EP260 - Aki & Family Streaming

Welcome to the Church Digital Podcast. Through this podcast, we'll talk about the technological

innovations within the church. But more than tech for tech itself, we'll address deeper questions.

Is disciple making possible digitally? How should we approach the digital mission field?

Can a biblically grounded church operate in digital space? Oh, and where does the metaverse

fit into all this? Whether you're a big or small church, an established church, or a startup church

plant. The Church Digital's goal is to help churches like yours learn to be a multiplying church,

digitally and physically. Our heart? That churches like yours will discover a newfound focus on

disciple making that will revolutionize your church. And now, here's your host, Jeff Reed.

All right. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Church Digital Podcast, broadcasting live on Twitch.

My name is Jeff Reed, founder of the Church Digital, Digital Church Network. And it's

awesome to hang out with you here on Digital Church Network's Twitch channel. So we are doing this

broadcast live. If you're in the Twitch audience, you can hear me in real time. It's Thursday afternoon,

and it's great to hang out with you. I'm excited about today's guest. We also are doing this as a

podcast recording on Monday. And so if you're listening to it on the podcast, what's wrong with

you? Come hang out with us on Twitch. We broadcast this every Thursday afternoon here in season four of the

Church Digital Podcasts, where we're hanging out talking about gamers, Jesus, and church. So

through this season, we've been highlighting, well, different things within gaming culture, within

nude culture. That would be incredibly inappropriate. And the Twitch filters are probably going off

somewhere. Within nerd, nerd culture. I'm sure somebody out there is laughing right now. And then also

getting into esports, digital missionaries, Twitch, Discord, everything that's centered around this

gaming culture. And so I'm excited. Literally, I'm excited about today's guest because I have been

trying to have an interview, a podcast interview, really a conversation with this guy for, well,

shoot, at least a year, at least if not multiple. And I'll be honest, very few people have ever said

no to me. But this is the one guy who he didn't say no. He said, let's reschedule. And then it was

a year. And then, hey, we finally came back around to it, including him. No, I'm kidding. I love

Aki. And so, hey, let's go and bring Aki into the conversation. And looking forward to digging into

this conversation. I don't know what will hit. Actually, I probably wouldn't ask him what are we

going to hit. But let's do this, Aki. But before we get into this a little bit, you know, I love your

room. Set up Destiny 2. I'm sure we'll get into Destiny 2 in the conversation. What is Aki?

What is Aki?

You're on your, like, birth certificate. So what are we doing here? Aki, A-K-I. What does

that mean?

That's right. Aki is actually short for a character name. It's short for Akihiko Sonata, which

is from a Japanese RPG called Persona 3. And I love the Persona series very much. And it

was just kind of a name that I took on and I shortened it because it's Akihiko Sonata is

a mouthful and it's kind of long. And it wasn't completely representative of who I wanted

to be on Twitch. And so who I am personally is part of Akihiko and Fam. And that is, you

can actually see that right over there. But I stream with my family. I'm the father of a

household, father to two amazing kids, husband to an awesome wife named Mama Peach. And we

stream with our whole family. I game with all my kids and the dogs that go running by occasionally

when packages come to the front door. And I was absolutely laughing at you behind the scenes

as you made your verbal missteps and other things there. But it was a good time. Actually,

it was funny. We delayed this so long. We had a chance to meet IRL back in October, which

was awesome and had a lot of good times there at Megazord. I'm so grateful for the conversations

we've had since then. I'm really excited about today.

So yeah, I stream on Twitch. I set about... We just celebrated our third year streamversary.

So we just started our third year on Twitch. And I decided I want to create a space that could

feel like home for either those that didn't have one or maybe had a toxic relationship with

theirs. And so yeah, that's what we've set about to do.

Awesome. And so I am really looking forward... Yeah, I'm really looking forward to getting

into this family streaming and learning more about this. I've watched some of your streams

and just the family environment is... Man, it just gives me the warmth. It's like, man,

this is nice. This is home. And the idea that you've created that environment for the people

that have not been able to receive that is just so telling. I was actually... I mean,

people are like, yeah, that's not real. Actually, I read this article. I'm going to show my nerd

culture here for a minute and just open, honest conversation. We're going to dig into this.

I was reading an article where Jamie Foxx was talking with Peter... I believe his name's Peter

Cullen. Does that name sound familiar?

It does sound familiar, yeah.

He's the voice actor for Optimus Prime.

Okay, okay.

Like the guy who has been Optimus Prime, Peter Cullen, since like the cartoon in the 80s. He did

the cartoons, the movies in the 80s. He did the... Was it the Michael Bay stuff or the

Bruckheimer, whichever one of those... Yeah, yeah. It was Michael Bay because he had a lot of

explosions. And like Peter Cullen died just maybe... Pretty recent.

Yeah. Yeah. And it's funny. They were in the middle of like a Netflix...

Transformers shoot and they had to find another voice actor. And I'm sorry, whoever that guy is,

he's nothing compared to Peter Cullen. And so...

It was iconic, really.

But there was this interview where Jamie Foxx was talking about his relationship with Peter Cullen.

And what Jamie Foxx said was, Peter Cullen was the only stable male father figure that was in my

house growing up. He was that person. Not because he showed up in the house, but because he was on a

cartoon. And it's incredible to think of the power and potential that even we can have utilizing this

technology to engage with people. And so the fact that you're wanting to do this right up at the top,

hey, I want to create a family environment online for people that don't have that.

Like, dude, that's incredible.

Let me just ask, Aki, as we're opening up this conversation, where did that vision come from?

So I think for me personally, it just kind of came from the fact that growing up, I was just going to be

really vulnerable here. I didn't always have the best relationship with my parents. There was a lot

of... We weren't necessarily always encouraged to talk openly about our feelings and emotions and the

things that we were struggling with and going through. And it's not... I don't think that my

parents intentionally did anything wrong. I think it's just they were doing their best based on how

they were raised. But as I've gotten older and as I've had kids of my own, I've realized that it's

important for us to be open and honest and vulnerable about the things that we struggle

with. Because so often you'll find that other people are struggling with similar things. And when

we bear one another's burdens in a way that can really honor Christ, I think it's so important

because authenticity brings vulnerability. And when we are authentic about the things that we're going

through and struggling with and struggling with about how life is not always sunshine and rainbows

and roses and parenting's hard. Kids go through things. We go through stuff. Life throws things

at us constantly. That you're surprised about what you learn about how not isolated we are and how

community can really happen online. And you can really feel, I think, Christ's love in a healthy

environment, even just here on Twitch. Yeah. Authenticity breeds vulnerability.

They don't teach you that in seminary. Or maybe they do at this point. But that has been something

culturally that we've seen change night and day. And it's so hard for some of the, forgive the term,

the old dogs, some of the old school, to adapt and to understand that in weakness and showing weakness,

there's strength because you're able to connect with people at a far greater level at your weakness

than by pushing and posing with your strengths.

Yeah. Absolutely.

So talk to me a little bit because you're creating a family environment. We'll put links in the show notes

and allow others maybe to get a feel for that. But describe for me a little bit. Because I've seen,

you know, there's already a joke in chat where Chino Mage is like, are you playing D2 right now?

Because evidently you're addicted to that game. That's all I ever see you play.

No, no, no. He's talking about the wizard behind the curtain. That's who he's talking about.

Oh, okay. All right. So I missed right into that. The wizard behind the curtain. Mark Lutz was supposed to be.

That's a Twitch stream. We're still right there because I'm keeping up with chat while we're having a separate conversation, right?

So there is that. I was actually, well, I'm formally diagnosed with ADHD and I always talk about how it's a superpower,

but it's a blessing and a curse, right? So it enables me to keep up with chat while engaging in the conversation.

And that is definitely something that is detrimental to gameplay.

So I will say that our Twitch stream is, we're not all about like professional gameplay,

but we are all about entertaining people, making them feel loved and valued.

How Christ does at the end of the day. And so I open up every stream.

Usually my wife is with me or my kids and we spend some time in devotions and prayer,

just trying to set the tone for the stream.

But, you know, usually baby Aki, my son is sitting on my lap or Peach, my daughter is sitting beside me

and we hang out and we game together.

And one of the rules that I created actually, when I really wanted to be intentional about,

I always want our stream to be safe and fun for the whole family, no matter who's there, no matter who's tuning in, no matter what we're doing.

And so one of the rules I set really early on, and this is not popular on Twitch, as I said, we would never play an M-rated game on stream.

And that's kind of a hard and fast line because you think about some of the biggest titles in gaming,

including Halo, Call of Duty, are technically M-rated.

So over time, we ended up, we made some caveats to that rule.

It was, if the M-rated elements can be toned down or turned off, like in Call of Duty,

you can turn off all voice lines, which is where, you know, your heavy language comes in.

In Halo, you can be selective about who you play multiplayer with,

because that's really where the M-rated elements come into play there.

Games with open mics, even Fortnite, you have to be cautious about,

because if you hop into an open voice chat in a public match, you matchmake with somebody,

you never know what you're going to hear coming across that mic.

So we're always really protective and defensive about how things come through the stream

to make sure that we keep that filtered and safe for the whole family.

And for my kids, too, because my kids are always present.

And the wonderful thing about when you have your kids on stream with you is it generally lets chat know,

hey, by the way, there's kids present.

Let's keep things toned down, kind of be mindful about the things that we're discussing

and the conversations that we're having.

But that doesn't prevent us from grappling with some of the tougher issues.

So, yeah.

Love that.

Now, you're, I mean, openly, ADHD, hey, like, I'm not that good at gaming.

Yet you're doing a ministry where all you do is play games.

Forgive me.

You're using games to connect with people to minister to them.

Like, I don't want to be this demissive with that.

Sure.

But you're not good at games or you're not the best.

Like, you know, I feel tension.

You know, I've thought about it.

Maybe I should stream.

And I joke that, you know, I'm not relevant going all the way back to, like,

GoldenEye on N64.

It's still relevant.

They just released a remake.

Did you know that?

They just released GoldenEye.

Well, my wife still kicks my butt.

My wife gets the sniper rifle and, like, hides out in the rooms where,

the one spot where you can't see her, but she can get the perfect shot.

My wife and I almost broke up over Mario Kart back in the day.

Mario Kart 64 or something ago.

Oh, no, no, no.

I'm still the best at Mario Kart.

Like, and even to the fact that, like, I school my kids.

And that's the point of tension.

Oh, I will say this.

This is for the parents in the house.

I've never let my kids beat me at a video game.

Because a lot of times you let your kids win.

I've never let my kids win because I'm like,

if you beat me, I want it to feel authentic and earned.

And that's just, I think that's an important lesson.

And my daughter has gotten to the point where she can legitimately beat me in Mario Kart.

And she celebrates that and rubs it in my face,

which is exactly what she should do.

So, yeah.

Do you feel tension?

Like, hey, like, I can't keep up with the big kids.

Even stuff like, you know, you're not playing some of these games that are very popular.

It seems like you're sticking with Destiny 2, which is a great game.

But it's a game that's been around a minute.

Like, do you, how do you balance that?

Man, I'm not the cool, edgy guy.

I'm the family guy.

So, and I think something that's important about that is, so, D2, a community member of ours put it in a really good way.

D2 is what is called our anchor game.

But we still are kind of variety streamers.

The very first game we ever played on stream was the original Final Fantasy for the NES,

which was a game released all the way back in 1985.

But with my son, I'm playing through Horizon Zero Dawn, for example.

That's on Monday evenings.

And then with my daughter, we play a lot of Destiny 2.

Generally speaking, that's Tuesdays and Thursdays.

But a new expansion just released.

So we're playing a lot of Destiny right now.

And then Friday nights are kind of community nights.

And Sunday nights, we're playing Final Fantasy XIV.

So we actually, we do play a variety of games.

But Destiny is definitely our anchor game.

And I will say that when it comes to Twitch and strategies and things for growth,

variety is really, really difficult to really build a large community on.

Because generally speaking, when people come to Twitch, they're coming to watch a specific game.

They're wanting to consume a certain kind of content.

But for the first two years of our stream, Destiny was always kind of around,

but it wasn't really a focus.

We actually made Twitch Partner doing mostly variety, playing a lot of different things,

making a lot of different friends and people and folks who would come into stream

and be like, I like this.

I want to be a part of it.

And so, yeah.

And for those of you who are watching the podcast to get Twitch Partner,

you have to average at least 75 or more people for a 30-day time period.

And for us, we had to carry it for almost three months because we had to apply twice.

Interesting.

What are the benefits?

I've heard Twitch Partner before, but do you get a free t-shirt?

Do you get priority in the algorithms?

What does that mean?

So no real priority.

There aren't a ton of tangible benefits.

The number one thing you get over someone who is an affiliate or just a non,

not at all connected with Twitch, is you get what's called encoding.

Every single stream that I have, I get encoding.

What that means is people can watch at the high quality 1080p stream,

or they can go scale all the way down to 160p,

which is really low quality, easy for like mobile cell phone kind of consumption.

That was actually the reason why I wanted to go for Twitch Partner,

because we have a wide variety of people and situations and internet connections,

stability that can watch and consume our content.

And so having that flexibility that anybody can tune in and plug in and be connected

was really important.

So you're a family streamer.

You intentionally wanted a wide variety because you've got high-end,

you've got some minimal devices that I'm sure that are streaming.

Although, whatever, 180, 160p, that's pretty low.

It's pretty low.

Talk to me about your audience.

Like, who are you engaging with?

What's your...

Is there a target?

Like, who are you seeing?

What types of people?

Like, who's engaging with you in Twitch?

Sure.

And I'll say that the Megazord conference really helped me kind of hone in on my content.

I really kind of...

That was when I decided that I really wanted to minister and reach to the Destiny 2 community.

And that's when I really decided to make it kind of our focus, our anchor game.

So I really want to reach people who are playing Destiny 2.

Maybe they play a few other things.

But generally speaking, I'm looking for young adults, for the most part.

People who maybe have struggled with addictions in the past.

Because for myself, how transparent do you get on this podcast?

Like, I get pretty transparent on my streams.

Like, I'm a former porn addict.

I've broken free of that.

I am a suicide attempt survivor.

I'm pretty open and honest about that on stream.

We talk a lot about depression and anxiety and mental health.

And so all of those things are things that we talk about openly on stream.

And we let people know that they're not struggling and suffering alone in the dark.

And that there is hope.

And there are solutions and ways to move forward.

Whether that's, you know, in Christ, in church, there are so many options and ways to plug in and do community here on Twitch and in IRL too.

So, yeah, those are kind of some of the things that we really dove into and wanted to minister to those people, especially neurodivergent.

You know, the first thing I talked about was ADHD.

And obviously, you know, it was my wife as well, also a suicide attempt survivor.

So, you know, we've been really open and honest about our struggles and things that we've dealt with.

And that we have some amazing stories about people who have come into our community.

Many of them struggle with anxiety.

A lot of people are neurodivergent in some ways.

I remember one specific story.

We had a young girl from Canada who came into our stream.

And she told us that she was there ready to end her life.

And, you know, we stopped everything that we were doing.

We took a beat to pray over her.

And she didn't know the Lord at the time.

She still doesn't know the Lord, but she is open to the conversations and is receiving the things that were pouring into her life.

And she's been still around two years later after that night and still plugged in and still listening to the things that we're saying and is open to receiving prayer.

And so we've been taking steps with her over time and building that relational equity with the people who are in our community.

That may be the greatest two minutes of recording and broadcasting we've ever done here with the Church Digital Podcast.

Like the courage it took to say that publicly.

But the number of points that you hit on.

I mean, we're talking about operating out of your weakness and making your weakness your strength.

Like that was a beautiful moment.

And there's maybe a dozen questions that I have off of that.

Let's start with this.

I want to get into what it is to be transparent in that space.

But you're a family show.

And so you've got your kid on your lap and you're doing ministry where you're talking about, you know, your porn addiction in the past or you and your wife's suicide and your neurodivergent issues.

Like these are a lot of very poignant, very hard conversations to have.

And you're doing them while playing video games while you got your kid on your lap.

Like, how do you manage that tension with your kids with being serious while playing a video game?

Like, give me some insight here.

So the interesting, for a lot of the heavier conversations, they generally happen later in the evening when the young, young kid is off to bed or off, you know, getting ready for bed and things like that.

But my older daughter has engaged with us.

You said, like, what's the term?

It's like after show?

Yeah, Aki After Dark is what we call it.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Aki After Dark.

So when the sun goes down, you know, things get a little heavier, a little bit more intense conversations.

But, you know, my daughter is openly struggling with anxiety right now.

And we don't hide that.

We don't, you know, shy away from that.

And we openly wrestle with these things on stream.

You'll often see me parenting live in action on stream, having conversations with my daughter about different heavy things in life.

And, you know, just kind of going through those and encouraging her to be honest about how she's feeling, about, you know, what she's wanting to do.

And she obviously, she listens to me talk about some of those heavier things.

And so far, it's gone really well.

There definitely is some tension to manage there.

And we have some off-stream conversations with her about things that we go through.

But we also, I don't know, we don't try to sugarcoat or hide the harder things in life with her.

As they come, we want her to be, to go into life with eyes wide open.

So, yeah, yeah.

So, you're, you're, you're, I mean, you're literally actively parenting your kid on, in front of people, talking about tough subjects, being very transparent about yourself and your wife in this season with Aki After Dark.

How has the audience received this?

Like, do they engage?

Do they, do they comment?

Do they laugh?

Are they, wow, that's a great point.

I wish somebody had told me that.

Like, what, how are they literally responding when, when they're seeing some of this stuff?

You know, it's funny too.

I think about, so last night we were playing the, the new Destiny 2 campaign that came out.

And, you know, I'm, I'm playing with my daughter who just turned 12.

So she's very young.

And legendary is something that even like grown up gamers struggle with.

It's, it's hard.

It's not an easy difficulty.

And we're, we're working through this campaign and it's, it's so often easy to get frustrated and, and

and get upset.

And we, we fought for, I think it was about six hours on this one boss.

We, we, we went again and again and again and again.

And we finally beat this boss.

And as we beat the boss, her PC blue screened, which those of you who are in computers, you

know that that means it's locked up and it's rebooting.

And so I go through and I, I watched the final cut scene.

She watches the final cut scene with me.

And then she gets back into the game and finds out that everything we had just done, every,

all those hours we had just fought for, none of it counted.

We have to do it again.

And instead of being upset or frustrated, she's excited.

She's positive.

She's like, I just want to play more with my dad.

I want to, I want to do this more.

And like chat was just free is freaking out.

Like I could learn from peach.

Like I would be so angry in this moment.

I would be so upset.

And so I think, I think those authentic moments.

And when we're doing the parenting on stream, I think it all just kind of builds towards

that.

Hey, this is effective.

What we're doing.

You're seeing it.

You're seeing it play out in a way that is positive and encouraging and really, I, my

hope, I'm like getting emotional thinking about it because I was so proud of her last night.

It was just, it was crazy seeing how she reacted to that.

But yeah, my, my hope is that again, that authenticity breeds vulnerability.

I want people to understand that you're not alone in your struggles, that life can be frustrating

sometimes, but there are ways to exhibit that in positive and encouraging ways rather than

just getting angry or toxic because so many online communities are very toxic and we never

want to be that way.

So you rattled off earlier, um, like a Sunday night, a Tuesday night, Thursday, like you,

you just, you rattled off your schedule very quickly.

Um, how many hours a week are you, are you spending into this?

Uh, so Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, and Sunday, we start at six, five days a week

time every day.

Yeah.

Five days a week.

Okay.

So about four to four and a half hours.

Depending on this stream, sometimes we go up to five to six, um, totally depends on what's

going on, what we're doing.

Um, so yeah, I would say it's another part-time to full-time job, depending on the week.

That's not counting the hours I spend off stream working on short form content, uh, ministering

to people in our discord, having other offline conversations with folks.

Um, async.

We're going to, we're going to get into discord in a minute.

So, but you're, you're 25 to 30 hours.

Minimum.

So, so talk to me about that tension because you've, what, what's your, what's your nine

to five?

What, what do you do?

My nine to five, I'm a network engineer for a medium-sized cable ISP.

I'm on my lunch break technically right now.

So, yeah.

Awesome.

Well, thanks.

Thanks for giving us the time here.

So, but you're, so you're, you're a, you're a, you're a IT guy.

Sounds like.

Yep.

Nine to five.

And then you, and then you do.

I work from home full time, which is a family streaming guy.

Yeah.

Um, how do you manage the relational tension?

How do you manage some of the, the financial strains?

Like, cause that's, I mean, you're, you're putting in, I'm 40 plus 25 to 30.

That's 65 to 70 hours between ministry and, and work.

So how do you keep a healthy balance?

We're plugged into a local church here that we serve at too.

My wife, uh, uh, does cleaning of the church and children's ministry.

And I run the sound and tech at church.

Um, so yeah, we, we, we do a lot.

And I think the thing about it is, is the whole family is plugged in to everything that we do.

We don't, we don't go separate directions.

The whole family is plugged into the stream.

I'm here.

My daughter is homeschooled.

My son is in pre-K right now.

He'll be full-time kindergarten next year.

Um, but we're, we're all plugged in together.

We're all doing life together.

We're all running in the same direction.

We're not going different places, doing different things.

So like, even like sometimes I'll go clean the church for my wife.

Um, we make time on Saturdays.

That's intentionally like a family day where we go and we do an activity together.

Um, the work from home flexibility is, is huge.

Being able to be here and be plugged in.

If I, if I had to go into an office, I don't think I'd be able to put as many hours into the streaming as I do.

So, okay.

I know, um, we had Jade on last week who was, uh, you know, obviously, you know, Jade, digital missionary.

I love Jade.

Actually, so last night after, after everything crashed, Jade actually hopped in with us and we, we finished, we did, we did the redo because we had done it by ourselves.

We're like, okay, Jade, come on in and we'll, we'll finish it all together.

Cause he hadn't finished it yet.

That's awesome.

Well, and he just had a system crash too, didn't he?

Recently?

Is that what I saw?

His whole PC.

Yeah.

Yeah.

God bless him.

But, you know, I know he was, he was talking, you know, he's, he's wanting to do his full time.

I don't know.

He's, he's streaming like 50, 60, 70.

Like I wake up at 2am and he's going, I feel like in the middle of the day, I see him on like the guys, the guys just really, you know, heavy into this stuff.

But we, we talked about some of the financial struggles of being a full time in this and living literally off of streaming tips and, and things like this where, you know, I think he's got an account that basically is like keep, keep Jade alive.com or something set up.

Like it's, it's just, it's, it's, it's, it's a hard, it's a hard life.

Um, how is it bivocationally where, where you're, you're working IT, you're receiving a check from the IT, you're, you're doing ministry on the side with, with your family involved.

You're all rowing in the same direction.

Like, is that, is that rewarding?

Is that healthy?

Are there challenges?

Are there obstacles that you're facing?

I'd love some insight financially, maybe even otherwise relationally.

I feel like, you know, there's the old adage, right?

That God doesn't, uh, call the equip, the equip's the called.

And, uh, you know, when we first started, we started in a very bare empty room.

All I had was a little blue Yeti mic.

And, uh, that was, that was basically it.

And, uh, my daughter and I sat down in this room, we started streaming together and we very gratefully, we had folks come alongside of us that there's subscriptions on Twitch, which is cool.

Um, but 50% of that goes back to the platform.

There's also a way to donate directly.

Um, if you, if you go to any Twitch page, most streamers, if you scroll down, you'll see a link to donate.

And fortunately, we had some very generous people early on that helped us.

For example, I have a Shure SM7B.

I have a decent, uh, XLR interface.

I have a decent camera.

All of this was, was funded by, uh, the community that we built really early on.

And we have, we have kept the streaming funds separate from the personal funds, um, and the personal funds separate from the streaming funds.

But we did obviously invest a significant amount of our own money early on because, you know, when I first went to my wife almost four years ago and said, Hey, I think, I think this, this could be a thing.

I think, I think, I think I feel this is what the Lord wants me to do next.

Um, she didn't initially catch the vision, but once, once I started walking it out and she saw the people coming in the chat and she saw the stories that were being shared and the vulnerability and the authenticity that was, that was growing this community.

She really, she really, she really bought in and, uh, it's been, it's been wonderful to see what I, again, the importance.

I stress this.

I feel the Lord has called me to do this without that.

If I wasn't walking in obedience, I think there would be a lot more struggle, but I feel like because this is something I feel the Lord has called me to do.

And I'm walking in obedience to that with my family that, uh, makes everything, you know, when you're walking in the Lord's will, life flows.

It's a lot easier than if you're, if you're doing something in rebellion or fighting against that.

And so I think, I think that's the key there.

Um, because yeah, there's a lot of struggle because I have a lot of work responsibilities.

We have kids, we have the whole family dynamic thing, but because we're all working together, we're trying to honor the Lord.

We're trying to be obedient to the things that he's calling us to do.

It does make that easier in a sense.

It's stressful.

Absolutely.

And, uh, but we love each other.

We have really hard conversations on the regular about how things are going and how we're doing.

And we make sure that, Hey, we, uh, I will postpone or cancel streams.

If we have to, if we have to deal with family stuff, because at the end of the day for a family stream, if the family isn't first and yeah, it's not, it's not good for anybody.

Next is, um, how old's your daughter?

12.

She just turned 12.

Uh, the beginning of February.

She just turned 12.

So what is that?

Sixth grade, fifth grade, somewhere in there?

Sixth grade.

Sixth grade.

Um, is she, is she comfortable like being on camera?

Like, you know, is, is that, is that native to her where she's, she's an extrovert?

Is she, uh, less to have an extroverted daughter?

Yeah, she's no, she's a hundred percent extroverted.

My wife is very introverted.

Uh, she very rarely gets on camera.

So I was about to say, I don't think I've, I've seen your wife on.

No, I've seen both kids interact at some level at the microphone, but yeah, she doesn't, she doesn't.

It's funny because I'm pretty sure both my kids are extroverts, which takes after me.

I'm an extrovert, but my wife is very introverted.

Yeah.

So like your, your daughter just, you know, you introduced her to video games and she clung and ran with it.

Um, like what was, was that when you talk about the, let's do this instead of the ministry, let's talk about the ministry potential.

Um, how old was she when she understood the ministry impact of what the streamings were?

What did that look like?

I'm not a hundred percent positive.

She understands the ministry impact fully yet.

I think she's beginning to understand, especially over these past three to four months, you're starting to see her really understand, Hey, there's a chat here.

People are talking, they're talking about me.

They're talking about the things that we're doing.

And that's really starting to become something that she is cognizant of.

Or also, I'm also having conversations with her about that on the side because it's, it's easy to be influenced by chat.

And I'm like, we have to be authentic to ourselves and not necessarily always be concerned about making everybody else happy because that's, you know, obviously an important distinction there.

Yeah, that's so good.

I was, I, the reason I asked, and I'll just be transparent here.

My daughter's 14.

And, um, and, and so even as, because of what I do with the church digital and the conversations and the streams, not in Twitch, but in other environments and platforms, like, you know, she's hearing at least one half of the conversation because the other half's in my head.

And so, you know, even her starting to engage with that and dialogue, I wrote a book on churches and virtual reality and, uh, and she, she grabbed it.

She started reading it.

It was funny.

Like one day she wanted me to pick her up from school.

And so she logged onto my website, went to my scheduled Jeff page and, uh, and actually scheduled time with me so that I could pick her up early from school and, uh, and take her out to lunch.

And so like, I didn't realize it until the day before I looked at my calendar.

I'm like, what's this Caitlin meeting?

And she's like, oh, you're picking me up from school.

I was like, oh, okay.

And, but it's, it's been so, it's been so much fun.

Like we're, we're not doing to the full streaming level, but having like my, my daughter, um, seeing that and starting to converse with her.

Like, it's so funny.

I actually had this conversation with her.

We were helping, um, plant the physical church.

I was running, you're a physical church tech guy.

I was doing that maybe five or six years ago.

And, uh, we were going to help plant a physical multi-site campus.

We were talking about planting churches.

And, um, and, and I said to my daughter who was probably 12, maybe, maybe it was 10 at the time.

Hey, so how, how do you think you would plant the physical church?

And she just starts rattling through like her mental process of what planting a church was.

Um, and the funny thing was she, I was expecting her to do like the, if you build it, they will come.

Um, but what she actually started to do was build the team, recruit volunteers, literally just like disciple them, grow them, train them, and then release them.

Start with the foundation.

And, and, and I'm like, my daughter's 10 and she just knows more than like, you know, and I'm not going to, I'm not going to finish that sentence.

But it was incredible, you know, some of what was, what was coming out of her on that.

So, uh, man, this is, this is so good.

Let's talk a little bit.

I want to dance around because, you know, you're, you're, you're discord as well.

Um, you know, when I've asked, I have asked people in the know, cause I do not know, but I've asked people in the know, Hey, who's really good at, at discord.

Your name comes up more often than not.

And, uh, and so you're, you're an interesting balance between Twitch and discord.

I don't know how common that is, but typically I see people who are really strong on one side than the other.

And you're like this, this, um, I don't know, purple dinosaur that, that equal pink, uh, unicorn, I guess makes more sense that puts it together.

We've let me say nude again, cause this thing's just going crazy here.

This question, off the rails, we're done.

What's the role of, of, of discord?

How do you balance it into what you're doing?

Uh, you know, I, I, I kind of see it as you talked about discipleship just kind of briefly, but I feel like it's just that, that part of community building.

You know, you can only learn so much about somebody in a, in a Twitch chat.

Um, learn a lot more when you have a chance to watch them conversate on discord or hang out in a voice chat with them.

And so we're kind of intentional about events in our discord, uh, whether that's movie or game nights and, and hanging out and, and watching things and kind of doing life together and talking about things.

Cause I always, I'll, I'll, I'll actually sit in there usually after whatever event we're doing is over and just hang out and chat with people and ask about their day.

And just, you know, you, you, you, you, you find out so much more about people when you get a chance to sit and, and chat with them.

So, yeah.

But I think, I think it's just intentional about those relationships.

So you're like, you're like, you're 40 hours, nine to five, you're 25 to 30 on, on Twitch.

How much time are you putting into discord?

Um, I get a notification every time there's a message sent in my discord on my phone.

So probably a lot of passive time staring at this, um, you know, chat with people, interacting with folks.

And yeah, do you, you know, it's, it's funny.

There used to be like the saying for what happens in Facebook stays in Facebook where, you know, it just like, that was like separate.

Do you talk about discord in, in those conversations on Twitch?

Do you reference Twitch and discord?

Like where it's unified?

Absolutely.

They're very, they're very intermingled.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

And there's, there's some folks that are in our discord that actually don't watch our streams.

Um, there's some folks in our streams that aren't in our discord.

Um, but we still reference each other and kind of mesh together.

And I regularly, when I'm, when I'm playing with the community, if we're doing raids or whatever in destiny or games in Fortnite, so on and so forth, um, we'll hop into discord with people and be in voice chat and hang out and game together.

So, yeah.

I want to ask a follow-up on the discipleship piece.

Um, it's, it's, it's funny.

You line up 10 pastors and you ask them what discipleship means.

You get 15 different answers because a couple, everybody thinks something different and a couple of them think multiple things.

They don't realize it.

Um, what does, in the idea of digital discipleship, discipling in digital space, like through the podcast, we're friends of that.

But even within the podcast and the audience, there's different ideas of what discipleship or disciple making or whatever it is.

With your church, with your stream, whatever, you know, that would actually be the, probably the intro.

First question, what are you?

What do you consider yourself?

And then what is your role in discipleship?

What are, what's the goal, the expectation, the hope, the prayer for discipleship within your, your org?

Yeah, I think for me, the, I consider myself a digital missionary.

Um, that's, that's, that's what we attempt to do.

We're big on evangelizing.

We talk a lot about how you don't have to believe the same ways we do to belong in our community, but I love Jesus and it colors everything I do.

All the conversations that we have, we're very open and transparent about that.

Um, but really open and honest in, in Twitch chat about, um, maybe, maybe, maybe keeping some of those difficult, like nuanced theological conversations to like, I will, I've had some difficult, nuanced theological conversations in voice chat over discord.

Because so often stuff gets misconstrued over text and those, those conversations are more difficult to have.

It's a lot easier when you can hear the vocal timbre of what someone is saying when you're, when you're speaking, uh, in a discord, in a voice call, or even if you're on camera, a lot of times I'll, I'll be in discord.

I'll have my camera on so people can see, you know, my posture and the way that I'm communicating and the way that I'm trying to be empathetic and understand and listen to the things that they're trying to say.

Um, but it, it, it totally depends.

I mean, obviously I've, I've had gospel conversations with folks we've had, I've, I've prayed with a few folks, um, but I've also encouraged them to either get plugged into a local church or, uh, there's wonderful online church resources such as Lux Digital Church or God Squad Church that we, we generally point them towards, uh, if they're looking for more in-depth, intentional discipleship in small groups, because I'm one person, my wife is one person.

And when it comes to, um, and when it comes to, um, being able to really grow a community outside of what we're attempting to do when it comes to the family and being more intentional about deeper faith and theological discussions, you know, Lux and God Squad Church, I would say we really align when it comes to the principles of the gospel and doing that intentional discipleship, building that really solid foundational relationship with Christ.

I love how much, um, I love how much the, the gaming community churches, the, the, the, the, the digital missionaries, the discipleship groups, the, like, I love how much unity, how much they're working together.

Um, and, and, and so the fact that you just listed God Squad and, and, uh, and, and Lux is, is incredible.

Um, is there a, do you, like, I don't, I'm going to say the question this way.

I know it's not that rough, but at what point do you kick them out of the nest?

Like, is there, is there a characteristic or a trait that you're looking for that's seen developed?

Is it case by case basis?

Do you let them self-identify when it's time to, to head to the next step, whatever that is?

Like, what is, what is the maturation process and what's next?

Combination of your last two points, case by case, and kind of letting them decide when, Hey, when, when do you really want more?

You know, because obviously we all know as we build a relationship with Christ, we become more hungry and thirsty for more of, of him.

And so as, as that naturally develops, again, we, we, we, we continually point and encourage people to plug into those deeper resources where they can find that discipleship.

Um, and it's not just limited to GSC and Lux because I love both of those ministries.

And I think it's so important.

And there's going to be so many people who are on Twitch will never, who will never walk into a physical church.

But for those that are capable and willing, I do encourage them to, to find a local church if they can.

So there's definitely, we, we kind of take that hybrid approach.

Interesting.

So I see in chat, somebody said something about a movie event, movie events that you do on your off nights.

What's a movie event?

Um, well, we all, we all get together in discord and we watch a movie together.

Um, in January, we did Jones January.

We watched through the Indiana Jones movies.

Uh, this past month we did Pirates of the Caribbean.

Um, so we do different kinds of movie series and sagas.

And, uh, last year we had a big event where we watched all the Lord of the Rings movies together.

That was, uh, those were marathons.

Those were longs.

Um, but I, fortunately, I do have some community members who are generally, uh, willing to run those events for me.

I occasionally, the one that I dedicate to doing every week is on Wednesday nights or later in the evenings.

We, we watch anime together.

So we're an intersection of a lot of different nerd cultures.

We don't just do gaming.

We do anime.

We do Star Wars.

We do, we do all of the things really.

And actually, it's funny because my daughter who's 12 has never seen Star Wars and we're probably going to do that pretty soon.

So.

It's interesting.

Totally.

You just listed off like three or four of the movie series, the trilogies that I've watched in the past two months in 23.

Like, I've watched all the Indiana Jones.

I've, I've watched, um, I'm watching Star Wars all the time.

Um, uh, Pirates of the Caribbean.

I just kicked off the other day.

Um, like, and it's so that that's fascinating.

So, but let me, let me, let me get granular.

Someone is, is streaming that into Discord onto your server and then people are coming in and they're doing text chat, voice chat while they're watching.

Like, what, what is.

Yeah.

So, before Discord integrated this, we actually had a voice for the mic list, um, chat, which is for people who come in who don't have mics can, can type in text chat.

But now, like an individual voice channels, there's a separate text chat thread.

And so, we'll, we'll have the movie up and everybody will be, you know, there'll be a running commentary going as we're watching the movie and we'll sit there.

And that's just a wonderful way.

It's not going to say like a mystery science theater effect, but you know, you get to sit there and you have conversations about the movie while you're watching the movie together.

So.

That's, it's incredible.

Now, I mean, in my mind, I'm like, is, is, is that licensing?

It's like having a bunch of, it's like, it's like having a bunch of friends over sitting on the couch and watching a movie.

Yeah.

It's, it's, it's like the, you know, the watch party feature.

Except you're using voice where most of that is, is text.

Like that's, and so you're getting a lot of engagement.

People are watching the stuff together and they're, they're laughing.

They're having fun with it.

Absolutely.

Cool.

Well, I mean, what another way to just build community and allow people to build community with each other through, through watching that.

That's, that's really interesting.

Flatcap says his go-to movie would be Monty Python.

I'm assuming, of course, that would be the Holy Grail.

And I'm, of course, flashing to, I'm not dead yet.

Yes, you are.

No, I'm not.

So thank you, Flatcap, for, you know, letting me enjoy that moment with you.

Just a flesh wound.

Just a flesh wound.

That's right.

Oh my gosh.

I have not watched that movie.

My, my degree in college was radio, TV, film.

I have an Among Us t-shirt that is, is, is like that scene.

And it says it's just a flesh wound, but it's after the imposter has obviously decapitated another crewmate.

So it's funny.

So good.

The, man, I don't even know like where to go.

This has been solid.

I've just been, been drilling you with questions and you've been, you've been flowing here, man.

This is, this is solid.

Where do you want to go?

Like, where, what is, what does your ministry look like in, in 2025 and 27?

I think, uh, it, it's, as, uh, it, it's fun because I get to sit here and think about, well, as my, as my kids grow up, we're obviously going to have different phases of the stream, right?

Peach has become a real gamer.

Like she's, she's really coming into her own as a gamer.

And I actually, I see skills in her that could present as possibly, uh, becoming an e-sports competitor.

Who knows?

Who knows what the future holds for her?

It's hard to say.

Um, baby Aki, the wonderful thing about him is as he grows older, we recently, just this past summer, played through my favorite game of all time.

Which was Chrono Trigger.

Um, so I'll, I'll be able to share some of those epic, amazing, uh, games that I really, really love with her, with them on stream and age appropriate as they, as they get older.

And, uh, yeah, I think, I think that the, the five to 10 year plan, as it were, is just work through those different phases of life together.

And the interesting thing about our communities, you literally get to watch our kids grow up as the stream goes on.

So, yeah, it's a lot of fun.

How do you, because I, and I know like we've had conversations on the side and one of the things that I love, uh, with the Megazord, the meetings that we had in April and there's a documentary out about that.

We just published the blog.

Mark, uh, the tech guy, the digital pastor for Lux Digital Church, the tech person who almost accidentally just hung up on us and closed the stream.

Thank you, Mark, for not doing that.

Maybe I need to really find the new tech guy next week.

Um, but he, he, um, you know, he, he, he brought, he and some others brought, uh, this group together and there's this huge emphasis and push now within on a multiplication.

How, how, how do we train the next level?

How, how do we, how do we multiply our, our ideas, our vision, who we are into others?

Um, you've shared some really intimate things, you know, suicide, depression, um, uh, pornography addiction.

Uh, and those, those are, those are legitimate, those are heartfelt, those, those are major issues that, that, that connect, that peel to the inner, innerness.

The man looks on the outward appearance, the Lord looks at the heart.

And so you sharing that's allowing many others to connect with you.

How does that multiply?

How do you get others to be as open and transparent?

I think, again, that authenticity breeds vulnerability.

And when, when people, when people are able to share those things and see those things be shared in a judgment-free environment, those things have weight, they have consequences.

I talk about the consequences.

I talk about how my marriage almost ended.

And it's, I talk about the things that we went through and the struggles and all of, all of those real things.

But seeing the hope on the other side of it, I think, encourages people to, to be vulnerable and to be authentic.

And to really, to dive into those things.

And as those people continue to share about their struggles and talk with others about the things that are going, that's just a natural multiplication effect.

So.

Do you have to coach courage?

Like, I mean, it's one thing to recognize and to be vulnerable, you know, one-on-one.

But to say that in front of a microphone with the camera on with, you said you were authorized, so 75 at the partner in front of 75 people.

I mean, that's, that's a legitimate thing.

What, what, what is, what is, does that grow naturally?

Like, what does that look like?

I think, um, I, again, when you are called to someone, I think, called to something, I do believe that the Lord provides you with the strength necessary to complete the task.

And so for me, I don't know, like, there's, there's no shame in the truth.

There's no shame in Christ.

And, and knowing that I am forgiven and the Lord loves me, um, in spite of my many failings and that I am a child of God.

And knowing that that's where my identity lies, it's a lot easier to be courageous and open about those things.

What, um, do you find, like, would you find those people within the crowd?

Are you, would you find people like, yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

How have those, have you had any of those conversations yet?

Um, and I don't, I don't want to like, like push too hard here, but I'm just, just curious because I love what you're doing.

And, and I, and I think you can totally multiply because it's out, you're not getting a paycheck or much of a paycheck from it.

You're, you're influencing people that are at a huge need.

You're creating a family environment for people that don't necessarily have one like this.

There's a lot of opportunities in this space.

Um, and I could see a lot of people being interested in doing something like this, whether connected to a church or not.

So, um, like, have you had any conversations like that?

Are people open to the idea or, or what does some of that look like?

Um, I haven't necessarily had any of those specific conversations yet.

I mean, I've had a lot of one-on-one people coming to me and, and, and wanting to do things and wanting to get into this.

And I've, you know, provided advice and encouragement and, uh, I've, I've seen some growth.

Um, I think it's still kind of the early stages for a lot of that.

And so we'll see, we'll see kind of where the Lord takes it.

That's, that's exciting.

Yeah.

Just the, the potential, uh, and when I look at gaming churches, when I look at digital missionaries, when I look at, at, you know, we have so many conversations along this path between, uh, between Mark and Bubba and, uh, and Jate and Jono with the e-sports, Jate with digital missionary.

And now you, there's, it's, there's this huge potential.

There's this huge opportunity to reach a different type of person.

There's three point something billion gamers on the planet.

And, and it's not, Hey, let's create a church for a billion people, or even a church for a million people.

Let's create, you know, a million expressions of churches that can reach 30 or 50 or a hundred, whatever the math is there.

I know that math is way off, but you at least see where I'm going.

And so reproducing, um, some of the ideas here is totally a win.

Uh, and so taking, creating a home environment for, for the people that you are is great and to reach 75, a hundred.

Let me ask you the question, when do you lose, maybe lose control is the wrong word, but when does the thing get too big for you, uh, in your, uh, you know, ADHD mind, uh, to keep up with like, where is it?

I can't do this.

I think, I think the biggest thing is that the stream, keeping up with the stream chat where we're at right now, I'm not at my capacity yet.

It totally depends on how many people are talking at the same time.

So often on Twitch, people aren't even necessarily chatting, but they are listening to what you have to say.

Um, and so I think that there is definitely scalability there.

I think a lot of it depends on how many people, because we, we have some really good mods.

We have some really good people that are running events.

We have some really good help right now that is going to have to grow as we grow.

Um, we're going to need people that are willing to run events.

We're going to need people that are willing to, uh, continue to minister to people in the discord.

We're going to need people that are willing to moderate the Twitch chat.

We're going to need people that are willing to, I have, I have a guy, thankfully that's in our community right now that has volunteered to do some YouTube editing for me.

Uh, on a pro bono basis right now.

Because again, like you said, not a lot of money.

Um, but media editing is huge.

Doing thumbnails, doing shorts, all of those things.

There's, there's so much that goes into this.

And I'm fortunate to have people that are helping right now.

That's going to have to grow as this grows.

And, you know, people spin off and continue to do their own ministries.

They're going to need people to do that too.

So all of that goes into that.

So as, as a digital missionary, you know, you're not, you're not alone in this.

Like I feel like with Jade, I mean, he's got people that are involved, but Jade's not talking about recruiting teams in some of this.

But what I hear from you is like recruiting and developing and, and, and like, you're almost a, like a org chart type of thing between the mods and event leaders and things like that.

How many people are active with what you're doing now?

I would say we probably between moderators and, uh, other people that are contributing in different ways.

I'd say we have about a dozen right now.

Oh my gosh.

Yeah.

So they're, and they're all, all volunteers.

All volunteers.

Beautiful.

All people that believe in what we're doing.

And so you're just sharing vision with them, getting them excited and, and, and encouraging them and celebrating what's happening in the part that they played.

Absolutely.

So good.

Absolutely.

Hey, let's, let's pivot real quick.

Last question.

Um, physical church.

How do they get into this?

Like opinions, thoughts.

What do you think?

So what's really cool about our, so I'll share the story of our physical church.

What's really cool about what our physical church has done is my, I actually shared with my pastor.

I said, Hey, I feel called to do this thing on Twitch.

So I'm going to do this thing on Twitch and I'll let you guys know how it goes.

If you could be praying for me.

And, uh, that's what they've done.

He actually has come into a few of our Twitch streams and, uh, they actually on Sunday mornings, they, they have a slide in the announcements, uh, that, that talks about our Twitch stream.

And it's just letting nerds know we have a few people that go to our church that are nerds, um, destiny gamers, other people that, that come into our Twitch stream and come by and hang out and game with us.

And so I think that for the physical church, it's a pretty easy ask, you know, you could even just, I don't know, like whether it's through small groups or even just an announcement on a Sunday morning and say, Hey, we're curious about Twitch.

Do any of you stream and have conversations with the people in your congregation that are streamers?

Because I guarantee you most churches, there's probably one person that either knows what Twitch is or maybe does a little bit of streaming and ask them about if they take it from a ministry perspective.

Is it just a hobby?

Is it for fun?

Are they being intentional?

Like there are definitely ways to pour into those folks.

You have to have the conversation first.

There's a little bit of discovery that has to happen there.

And for the physical church, if you want to treat Twitch as a mission field, which I absolutely believe it is, there's a lot of opportunity to get plugged in and you don't have to stream yourself.

But I'm telling you that the people who are streaming could definitely use your help and your support.

So, yeah.

How hard is it to get started?

Like if you could give coaching or advice to somebody who's wanting to get started, what would you tell them to do?

I would tell them to get a decent microphone and hit the go live button.

But a microphone is huge because like I said, most times people are listening to you more than they're actually watching what you're doing.

And is it important to play the video game?

Is it just chatting?

Like what part does the content play in streaming?

Totally depends on what you feel called to do.

I'm a nerd.

I'm a gamer.

I've been a gamer most of my life.

So that's what I wanted to do.

I wanted to use games to reach people.

But I know people that do leatherworking on stream.

I know people that do 3D printing.

I know all sorts of people that do different things.

There's lots of different ways to get involved and plugged in.

But the most important thing is just to start.

Yeah.

Okay, so Chino Mage is like, oh yeah, I'm straight up stealing from Aki for our streams.

That's kind of funny.

Zach is saying, I see God moving across the spectrum through movies, music, streaming, art.

I believe Revival is coming.

Thank you.

And your interview is Trailblazers.

I wasn't looking for Frazier.

But thank you.

I appreciate that.

Man, Aki, I just want to come over there and give you a hug because I love you.

But on top of that, man, you're just so transparent, vulnerable, authentic, real, genuine.

You know, it's interesting, being digital, like a lot of the words that I just said,

the average church does not think can happen in digital space.

I think we hung out.

And even from a distance, we didn't hang out as much as I would have liked to just because we were...

Even when we were there, I felt like we were scattered in different directions and leading in different ways.

And so I didn't get much Aki time.

But even in this, man, like your heart for what you're doing, the genuineness of who you're reaching and how you're doing it,

and recognizing, hey, the role that I'm playing is a digital missionary.

I can fill this role well, but I'm not able to do the full picture.

And I'm okay recognizing that.

So let me hand it off to somebody who can do the deep discipleship at the church level.

Like, the fact that you're even okay with that and partnering and working with others is so good.

And so, man, I want to thank you.

I want to thank...

Listen, the thing that I was not expecting to come out of this was the movie thing.

Where it's like, yeah, we create community playing movies on Discord.

And like, Discord doesn't shut that crap down.

Because I'm like, there's got to be some legal issue why that won't work.

But evidently, Aki's doing it.

So we're going to say that's legal.

And just any hate or any lawsuit, send it Aki's way.

Jeff didn't tell you to do it, but Aki did.

Yeah.

So it's so good.

And understanding what you want to do, who you want to reach.

You know, St. Baird just threw some comments in chat about that.

I know that was a source, a topic, a target audience and personas.

Yeah.

Well, and I talked a little bit about that, right?

At Begazord.

That's where I honed in on my one.

And figure out what you're wanting to do, find your niche, hone in on your one.

That is definitely important.

Yeah.

And so, Melorus, I can't even read.

Melinius, I have no idea if I said that correct.

Mel, at least I can read that much because I'm blind.

If you find out legal on that, feel free to let me know.

Dear Fedge on social and Discord.

But hey, guys, we're going to wrap the plane.

We're going to wrap the plane.

Let me say nude again because, like, my words have not been coming out of my mouth well today.

But we're going to land the plane here.

So, for Aki, who's engaging in chat, this has been a lot of fun.

But this is Jeff with the Church Digital, Digital Church Network.

Thanks for jumping on the live stream here.

Thanks for watching the podcast.

Thanks for being part of the show.

All right.

Y'all have a good day.

Bye.

Bye.

Bye.