You keep telling yourself the good part is coming. After the move. After

the next deal. After you figure out what's next. But your kid is ten

months old and about to walk, and you're going to blink and miss it...

There's a song I can't stop playing this summer — Judah & the Lion's

"Maybe the Best Is Now." I heard it while my wife and I were sitting in

the middle of a lot of uncertainty: where we're going to move, two jobs, a

nonprofit getting off the ground, nothing settled. And that one line

undid me. Because I've spent most of my life identifying myself with what

I could produce. Work harder, take on more, prove I'm worth something.

Then look up and realize the things I say matter most are getting the

leftovers.

This episode is about the gap between what you say is important and what

your calendar actually says. If Charlotte and Jack are the most important

thing in my life — show me the evidence. That question doesn't let me off

the hook, and it shouldn't.

In Psalm 46, it says, "be still, and know that I am God." It doesn't mean to just sit quietly

and meditate. It means: stop fighting. Stop trying to control every outcome. Stop

needing the whole thing figured out before you'll let yourself "be here now."

I'm not telling you to quit your job. I'm asking you to look around — what is important to you? What do you see?

The advice I am taking in all of this: Take the trip. Go to the ice cream stand. Watch your kid at the

playground on a Tuesday. Make the memory now, because there's no rewind

button and you don't get these years back.

Wow. Maybe the best is now.

---

Mentioned in this episode: Judah & the Lion, Psalm 46:10, and Ashton's

Story — go back and listen to that one.

Themes: living in the present, being still, Psalm 46:10, fatherhood and

presence, work identity and workaholism, anxiety and control, gratitude,

what matters most, trusting God with the unknown, becoming who you were

made to be.

The Yellow Coat Club is a podcast about identity, courage, and becoming who God created you to be.

📖 Get the book: The Yellow Coat Club — available on Amazon

🌐 yellowcoatclub.com

📩 Questions, feedback, episode ideas: sean@yellowcoatclub.com

Be well. Be still. Maybe the best is now.

We often pick our role models by what they hold — wealth, power, status. We want what they have. But have you stopped to ever ask: do I want to be like them?

I'll say this directly, there's only one worth modeling your life after: Jesus. All of the characteristics you would ever need to embody can be found in this one man — courage, certainty, humility, compassion, to name a few.

It would be easy to write Jesus off as the soft-eyed, ultra-perm Jesus that was often portrayed to us. But that is not Jesus. There is no way you could have a warrior like David, or an uncivilized John, and think Jesus would be compliant. And of the many things Jesus was, in this episode, we look at His courage.

Courage doesn't start with fearlessness. It starts with a heart — and a standard that draws the line and refuses to bend.

In our culture today, masculinity has been portrayed as the enemy. And who would blame anyone for this, given the toxic version that has been praised for so long? Strength and courage doesn't mean loud and aggressive. It often doesn't need to be. But we also can't just throw out men — we need to realign ourselves to the standard, which includes having one.

There is a story in the Bible where Jesus braids cords into a whip and clears the temple in broad daylight. But this wasn't Him losing control. While those before Him tolerated what was happening, Jesus refused to stand aside and witness injustice happening, and barriers created for others to stand in the presence of the Father. In complete control, aimed at the right target, for the right reason, He drives everyone out. His courage came from the love.

The question is: are you willing to stand alone when you stand for what is right? For far too long, we have allowed bad behavior of imposter men and we must take a stand. Our "yes" be "yes," and our "no" be "no." Now is the time to stop being silent. For even in your silence, you are complicit. Stop making excuses for yourself and others, refusing to be a victim, and become who you were created to be.

You weren't made to be small. You weren't made to be safe. You were made to be dangerous. — We dig into the courage of Jesus in John 2 and John 8 — fear of man versus trusting God — plus the difference between peace and quiet, and why the real enemy was never the people.

Themes: courage, standing alone, holding the line, fear of man, biblical manhood, and trusting God in the wreckage.

From The Yellow Coat Club — stop hiding, start becoming.

He was thirteen when he started stealing his dying mother's pain pills so he wouldn't have to feel her leaving.

By the time Ashton met me, he'd buried his mom at her funeral and buried himself in everything that would numb it — pills, cocaine, anything to sedate. He'd cheated on the mother of his daughter and told her he didn't want to be with her anymore. He was angry at the world and angrier at God. In his words: "I told myself I hate God."

That was three years ago.

On this episode, Ashton is 22. Married to Emma — the girl he's loved since he was 14. Two kids, one on the way. Sober. And when I asked him what life is like now, he said: "It's pretty beautiful, actually."

This is a conversation about the long road between those two sentences. About a young man who was so close to losing his whole family — and didn't. About what it costs to stop running, and who has to be in your corner when you finally do. He said it plainer than I could: "That's not who I am anymore."

This is the work. This is why we do it. And this is why we are building something beyond The Yellow Coat Club.

There are young men out there in need of formation, in need of brotherhood. For 3 years, Ashton has stayed in the fold, committed, and I have watched his life radically change. It is the fruit in his life that INVICTUS is being built from... Stay tuned for the next podcast to learn more.