Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: This is the Morning Journey Rewind with Mark and Brittany. Never miss a moment.
[00:00:04] Speaker B: This week on the Morning Journey, Rewind. Luke from For King and Country stops by. Operation Christmas Child is underway. A grandmother of 12 planks for five hours straight. And a father and son duo bike to the ballpark. All for a good cause. Also, college kids, how would you like to get paid to sleep? And we all know the struggle with social media versus reality.
[00:00:23] Speaker C: It's Mark and Brittany with you on the Morning Journey. We've got a special guest with us today. Part of For King and Country on Luke is here. Good morning.
[00:00:31] Speaker D: Hey, good morning. Thank you guys for taking the time to chat with me. Always a privilege to stop on by the strip mall radio station. It's one of the only that I know like this.
[00:00:41] Speaker C: So now you remember what happened the last time you were here?
[00:00:44] Speaker D: I do remember. I didn't know if I should bring it up to Brittany or not, but yes, the last. How many years ago was that? Two years ago.
[00:00:49] Speaker E: I think it was two years ago.
[00:00:51] Speaker D: We came in here. I mean, you may know the story better than me, but we came in here for it, for an interview. Everything was humming along wonderfully.
And then all of a sudden, you were like, our mics don't work.
[00:01:00] Speaker E: Yeah, live on the morning show. We get to turn you guys on. And they're talking and we hear nothing. And we're like, what do we do now? I think Joel actually came around here with my co host and shared a microphone with him just to get something going.
[00:01:13] Speaker D: Oh, is that right?
[00:01:14] Speaker C: Is that right?
[00:01:15] Speaker D: So I remember feeling terrible for you, and you were probably like, oh, they're gonna think it. And we were like, hey, this stuff happens. We've been around the block, but we're making new memories today.
[00:01:25] Speaker C: That's right. There you go.
[00:01:26] Speaker D: That's right.
[00:01:27] Speaker E: So you guys actually took a Much need and you're back, which we're so excited for. And the Beautiful Colors tour. Tell us about what inspired this tour and where the name Beautiful Colors came from.
[00:01:36] Speaker D: Yeah, the most beautiful Colors. Well, it comes from. We took 2025 off from touring, so we didn't take time off from all of the other creative things that we're doing. But we weren't touring, so we were working on two things. We're working on a new album, and then we're working on this film called Drummer Boy, which we'll talk about in a few moments. And the Most Beautiful Colors actually came right towards the end of the recording process we were working on. I was reading a Book called Imagine Heaven by a guy named John Burke. And it's about basically all these kind of near death experiences that people have, and they go to another realm and then they come back and it's all. The book is all about what they see. And so anyway, one day we're in the studio and I heard something that had, you know, had that phrase, the most beautiful colors. And I remember thinking to myself, well, you know, that has to be attributed to heaven. Like, there's nothing else that I can think of that has really contains the most beautiful colors. And so, yeah, I was really inspired by that song. And obviously then that song became the album title. And then once an album title, obviously now has become this tour that we're. This is the last weekend, can you believe it? Of this fall tour. That's crazy.
Here we are.
[00:02:48] Speaker C: The new song, what if I Told you'd. That's our Fresh Music Friday song. We'll hear it in just a little bit. What do you want the listeners really to take from the song?
[00:02:57] Speaker D: Yeah. Well, what if I told you I don't fully remember what I was personally going through on the day, but there was one particular day we went into the studio and I. You know, a lot of times in the studio, you're writing these songs with some of your dearest friends, probably like, you guys, you know, you just. You do a lot of life together. And a lot of times, you know, right, wrong, or indifferent. The first half of the day sometimes is catching up with old friends. And somehow the questions kind of came my direction. Like, Luke, you know, how are you doing? What's going on in your world? And I said, you know, guys, I'm good, but for whatever reason, today is just one of those days where I just don't quite feel good enough. I don't feel like I'm a good enough husband. I don't feel like I'm a good enough father. I don't feel like I walk with Jesus the way that I should. And I just said, guys, I feel like if we could write a song that could comfort my soul today, I think there's plenty of other people that oftentimes just don't feel quite good enough. And so in some cases, the song is actually all about really a reminder of who you truly are, not just those feelings of those moments when. When life kind of feels like there's a snowball kind of in on who you are as a person and in your life.
[00:04:04] Speaker E: I love that you said that too, because we tell our listeners all the time, like, just because we're behind the microphone or just because our artists are singing these songs, it comes out of a place of truth and vulnerability. Like, they are going through these things when they write these songs. We are going through things when we are behind the microphone here on the show. We don't have it all together just because we've been given a different platform.
[00:04:22] Speaker D: That's right. Well, look, I. I've often joked for many years, like, I'm not a good enough songwriter to write songs about things that don't mean something to me. And so, you know, many, many, many, many years ago when I first started writing songs, I was always trying to write songs for other people, which is a wonderful thing to do. But the problem is they weren't ringing true to anybody else because it actually wasn't true to me. And it wasn't until I started actually learning to write songs that comforted my own soul or would comfort my own soul, that somehow music at that point became much more relatable, much more powerful.
[00:04:51] Speaker C: At that point, the new movie is coming out. What do you want the audience, the drummer boy. What do you want the audience really to learn to take from the movie?
[00:05:02] Speaker D: Yeah. Yeah. So Drummer Boy is about two brothers that end up on opposite sides of the Revolutionary War. It's a Christmas film, and it's also a musical. And so in some cases, it merges kind of some of Fikian country's favorite things, which is film and, you know, music videos that we've done over the years and, you know, music. And so, you know, when it comes to the film, you know, the film really deals with two brothers that have significant unforgiveness in their life to the point where they get to. Driven to different sides of. Of. Of war.
And. And at the end of the day, you know, one of the things that's been powerful about that film is about a year and a half ago, the. The film is made by myself, my brother Joel and Ben. And through all sorts of crazy circumstances, us as brothers kind of ended up not on the opposite sides of the Revolutionary War, but we did end up on opposite sides of.
Of many topics, of many, many different things. And about a year and a half ago, we actually kind of committed to ourselves. I was like, hey, guys, we are at this point where I think we need to put our differences aside and actually live out the message of this film. And one of the things that I'm most proud of is obviously, I think the film is a fantastic film, but it's, you know, sometimes just making another piece of art isn't always necessarily worthwhile unless there's something more going on. And one of the things that I'm really proud of is the message of the film between us brothers is that we've. We've had to live out as well. And so that's another reason. Reason why I'm just obviously thrilled about the movie.
[00:06:30] Speaker E: I'm super intrigued by this, too, because it is like the Christmas drummer boy in a way, but. But not really. I mean, we're talking war here. Like, the revolutionary. What made you guys want to take this drummer boy concept and turn it into kind of like almost like a war film?
[00:06:44] Speaker D: Well, part of it was because that's where drummer boys were actually used, you know. And so we wanted it to be somewhat authentic to, you know, what, you know, the topic that we were talking about, which is this. This film is about a drumme.
And so he is. Most people don't think of drummer boys as being key or instrumental in war, but back in the day, that's how you actually did war tactics. That's how you would sound retreats. And essentially it was your megaphone.
[00:07:10] Speaker E: Right.
[00:07:10] Speaker D: And so if you start to think through, you know, drummer boys were very, very important, the kind of the pinnacle of how you would communicate in a war. And so that was what drew us to this kind of concept because obviously we've got this song, the Little Drummer Boy, and we thought to ourselves, you know, well, it'd be kind of fun to kind of turn this into something, you know, much more. And obviously, the Revolutionary War, they had drummer boys. And. And that was something that was very common for family members to kind of go against each other. You know, we look back at the revolution and thinking, like, all of America was for, you know, independence. And it was a lot smaller than you realize. If you go look at the history, there's a lot more nuance to it than. Than you would realize. And obviously we explore those things in with the film. And it's also very special because it is the 250th, obviously, anniversary of America. And so this is kind of, you know, finishing out the celebration of this Great Nation on November 6th.
[00:08:02] Speaker E: Well, if you haven't seen it, November 6th it comes out, and I am so excited for it.
[00:08:06] Speaker C: Yep. And before that, coming up on October 17th in Richmond for King and country will be in concert at the Altria Theater. Info is on our website, myjourneyfm.com Luke, thank you.
[00:08:18] Speaker D: Hi. Thank you. Appreciate you guys.
[00:08:21] Speaker A: Uplifting and encouraging because you need it now more than ever.
[00:08:25] Speaker D: You betcha.
[00:08:26] Speaker A: The morning journey with Mark and Brittany.
[00:08:28] Speaker C: Operation Christmas Child is underway. You can pick up your OCC boxes right here at the journey.
[00:08:35] Speaker E: I can't believe we're already talking about Christmas. I had the exact same thought, Operation Christmas Child. But with Operation Christmas Child, they have to distribute these boxes to get to people by Christmas. So collection week is actually November 16th through the 23rd this year. We are a pickup location. We're right next to Ollie's and Candler station. So if you could swing by, get your box, get it filled up and get it back to us by November 16th that week, that would be so great. They do so much good for others in helping children experience Christmas who otherwise would not. And so if you want to get involved, all the details are right there at our website, myjourneyfm.com a great way
[00:09:08] Speaker A: to start your day. The morning journey with Mark and Brittany.
[00:09:12] Speaker C: I know you work out.
[00:09:13] Speaker E: Do you plank sometimes? Do you? Yeah, not super often, but every once in a while for like 30 seconds to a minute.
[00:09:21] Speaker C: Okay. Well, a grandmother of 12 broke her own Guinness world record. She held a plank for five hours.
[00:09:29] Speaker E: Five hours.
[00:09:30] Speaker C: Five hours.
[00:09:31] Speaker E: How in the world.
[00:09:33] Speaker C: Her training included having her three year old granddaughter lie on her back while she planks. So that was one of the ways she trained for this.
[00:09:42] Speaker E: I can't even think about logistically how this would go. Like not going to the bathroom for five hours, not being able to eat or drink for five hours. That alone would be tough.
[00:09:50] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:09:50] Speaker E: Much less holding a plank position.
[00:09:52] Speaker C: She said that she almost didn't make it. She was actually going down and she was telling her husband, I'm done, I'm not going to be able to finish. The crowd cheered her on and then they carried her through that the last 10 minutes so that she could set the record. Get this. The morning after she ran a 3000 meter race.
[00:10:12] Speaker E: Goodness gracious. This also isn't her only world record. She also holds the record for most push ups done in an hour by a woman.
1575 push ups in an hour?
In an hour. Goodness, that's crazy. Well, good for her. She looks physically fit. I mean, if you can do it, do it. But I don't think I'll ever get up to an hour or five hours holding a plank. Goodness gracious. It's impressive.
[00:10:39] Speaker C: We're just gonna worship, we're gonna be encouraged and we're just gonna be together.
[00:10:45] Speaker A: That's the idea. You're on the morning journey with Mark
[00:10:48] Speaker C: and Major league baseball playoffs are going on now a lot of people have a. A goal of visiting every major league ballpark.
[00:10:58] Speaker E: They do. And, like, if you're a sports fan. I know my parents want to go to, like, every NFL stadium. And so it's kind of like a rite of passage to go to the ballpark or go to the stadiums. But not everyone wants to do it via bike.
[00:11:09] Speaker C: No.
Scott and Ethan, father and son, they pedal nearly 10,000 miles and hit every single park. All 30 of them.
[00:11:19] Speaker E: Yeah. This was a cross country trip called Bikes to Ballparks. And it's all for a good cause. Throughout doing this, they were raising money for St. Jude Children's Hospital. But what a cool experience. Now you've done this. You've gone with your dad to ball games and stuff, and recently too. And it's just a fun opportunity to, like, spend that bonding time together.
[00:11:36] Speaker C: Yeah, it really is. It's more than just the going to see a baseball game that's obviously a huge part of it.
And then the last trip we went to Atlanta. It was really cool because we got to go actually down on the field and take a tour of the stadium and all of that. So that was a lot of fun. What these two did something that was fun for them. They also did reviews of ballpark food at each stop.
[00:12:00] Speaker E: See, now that would be something that I would love to. I'm gonna have to go read their reviews because I love a good ballpark meal. Ballpark burgers are like my favorite hamburgers. And there's nothing special about them. They're just like something you get at the ballpark. It's fun.
[00:12:13] Speaker C: You can find their reviews and their journey in bikes. Bike to ballparks.
Try that again. Bike to ballparks on Instagram.
[00:12:20] Speaker E: Yeah. Super fun. And I just love watching their relationship. I mean, they went through rainstorms and thunder and lightning and all kinds of stuff to get to all the ballparks and met a lot of cool people on the way. And they said, you know, our country's beautiful, not only landscape wise, but there's a lot of beautiful people out there who have helped them along this journey.
[00:12:36] Speaker A: So pretty cool start on a positive note. You're on the morning journey with Mark and Brittany.
[00:12:43] Speaker C: If you are in school, especially a college student, you need to get more sleep to improve your grades.
[00:12:49] Speaker E: Yeah. A new study says that college students who were paid $5 every night, they slept seven hours or more got better grades. And so I think about, like, I would love to get paid to sleep, and $5 can add up, but it's so hard to get seven plus hours of sleep these days, especially if you're in college.
[00:13:06] Speaker C: Yeah. The study showed that college students are actually getting on average about six and a half hours of sleep per night.
[00:13:13] Speaker E: I'm not in college, but that's actually about what I average a night.
[00:13:16] Speaker C: Do you really?
[00:13:17] Speaker E: It's about six and a half hours. Yep.
[00:13:19] Speaker C: I am not there.
[00:13:21] Speaker E: Worse than that.
[00:13:21] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:13:22] Speaker E: Yikes.
[00:13:23] Speaker C: Probably about five.
[00:13:24] Speaker E: Look, I'll start paying you $5 every time you sleep more than seven hours. Look at that. I think I'll be keeping my money.
[00:13:31] Speaker A: We just wanted to say thanks for making us part of your day. It's the Morning Journey with Mark and Brittany.
[00:13:38] Speaker C: Well, Instagram versus reality, it's not always the same.
[00:13:42] Speaker E: Yeah. We've very often realized that Instagram is most of the time a highlight reel of someone's life, whereas the reality is not so glamorous. And so recently my friends and I, we went to Carter Mountain Orchard. We do this every year. We go apple picking. And now we have four kids between us and we have a five month old and then my son, who's almost four months old.
[00:14:00] Speaker C: So a little different experience.
[00:14:01] Speaker E: So a little different. But if you look at our pictures on Instagram, everyone's smiling, everyone's happy. It looks like we had a fantastic time, which we did. We did have a good time, but not pictured. Is the dad carrying all the diaper bags. Cause they're not allowed in the orchard. And the kids having a meltdown and diaper changes and baby feedings and all of that and being spit up on. I mean, so there are things that when you look at Instagram, you're like, oh, this is so fun. And it was. But there are real life things that happen behind the scenes that no one posts. And I think maybe we should start doing that. Like, post the spit up picture and be like, hey, my baby was cute 10 seconds ago. And then it threw up all over me.
And just be more real and transparent with what's going on in your actual life.
I turn y' all on in the
[00:14:46] Speaker D: morning when I get in my truck.
[00:14:47] Speaker E: It's helpful when I'm taking the kids.
Here we go.
[00:14:50] Speaker A: It's the Morning journey with Mark and Brittany.
[00:14:53] Speaker C: A new diary of the mom squad podcast is out. That's hosted by Brittany and Kate.
[00:14:59] Speaker E: Yeah. Out this morning for the month of October. This time it's with Aaron Fitz, local author of Fall Risk. She talks about her life, how she came to know the Lord, her diagnosis with cancer, and. And just what that looked like and how that shaped the ending of the book. And so if you want to learn about motherhood and dealing with all of the good, the bad and the ugly, this is the one for you. Make sure you check it out. Wherever you get your podcast, just search Diary of the Mom Squad. Or you can find it at myjourneyfm.com or on our Facebook page at MyJourney FM. I just kind of channel surfing through the radio.
[00:15:32] Speaker A: Families are catching on and I'm like,
[00:15:34] Speaker D: wow, this is pretty cool.
[00:15:35] Speaker A: To the best way.
[00:15:36] Speaker E: But now this is the only thing
[00:15:37] Speaker A: I listen to now to wake up.
[00:15:38] Speaker E: My style of Everything has started and changed.
[00:15:40] Speaker A: It's the Morning Journey with Mark and Brittany.
[00:15:43] Speaker C: Well, we're told to eat our fruit and vegetables, but new information says they're not as nutritious as they used to be. Only half of nutri. Only half as nutritious as they were
[00:15:55] Speaker E: 60 years ago, which is crazy to think about. I mean, I just like how does a fruit or vegetable lose its nutrition?
[00:16:03] Speaker C: They say it's because of the soil quality.
[00:16:06] Speaker E: Oh, okay. That makes sense.
[00:16:08] Speaker C: Yeah. Particularly lacking in vitamin C and iron.
So you need to eat twice as much fruits and vegetables as you did in the 60s.
[00:16:17] Speaker E: Or get like one of those, like one a day vitamins, I guess, because that would probably do it for you. That's what my husband does because he doesn't like vegetables, so. And he hardly eats fruit and so he just takes vitamins. And so you could do it one of two ways. You could eat more or you could get a vitamin supplement, I guess. I like fruits and vegetables.
[00:16:34] Speaker C: I do too.
[00:16:34] Speaker E: I tend to try and eat at least daily, one or the other, if not both. But it is sad to think about like that now it takes twice as much to get the same nutritional benefits. I guess that's where stuff like the V8 juice comes into play too. Like the. Just the tomatoey one, not like the fun one.
Yeah, well, now we know. Got to eat more of them.
[00:16:57] Speaker C: We're just going to worship, we're going to be encouraged and we're just going to be together.
[00:17:02] Speaker A: That's the idea. You're on the Morning journey with Mark and Brittany.
[00:17:06] Speaker C: Well, last week Brittany told us she bought a jumping spider. This is a major surprise because you do not like spiders.
[00:17:14] Speaker E: Against my better judgment, I bought a decoration that I immediately regretted because my husband and my daughter set it up at home. And that thing, when it jumps one, it's huge. It's very, very big. And when it jumps, it jumps about the height of her, which is about 3ft does it really?
And so I have yet to experience it, thankfully. I've been walking around the other side of the stairs.
[00:17:35] Speaker C: So you won't even go near it?
[00:17:36] Speaker E: No. And making sure it's turned off. And she tries to get me to pet it when it's off. And if I know it's off, I will, like, go touch the leg, like, barely. But I am so afraid that my husband's gonna get me and turn it on and I'm just gonna, like, he's gonna get you full on panic attack about this thing. My point to having it is so that when our friends come over, I want to put it, like, by the front porch, jump on them, and it can, like, jump out and scare them. And we have one of those ring doorbells so we can, like, see their reactions.
So I'm hoping to, like, scare a couple people. But in the meantime, I think I'm really just gonna scare myself. This was a really, really bad idea.
[00:18:11] Speaker A: Start on a positive note. You're on the Morning Journey with Mark and Brittany.
[00:18:17] Speaker E: Well, we love getting feedback from you and comments from you. And so Richard wrote it on our Facebook page from our Fresh Music Friday song. Brandon Lake. How good God is is the one we added this past Friday. He just said, thank you so much for playing this song this morning. It truly was the right song at the right time for me today. It seemed like if anything could go wrong for me today, it did. And I was having a hard time keeping my attitude in check. Not a good start to a Friday. The song reminded me that even when it's hard, God is still in control. Thank you for that reminder. That's awesome. Thank you so much, Richard, for commenting and for letting us know what that song means to you. We get lucky. We get to hear that a lot. The right song at the right time.
[00:18:54] Speaker C: That's why we're here.
[00:18:55] Speaker B: You guys always make me smile.
[00:18:57] Speaker A: The Morning Journey with Mark and Brittany.
[00:19:00] Speaker C: Hey, by the way, if you're going to be traveling, make sure that you have the My Journey FM app. That way you'll always have your favorite songs with you. Stephanie from Chesapeake is checking in, listening on the app, and Cherie listening on the app from Elizabeth City. Good morning. She says the Journey is the only station she listens to.
[00:19:18] Speaker E: Yeah, Glenda wrote in. She said they're our friends at Chestnut Hill Bakery. They're on another road trip. They're going. They're currently in Maine and they're headed to Massachusetts. They've been from Virginia to Pennsylvania to New York to Vermont to New Hampshire. And they're still going. They're so blessed by being able to take the app along with them. We love to hear that. So thank you for listening. Thank you for taking the app, and thank you so much for mapping the app with us.
[00:19:41] Speaker A: Hope and encouragement. It's the morning journey with Mark and Brittany.
[00:19:46] Speaker C: Well, yesterday, Laura Chase on her afternoon show asked the question, if there was one bill you could never get again, didn't have to worry about it, what would it be?
[00:19:56] Speaker E: I would probably pick the mortgage.
If you could just never have to pay a house payment again. That would be mine. Yeah.
[00:20:02] Speaker C: I would go with probably car payment.
[00:20:04] Speaker E: Oh, okay. Yeah.
[00:20:06] Speaker C: Because of the length of them.
[00:20:08] Speaker E: They are very long.
[00:20:09] Speaker C: And then the average for a new car. The average monthly car payment for new vehicles, $765.
[00:20:17] Speaker E: Good grief. That's like half of a mortgage payment. She had a good suggestion, though. Hers was a credit card bill.
[00:20:24] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:20:24] Speaker E: Because you could put everything on the credit card. I know a lot of people would say gas or groceries, but if you put it all on the credit card and you never get your credit card bill, that would probably be a way to game the system a little bit. So good thinking, Laura. Yeah. If you want to tell us what yours is, 800-424-9594, feel free to call and let us know. But I said the mortgage. Mark said car payments, and Laura gaming the system with credit card payments.
[00:20:48] Speaker A: Your day starts with encouragement the Morning journey with Mark and Brittany.
[00:20:52] Speaker C: Well, if you need to improve your mental health, sing for joy.
[00:20:57] Speaker E: I mean, that makes sense to me. That's why we do what we do here. Because sometimes if you're in a bad mood, you just crank up the radio and you just start singing.
[00:21:05] Speaker C: Now, do you sing? Will you do that if you're.
[00:21:07] Speaker E: Yes.
I don't sing in public ever. I sing in my car. I sing in the shower.
[00:21:11] Speaker C: You have showered in public.
[00:21:12] Speaker E: I sing at home. I've done karaoke a few times. It's not ended well.
[00:21:16] Speaker C: What happened on those?
[00:21:17] Speaker E: I get booed off the stage most of the time. Maybe not so much booed, but, like, whoever's running karaoke will cut the song about halfway and be like, like, good job. Get off the stage, please. So while it brings me joy, it has not yet brought other people joy. So I tend to do this by myself most of the time.
[00:21:36] Speaker C: Yeah. The article. One of the best things you can do for your mental health is to join a choir.
[00:21:42] Speaker E: Okay. Well, I won't subject other people to my singing, but if you are somewhat inclined to sing. Joining a choir, I think the social aspect there, that's why worshiping in church brings you so much joy, because even if you're not up on stage or around other people who are singing. So I don't think I'll be joining choir. I will continue to sing in my car, in my shower, at home, in my house. And maybe I'll give up karaoke, too. We'll see.
[00:22:07] Speaker A: Thanks for catching up on the morning Journey Rewind podcast with Mark and Brittany.
