I Don't Know You

Matt Heisler
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A series of honest conversations, hosted by Matt Heisler, on exploring creativity and leadership within the faith based non-profit world as he seeks to ask the questions that help him understand his own journey in light of the perspectives and experiences his share. mattheisler.substack.com

  1. 6d ago

    How Three Generations at One Camp Shaped Rod Fletcher’s Definition of Home

    Description Rod Fletcher’s grandmother took a job as the camp secretary at Campus by the Sea in 1953. His father grew up there. His parents met there — the lifeguard and the camper, breaking a rule the camp still enforces. Rod’s first summer was 1974, and he was five. Seventy years later, after InterVarsity decided to get out of the camping business and a group of former family campers formed a nonprofit to rescue the place, Rod found himself on the search committee for a new director — and got hired into the job himself. In this conversation, recorded live with a room full of Barnabas Associates, Rod and his wife Heather talk about what it’s actually like to live where you serve: 39 people sharing every meal, trash and groceries hauled in by boat twice a week, ten-cent water, worship happening outside your front door every night. They talk about the church in Avalon that shut down and what sprang up in its absence, the cove next door Rod thinks could be a second camp, and how they handle conflict in a community where nobody can go home at the end of the day. And Rod closes with three pieces of advice for people in their twenties that I’ve thought about every week since. Lessons 1. A Widow, a Secretary Job, and Seventy Years of Consequence Rod’s dad was born to a widow — his own father died while she was pregnant. She never remarried and never had more children. In 1953 she took a job as the camp secretary and spent her summers helping build the place alongside InterVarsity’s Southern California director. Rod’s dad’s first summer was at ten. Nobody in that story could have known they were starting something that would still be running three generations later. ~04:15 2. The Original Rule Breaker Rod’s dad was an eighteen-year-old lifeguard. His mom was a camper down from UCSB. Staff are not allowed to fraternize with campers — then or now. Rod calls his father “the original rule breaker,” and notes that it worked out. It’s the kind of family lore that tells you what a place means to the people who came up in it. ~04:49 3. He Hired Him and He Hired Me When InterVarsity decided to stop owning camps after seventy years, a group of former family campers formed a nonprofit board and effectively rescued the property — subleasing for a year, then securing a lease. Rod was on that board. He was also on the search committee for the next director, since the sitting one was retiring. The line he uses: “I hired him and he hired me.” ~07:26 4. The Miracle Isn’t That He’s There Rod had spent twenty years as head of a school in Texas before that role wrapped up and they came out to camp three years ago. But he’s clear-eyed about the actual miracle: he already loved the place — the diving, the fishing, all of it. Heather is the one God had to move. His marriage advice on the subject is blunt: don’t try to convince your wife to move to a rustic, dirty island. ~08:01 5. Messy, Beautiful No roads. No phones. A house that’s tiny but sits on the cliff over the beach. Praise and worship happening outside the front door every single night — which Rod describes as awesome and really weird in the same breath. When someone in the room offers “messy, beautiful” as a description, he takes it immediately. There’s no line between his life and his work. ~08:35 6. Fletcher Friday and Money Monday Thirty-nine people currently live at camp, and they do everything together — every meal, every day. The rhythms have names: Fletcher Friday, Money Monday for talking about investing, Wednesday Bible study, Saturday movie night. Rod calls it massive discipleship, life on life. Heather notes she didn’t even go to movie night that week. ~09:09 7. Everything Comes By Boat The camp sits in a canyon with no road access — two miles straight up and five down to Avalon on foot. So trash goes out by boat twice a week and groceries come in by boat twice a week. Gas runs around eight dollars a gallon. Water is over ten cents a gallon, roughly thirty times what the mainland pays. Heather’s reaction on arrival: we have to do what? ~15:26 8. The Church Closed and the Town Got Healthier Avalon had a church that stood for 150 years. Two years ago, after a season of genuinely hard things, it shut down. What Rod expected was a spiritual vacuum. What happened instead: a cowboy fellowship at the horse ranch, a Sunday morning fellowship, a Thursday night fellowship, YWAM moving in, another church planting. None of them are a church in a building. His read is that the town is doing better spiritually now than it was when it had one. ~12:42 9. Venting Is Vilifying Heather’s contribution on managing conflict in a community where nobody gets to go home: they have an explicit anti-venting policy. The instinct people have is to check — am I crazy, or are you experiencing this too? — and she’s coached the staff hard against it. If you have a problem with someone, go to them. It’s accentuated in a place like this, but she says it’s the only way that ever works. ~23:46 10. Manners Are the New Superpower Asked what he’d tell a room full of people in their twenties, Rod gives three. Pay me now or pay me later — everything costs more later, so put in the work now. Manners are the new superpower — show up, do what you said, don’t whine, be on time, write handwritten notes, and you will stand out almost effortlessly because most people don’t do the basic stuff. And: people grow into the conversations around them, so choose the rooms you’re in on purpose. ~24:28 Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

  2. Aug 26

    How One Word Shouted at His Car in Uganda Shaped Jeff Davis’s View of Himself

    Description Jeff Davis has spent forty-five years married to his high school sweetheart, twenty years in corporate tech, and twenty more in ministry and nonprofit work. This conversation went almost nowhere I planned. We started with a word he picked up in Uganda, Mazungu, which literally means “white man busily running around looking at his watch,” and spent the first half hour on what cross-cultural work does to a Westerner’s sense of superiority. From there Jeff walked me through the curriculum he’d design for Gen-Z if anyone let him, the moment he realized his corporate ladder was leaning against the wrong wall, and why he says the hardest thing he’s ever done isn’t raising two daughters, it’s staying married well. His wisdom on marriage, family, and leadership is something I really appreciate and I'm deeply grateful for the opportunity to speak with him. Lessons from Jeff 1. Mazungu — The White Man Looking at His WatchJeff picked the word up in Uganda by hearing children shout it at his car and then asking what it meant. The literal translation is a white man busily running around looking at his watch — a piece of colonial residue baked into everyday speech. What makes it land is that Jeff doesn’t flinch from it. He treats it the way he’d treat gringo: self-deprecating, field-leveling, and true enough to be useful.~01:56 2. Fail in Their Language and the Barrier DropsThe fastest way into a relationship abroad, Jeff says, is to attempt a greeting badly. People laugh at how miserably you’re failing — and in that moment the hierarchy inverts. They become the expert, you become the student, and suddenly there’s a project the two of you are working on together. The project is you.~00:38 3. The English Camp That Wasn’t About VocabularyIn Cambodia, Jeff’s team ran an English camp and discovered students weren’t coming for vocabulary. They came to hear pronunciation from a native speaker. That single, narrow thing people actually wanted turned into the opening for everything else the trip was there to do.~07:03 4. You Arrive With Superiority Whether You’re Humble or NotJeff admits to feeling less superior for being monolingual, but the sharper observation follows: coming from the West, you show up with a sense of superiority regardless of your character, and it takes time to even notice it before you can set it down.~08:21 5. Sheer Randomness, Not MeritThe place he was born put resources in his hands. Jeff’s read on the person across from him who has none: they probably work harder than him and they’re probably smarter than him. Once that lands, the relationship stops being patron-and-client and becomes person-to-person — which is the only foundation worth building on.~08:51 6. The Curriculum He’d Build for Gen ZGiven the chance, Jeff would teach cross-cultural experience, language learning, history, literature, Bible — and other religious writings alongside it, specifically so students would have something to compare against. His logic mirrors his travel philosophy: you understand where you’re standing only by engaging something alien to it.~09:53 7. The Scottish Enlightenment Nobody Talks AboutJeff traces American ideas about equality not to the French Enlightenment but to the Scottish one, and to fifty years of preaching that preceded the founders — the Judeo-Christian ethic arriving through pulpits rather than being invented in a room. He notes it emerged out of four centuries of feudalism and injustice, which is what makes it remarkable rather than inevitable.~16:25 8. The Book That Didn’t Feel RightAs a high schooler just after the civil rights era, Jeff read The Light and the Glory — a widely accepted book in Christian circles arguing America’s westward conquest did indigenous nations a favor. He couldn’t articulate why at the time, but it didn’t sit right. Learning to trust that instinct against the consensus of his own community is the quiet skill underneath most of this conversation.~23:07 9. The Testimony He Used to EnvyJeff has no dramatic conversion story — no rescue from addiction or crime, just faith absorbed at home and taken for granted through adolescence. He used to envy people whose testimonies had teeth. At sixty-six, he understands the dramatic testimony comes at a great cost, and that he never had to pay it.~30:05 10. Climbing a Ladder Leaning Against the Wrong WallTwenty years into a successful tech career, disillusioned, Jeff told the dean at Azusa Pacific that he couldn’t afford him. The dean didn’t blink: the money’s your problem, figure that out, I’ll give you a job. That answer reframed the whole thing, and Jeff took the job — eventually taking a 50% pay cut while Julie saw the security they’d lose and he saw only the opportunity.~33:30 11. Raising Kids is Easy, Maintaining a Marriage is The Real WorkForty-five years in, Jeff says raising kids was easy — maintaining a harmonious marriage is the most thrilling and challenging thing he’s ever done. He describes needing someone five-foot-four who could stand toe to toe with him, and calls being broken on her the thing that finally made him dependent on God. ~35:00 Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

  3. Aug 19

    How the Pope's Essay (on AI) Confirmed Ian Heisler's Convictions On The Importance of The Classroom.

    Description Today I’m joined by my brother Ian — one of my closest friends, an incredible poet, writer, and teacher of seven-plus years — for a conversation I’ve been looking forward to for a while and is really special as it is my twentieth episode (thanks for continuing to listen). We both read the Pope’s new encyclical on AI, technology, and human dignity. Our conversation ranges from what stuck with us, what it means for how Ian teaches, and how I parent, and build things with AI every day. Fair warning going in: I use AI constantly — this conversation isn’t anti-AI (at least from my point of view), it’s a “how do we use this well/can we use this well” conversation. Enjoy. Lessons 1. Two building projects: Babel vs. Nehemiah 00:00–19:45 The Pope frames the whole encyclical around two images: the Tower of Babel — a unified, impressive project built without reference to God, that sacrifices human dignity for efficiency and ends in confusion — versus Nehemiah rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, a humbler, collaborative, dignified project. Ian reads the Pope’s own language on Babel (”sacrifices human dignity for efficiency, and aspires to reach heaven without God’s blessing”) and calls it the interpretive lens for the rest of the letter. * Ian’s overall take: multi-layered, doesn’t even get to AI directly until nearly halfway through — grounded first in Catholic social doctrine. * Ian self-describes as leaning “Luddite” (Matt pushes back — “cautious,” not Luddite) but says the letter surfaced dangers he hadn’t considered, especially effects on the global poor and lower-income workers, not just wealthy tech users. * Despite the warnings, both agree the letter’s overall tone is hopeful, not fatalistic — it appeals to leaders to steer AI deliberately rather than treating its trajectory as inevitable. * Tangent: the “self-fulfilling prophecy” logic of “we have to keep optimizing/innovating because that’s just what you do” (Instagram reel reference). 2. The technocratic paradigm & “using power well” 19:45–33:55 Centered on the Romano Guardini quote from paragraph 95 — “Contemporary man has not been trained to use power well” — and Pope Francis’s earlier term “the technocratic paradigm” (¶92): the logic of efficiency, control, and profit shaping personal, social, and economic decisions. * Matt’s question: has any era actually used power well, or is this just the permanent human condition (the Fall)? * Rabbit trail: they Google Romano Guardini (1885–1968) — lived through both World Wars, which frames the quote historically. * Matt only half-jokingly stakes out a monarchist position; Ian counters with George Washington voluntarily relinquishing power after two terms as a counterexample of power used well. * Ian’s key read: the technocratic paradigm makes technology more than a tool — it becomes the standard by which everything is judged, reducing creation to something to exploit and people to “cogs in a system driven toward ever greater efficiency” (¶93). 3. Does AI level the playing field, or concentrate power? 33:55–47:46 Matt’s question, tied to paragraph 108: is AI an amplifier for those who already have resources (design bias, business logic baked into models — e.g., the Google Gemini historical-image controversy) or a leveling force for the average person (e.g., Matt building his own half-Ironman training app in a couple hours with no coding background)? * Ian’s pushback: individual convenience isn’t the same as global equity — the Pope is thinking at the scale of nations and supply chains, not just individual hustle. * The “genie in a bottle” illusion: prompts feel weightless but sit on top of real infrastructure — data centers, water and power consumption for cooling, and (ties to later chapters) labor in the majority world extracting the materials and running the infrastructure that makes AI possible. * Shared conclusion: AI can lower the barrier to entry for individuals with ideas, but that doesn’t cancel out the larger pattern the Pope is naming — the people already holding capital, data, and expertise still benefit most. 4. “Cultivated, not built”: AI in Ian’s classroom 47:46–1:08:00 The heart of the education conversation. Starting from paragraph 104’s point that AI is never morally neutral — every model embodies choices about what it measures, ignores, and optimizes — Matt asks whether Ian distinguishes between “cultivating” and “building” a student. * Ian prefers “cultivation” as the education metaphor: ongoing, slow, never a one-time finished product — closer to tending land than assembling a thing. * Real policy detail: Ian’s school moved to fully handwritten, in-class work once ChatGPT went free ~2 years ago, because there’s no reliable way to verify authorship of anything typed at home. Matt calls it a hard line; Ian says he doesn’t know a more effective alternative if the goal is guaranteeing kids actually think for themselves. * Direct question: has Ian seen students lose the ability to sit with hard questions or tolerate difficulty because of AI/instant-answer culture? Ian: yes, sees it constantly — the “fill out the worksheet as fast as possible, then check out” mindset. Learning that comes fast doesn’t get valued or retained; things that took a year (like finally speaking up in a seminar) stick. * Riff on paragraph 100 — AI’s simulated care and the risk of losing “the very desire to form genuine human connections.” Extended into a broader point: TikTok/social media isn’t a neutral tool either — “tools don’t use you back,” but attention-economy products do. “You are the product.” * That Hideous Strength (C.S. Lewis) comes up as a parallel — the disembodied, reanimated head that the human characters believe they control but is actually being animated by an outside force — as a picture of the spiritual dimension behind powerful technology, regardless of whether its builders believe in the spiritual world. 5. Two loves, limitation, and the fruit of patience 1:08:00–1:18:07 Drawing on paragraphs 118, 120, and 130 — the “two cities/two loves” framing (love of self vs. love of God and neighbor) and the idea that humanity flourishes through its limitations, not despite them. * Ian reads paragraph 120 in full as one of his favorite passages in the whole document — the point that eliminating suffering would also extinguish love and desire, and that “the wonders of the soul” only occur through the interplay of freedom, failure, dreams, and disappointment. * Matt connects this to efficiency as an idol: wanting to get through pain quickly and “learn everything about it as fast as possible” is never actually how growth happens. Patience, like the fruit of the Spirit, is cultivated, not built. * Concrete example: information you look up instantly (Matt’s margarita-history example) doesn’t stick the way information earned slowly does — ties directly back to what Ian sees in students. 6. Closing reflections: slowness, parenthood, and craftsmanship 1:18:07–1:27:00 * Matt reflects on the paradox of his current season as a new dad — life feels fast, but he wants to be more intentional about slowing down and being deliberate about what he’s “cultivating” in his family, since “so much of how we do life is how we’re taught.” * Ian’s personal takeaway from the encyclical: conviction to prioritize interruptions from real people (e.g., a student who wants to talk) over routine/efficiency, and more awareness of how AI’s costs land hardest on the poor and the majority world — a blind spot he named in himself. * Malcolm Guite’s Arthurian narrative poems (Ian corrects Matt on-air: it’s a quartet, not trilogy — first is Galahad) come up as a picture of the “sweat equity” and cultivation baked into real craftsmanship, contrasted with what a single AI prompt can generate. Extends into a short reflection on the beauty of expertise and craft generally (coding included) as part of how God wired creativity into the world. Connector Questions Question from our last guest: What is one habit you know you need but haven’t started yet? Ian’s question for the next guest: What is something that’s making your life more disembodied or less human — and how could you rehumanize your life more? Guest Background Notes Guest: Ian Heisler, Matt’s brotherReference material discussed on the episode:- The Pope’s 2026 encyclical (full text/audio, ~3 hrs at normal speed)- C.S. Lewis’s That Hideous Strength- Malcolm Guite’s Arthurian poetry quartet (starting with Galahad) Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

  4. Aug 12

    How the Space Between the Promise and the Land Shaped Josh Henry's Patience

    Description Today, I’m joined by my friend Josh Henry. He’s been part of my story for over a decade. We met working together at Apple, and I got to watch him go from there into A21, an anti-trafficking organization where he eventually became my boss as I contracted with them through college. He’s a husband, a father, and a pastor, and lives out in Nashville. This was a really special conversation for me as it pulls on some of the biggest questions I’m wrestling with in this season: what it actually looks like to be faithful and wholehearted in a season where you can’t yet see what God’s doing. Enjoy. Lessons From Josh 1. The Trifecta That Confirmed a Calling - Josh didn’t move continents on a whim. He moved on the collision of three separate certainties: a woman he was in awe of, a cause he’d fallen in love with, and a whispered inner impression from the Holy Spirit about a city — Newport Beach — he hadn’t even lived in yet. When all three lined up, the decision stopped feeling like a risk and started feeling like obedience. ~14:30 2. Nick and Chris “Charge Hell With a Water Pistol” - Josh’s early leaders at A21 modeled a specific kind of faith — aware of darkness, unwilling to hide from it. Being immersed in that visionary, socially engaged leadership didn’t just teach him a leadership style. It became a mirror that showed him who he already wanted to be. ~19:02 3. Chris Caine Found Her Calling at 40 - One of the freeing moments in the conversation: Josh’s leader didn’t discover the cause that would define her ministry until midlife. Her example taught him never to put God’s leading into a box of preferences or a fixed identity — obedience doesn’t have an age limit. ~23:16 4. Identity Received, Not Achieved - Leaning on Tim Keller, Josh names the trap almost every driven person falls into — tying worth to output. The gospel flips it: you’re already a son or daughter, so the work becomes something you’re free to do well, not something you need to succeed at to be somebody. ~25:31 5. “My Hour Has Not Yet Come” - Josh points to Jesus’s own repeated acknowledgment of timing that wasn’t his to control. Living in “the space between” the promise and its fulfillment — what Josh calls hope deferred — is where trust actually gets built, not around it. ~27:02 6. Wholehearted Even Without an Outlet - While waiting years for a platform to preach, Josh wrote sermons with no audience — simply because faithfulness in the wait looked like doing the work before anyone gave him permission to. He calls it enrolling in “the school of timing.” ~29:49 7. The Painting Is Still Being Made - Trusting a process you can’t see the end of, Josh compares it to paint hitting a canvas — you don’t know yet if it’s a Jackson Pollock or a Picasso, but it’s still going to be beautiful in its own right once it’s finished. ~37:31 8. Content Dreamers, Not a Contradiction - Being satisfied with today and still dreaming toward tomorrow aren’t opposites. Josh preached an entire message on this to his students, insisting contentment and ambition can live in the same heart at the same time. ~41:56 9. Convictions You Don’t Set Get Set For You - On raising two young kids in a hyperconnected culture, Josh’s most quotable line of the conversation: if you don’t decide your family’s priorities on purpose, the culture will decide them for you by default. ~53:10 10. A Great Conversation Is What Makes His Heart Say Yes - Asked what makes him feel most alive, Josh didn’t point to ministry wins or metrics. He pointed to the table — to shared meals and honest conversation — calling it a preview of what heaven itself might mostly be like. ~58:33 Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

  5. Aug 5

    How Learning to Soothe His Newborn Daughter Shaped Peter Varberg's Coaching

    Description Today I’m joined by Peter Varberg. He grew up a missionary kid in Tacloban, Philippines — the kind of upbringing where his dad’s name opened doors before he ever said a word himself, and being blonde and blue-eyed in a country where that stood out meant he never really got to be anonymous. He studied film almost by accident, won “Film of the Year” as a freshman with a borrowed camera, and eventually found his way into sales and coaching. We talk about the real difference between managing people and leading them, what nearly two decades of missionary-family duty taught him about doing work , and how becoming a father less than a year into marriage cracked open everything he thought he understood about provision. We talk about how knowing when to pause something is important and that most of what shapes us doesn’t look like a plan while we’re living it — usually you only see the hand that was guiding you once you look back. If you enjoyed this podcast and want to hear more like this, please consider subscribing. This is a passion project for me and the more I can fund this, the more time I can invest in it. Lessons from Peter 1. Coaching and therapy solve different problems, and knowing the line matters. Peter went through ICF (International Coaching Federation) training that drew a clear distinction: therapy looks backward, processing where a pattern started and unlearning it; coaching looks forward, setting goals and taking action. He’s upfront that the line gets blurry in practice, and that part of coaching well is knowing when to point someone toward a therapist instead of trying to be one. (13:00–15:00) 2. Growing up in a “fishbowl” taught him to carry expectations before he ever chose his own. As a missionary kid in Tacloban, Peter couldn’t go anywhere without people already knowing his father — a six-foot-three American pastor who spoke five languages and knew everybody in the city. That visibility came with a quiet pressure: his actions reflected on his parents’ reputation, and he absorbed a heightened sense of duty and responsibility long before he understood he was absorbing it. All three siblings, he notes, ended up in therapy working through some version of the same thing — a reminder that even a genuinely good upbringing can wire in patterns worth examining as an adult. (18:00–21:00) 3. “Nobody ends up doing what they studied” — so he picked his major out of curiosity, not certainty. As kids, Peter’s dad walked him and his brother around Tacloban to interview successful people in different fields about how they’d chosen their careers — his own version of a podcast, years before podcasts existed. The lesson Peter actually walked away with was almost a joke: since so few people end up in the field they studied, he decided to study what was simply interesting to him. That’s how a video-editing hobby became a double major in graphic design and film. (27:00–30:00) 4. He built his early film career on effort, not innate talent. As a freshman intro-to-film student, Peter borrowed a friend’s Canon 5D Mark II — brand new technology at the time — while everyone else was still shooting on mini-DV tape. The film wasn’t exceptional, he admits, but it looked like a movie next to everyone else’s student work, and he won Film of the Year as a freshman. From there he went all-in: building his own camera dollies out of PVC pipe and skateboard wheels, welding jibs with a friend, chasing every new technique he could find on YouTube. (36:00–40:00) 5. His daughter’s inability to self-soothe became his sharpest leadership lesson yet. Peter went down a rabbit hole on “assisted naps” and newborn brain development — kids under a certain age physically cannot calm themselves down, so a crying baby isn’t being difficult, it’s in genuine fight-or-flight. That reframe from “why won’t you just settle” to “this is medically incapable of self-soothing yet” produced compassion instead of frustration. He maps the same insight directly onto coaching: leaders who are “unconsciously competent” at their own jobs often can’t see that a new hire’s mistakes aren’t laziness — it’s literally their first time doing this. (52:00–58:00) 6. “Work is not the enemy” — and he wants to build something around that conviction. Peter is sitting on one recorded episode of a podcast he hasn’t finished launching, built around the idea (inspired by Tim Keller’s Every Good Endeavor) that culture treats work as something to escape rather than as part of our design. Coming from a family of missionaries on both sides, he’s wrestled directly with the sacred-versus-secular question — pastor or missionary vs. a “regular” job — and landed on the conviction that work itself is good, not a necessary evil to be minimized. (58:00–1:03:00) 7. Pausing a good idea can be the healthiest decision, not a failure of nerve. One of Peter’s own coaches pushed him to book a recording date for his podcast on the spot — and he did, and it worked. But he’s just as quick to push back on hustle-culture coaching that treats every unfulfilled dream as fear in disguise. His actual framework: look honestly at your current capacity and priorities, and if there’s nothing left to give something, pausing it is a healthy call — not a leap of faith you’re too scared to take. (58:00–1:03:00) 8. Marriage and a baby eight months later pushed him into a season of “I don’t have enough” — until it wasn’t.Peter got married about a year and a half before this conversation, then found out they were expecting just eight months in. He describes months of feeling like he lacked the capacity, in his own strength, to meet the need he thought he needed to meet — a kind of slow-motion Gideon story. Once the baby arrived, he could finally see that the provision he needed had been there all along; he just couldn’t access it by force of will. (1:05:00–1:08:00) 9. You can only see God’s faithfulness by looking backward, never forward. Closing the conversation, Peter lands on the image of rowing a boat — facing backward toward where you’ve been, with no way to see what’s ahead. He connects it to “your word is a lamp unto my feet”: in the ancient world, a lamp only lit the very next step, not the whole road. The takeaway isn’t to demand more clarity before moving — it’s to trust that the next step is the only one you’re owed right now. (1:10:00–1:12:00) Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

  6. Jul 22

    How Saying Yes to Open Doors Led Arian Ghiacy from a Filing Cabinet to Nearly Two Decades in Nonprofit Leadership

    Description Today I’m joined by Arian Ghiacy. He grew up in a single-parent home in a rough part of Anaheim, and from a young age he clung to the idea that even though his earthly father had failed him, he had a Heavenly Father who never would. That conviction ends up threading through almost every decision in his life — a part-time bookstore job at Insight for Living, a season writing thank-you letters at Orange County Rescue Mission, an unplanned four-year run at an investment firm through the 2008 crash, and — almost by accident — becoming the interim pastor of a small Afghan Christian church in LA while working full-time in the corporate world. We talk about what it actually looks like to hear God’s voice at every turn of a career that never really had a five-year plan attached to it. Arian walks through building a development department and volunteer program from the ground up at Friendly Center over 13 years, why he believes relationships — not tactics — are what actually move fundraising, and what it cost him to keep saying yes to open doors while also building a marriage and raising kids. He also gets honest about the season he got caught up chasing certifications and credentials, and the question from his pastor that reframed his whole relationship to ambition. We close on his new role as Director of Advancement at a classical school, and what it means to finally stop trying to plan his own life. Most of the doors that shape your life don’t look like much when you’re standing in front of them — looking back is often the only way you ever really see how God was driving the whole time. Enjoy. 10 Lessons from Arian 1. A failed earthly father doesn’t disqualify you from a faithful Heavenly one. Arian’s story starts with a wound that could have become a lifelong excuse: a dad who wasn’t there in the way a father is meant to be. But instead of letting that absence define him, he let it drive him toward God — not as a concept, but as Father. That single shift becomes a thread through everything else in his life: the courage to step into responsibility early, the ability to keep showing up without needing perfect conditions, and the steady belief that he isn’t ultimately orphaned in the world. A lot of people spend years trying to “outwork” a father wound. Arian did something rarer: he let it become the place where trust in God got forged. (2:00–6:00) 2. God’s leading is usually only visible in hindsight. Over and over, Arian describes a life that didn’t feel like a master plan while it was happening. It felt like doors opening, seasons changing, and him doing the next faithful thing without knowing what it would add up to. Only later could he see the through-line — how one strange job, one unexpected relationship, one “this will be temporary” season became the training ground for what came next. The lesson isn’t “you should be more strategic.” It’s almost the opposite: don’t demand clarity as the price of obedience. God rarely gives you the full map — but He does give enough light for the next step. (19:00–24:00, 1:08:00) 3. Say yes to the small, unglamorous door in front of you. Arian’s defining opportunities didn’t arrive with a spotlight. They looked like filing cabinets, entry-level tasks, weird scheduling breaks, and roles that sounded unimpressive on paper. But he treated the “small” thing in front of him as meaningful, and that posture kept positioning him for bigger responsibility. There’s a quiet challenge here for anyone waiting for their calling to feel epic: sometimes God hides the next chapter inside a task you’d be tempted to dismiss. Humility and faithfulness with the small door is often the only way you ever get to the bigger one. (6:00–14:00) 4. Discernment grows out of relationship with God, not a formula. When you listen to Arian talk about guidance, he isn’t describing a technique — he’s describing a life with God. “The more you pray and lean into Him, the easier it becomes to recognize those moments.” That’s not a hack; it’s a long obedience. What makes his decisions compelling isn’t that he always knew the perfect answer. It’s that he kept returning to prayer, wise counsel, and a willingness to be led — even when it meant changing direction. If you want clarity, the most practical thing you can do isn’t build a decision spreadsheet. It’s deepen the relationship that produces discernment in the first place. (24:00–35:00) 5. Relationships outperform tactics in fundraising — and in life. Arian has been close enough to development work to see the temptation: lean on tactics because they’re measurable and repeatable. But his conviction is simple: donors don’t give because you found the perfect angle — they give because they trust you, they trust the mission, and they feel personally connected to the story. Strategy matters, but it can’t substitute for credibility and care. That’s true in fundraising, and it’s true in almost every arena: the long-term wins usually come from trust built slowly, not cleverness deployed quickly. (50:00–54:00) 6. Servant leadership means being willing to stay in the background. Arian keeps circling back to a kind of leadership that doesn’t need attention to feel valuable. He talks about serving, supporting, and building — doing work that’s essential but not flashy. In a world that trains us to measure leadership by visibility, his posture is a rebuke: you can carry real influence without the stage. Servant leadership doesn’t mean you have no conviction or direction — it means you’re more committed to the mission than to being seen. And in development and ministry work especially, the person who can lead from the background is often the person who can sustain the work for the long haul. (54:00–1:00:00) 7. Knowing when a season is over matters as much as knowing when to say yes. Most people can relate to the fear of starting something new. Fewer people have the courage to admit when a season has done its work and it’s time to release it. Arian’s story includes several closures that weren’t driven by burnout or disaster — just an internal sense that the assignment was complete. That’s wisdom: being faithful to a season without turning it into an identity. Sometimes staying too long is its own form of disobedience. The holy work is learning to recognize not only the doors God opens, but the doors He’s quietly asking you to walk away from. (13:00–19:00, 24:00–35:00) 8. Credentials and career-climbing can crowd out contentment. One of the sharpest moments in the conversation is that pastor’s question: “Have you needed those things for God to lead you through all of your previous doors?” It’s a gentle but devastating dismantling of the assumption that the next step requires a new badge. Arian isn’t anti-learning; he’s anti-striving. The point is that ambition can disguise itself as stewardship — and suddenly you’re collecting credentials to quiet insecurity, not to serve people better. The reframe is freeing: if God has been faithful to lead you so far, you don’t need to manufacture legitimacy. You need to keep listening and keep showing up. (1:04:00) 9. Trust has to be paired with patience. Arian’s life is a slow story. Not because nothing happened — but because growth, clarity, and answered prayers often took years to come into focus. He keeps pointing out that God’s timing rarely matches our urgency, and that the fruit of a season is often invisible while you’re in it. Patience isn’t passive; it’s active endurance — continuing to do the next right thing while you wait for God to make sense of it. Trust without patience turns into anxiety. Patience without trust turns into resignation. Together, they form a kind of steady faith that can survive long seasons of “not yet.” (1:08:00) 10. Parenting becomes a mirror for your own relationship with God. That pants story is funny because it’s so human — and it lands because it’s so true. Parenting puts you face to face with your own limits: how quickly you get frustrated, how hard it is to release control, how often love gets tested by repetition. And in that pressure, you start seeing yourself in your child — and then seeing God with you in the same frame. Matt’s point isn’t that parenting makes you holy overnight. It’s that it reveals what’s already in you, and it gives you constant opportunities to practice patience, gentleness, and surrender. If you want a daily discipleship lab, you don’t have to go looking for one — it’s already in your house. (1:13:00) Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

  7. Jul 2

    How Making A Documentary Taught Will Tober to Let God Define What Success Looks Like

    Description Will Tober is a Jesus follower, husband, and father whose faith shapes the way he works. His experience spans things like producing the documentary The Drop Box, board member at the Pregnancy Resource Center, and co-founder of 100 Companies That Care. In this conversation, we get into how a random LA Times article led a college kid to South Korea to film a story that ended up changing his life, how that film planted a seed for everything he’s built since in the nonprofit world, and what it actually looks like to be a driven man trying to hold family, faith, career, and calling all at once. Enjoy. Lessons From Will 1. Draw Hard Lines Around What Matters Will is home by 5:30pm. Non-negotiable. He’s learned to maximize the hours he gives to work so he can be fully present for everything else. He acknowledges that in commercial real estate, more hours usually means more money — and he’s made peace with leaving something on the table. Faith makes that easier. The practical boundary is just the output of a deeper conviction about what actually matters. (10:08) 2. Community Isn’t About Having Answers — It’s About Not Being Alone One of the most honest moments in the conversation is when Will talks about how community doesn’t usually hand you solutions. It just reminds you that you’re not the only one who doesn’t have this figured out. We know rationally that parenting and marriage and career and faith have challenged every generation before us — and yet it still feels uniquely impossible when it’s yours. The right people around you don’t fix that. They just make it bearable enough to keep going. (13:56) 3. The Achiever’s Real Enemy Is Fear of Failure Will describes himself as someone who’s always had an achiever mentality — doing every sport, setting long-term goals earlier than most of his peers, carrying a sense of family legacy from grandparents who immigrated from Mexico and a dad who was the first in the family to go to college. But underneath all of it was a pretty intense fear of failure that prevented him from trying things where there was a real risk of not succeeding. He’s been working to break that his whole life. High ambition and deep fear of failure are not opposites — they often travel together. (19:18) 4. Less About What You’re Doing, More About Who You’re Becoming Will talks about work not primarily as a vehicle for income or even impact, but as a classroom. He’s passionate about commercial real estate, believes there’s good in it, and sees opportunities to build relationships and invest in the kingdom through it. But more than any of that, he believes a big piece of why God puts us in the work we’re in is to teach us things we couldn’t learn any other way. That framing changes everything about how you show up when the work is hard. (25:24) 5. Saying Yes Before You Know What It Costs Is the Whole Point When Brian pitched Will on flying to South Korea to make a documentary about a pastor who built a box to receive abandoned babies, Will had no film background and no idea what a producer even did. He said yes anyway. That yes eventually generated $10 million, led to a Netflix deal, and planted seeds for everything he’s built since in the nonprofit world. You don’t need to know what you’re doing. You just need to give your yes. (31:00) 6. God Redefines the Success Metrics The Drop Box got rejected by Sundance, Cannes, and every major film festival they submitted to. The only ones that accepted it were the Christian ones — which was ironic, because they’d set out to make something that would reach beyond the church. They ended up winning $150,000 at a San Antonio Christian film festival that doesn’t even exist anymore, which funded the rest of the film. Will says in its success, God was still refining them by stripping away all the cool factors. Sometimes the door you wanted to walk through isn’t the one that opens. (35:55) 7. The Real Impact Is Usually Hidden 100 Companies That Care has generated unexpected outcomes Will and his co-founder never planned for — nonprofits collaborating with each other, board members joining from the business community, volunteer events, and donations beyond what the format requires. One nonprofit donated their entire literacy curriculum to an orphanage they’d never heard of before meeting them at a quarterly meeting. Will says most of the results from saying yes to God are hidden — seeds you plant and never see sprout. You build anyway. (48:53) 8. On the Other Side of Every No Is a Yes Will’s not naturally good at saying no. But the reframe that’s helped him most is this: every no is a yes to something else. He’s not declining because he doesn’t believe in what he’s being asked to do — he’s saying yes to something that ranks higher. And in this season, that something is almost always family. That turns no from a refusal into a redirection. (52:35) 9. Fatherhood Is the Best Theology Class You’ll Ever Take Will says he lives his faith more than he could ever read it. Becoming a dad has given him a window into who God is that no amount of Bible study could fully open. When he’s frustrated with his son, he catches himself thinking about how God is equally patient with him. When he feels completely unequipped as a parent, he reminds himself that God is his son’s real Father. Fatherhood doesn’t just teach you about love — it teaches you what it feels like to be loved the way God loves you. (57:40) 10. Parenting Is the Biggest Obstacle and the Clearest Calling When asked what’s occupying the most headspace and keeping him up at night, Will doesn’t say business development or nonprofit growth. He says parenting. The tension between feeling utterly unequipped and desperately wanting to get it right. The fear of messing his kids up. The daily work of being comfortable in the uncomfortable. He’s not performing like he has it together — he’s just trying to show up and trust that presence counts for something. (58:36) Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

  8. Jun 24

    How a Monday Night Table and a Sunday Pot of Pasta Shaped Bruce Bartolomeo's Life of Service

    Description Bruce Bartolomeo is an entrepreneur, husband, father, and grandfather who spent over 30 years building a construction company before stepping away to devote himself fully to mentorship and service. He serves on the board of The Barnabas Group and several other non profits I loved getting to chat with Bruce and talk about the power of early mentorship, the cost of being more married to your business than your wife, the paradigm shift from owner to steward, and what it looks like to be an intentional father of daughters. I’m really excited to look at this conversation throughout the years and continue to glean from his wisdom. Enjoy! Lessons from Bruce 1. You can be starving for a mentor without knowing it. (00:43) Bruce opens with a line that landed hard: “I didn’t even know I needed a mentor when I was your age. I think I was internally starving for one.” A lot of men are running hard and empty at the same time, proving something to no one in particular. Naming the hunger is the first step to doing something about it. 2. Grit is an asset and a liability — it depends on what you’re married to. (01:02) Bruce was so driven to succeed that he was, in his words, “more married to his business than his wife.” The grit that built the company also cost his family. He’s honest about the resentment it created and the healing that had to follow. High capacity without self-awareness is just high-speed damage. 3. When your identity shifts from achievement to Christ, everything changes. (01:58) The turning point for Bruce wasn’t a program or a sermon — it was understanding, at a deep level, that his identity was in Christ and not in what he did or what others associated with him. Until that settled, nothing else could. Identity is the foundation. Everything else is built on top of it. 4. The right kind of leader doesn’t drive people — they follow. (05:54) Bruce references the image of Middle Eastern shepherds, where sheep follow the shepherd rather than being driven. Leadership built on trust, shared mission, and genuine care creates followership you don’t have to force. People move with leaders they believe in. That’s not management. That’s discipleship. 5. Some of the most formative mentors teach by contrast. (07:10) Bruce learned how not to lead from a difficult boss early in his career. He made a promise to himself: if I ever have employees, I will never treat them this way. Negative models are still models. The question is whether we let bad experiences make us bitter or better. 6. Trust extended to you builds confidence that lasts decades. (14:16) At 14, a gas station owner handed Bruce the keys and told him to close the place. He’d only been working there a few months. That act of trust — unexpected, unearned, extended freely — built something in Bruce that shaped how he led people for the rest of his life. When someone older trusts you and you don’t betray it, it frames how life works. 7. The best mentors love you back into line. (19:44) Lou Spinelli, Bruce’s cousin’s husband and the man he spent summers with on the farm, never got harsh when Bruce was heading in the wrong direction. He would have “loved him back into line” — honest conversation, relational warmth, no withdrawal of affection. That kind of correction is more powerful than punishment because the relationship is the accountability. 8. Stewardship changes everything. (28:54) In a Convene meeting, something clicked for Bruce. He heard men talking about “my business, my business, my business” — and then realized: we’re not owners. We’re temporary stewards who have to give an account. When you hold your work that way, you’re responsible not just to yourself and your employees, but to the One who gave you every tool, every talent, every opportunity. 9. He doesn’t always call the equipped — and that’s intentional. (31:07) Bruce says he believes God intentionally does not call the equipped, because equipped people tend to rely on their own capacity. The call that comes to someone with nothing is the one where God gets to say, “Watch me.” That’s where the excitement is. That’s the tip of the spear. 10. Your career is what you’re paid for. Your calling is what you’re made for. (34:02) Bruce did Bob Shank’s Priority Living Master’s Program from 2003–2006, still running his business at the time. That three-year journey broke something open. The distinction between career and calling wasn’t just semantic — it fundamentally reoriented how he thought about the years ahead of him. 11. The fruit of fatherhood shows up later than you plant it. (39:02) Bruce’s daughter in Virginia calls him nearly every day. His grandkids sleep over once a week. His daughters are the same hospitable, community-building people he and Becky modeled for years. None of that happens without the seeds planted quietly over decades. Presence compounds. 12. What you allow, you encourage. (01:10:30) Asked about a lesson from his greatest failures, Bruce’s answer was this: what you allow, you encourage. In business, in parenting, in relationships — avoidance of necessary confrontation isn’t kindness. It’s permission. Addressing what needs to be addressed, respectfully and early, is one of the most loving things a leader can do. 13. Your daughters need a father, not another friend. (01:07:28) Bruce is clear: they have enough friends. They need a father. That means meeting the boys, having the garage talk, setting expectations high, and being willing to be the bad guy so she doesn’t have to fight that battle alone. The goal isn’t their approval. It’s their safety and formation. 14. Apologize on your knees. (01:02:15) When Bruce was too harsh with one of his daughters, he didn’t let it pass. He went to her room, got down to her level, looked her in the eye, and said: “I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve that. Will you forgive me?” That teaches children that trust can be restored — and it models the kind of humility and ownership that forms the next generation. 15. Check your wake. (01:20:18) Bruce closes with a metaphor from water skiing: the condition of your wake depends on how you’re driving the boat. When you interact with someone, what’s the condition of your wake? Did you leave them better for having been with you — or did you make the water rough for them? It’s a simple question worth asking after every significant interaction. Get full access to Matt Heisler at mattheisler.substack.com/subscribe

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About

A series of honest conversations, hosted by Matt Heisler, on exploring creativity and leadership within the faith based non-profit world as he seeks to ask the questions that help him understand his own journey in light of the perspectives and experiences his share. mattheisler.substack.com

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  • Creator
    Matt Heisler
  • Years Active
    2026
  • Episodes
    23
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Matt Heisler
  • Show Website
    I Don't Know You