals that were in place all of last year. And I'm not negative on the market. I don't want to sound like, hey, invest all your money in gold and get all your money out of stocks. That's not what I'm saying. I didn't say that last year and I won't say that any year. But what I am saying is the same thing.

I've unfortunately sound like a broken record. We are not going to have a pleasant year. In fact, take me out of this. The head of the IMF came out on January 1st and said that a recession is going to happen. She said that a third of the global economy will be in a recession this year.

Prepare for a tough year, tougher than the year we left behind, is what she says. And BlackRock said similar words that says they're the largest manager of funds. They're also warning a recession is imminent due to central banks borrowing cost raising interest rates. They said recession is foretold as central banks will try to tame inflation. The opposite is going to happen.

This is not the norm. Equity valuations do not reflect the damage ahead. In other words, they're saying there's going to be much more downturn ahead.

Yeah. And then, of course, all the people for the last six months, hey, they're going to pivot now. The Fed's going to pivot now and start lowering rates. But it sounds like that there's no pivot coming this year.

Is that right? Yeah, no pivot coming. I'm going to come out with a white paper next week called The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly. I'm just about finished writing.

It'll be at the print shop in time, hopefully. That will tell a lot of my predictions for next year. And we'll go over that with a full Monday show next week. Great. And then you mentioned last time you were on, David, we were talking a little bit about there's this discount that shows up in the gold and silver markets at the end of the year, the beginning of the year. So what's the status of that right now? So it is happening. It started yesterday.

It's a first come, first serve. What triggers this is wholesalers have to pay an inventory tax. They don't like paying taxes.

Nobody does. So they pass the savings off. Most of the people in the industry don't know this because they don't pass it off to their clients, but Landmark Capital does. So call my company, learn about what's being discounted. It's a first come, first serve until product runs out, discounts are between 5% to 15%. And well, there's no obligation to call and say, do something.

You can call and learn about that. Yeah, we were talking, we did kind of a looking back at 2022 show yesterday. And the rate at the federal rate at the end of 2021 was 0.8%. So it's gone up 56 times since then. And that's just reality. A lot of people think, woo, I'm so glad 2022 is over.

Yeah, well, don't get too excited about 2023. That's why we're going to continue to have these conversations with David Fisher at landmarkgold.com. And then we'll do a full money Monday. Next Monday, got a lot to talk about then as well, but people getting educated, people learning more about this. David, what do they do? Give us a call 844-604-2575.

Again, the number 844-604-2575 or website landmarkgold.com. Awesome. Thank you, my brother. Great hearing from you. Happy new year. We look forward to talking to you for a full show next Monday. Another program powered by the truth network.