Finding Faith on Twitch: How an Australian Band Built a Living Online Christian Community

Ash: We do always offer prayer regardless of what you believe. We say, if you want prayer, you're welcome to have prayer. If that's not your thing, that's fine. Let us know if you ever change your mind. Sometimes we see people who ask for prayer as like a, well, I don't know if it's going to do anything, but they're offering. And sometimes it's really cool to see how things then change in their lives. And then they come back to say, hey, you prayed and something changed.

Ash: And I'm starting to think that's Jesus. I don't know if I believe in Jesus, but I'm starting to think that's something else. And that's a really cool thing to kind of see the progression of. And the fact that they're coming back to let us know that is a huge praise point. It's really something that has been a real privilege to be a part of. And we've been fortunate enough to actually see Jesus really working in the lives of some of those people to the point where they could no longer ignore him. Welcome into Control-Alt-Redeem.

Flatcap: We are redeeming the culture. We are resetting the space. And it is my privilege to have We Are Amber Lights on the podcast. So Ash and Pete, welcome in.

Ash: Hello, hello. Great to be here.

Flatcap: I don't know if, I mean, I know I've mentioned it, but I don't know how much it resonated with you and your community. But one of the things that a lot of people I run into do not believe is that there's real relationships online. They tend to not think that's true. And your community is one of the things I point people to when I talk about, no, it's real relationship, real community, because, you know, time change happens. I think I was watching it's probably six years ago, five or six, you know, during COVID started watching you go into the fall. Time change happens. We go in opposite directions.

Flatcap: You're now two hours earlier. I'm not getting up to watch you. Come back in March. So November to March, not watching you. I show up in your stream. I'm greeted by a dozen people in your channel. You didn't even get a chance to say hi to me or acknowledge me.

Flatcap: I'm already being welcomed by a dozen people who aren't like, you know, you miss church. And where were you? It was excitement. Hey, good to see you back. Good to have you here. How have things been? And you acknowledged me as well, but it's like, wow, there was real relationship that was here that was so genuine that even over a several month gap, people were excited that I came back and was in the community.

Flatcap: And I was like, wow, this is a really lovely thing that you have created with your community that proves and shows it's real. And I just want to make sure that you and your community knows that.

Pete: No, that's, yeah, it's super humbling. And I know that it's something that we always try to foster, but we genuinely just, yeah, give the credit back to Jesus about, yeah, just the space that we get to be part of. On Twitch is one that we've always tried to make sure is fully part of and, you know, that we sent everything around. And yeah, I think we, we definitely try and be intentional about helping create that welcoming, supportive space, but, you know, it's, yeah, every time you just come back to it and just think it's, it's all coming from you. But yeah, it's, it's so good just to hear you say that and just feeling like, you know, after, you know, that six months coming back and just still feeling that, that same sense of people being excited to, you know, to see people that have been away for a while.

Pete: That's, that's so special.

Flatcap: Yeah. Yeah. And like I said, it wasn't something I was expecting or, you know, it's one thing for, you know, the person on camera to recognize and acknowledge you and do those things. I wasn't expecting the chat community to have built a relationship with me that would embrace me and be excited about me coming back. Like that was the thing that was like, wait a minute, it's not just the streamer. It is the whole community, which is a lot of what people who aren't on Twitch don't understand. It's not like other social media, like you're putting YouTube video out and there's just chat and arguing and back and forth or whatever.

Flatcap: There's no, there's no real community in a lot of other social media places. Here you can, if you're intentional, create something that is genuine and is, is relationship. And I'm, I just, you know.

Ash: Yeah, absolutely. And it's one that we are constantly grateful for. And we say this a lot on stream as well, that like when we, cause we like, we love to pray on our streams and something we love to also say is like, Jesus, thank you to this community. And it's because we genuinely feel like sometimes we're just there as the background music to their hangout. It's where like, where we're playing some music, we're praying and we're having a chat, but so are they. And so often in while we're, while we're playing music and we're streaming and whatnot, I'm just watching the chat, just like go off the screen and I'm like, I'm not keeping up with this because they're all either like talking to each other, sharing what's going on in their lives, supporting each other, giving each other like virtual hugs.

Ash: And it's just a really, really beautiful thing to see because we could have never fathomed growing that. We could have never fathomed that. We were always kind of come into this thinking we wanted to create a safe space for people to come online, where they can, people of all ages can come, feel welcomed, hopefully, feel a bit of love of Jesus, know they can be prayed for. And honestly, Jesus, just as Pete said, Jesus just brought people who were wanting to foster that. And I think that's just a beautiful thing.

Flatcap: Yeah. How, I, I always like asking everyone, how did you first get introduced to Twitch? And then if it's a different story, why did you decide? And especially for you as a band, why did you decide Twitch? Twitch was a place where you could go live and, and you could, you know, share your love of music and your talents with others who like myself may never run into you halfway around the world, uh, be able to go to a concert, but I can enjoy you live. So what was, what was the introduction to Twitch and what was the decision to go live on Twitch? Cause there's still not a lot of bands that are live on Twitch.

Pete: I mean, there's individual artists or, you know, Yeah, man, I, I almost, I don't think I can even remember how I got introduced to Twitch as a platform. All I can remember is that I engaged. And, and being part of Twitch a little bit and our old bass player, James was also a frequenter on the platform. And we were just thinking about ways as a band that we could connect more meaningfully with the audiences that we were playing to live. And we initially defaulted to YouTube because we kind of felt most people know YouTube. And so we started there and it just wasn't hitting the way that we had hoped it would. And so we're thinking about that and yeah, you know, pretty much just went, why don't we give Twitch a try?

Pete: And at the time you mentioned there not being many bands on Twitch. Now there were even fewer, I think like when we first started streaming on Twitch as a full band, we couldn't even find five other bands collectively on Twitch. Like you're saying there were heaps of single songwriters, heaps of DJs, you know, solo performers, all the rest of it, but full bands. Yeah, like right now I can, I can only remember three that I could think of then. Um, and I, so I think that that was really, you know, what helped introduce, you know, us to a lot of people in this space was there was just not a lot of what we were doing going on. And what we found was that, and we mentioned this before Twitch as a platform just has a very different vibe when it comes to community.

Pete: And like you're saying people looking for that space where they can spend a lot of time, you know, with a group of people, um, interacting with each other. And so I think that's all of those things combined, I meant that, yeah, we, we abandoned YouTube for a while because it wasn't quite, you know, seeing what we, what we hoped, we weren't able to Twitch. And then we just started having people come in into the stream going, oh, wow, like a full band, you know, I haven't seen this on Twitch before. Like, what are you guys about? And we just started having conversations with people and playing some music in between. So, yeah.

Flatcap: Yeah. Yeah. Was it, was it, uh, before COVID that you started on Twitch or was it around that time? Cause I know I found you around that time. Yeah.

Pete: Yeah. It was around that time. Okay. Yeah. COVID gave us permission to focus on figuring out digital in a much greater capacity than we had before COVID. So we, we were pretty, pretty dizzy with live shows and, you know, as a band and, you know, what our heart for, you know, those shows being and where we wanted to do that and make that that was taking up the time that we had available. And then obviously COVID came along and live shows just weren't an option anymore, but we still had the same heart of wanting to connect to people through music and, you know, share the hope that Jesus, you know, gave us in our life through, through that music.

Pete: So it was just, you know, great. We'd already been doing some stuff and doing some uploads on YouTube. And so we thought we're just gonna, we're gonna dig in and figure out what it looks like to build community in digital spaces. And that's why we started in YouTube because we already had a presence there. We'd already been uploading. Um, but like I said, we just found that. Yeah.

Pete: The, uh, the live scene was different to the, the long form upload scene on YouTube. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Which sounds silly to say, like everyone kind of knows that, but you know, we had to give it a shot and start somewhere. So yeah. But that's, yeah, I guess that's how that came about in terms of when we started and the why.

Flatcap: Yeah. You know, it's, it's one of those things like I, I love the fringe areas in, you know, Twitch of, uh, the artists who are doing art online, you know, the cooking things like the, the, the, nobody else is doing this. So, you know, it was, and I, I think partially probably because of COVID, like I, you couldn't go out to concerts. So to kind of have a concert in your, on your screen, knowing it's live. The one thing that I really wish the church could figure out is if you're doing worship, how to make worship feel the same way I feel when I'm watching you live, because it's different than a worship service. It feels different. It doesn't feel like I'm a participant usually in a worship service.

Flatcap: I feel like a participant when I watch you live. And I want one of the things I think, and I might be wrong on this. The fact that somebody made a request and you play a request makes it feel participatory. The fact that I'm chatting with other people makes it feel participatory. I'm actually planning to write up a thing for the church to kind of say, you're doing this wrong. You're making people spectators instead of making them participants when they're at home. We need to figure out how to change this.

Flatcap: And I'm really using you and others that draw me in as, as a thing to point to what's the difference between what you're doing and what's the difference of when I, and I do this. I turn on a, a church that I know is a physical church and I watch their stream and I'm not participatory in any way. It's, I mean, I might as well, like, this is my bias. I might as well wait till you're not live and watch you at double speed, you know, because I'm not participating anyway. So if I'm just there for content, I want it faster. Uh, I'm, I, you know, I'm want to consume it. If it's content, I don't want to consume it.

Flatcap: I want worship to be a participatory thing. And to the extent at which your music does that, I really feel like I'm participating or I'm present while it's happening. So, you know, that's just a really cool thing that you were able to, because I don't know if everybody realizes that when you go live, am I a spectator or am I part of what's happening?

Pete: That's, I mean, that's probably something interesting, you know, at least for the music category on Twitch is that does vary a little bit, but we, we set this stream up highly intentional about making every element that we could as interactive as possible. So from the fact that. We base it, you know, our music streams around song requests, right? Whether it's Sam on drums taking song requests of YouTube or us as a full band, but like the community can choose the color of the lights whenever they want. Like that's not paywall. That's just, you know, if, if you're in the chat, you can do that. They can choose the camera angle.

Pete: They can choose the song. They can choose whether or not we play with ridiculous sized implements, like giant pics or giant, like we, we have been really intentional. Hey Ash about this guy. And how many choices can we give people? Right. So that, so that it is their stream. And I think you said it before as well, right.

Pete: Yeah. We want it to be a space where we're almost the background and people can just kind of make it their stream and have ownership of that. So yeah.

Ash: Like it was a difficult, it is still a difficult balance though, because. Sometimes you give them too much control. That's true. That's a, that's a, that's a line that we've kind of taken. So, but things like camera angles and lights, that's generally like, that's something that is already happening. Well, the lights aren't, the lights kind of just defaulted until, but like there are lights there already. The camera will be switching, but say like Pete's absolutely shredding the solo.

Ash: Someone can drop a guitar, a camera command in and swap it over. And if there's a delay that, oh no, you've got him in a, in a lull. Let's swap it to something else now. So it kind of, but then the music still goes on. And I think that's something that's quite, that's quite cool about Twitch, being able to do that. And I think actually like you asked earlier how we got introduced to Twitch. Honestly, my very first introduction to Twitch was many people's, which was Twitch plays Pokemon.

Ash: And that was revolutionary in my brain. Yeah. Where everyone was just spamming chat and accidentally releasing YouTube. Like I don't even know how it was happening, but everyone, but you were there for the content and you felt like you could be a part of it. Even if your move happened in, you don't even know when it was about to happen. But I think that's what Twitch facilitates is something like that, where you can go in and be like, okay, great. I have control over something that's happening on the screen.

Ash: Yeah. And I think that is what helps you to be slightly participant. And like, even if someone's waiting half an hour for their song to be played, it's kind of like, okay, hopefully I'll be here for it. And hopefully I can enjoy the things in the meantime. What am I going to do? Oh, look, these people seem to be enjoying themselves. Maybe I'll talk to them.

Ash: So a little bit of a waiting room for music at the same time. Oh no, accidental friend.

Flatcap: Yeah. Yeah. And, and the, uh, the request thing, I mean, it reminds me of when I was a kid, cause you could call into the radio station and request songs and, and you would try to wait, you'd get your song and you're just like waiting. And you would listen to the radio for an hour, hoping in that hour that your song gets played. But now I'm connected and I'm invested and I want to, I want to wait and be there. I don't know if a church would do this, but cause you really have to have a, a set that here's the songs you can pick for us to play. And you have to practice them and, and praise teams aren't always able to do that, but I still think it would be great.

Flatcap: And I, maybe you can't do it every worship service service. Maybe you do once a month, hymn sing, and you could do something like that. Uh, but I hadn't thought about, I mean, I do have this on my fish channel where you can change the camera of what channel you're like. Wow. How fun would that be as a worship service? If the, if the people at home controlled what camera they watched, if you had, and a lot of churches only have one, but if you had enough cameras to be able to switch and do those, like you can give ownership to the community of things. And I, and I know you have that with the lights and, and, and other things.

Flatcap: I think that's fantastic. It, it, it moves me from a spectator to being a participant there. Even if I'm not the one choosing, I know the person next to me, you know, in the chat is, is the one who made a selection and something is happening. So I feel more part of it in that way. And I think that's really just fun.

Pete: Yeah. I think honestly, one of the biggest things that a lot of live streams and like for churches could make to be a more enjoyable experience is having just more than one camera. Because the reality is that as a human being in a room, you're not viewing that room through a fixed static set of eyes, whether it's a church service or a concert, you've got different angles that you're switching between individually. And so, yeah, for whether it's a stream or a church or whatever it might be to just think, Hey, what are the two or three angles that people can view through is instantly going to make them more engaged with the room and the people in it.

Pete: What's happening because it's just not a static, it just creates a little bit of dynamic-ism, is that the word? Yeah. For them just to, to keep engaged. Yeah.

Ash: I do acknowledge though, that is a bit of a challenge in a church space, because as you said, not necessarily the people who were volunteering for that are comfortable getting, I guess, that much close attention. And so like if you're, if you're opting to be on Twitch, for example, you've chosen to become a content creator. So you're expecting that heat and that spotlight, but that might not be the case. I think there's people who are wanting to just, you know, serve a church in that way. So I do acknowledge that there's a little bit of difference there, but that can come with training. I do, I do believe. You can have a team that is more comfortable and has signed the release forms, for example.

Flatcap: Well, and I'm convinced there, there are more techie nerds sitting in the pews than we get so many.

Ash: Oh yeah.

Flatcap: Yeah. And, and, and they're, they're hiding and they're in stealth mode. They're just lurkers in the church and they're waiting for someone to say, we can use our skills and our talents for something. And we don't have to be upfront. See, that's the problem is we try to put them in a role that everyone sees them and they don't want it. So we need to find a way to invite them to participate and use their skills and talents. And I, I, you know, I think, I think that we just don't invite them often enough.

Pete: The unfortunate reality is that often the technical mind comes with a very quiet personality. Not always. There's always exceptions, but yeah, in my experience, the two often go together more. Yeah. Like him.

Ash: I'm not an extra. Yeah. No, I, I am enjoying Scooby Stewie's comment in the chat saying, Kimmy, you're not supposed to stare at the lead signal.

Flatcap: Not a joke. Well, yeah, that's, that's where some people stare. I, I'm usually staring at the bass guitarist. That's my bias, you know.

Pete: It's fantastic.

Flatcap: That's because I'm gonna, I'm gonna, you know, be bopping my head to, to the bass guitar. So I need to, I need to watch. Yeah.

Ash: Everyone's got the, everyone's got the instrument that fixates them. And definitely. Yeah. I don't fixate on the singers that I'm seeing off. So yeah. Yeah.

Flatcap: I'd, I'd love to hear if you've got, you know, maybe two, two or three stories of things that have been a blessing that have happened to you and your community, either an individual, something happened in their life, something that happened on stream that would have never happened had you not been a Twitch streamers.

Ash: The thing that happened a few days ago. Yeah.

Pete: Yeah. Do you, do you want me to share or do you want to?

Ash: You go ahead.

Pete: I would overarchingly say like how many, like two or three was the cap you gave, but I think I can just say generally, we have been so blessed by seeing so many people be blessed by Jesus in this community. In some very big ways with just big answers to prayer for health or relationships to very small, but still significant ways as well. And yeah, there's yeah. Someone yet recently just in the community that has just been on a journey of just trying to figure out, you know, what they believe, you know, what they're centering their life around. And, you know, it's just, you know, had had some hard times over the last few years in the midst of all of that.

Pete: And a couple of days ago, you know what, actually, I want to base my life on Jesus and I'm going to make that decision and I'm going to let it into my life. So that's just like, those are the huge highlights and we don't stream expecting that to happen, but Jesus is part of who we are. And by extension, that's something that we love being able to see in other people's lives within this community when it does happen. But yeah, it's, yeah, I think that's a real recent one, but we've just, we've seen that time and time again over the last five years, way more than two or three. And, you know, just giving everyone proper anonymity and all that and all the rest of it.

Pete: That would be the thing that I just go to.

Ash: I would also like say, it's not just, yeah, being able to see, like, you build a connection with people because it's not just the community building connection amongst themselves. They build a trust with you as well and start to tell you their stories. And what I think is really cool is we do always offer prayer regardless of what you believe. And we say, if you want prayer, you're welcome to have prayer. If that's not your thing, that's fine. Let us know if you ever change your mind. And so it's like, and we'll be here ready to pray.

Ash: And so sometimes we see people who are almost asked for prayers like a, well, I don't know if they're going to do anything, but they're offering. And sometimes it's really cool to see how things then change in their lives. And then they come back to say, hey, you prayed and something changed. And I'm starting to think that that's Jesus. I don't know if I believe in Jesus, but I'm starting to think that's something else. And that's a really cool thing to kind of see the progression of slowly. And the fact that they're coming back to let us know that is a huge praise point.

Ash: It's really something that has been a real privilege to be a part of. And we've been fortunate enough to actually see Jesus really working in the lives of some of those people to the point where they could no longer ignore him. And it's like, that's, that's something that's, yeah, I guess we could never have fathomed to begin with, but it's also the beauty of what prayer is just now in an online context as well. Right.

Flatcap: And, and one of the interesting things of, of having that on a stream is a whole lot different. Like if you're in a concert, like, are you asking and inviting people to stop the concert so you can pray for them? And it's like, that's not part of the experience. That's not part of what people expect versus versus live stream. It's about the community. It's not about the performers on stage, so to speak. But I love that aspect of, of the building relationship over time.

Flatcap: I don't know if this is the way you would describe it of people belonging before they believe of you're there. They belong to the community because they belong to the community and they're exposed to what the community believes and the community values are. They're open to, like you said, Hey, I don't know if this prayer thing works, but say, I keep watching you do it and I've got a problem. Go ahead and pray for me and let's see what happens. That openness because they belong already before they believe.

Pete: Yeah. One of the very first viewers on Twitch, like probably one of the first 10 people actually had started watching us about six months after. Yeah. We started streaming, tried some messages saying, you know, to, to the effect of, Hey, I haven't had a positive experience of church growing up. And then because of that, I'd really walked away from the idea of who God was, but just hanging out with you guys in the community for the last few months has actually completely changed my mind about who Jesus is. And it was really that sense of actually just observing what it looks like to be in a community and around people that just genuinely love God and are authentic and transparent.

Pete: And just having some of those casual conversations and what you're saying, like the belonging before believing that made him, even after bad experience, come back around and go, Oh, is this actually who Jesus might be? And if that's the case, then that, you know, he's, he's someone that I am very willing to learn more about, which is just so special and just really blindsided this. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. As I said before, it's not something that we expect is going to happen for everyone or anyone. Um, so, and just the fact that he shot that completely unprompted.

Pete: I was like, man. We were floored.

Ash: Like we at that point were essentially just streaming our rehearsals. We were floored. It wasn't practiced. It wasn't, there was no, there was no camera angles. There was no like real set list. It was just, we're going to rehearse and we're going to be on a camera now. So, and the way then that he kind of engaged with that is like, but we'll pray, but we don't really know what's happening with the rest of this.

Ash: And that was really cool to see. Um, then he also like, I swapped platforms as well. Cause we swapped platforms in that time to come over to Twitch. We were on YouTube and just the way, especially, I think it was also something he said. It was, he always felt like he had to act a certain way to fit in with the Christian community, to be accepted by Jesus. And I think the beauty almost of online as well though, is you can choose to engage as much as you want. And if you're feeling awkward or maybe you have a bit of social anxiety or whatever it is, you have the ability to also withdraw and observe without worrying about how much you're engaging.

Ash: And so I think it gave them always the opportunity to kind of just stand back and just watch and figure it out in their own time. So then one day it'd be like, hang on, this is also how Jesus is. I don't have to act a certain way. I can watch Jesus and look at his life and see what's happening in the Bible and he'll wait for me to approach him. But I don't need to act a certain way. I just need to approach him. And I think that was kind of what I think sometimes having online community like that helps because it allows people who are maybe a little bit more afraid in person to just observe when they need to observe.

Ash: And so it lets them.

Flatcap: Yeah. When you're when you show up and I think about my middle child who is socially awkward and more introverted, you know, as a 30 year old, he's not showing up in a local church alone because now he's the center of attention. Exactly. Because exactly. Yeah. Like I walk through the doors. I'm greeted by people I don't know.

Flatcap: I'm trying to just check the church out and I'm going to be bombarded by people asking me things. I'm not even going to be able to feel comfortable in that whole state in scenario. The online community allows the lurking until you're comfortable with people that doesn't happen in a physical church because we got to greet people and don't do this. I've seen this happen of all the visitors. Please stand up so we can greet you. My goodness. Introvert nightmare happening right there.

Flatcap: It's melting. Right.

Pete: But it's like, oh, man. Yeah.

Ash: I'm integrated into a church and sometimes I still feel like I want to turn up and I just want to hide away. Yeah. I'm there because I want to spend intentional time with the Lord and learn. But I'm so emotionally tapped out or so socially tapped out so that I'm just kind of like, I don't really want to engage. I just want to be here. I just want to be in the presence that is being cultivated right now. And it's like, I want to be in that room where two or three have gathered, but I don't want to have to put on a show to feel like I have to partake in this.

Ash: So like, so I definitely think there is an element of that where it's like in past, maybe I would have pulled, gone to like a podcast or something, but it's not the same. You don't have the same sets of community. You don't have those. Yeah. You can interact with it when you want to. So there's some definitely benefits online.

Flatcap: Yeah. You've left the faith, the being able to explore it again in a safe way. You don't have to come back to the church in person and be ready to be accepted by the church. It feels threatening here. You're like, well, you know, maybe it wasn't the, maybe it wasn't Jesus. That was a problem. Maybe it was my local church.

Flatcap: It was a problem. Maybe it was just people in that church. It was a problem. Maybe it was just a situation that I couldn't see all the circumstances. But if all those things can't be seen, you're not going to be open to walking through the doors of a church where if it's less threatening, if it's more open, if it's just check it out and see from a safe distance of those people who have deconstructed or just left the faith or walked away. It's a much more inviting space to just bring you in. So the fact that they shared that with you, that is an awesome thing to say, hey, we I had left.

Flatcap: I walked away from faith and through watching you live out faith online. I'm now drawn back to Jesus. That's that's a really cool thing. And that's the first step, right?

Ash: You come back to Jesus and then you never know what healing. So what healing will come from that? It's like they might find that healing comes and they can go back to a physical church. I still think that's incredibly important to have that, that physical community as well, or a local, a regular church community that will check in with you more than say someone online will. But sorry, when I say online, I mean like streamers, but yeah, it's yeah. I say like, but you never, the first step is coming back to Jesus and learning that Jesus never rejected you. Jesus never was those people, those spaces that you no longer felt safe in, because Jesus is the safety.

Ash: And then you never know what healing comes after that. And that's something that it's been. Yeah. It's cool to just kind of be a part of that. Oh, hopefully be a part of that step.

Pete: Yeah. And it's funny as well. You kind of alluded to a little bit. It just reminded me. I've never, I know that they're out there, but I've never met someone who has an issue with Jesus. I've met a lot of people that have an issue with some of the people that say that they believe in Jesus or a local church, which. Which is horrible and you hope wouldn't ever be the case, but it just seems to be the reality.

Pete: But yeah, just being able to create that space where people can just see Jesus again. Yeah. It's, it's huge. I don't know. It's very humbling to think that that's been the case for some people that have been part of our community. Absolutely. Just to have that, that chance to try again and experience again in a safe way.

Pete: Yeah.

Flatcap: Yeah. And that's, it's one of those, those things that I've seen it in your community. I've seen in other communities of, of, you know, Twitch streamers who are intentionally Christian, praying for people doing those things is the lost and the lonely are attracted to that because it's something that they need and they want. And maybe they don't know what that is, but they're going to keep coming around and, and, and hanging out in the community because there is blessing and there is hope there. Uh, and, and if it's someone who's walked away from faith, it can bring them back. If someone's never had it, it can, it can make a safe way, especially I've had this, you know, for myself, Muslims in countries that can't openly walk through the doors of a church to check it out, can safely come and check out me reading the Bible because it's safe for them to do so.

Flatcap: Uh, so whether it's someone who's walked away from faith or just curious, you know, online streamers can be that place that's safe for them. Yeah, absolutely.

Ash: Oh, I was going to say like in that as well, it's just, yeah. Or it's people who've walked away or people who are afraid of showing it. Maybe they've been abused in past or persecuted or something. And it's like being, it's being able to also, I think, normalize that praying is something that you can do. Normalize mentioning the name of Jesus. And that's something actually we see quite a bit a lot that's been really cool is that we'll be playing music and then we'll be like, all right, if you have any prayer requests, let us know. And people are like, oh, you guys are Christians.

Ash: Yeah, sweet.

Pete: We don't seem to get it as much these days. So I don't know if people feel it's a bit more normalized now, but the first few years when we were streaming, we used to get almost weekly someone in chat being like, wow, I've never seen a stream or pray like on stream before. And it just seemed to be such a foreign thing to a lot of people. Do you remember that?

Ash: Vaguely. It's become so normal now.

Pete: Yeah. I still remember that it was something that just really struck people. Yeah. That, again, it was something we weren't expecting. It's like, hey, this is who we are. We talk to Jesus. Like, yeah, we've seen him do incredible things in our lives.

Pete: So we're going to do that now. Yeah. We're talking to you.

Ash: We're talking to each other. We'll talk to Jesus. Yeah. It's just normal.

Flatcap: Yeah. Yeah. Anyway. You know, when I when I went on Twitch, I intentionally and this this comes from, you know, my background of going out, doing a pickup game of golf, you know, playing around, get about to the ninth hole. They finally ask you what you do and you say you're a pastor and they would all of a sudden apologize for all the swearing they did. And I was like, stop apologizing. Okay.

Flatcap: Yeah. I saw you were frustrated. Your whole your ball went in the water. It went in the sand and it went whatever. It was awful. Whatever. I didn't bother me.

Flatcap: If I was offended, I just said something. But it always felt like I was now intruding on their enjoyment of the rest of the game that they found out I was a pastor. Like it just bothered me. So it's like, I'm going to put pastor in my name.

Pete: I didn't.

Flatcap: I knew other two or three pastors that were in Twitch. Some had pastors, some didn't, but I always felt like that. You need to know upfront who I am. I also don't take myself that seriously. So I, you know, I wanted to have a fun name that kind of pointed at poked fun of myself a little bit, but in tongue in cheek way. And, and so I was like, that was it. So I have a different perspective because people come in going, okay, you're a pastor.

Flatcap: What does this mean? But it's easier to start from, for me, for that position. So now they come in knowing that, but early on, on Twitch, there wasn't the Christian tag. People didn't know that was the only way I could signify it. So they would know, Hey, I can come in here and ask for prayer, you know, have the, the, the announcement in chat saying, Hey, if you need prayer, ask for it. You know, those kinds of things, but you're right. The, it has become maybe more normalized because I think Christians have decided they can be open about their faith on stream.

Flatcap: Yeah. And if they, they can create communities where it's safe to do that and safe for anybody to come and hang out, even if you're not a Christian, because there's a lot of toxicity out there. So just having a safe community and establishing that is going to draw people to you. Yeah.

Pete: Yeah. Yeah. That's good.

Flatcap: Yeah.

Pete: Well, I mentioned another highlight as well, just off that original question. If you, if you want to hear that. Yeah. Go ahead. It was basically something I think that, yeah, that we have recognized and that we've seen that, that wouldn't have happened. Had we not started streaming was the other pockets of community that have emerged from people that have met each other. In our stream that have then gone off and started streaming and had others from, from the community, then start gathering around them when we're not live.

Pete: That has been really special. So that I can probably think of like a half dozen to a dozen different people in the community that now stream that at any point during the week, you know, if I hop on Twitch and be like, oh, so-and-so streaming and, you know, jump in for a quick work or even to say hi. And then there's like, oh, yeah, this person and this person and this person and this person. And you look at the mix of people like, oh, none of them knew each other before. Yeah. Jumping in this stream, which has just been incredibly special to see just that extension of community and movement going out as well.

Ash: Digital neighborhood.

Pete: Digital neighborhood. Yeah. And yeah, I just think like, yeah, we were talking off stream before, before we started about Wild Free Me and the fact that the digital community that we have a number of years back now, we made an intentional decision to have it extend beyond us. We didn't want it to be about us. And a huge highlight was combining a Discord server with, with Wild Free Me and having both of our streams really start to champion each other because we really believed that community should be more than just us. And that it was possible to see people just fluidly go from streamer to streamer with each other so that it's not about the streamer.

Pete: And it's just been a huge highlight to see that become a reality within just out of the Discord community. Where, yeah, we've, we've just seen that fluidity happen and people come in from multiple places and then starting to acting, you know, regardless of who's live. And it's just been so special to see that, that grow as well. Um, so that's just another highlight. And then, yeah, just all of those other, almost, yeah, just other, there's just so many popping out now where it's, yeah, people go, oh, I'm going to stream too. And then just, you know, sections of the community, you know, are going to be there. It's like, that's so good.

Ash: And people start to get excited because they see a safe name that they know, or they can, they can feel like they could support another friend. And it's like turning up to people's, you know, sports games. It's like, you can support them, but you can, yeah. And you want to be able to do that for them. But you also know that it's going to be a fun time. And if it isn't, then you kind of just like, oh, I remember that time you tried that thing. Ha ha.

Ash: But we were there for you.

Flatcap: You know, that's fascinating because I've, I, I've, I've witnessed that in other communities as well, where you, you know, and we were talking beforehand about hopeful disasters. Uh, I've met some people in hopeful disasters, reach conference. Another, what I was probably, probably, I want to say three years ago, maybe four that started to see people drawing groups together and saying, we're going to stream alongside of other people in a community. We're so, and I love that idea. I, I, I, I think it would be really cool to, you know, just constantly have a person in the community that's streaming live 24 seven. And, you know, you have to have a large community to be able to do that.

Flatcap: But the smaller ones are fantastic. And the multiple raids that you can do back and forth with one another, supporting one another. Hey, we're done over here. We're going to go support this other person over here. Is, is just a fantastic thing that Twitch does that others don't as far as, because think about your local church, your local church. Isn't going and supporting the church down the road after the service is over. We're not supporting the church down the road, but we're, we're all serving the same Jesus.

Flatcap: So why, why, and, and I, and I've tried to, as a, as a, as a pastor in local communities, get churches together to, to do community projects together. And some of those to get your people together outside of community projects. It's a lot harder to, to draw the church together or an Easter celebration or Christmas pageant. If you're putting those on, it's like, there's not natural ways to build it in, but Twitch community has that built in to be able to support one another. I, I always joke around about, I would love to see it someday an Easter raid train of churches in my town that, that we all show up at sunrise service at 6:00 AM at one church.

Flatcap: We go over to the next church at 7:00 AM. And for the next six hours, we're going from church to church, church hopping. And we're just having Easter morning celebration for six hours would be amazing. But I probably won't convince anyone to do that.

Pete: It's going to do an Easter parade from like station to station, but it's like just the church, church.

Flatcap: Yeah.

Ash: It's just church. Like the nag at every next church.

Pete: That would be so fun.

Flatcap: If I say it often enough, somebody will make it happen and invite me. That's what I just figure. I'll just keep throwing, throw the idea out there. And they'll say it's their idea as well.

Pete: I don't care.

Flatcap: Take this idea. I just want to show up and enjoy it. Like you were saying, I don't want to be the one leading it. I just want to stealthily show up and lurk in all of those churches all the way through. And they get at the end and go, I was here for all of it. No, that's yeah.

Pete: That's often the best way to create change is you've just got to keep saying the same message until people hear it. And then and then one day someone will be like, hey, I've got this great idea. And everyone else goes, oh, yeah. And then and then it's.

Flatcap: Well, you know, along those lines, you know, too, is sometimes you can know that there's things available to do. But if but you don't really think they can happen until somebody brings it up and says it can happen. I often and I have been as I've been a pastor solving issues the church has by turning to technology and turning to online to help reach into that. But it wasn't until covid that I saw, wait a minute, there's a mission field here. I was just trying to take the community I had in person and better serve the community I already had. I didn't see I could go online and find a community there that may never gather together in person. I mean, I don't know if I'll ever get to Australia.

Flatcap: I don't know if you guys will ever do concerts in the States. You know, I don't know if those things will happen. I would love either of those to happen, but don't know about it. But every chance I get to meet someone I know from Twitch, I say, yes, let's do this. Let's let's hang out. Let's let's get together. Let's so I would have never been thinking about that, you know, five, 10 years ago, even if I was the crazy pastor who was streaming live on YouTube as soon as it was available.

Flatcap: It didn't mean I was innovative. It just meant it was a need that I knew how to fix with YouTube. That's that's all it was.

Pete: Yeah. We're the same. Any chance we can. Yeah. Organize to to make people IRL. Yeah. From this space.

Pete: And we've had some really special and great. Yeah. Meetups. Yeah. So and likewise, I think we'd be happy with either of the options you presented. If you if you ever get down to Australia or if by some miracle we end up doing the US tour. Yeah.

Ash: Let's just doing the math here. There's pretty more of us than you. You're a big chief. Yeah.

Flatcap: Yeah. Well, you know, it there there there. It is on my list to go to Australia and New Zealand. So it's it's one of those places I would love to give get to. I definitely will let you know and several others. I know that like, hey, I'm coming. We're having a party.

Flatcap: You know, we're gonna do something. Which which is funny because at times I'm with my family on vacation and I meet up with people and my wife's like, go have fun. Whatever doesn't want to meet these strange people that you know online. But that's also her introvert like, you know, no, I don't need all of that excitement. And I don't know who these people are. But what was really funny, I was we were going on vacation. I, you know, a day before and a day after before we left on a cruise and somebody was in my.

Flatcap: So we were in Miami and one of my mods was in Miami for a wedding. And they're like, wanted to stop by, wanted to see me. We had like a two, three hour window. That's the only thing that worked. So they showed up at my hotel. We just met in the lobby and she brought her daughters with. It was just fantastic and fun.

Flatcap: Like, but if you don't have a relationship, why would you meet up for two hours in a hotel lobby?

Pete: Yeah, yeah, absolutely sketchy heading out.

Flatcap: Hey, thank you for being here. God bless you all. You as well, sketchy. Let's let's go the other side of of things. So we talked about some of the blessings that you've experienced. What have been some challenges that either you individually. So it could be related to the band.

Flatcap: It could be related to personal things. Some challenges you faced with being Twitch streamers and things that have become difficult in life. Trying to be to be in the band, be in the stream, be all of those things or just life happening as you've been, you know, living your faith out in front of people.

Pete: Yes, that's difficult. Nailed it. Living life, being in a band, streaming. Have you got anything that comes to mind?

Ash: We've got, we'll have different answers to this because our lives are quite different. Yeah. Yeah. I guess we like all of us have other things that we do when we're not on stream, obviously other parts of our jobs and things like that. I think for me, yeah. Okay. Let's talk about the, the being on Twitch site.

Ash: I guess I'd never been so on, I'd never realized how much content there would be of me online. That's something that I definitely never really quite fathomed when we started this. I was like, yeah, we're joining a band, but we just do all these kinds of stuff. And like, it's, it's one thing to just put on a couple of YouTube videos and then a couple of audio tracks. It's another thing to have like hundreds of hours of footage of you saying silly things and missing notes and forgetting lyrics and all these kinds of things. And it's, yeah, it's that one I never quite fathomed. And so I still quite, can't quite fathom it because in reality, no one's ever going to go back and watch them.

Ash: And that's honestly what makes me feel safe. You do. Okay, great. But you're on, you see it live. And that's something that I, I struggled with, I guess. And especially as someone who I, I really don't like watching myself back. I really don't like listening to myself back.

Ash: And so it's the idea that it's out there is still like mildly terrifying. So that's one thing. The other thing I think is, um, the internet is a wide place. And so you're never quite sure. It's always very pleasant when you're in the chat and someone comes in, they go, Hey, I know you. I are well, and you kind of just like, ow, where, what, what, where and when. And so that's an interesting one where you're like, yeah.

Ash: And then he's trying to piece those, put those dots together. And I guess also sometimes you do come across people who, you, they think they're keyboard warriors, right? They, they hide behind their keyboard too. For whatever reason, they, they feel good about bringing others down. And so trying to manage that while also trying to be loving can be quite difficult sometimes. Cause we are still human as well. And so that is something as well.

Ash: That's kind of like you develop a tough skin pretty quick and you kind of have to. And so just like, it's, but that in itself is also a blessing because you get reminded of what, of what's important. And it's, it's not the words of a stranger. And so, yeah. And so that, that's kind of that. And then like, I guess day to day, something that I know I've found challenging is the parasocial relationships you can often have with people online. Who, from my perspective, I'm online once a week, twice a week or whatever it is.

Ash: And then they come around and they're like, yeah, let's meet up. And I'm like, yeah, great. And then you, you know, your friends, you're friendly and your friends. And then you meet up in person. It's kind of something I've noticed in particular. Sometimes they watch you and it's like, oh no, we're in person now. You don't have to watch me.

Ash: You can partake. And so like that almost dynamic, it like takes a little bit to kind of reframe your brain because they're so used to that. And it's kind of just like, no, no, you're part of this now. Let's, let's, let's talk. And so I think that's something that I didn't expect.

Flatcap: That's interesting. And I wonder, wonder if that's more from being, you know, a traditional on stage kind of thing of an artist makes people move in that direction. I think the only place I've kind of experienced that, that of standoff, you know, not, or maybe being intimidated to, to engage has been more at a conference I've gone to that has a bunch of people that watch me or that know of me. Then they don't feel permission to come up as opposed to if it's one-on-one or just a couple of people I've had more engagement. So I actually was one of the conferences I went to somebody came up to me on the last day of the conference who wanted to start a podcast and said, well, people have been telling me the whole time I should come up and talk to you.

Flatcap: And we're all packing and leaving. And he finally comes up to talk to me. And I was like, I've been here the whole time. You gotta come up. So I get that level of, of people watching instead of engaging. That's, that's interesting.

Pete: Yeah. We are most absolutely just people and don't think. Yeah. Yeah. I resonate with what Ash was saying in terms of something this type is. We, I think have all had to learn to be very comfortable with our inadequacies. Yes.

Ash: Oh yeah.

Pete: Um, I don't think you can be a musician in a space like this. If you're worried about what other people think or.

Ash: I think in any space.

Pete: Look, definitely in any space. Yeah. Um, but it was, yeah, I think something that we've all had to work through, especially in the first few years. I think, I think all of us at this point are very comfortable with making mistakes when we play songs or forgetting parts or, you know, singing a bum note or whatever. But it has been something that was most definitely very important. And I think really in some weird blessing of a way has helped us all to focus more on what Jesus thinks of us and less about what other people think of us. It's like, you know, at the end of the day, it's like, yeah, we're human.

Pete: We're going to mess up. This is live. And you can't escape that. So just get used to it. You know, speaking to myself here, it's going to happen, dude. So I think that was tough initially. I think one for me that, yeah, has been tough.

Pete: Um, and again, I think that this applies to all of us is over the length of time that we've been on Twitch, there have been a number of things going on behind the scenes personally or with family and just life that we've all had to navigate through that have been really tough at different points. And showing up for a stream every week or twice a week or, you know, in the midst of all of that at different times has most definitely been very hard and very draining. And we've had a lot of conversations behind the scenes about how much of that are we comfortable bringing to the community whilst wanting to be a space that people can come in their own hurt and trouble.

Pete: And it has been something at times, which has been really hard to navigate, but I think the, the beauty of, and I think Amber Lights is really blessed that at least on a Wednesday night, cause Sam and I do both stream solo, but on a Wednesday night, there's always been three or four of us in the room together. So if someone does show up and we can usually tell pretty quickly if something's going on, if someone shows up and it's like, oh, it's been a bad day or a rough week, that's fine. Like if you don't want to talk much or engage that much, if you just need to sort of be here and do your part, we've got you covered. That's been a huge blessing that we just recognize is really unique for us that a lot of other streams don't have, but also just recognizing that that, that is something that's tough.

Pete: Especially with the, the consistency that we've tried to have in being live weekly for the last five years. Yeah. There's, there's just been plenty of those times where, yeah. And sometimes, you know, guys in the community notice it. Yeah. And they'll message us off stream or even ask on stream, hey, is everything okay? And, you know, to some level we want to be transparent and say, yeah, actually just having a rough week.

Pete: Yeah. We don't want to hide that, but.

Ash: And I think that's important as well, because it's like, we never, we've never pretended to be, as Pete said, we're humans too. We never pretend to be perfect. We're not, we're not their, their mentors. We're not their, we're not, you know, their spiritual guides. It's like, we're, we're humans who are spreading content and trying to create a safe space and we're going to have our lows just like they do. And it's kind of like, it's also, I think it's, that's also been super important. It's a conversation we've had many times to be like, if you're comfortable sharing that you're not feeling great, it doesn't have, they don't have that details.

Ash: Maybe you can just be like, hey, I'd appreciate some prayer myself.

Pete: Yeah.

Ash: And it's like, that's, that's allowed. And in fact, the actual, I think that helps foster that, that community and participation as well. Cause then it's like, okay, well then it's not just us praying for them. They can also pray for us. Yeah.

Pete: Yeah. Yeah. So that, that's been a big one. Yeah.

Flatcap: Yeah. I can say, I, I think that's a really valuable thing that a online streaming community gives you that polished videos on YouTube. Don't is you have the ability to be vulnerable in your own struggles. And like you said, I don't have to give you all the details of everything going on, but I can tell you I'm struggling. I can tell you. Yeah. It's I'll just pick on myself.

Flatcap: My neighbor has a problem with my kids again, you know, like whatever, whatever it is, I can give you enough to go. Oh, okay. I got an idea of what's going on. I got an idea of the emotional rollercoaster you're on and do that where it's still difficult. It's still hard to show up sometimes when you're not showing up for yourself because you just feel good. You're showing up for the others in the band or you're showing up for the community because the community is expecting or relying on you to be there. When, if you said you're going to be there.

Flatcap: And so, you know, that there's that, which on the other side of this, having, you know, been in the pulpit for a number of years, nobody expects their pastor to show up and say, I'm having a bad day. And, and if you do, they don't like it. Yeah.

Ash: It's an interesting moment.

Flatcap: So, so I, I love that. So I, I love the aspect of being able to show up on stream and just tell people today's awful. Let me tell you why today's a bad day. Yeah. Cause I don't get to do that. Cause the church doesn't want me to, they don't, they, they feel uncomfortable. If I, it depends on the church, but some churches were really uncomfortable.

Flatcap: If I said, I'm struggling. Oh, you can't be struggling. You're, you're the pastor. You telling me Moses didn't struggle when he was leading. Yeah. Come on.

Flatcap: Peter wasn't struggling. I read. Give me, give me a break.

Pete: I read Exodus and I'm pretty sure Moses had it all together, man. I never had a bad day. I definitely never stumbled. He nailed it.

Ash: I need to proof check your Bible. Maybe.

Pete: Come on. Sarcastic. Australian. Hey, I, I, I, I, I fully, I fully got it.

Flatcap: You don't need to explain any of that. Yeah. Yeah. We say. Yeah. I can say with, with being in Michigan, our sarcasm, no hint that we're giving you any clue. If you're, if you're my brother and I at times would have conversations with somebody listening and you know, and it's like, it sounded like we were dead serious.

Flatcap: And the only two that knew that we were being sarcastic was the two of us. So, you know, that's so good. We, I, I remember one conversation. He, he went to a new church and we were having a conversation about, oh, it was the snake handling church, right? Oh yeah. They brought the snakes out. And we just talked like we were, we were just poking fun of his experience, but it sounded like he had a great experience at a snake handling church.

Pete: Amazing. Amazing. Yeah. Yeah.

Ash: That's just like a church every weekend in Australia. That's right. Snakes are everywhere.

Pete: Yeah, they are. Yeah. Only they're deadly here.

Ash: Oh, we get, we get the pythons only. Yeah.

Pete: Come on. I'll bring it back down again. The, the, the other thing that has been a struggle though, um, has, has been maintaining balance because we aren't exclusively operating online. We, we do try and do a good bit amongst, um, you know, just the, the IRL side of things as well with live shows, with connecting to the next generation, youth and young adults, uh, you know, just with the shows that we do and just a few other things. Yeah. When we came into the streaming space, it was, I think we pretty much explicitly said what, whatever we commit to doing because we started during COVID, whatever we commit to doing, we need to feel it's going to be sustainable.

Pete: Once the COVID stuff dies down and we start doing all the live side of things again. So we tried to be intentional about that, but you know, reality kicks in and it has been tough to maintain that balance. And something else that we have always tried to say as well, that we just recognize is a big trap of a lot of content creators that burn out after five or six years, because they just go all in and don't pace themselves. Yeah. Is that we never wanted to be a slave to the stream schedule or the upload schedule. And so there's been many years of learning what that looks like. And it has been tough sometimes.

Pete: Yeah. When we just have unexpected periods of business with life, you know, yeah, IRL side of things to continue to engage and be present in the online space as well. So we really have to try and just build in some buffers and the last number of years, we've just built a routine of mid year, we disappear for a few weeks. End of year as well. Yeah. And at the end of the year and the beginning of the year, we have an unusually long compared to probably most Twitch streamers break where we disappear for six to eight weeks. And those have all come around because those first few years were really tough and we pretty much kind of burnt ourselves out.

Ash: Oh, we absolutely did. Yeah.

Pete: As things started wrapping up, man, like we want to be here for a long time and we're not going to be if we keep trying to keep this pace up. So we need to scale things back. So it's meant over the years that YouTube uploads have scaled right back to the point of like, we haven't released, you know, a YouTube cover video in years at this point. And, you know, if you look at when we're live at the moment, we're only streaming every second Wednesdays full band because we just haven't had the time to invest into songwriting and putting some of the stories of what Jesus has done in our lives into the music that we want to be able to have for people to listen to.

Pete: So I think that has been something that, that has, yeah, it has been tough as well. Right. And just figuring out how do we do all of these things that we feel really valuable and when we're seeing God working with that, just completely cooking ourselves.

Flatcap: Yeah. I do want to come back to, to just talking about as, as a band with, with all of that. But you, you talk about having balance. I've, I've come up with, I don't know if it's a better word, but it helps me think about it differently because one of the things when I think about balance is I got to put the same amount on this side as I put on this side. And that's not how life is. So I've started to use the word harmony because if everything is in harmony with an ecosystem, everything is blessing and contributing to everything else. So you don't want anything to get out of balance because it causes disharmony in, in, in the ecosystem.

Flatcap: So I had this a couple of years ago where, uh, Baldur's Gate 3 came out. My kids were playing it. We decided we were going to play. My, my wife had always liked watching the kids play video games. Great. We're going to do this. Well, she doesn't want to sit in the basement behind me and watch the screen.

Flatcap: Like. Okay. I could stream it upstairs to the TV. You can sit upstairs and watch and, and be in the discord channel and do this. And I was like, no, I'm just not gonna. So to begin with thought she was going to watch engage in the conversation. Now she's not.

Flatcap: Now I'm spending three hours every Sunday night playing video games with my kids, feeling like my wife's upstairs. I'm neglecting her. And she's like, don't ever feel like you're neglecting. Me. If you're spending time with our kids, your investment in, in our, your relationship with their kids is a written investment in your relationship with me. You're not neglecting me. And so it's really just that viewpoint of does this contribute to all my other relationships in some way?

Flatcap: Does it make me better in the time I spend with you? Yes, it does. Does it make the relationships we have together with our kids better? It does. Which. When I was doing it as balance, I was stealing three hours from her. To give three hours to my kids and it didn't balance out.

Flatcap: But if I saw it in harmony, that this is a thing that contributes to the overall family dynamic. It is a blessing. It is a benefit. So it is. So that's why I kind of made that shift about three years ago to kind of thinking about it in a, in a, in a realm of does this contribute in some way to the relationships? And, and what I'm doing, if it does, it's in harmony. It's not about, I have to balance everything and have the scales equal.

Flatcap: Yeah.

Pete: That's good. We're looking at it. Hey. Yeah. That's. We've probably got different language, but in reality, I think that's probably the way that, yeah, that it sits in our mind as well as yeah. What, what is our best investment now into the reality that we could see?

Pete: Yeah. It's probably, yeah. What that balance defined trust. Like yeah. In terms of what have we got? We've got finite time individually and collectively. Yeah.

Pete: So just thinking big picture, it's like, yeah, there's a lot of good things happening on the micro, but keeping our minds on that, on that horizon of where do we feel, you know, God wants us to be, you know, where's he at work and how are we moving towards that? Um, okay. We might need to just pull back on this. Now it's a good thing, but it's okay because we're pulling that back to bring this up so that we can get to that, you know, to that space.

Flatcap: Yeah.

Pete: So I think that's probably how we would sort of define what balance looks like for us.

Flatcap: Yeah. Yeah. I've just tried to define it in terms of how I've, I've seen it. Not, not assuming how you were defining it, but yeah, the, the other, another piece of that, that you did mention is the Sabbath rest. That's not how you described it, but taking a break intentionally to rest is one of the biggest problems. I think the church doesn't do. It doesn't do well.

Flatcap: It, you know, I, I, even when I was in seminary, I had one professor that, that would, would, you know, was in the hospital or whatever. Uh, and he would say, yeah, about every three years I ended up in the hospital. Like, cause you don't stop working. That's why you keep ending up in the hospital. You don't give yourself a break. So you just work until your body collapses and you go to the hospital. This is not a good pattern to, to, to follow and to do.

Ash: It's not great. Not to the hospital's part, but yeah, just in terms of sickness. But no, I think that's, that's, I think it's a healthy perspective to have. Unfortunately, I do think a lot of people don't have that perspective, especially, maybe those who are a little bit more dependent on the community they get from those spaces and things like that, where they feel like they're, they, they get, they almost tricked themselves into believing they're owed it. And so it's like, well, you serve me. And it's kind of just like, well, yeah, we're actually humans. That's why we have Jesus.

Ash: We're just here to put you in that direction. So I think it's a really healthy perspective you have there.

Pete: Yeah. Yeah. It's huge for us. Yeah. I think both personally, we, we all talk about it from a personal point of view, and we've really tried to bake it into Amber Lights as a band and just our broader ministry that we're, you know, that we're part of and connected with is we're never committing to so much that we haven't got that time of rest every week or month or year. Like I think all of those rhythms need to be there for just as a human being us to do well. But this has a reason why God put it in the 10 things that he thought were important to agree with, you know, with, with Israel about, right?

Pete: It's like, Hey, I made you to rest. That's part of who you are.

Ash: Remember when I made the earth, this was one of the first things I did.

Pete: Can't neglect that. You're not going to do the other nine well, if you don't do this one. Yeah. Yeah. So I think that's something for us. Uh, I, we could commit some of that leave time to being on tour, but we made, you know, the decision that it's like, no, it's like, we've got our work times and then we're going to keep time for ourselves and we're going, we're going to block that out.

Ash: And, you know, and also making sure that we don't neglect what's happening in our own worlds as well. Yeah. It's like when you go, go, go, you're so, it's very easy to neglect the other things and not even notice you've been putting them to the wayside. And when all of a sudden you have a break in schedule, it's no longer just routine. You have the, all of a sudden you have the ability to be, hang on, I haven't called that friend in a really long time. I haven't seen this family member. I haven't done this thing I said I would do for this person that I love.

Ash: And it's just, it's, it's a really good way to just kind of stop and be like, hang on a second. There are things that maybe I've neglected. Now I have the capacity to actually start to look into doing that again.

Pete: And actually that's one of the reasons, let's say Amber Lights, we stream three days a week on Twitch, but there's a reason why only one of those streams, all four of us are present. Yeah. And it was, and, and it's because we recognize that we had capacity for three days online, but not all together. And so we structured it in a way that was sustainable. Most weeks for us to be able to be as present as possible with as few people as possible. So everyone else can rest and do the rest of life. So yeah, it's like little things like that, that we'd probably never talk about on stream.

Pete: And, you know, unless we're in a context like this, aren't going to come up, but just the nuances of our stream schedule and, you know, why we disappear at two points of the year or why we're so okay with, you know, even on a Wednesday night showing up and be like, Hey, it's only two of us tonight, or it's only three of us tonight because, you know, Sam or Mitchell or Ash or Pete are on holidays. Because we, you know, we want to release each other to be able to do that and go and rest and enjoy life. Yeah. And not just feel like you've got to be here. So.

Ash: And if you think about it, like many, all jobs give some level of leave. That's right. For a reason.

Flatcap: Well, unless you're a pastor, you just work one day a week. Right?

Ash: Oh yeah. Teachers only work during the school holidays. Oh, sorry. During the school time.

Flatcap: Yeah. They work during the school holidays. I was on a Sunday.

Ash: Yeah.

Flatcap: Oh boy. Yeah. It's just two hours. That's it.

Ash: Yeah. That's fine. Everyone, this is the sarcasm tone.

Flatcap: Yeah. And the sermon just, you know, just comes to you. Oh boy.

Ash: Can you imagine if that happened? Oh, that would be awful.

Flatcap: Yeah. Just show up and you know, whatever comes out, comes out. It's the Holy spirit, right?

Pete: That's right. Look, sometimes that is the catch, right? Oh yeah. More often than that. Yeah. Yeah.

Flatcap: Anyway. But I, I still think that building intentional rest, cause you're talking about streamers burnout. Well, one of the reasons they burn out is they don't intentionally rest. They, they are, they are doing everything as if it relies on them to do everything. It, which reminds me of the phrase. I don't know if, if you, you hear it in Australia, but I heard this growing up as pray like it depends on God and work like it depends on you. And that always bothered me because it's like, if I'm praying like it depends on God, but I'm working like it depends on me, then I didn't believe my prayer.

Flatcap: Maybe I should pray like it depends on God and work my ability and leave the rest up to God to make it happen. So I don't need to do three 12 hour streams back to back in a week to try to try to make partner. I can do three, three hour streams and, and live the rest of my life. And then within the church, which I think can carry over into Christian streamers is the mentality. I'm doing it for Jesus so I can neglect the rest of my life and rest of my relationships because I'm doing it for Jesus. I'm doing it for the church. I'm doing it to bring people in relationship with them.

Flatcap: So it doesn't matter that I neglected my family or my other responsibilities and, or I burned myself out because I was, I was, you know, doing it for Jesus. Yeah.

Pete: It's a really humbling thing to come to the realization that, that God doesn't need us.

Flatcap: Well, yes. No, you're yeah. The, the, the foolishness of preaching, you know, that's, that's, you know, how he decides to bring people to him is the foolishness of preaching.

Pete: It's yeah, let's say this is a thought I have often is like, God, I recognize that you absolutely don't need me. And I am so incredibly humbled that you still want to use me, even though you don't need me. And just that he has that heart for partnership with the people that he's created. But if, yeah, I think I'm just, I'm talking about myself here. There's a little bit of it inside my head. And yeah, it, I've got to be real careful about ever feeling like anything that I have to contribute is necessary. And if I start to think that if I don't do this, then the God thing is not going to happen.

Pete: Well, I've now kind of made myself God and I've put myself in his place. Yeah. So I think that that's something that is always humbling to, to remind myself of and bringing it back into the streaming space. I think there's a lot of people on Twitch that would be terrified at the thought of every year, not streaming for six to eight weeks over the holiday period. Yeah. And I know a genuine fear for a lot of content creators is if I don't go live in two months, that I'm going to lose my audience and my livelihood or whatever it may be. But at like our experience has been by God's grace that every year for the past, the past four years, that's exactly what we've done.

Pete: We've come back and everyone's still been there.

Ash: Well, it's like your experience that you said there, it didn't turn up for a couple of months, came back and people were like, Hey, it's the Dapper Pastor.

Pete: Yeah. And again, I think just like a huge credit to, when you, when you allow the Lord to be the one that leads the thing and builds the thing and does the thing, it gives you the ability to be like, Hey, okay, well, if this is your thing, then we can step away.

Flatcap: Yeah.

Pete: And you're going to keep working while we're not there. And when we come back, it's just going to keep, it's going to carry on where we left off because you've been, you know what I mean? Yeah. So I think, yeah, no, absolutely. That's, that's another reality for us. Yeah, absolutely.

Flatcap: I understand that early on as, as a pastor, I really hated to take a week off. It was, it was, it was hard to be away because then I, well, what if people need me? What, what if something happens while, while I was gone? I, I, I got to the point later on where it's like, no, I want two weeks off. I don't want just one week off at a time. I want to actually take and, and be able to get refreshed because one week wasn't enough time. I got to decompress.

Flatcap: I've got to get away. And then I can, I can, you know, re-engage when I, you know, come back. Cause I'll be refreshed along the way. My, you know, a couple of family vacations that were just, well, we're just visiting family. Uh, we're not actually doing anything. Someone dies. I go back.

Flatcap: Cause I'm going to do the funeral. So we go back early. My wife decided I want vacations where you can't leave. So, so we, we go, we go on cruises. We go out of country. I can't return. Doesn't matter what happens.

Flatcap: I am unreachable. You can't. And I also, you know, now that everything's become easier to actually be reachable. I still go to the pattern of no, I'm unreachable. I don't pick up my phone. I don't check my email. I am out completely so that I actually do get rest.

Flatcap: I actually am not engaged in, in those things. So, you know, six to eight months. I'm not, I'm not taking a break that long from, uh, you know, streaming entirely. But I did just take a six to eight week break from doing the podcast because I needed it. I think I did, I don't know, 65 weeks straight of doing the podcast with, with maybe a, you know, a, a, a vacation in there where I was gone for a week, but pinned it on both sides. So maybe it was only, you know, like eight or nine days break, but it was like, no, I, I didn't take a break of the scheduling it of, uh, the coordinating it. So you guys are the first ones of season three.

Flatcap: I'm excited about that, but it was like, I needed that break. To, to get refreshed. Not because I didn't love what I was doing. It was just becoming the grind of the schedule. And instead of the, I'm excited and looking forward to, I get to meet with this person. I get to sit down with them. I get to have a great conversation.

Flatcap: We get to talk about things that we don't normally talk about on stream. I, I hopefully get to bring out from you, the blessings that you're, you're receiving from God and acknowledge some people in your community and point to what God's up to. So that some other band or some other person is going to be inspired by listening to you and say, I could go do the same thing. So I don't know. I don't know where God's going to use this, this podcast, but I'm convinced it's for one person. And that person will find it eventually if it's, you know, when it gets released in about three weeks, or if it's three years from now and they listen to it. Somebody's somebody is appointed to listen to this conversation and be blessed.

Pete: Now we hope so. Yeah, absolutely.

Ash: I completely forgot about the fact that this was a podcast, not just the stream. So hello, podcast listeners in three years time.

Pete: And you know, like go, go and continue with that thing about taking a break. In those long periods where we're not live, it doesn't mean that we don't miss doing it. Or, you know, you have those moments or, you know, or want to engage with the community and stuff like that. But I think, yeah, we've just seen it as so necessary. Yeah. I don't know. I just felt like for whatever reason to say, it's like, yeah, it's like whenever we are, like, I think for, you know, for each of us at different points, there is a sense of like, oh, like, yeah, just hang out with the guys.

Pete: And when we just start streaming again, it's always a case of, hey, it's great to be back and catching up and chatting and hearing about what's been going on. Yeah. Sabbath. It's, you know, it's important. It's part of how God made us. And if we don't do, I was talking to someone actually, I mean, the other week on stream about, about this, because they're just like, I just feel really burnt and just really fried and cynical and, you know, just about an area in, in life that they were serving. And just really felt the need to encourage them and to say, Hey, Hey man, if that's how you're feeling, then just have a break.

Pete: Yeah. Like this, it's okay to step away for a minute, because if you don't, then it's only going to end badly. Like you don't recharge by doing more. You're not going to feel better by draining yourself even further. You need to have a conversation. Um, and, and just say to the person that you know, that you need to say to, Hey, I, I really enjoy serving and doing this thing, but I just need to step away for a while because I need the rest. So yeah.

Ash: Not to say that you can't be tricked into thinking that it will help, but it's not the case.

Flatcap: Well, yeah, they're certainly they, well, you can be guilted into not taking a break. You know, like there's also, I think a sense that you can become prideful of. I'm always here. I don't take breaks. I've been doing this for so many years. You can't do it without me. There's so many different lies that, that feed into our decision to not take the rest that we need.

Ash: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. The human condition.

Flatcap: Well, yeah, yeah. And, and that happens in, I mean, you read through the Bible, they didn't take the break. They were supposed to every seven years and let the land, you know, go fallow. Uh, they didn't, uh, you know, let the poor come in and take their share afterwards. You know, like, no, no, no, no. The, the lie of, I have to have it all. And if I don't go do it, it won't happen.

Flatcap: I'll, I'll be neglected. I'll get worse. Like there's, there's so many of those that we just fall into. Yeah.

Pete: And again, that for them, that came back to the fact that God was asking them to trust him in those seasons of rest to continue providing. Right. It was the same as the manner in the desert when they were still wondering, it's like, you know, do not collect more than you need for today. I promise you, I will give you more tomorrow. Right. But just, yeah, you gotta trust me for that provision. And yeah, in the cases of, you know, like those seasons of Jubilee and rest, it's like, yeah.

Pete: Okay. We've got a, a set period of time when we get to work the land, but then we're gonna make the trustable. Yeah. Um, to continue providing in those seasons of rest, but they never did it today.

Flatcap: No, no, they never, they never, they never did the, the, uh, return the land to everybody. Let the land go fallow. They, they did. They didn't do the Jubilee. They didn't do the, uh, Sabbath rest of the land. So I, I wonder at times, what would it be like if we would practice those things today? Still, you know, I do see, you know, some farmers near me who will, and I don't know what schedule they're on.

Flatcap: They will let a field go fallow for a year every so often. Uh, but I don't know that they're doing it because of any biblical reasons or anything like that. Uh, it just might be for a season that they decide they're rotating crops or doing things like that, that let that happen. It'll be beneficial. But I, I love the aspect of resting is trusting, trusting that God's got it, trusting that it can happen without me, trusting that I'm not the all essential thing, which I want to tell myself. I don't know that you do. I, I love to tell myself I'm, I'm the absolutely essential piece of Twitch that people need today.

Flatcap: Uh, and, and if you're missed me, you've missed, you missed everything. Little exaggeration there, but, but it's easy for me to fall into that mindset. It, it always has been. It's one of the things that makes me comfortable with being unique and different than everybody else and not trying to fit in. Um, I haven't been trying to fit in since I was in seventh grade. I've been trying to stand out. So yeah.

Flatcap: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And one way to do that is have fabulous hats. Exactly. You do it so well.

Ash: So dapper.

Flatcap: So, so fast. So pastor that I'll just leave that one.

Ash: You always got him.

Flatcap: Uh, but I did, I did want to talk about the aspects of, of being in, in a band. So, so you have band, you have life, whatever the rest of your individual lives are, and you have the, the streaming, what are the elements of being in a band that might make it difficult at times to also then be streaming? A few things, I guess. One is there's lots of us.

Ash: So you've got a few more personalities to, to talk to you would agree. Although I, I think we're fortunate enough that we're generally all being on the same page because we generally have the same heart as to what this is. So it's being a very, very rare case. If I can't actually think of any where we've completely disagreed on something. So. Okay. Oh, okay.

Pete: Great. It was, it was, it was the color of my, my hoodie.

Ash: Yeah. That was all, that always broke the band up.

Pete: So.

Ash: Yeah. No, no, I'm kidding. I'm kidding. If it's something, if it's a very important thing, like, like the color of his hoodie, it was brown, but, but no, it was, yeah, I guess the other part is, yeah, we do have different lives with stream schedules. I think we kind of said it earlier where it's like, we didn't want to be a slave to this stream schedule, but we also have a whole bunch of other things we want to do. And so it can be quite difficult. Sometimes you can feel maybe a little bit guilty to the community or something like that.

Ash: When you are doing something else, like maybe you've got a live show, maybe you're doing like, yeah, taking the break. I think the first year we took the break, we were kind of a little bit feeling a little bit, I was feeling a bit guilty to the community who were really relying on it. That I was, it was, it was kind of just like, oh, okay, but I've forgotten what the question is. You know what?

Pete: Let's, let's, let's do this again. The question was the difficulties of like being in a band, also streaming more or less. Right. Yeah. Well, I can jump in and say, an actual reality for us is between the four of us, the only time consistently that we can all meet is the Wednesday night when we stream. Oh yeah. That's really true.

Pete: And so in the last few years, we have really struggled to, to do some of the things as a band that would like to be, you know, release new music or create some other content that isn't stream based content because the time just isn't there. So that, that has been, yeah, an interesting one to try and balance and actually, and yeah, I mentioned it before that ultimately meant that earlier this year, we had to say, actually, we're only going to stream every fortnight. That's a full band because that, you know, four hour block on a Wednesday night is the only time that we have together. And we've got a whole heap of stuff that we really feel is important for us to be able to work on and do together, you know, and develop.

Pete: Yeah. And so that's what that's going to have to look like is, yeah, we're just going to have to string less for a little while. So I think that's, that has been something that, yeah, has been interesting to, to try and navigate around.

Flatcap: So with the, with, with being creative and, and trying to do songwriting and those things, have you, have you found that there's different seasons where it becomes easier to do that? It becomes drier at times. And then how do you, how do you deal with those kinds of things to, you know, continue to, to try and go to the well when it is empty? What do you, what do you do at those times?

Pete: We, we talk about this a bit and it is literal seasons.

Ash: Yeah.

Pete: So Ash and I do a lot of, not all of, like our very first single, actually Sam wrote a huge deal of that drama. But some of the more recent stuff has been a bit more heavily Ash and myself. And summer for me is when I do most of my writing. It is very rare that I will send anything to the rest of the band, like autumn to winter. It's my, my least creative time. It's, I'm not a winter person. It's the months that I feel least inspired.

Pete: It's cold. It's wet. It's dark. It's depressing.

Ash: Spring comes, spring comes, the flowers come out. The sun's not shining. And so to speak. That's right.

Pete: That's my happy part. That's when all the ideas come. So we're actually like, yeah, and it's been true. I actually started a little bit early this year. I started shooting some new ideas to, to the guys that started coming to me towards the end of winter. So maybe I'm changing.

Flatcap: It was just a really warm winter. Or, or maybe you just need to bring your inner emo out and just, you know.

Pete: It's funny actually, as I was saying all that stuff about winter, I'm like cold, depressing. I'm like, that actually should be the time when all of the songs come out. Yeah. But I don't know, man. Yeah. I just, I learned that about myself many years ago is that I'm, I'm the kind of person that just enjoys the warm, the hot weather, the, yeah, the sunshine. And that's just when I generally feel more creative.

Pete: So yeah. For fun fact, we're entering it's creative season because winter has ended it. That's correct. Oh, I got a, what about, what about you?

Flatcap: Got a raid coming in here. Hey, ukulele for worship. Ukulele for worship coming in with the raid. Katrina waves. Welcome in. Go Fina. Good to see you.

Flatcap: Freytrain coming in. I still, I still need to work on getting a rain overlay for my podcast. You'd think after, you know, doing the podcast a year and a half, I'd have figured that out. But I, I have all a good time. Yeah. All a good time. Yeah.

Flatcap: I promise my stream. I will eventually do things and I do eventually do them. We just talk about them for six months and then finally decide to do them. Six. That's so quick.

Pete: We generally talk about things for four years, but through three to four years and then we'll implement.

Ash: When our first single that Pete mentioned earlier came out, I actually didn't realize I'd check Spotify today. That came out two years ago. The two songs that we have just released also were written and around that time. And it took us two years to get them onto platforms. Six months is very quick.

Flatcap: And I'm thinking that's incredibly, incredibly slow.

Pete: You're a leopard, a cheater. Yeah. What other fast cats are out there?

Flatcap: Well, I've, I've always been a goal setter. And, and so I, and I internally motivated, I set a goal and I go striving after it. So I, I basically say it and I keep hearing myself say it often enough and I get annoyed and I go do it. So that's kind of it.

Pete: We used to have a whiteboard that would sit behind the miles of like, yeah, it was literally the whiteboard of things that we have to do. And yeah, so many streams, someone in chat would ask us about, you know, that thing that we'd said we do. I'm like, ah, we need to put that on the whiteboard.

Ash: Yeah. Or we'd look up and be like, oh, it is on the whiteboard.

Pete: That's right. And look, we don't have a whiteboard anymore. So there's probably a very long list of things. I don't know. Yeah.

Flatcap: Yeah. Well, I guess I, I don't, I don't have a whiteboard, but I do, I do write down on sticky notes. I'm well, I've got, well, that's also a redeem on my, on my channel, not here that you can redeem a random sticky note. And I've got a box that's just filled with old sticky notes. I have no idea what's going to be on there. I'll, I'll do that with prayer requests. I'll have a whole sticky note.

Flatcap: That's just full of prayer requests and I'll just pull it up and go, we're praying for so-and-so, but I don't know what it was about. Uh, it's just listed here or, well, I can't tell you what this one was because it was private and, and I don't have freedom to share, but like, they're just, they're just funny and fascinating to go back three years later, read a sticky note. And you have no idea what, what did I even write on here? This is my writing, but I don't know what it was about.

Pete: So good. Got a time capsule.

Flatcap: Yes. Time capsule. Just right there. I'll actually show you the.

Pete: Oh, wow. So good. Yeah.

Flatcap: The box of sticky notes. Amazing. I don't know how many are in there. I don't need to count them. I'll just randomly pick one and we'll be good to go. All right. Before we got the interrupted by the, by the raid, what were we talking about?

Flatcap: I was trying to remember.

Ash: Yeah. Originals.

Pete: Yeah.

Flatcap: Struggle, struggles of being a band and. Yeah. Being creative and, and how, how do you deal with times and seasons of. Oh, I guess winter is the season for, for no writing.

Ash: It was literally the season for Pete. Yeah. He said, so I'm, I'm quite similar as I definitely come back. I, I unthaw when, when winter ends, even though we don't really. Have very cold winters over in this part of Australia, but yeah, but it's. Yeah. I don't know.

Ash: I, I don't have seasons the same way. I haven't got the same pattern as Pete. So it probably took, like we've been in the band together for almost like what? Nine years now.

Flatcap: Yeah.

Ash: I would say it took Pete five years to get anything creatively out of me. Anything. It was five years of him trying to be like, come on Ash, write with me. And I'm like, nope.

Pete: So. Cause I hadn't really done that before. Had you with anyone?

Ash: Yeah, I'd never done it. Yeah, exactly. So, and it was, it's a vulnerable thing to create with others. And so, and that was just like a, a new experience that I hadn't had. And apparently it took five years for that to kind of, me to work through that. And I will say though, we, for me to work through that without actually trying. So it wasn't like me actively, it was just kind of like in the background kind of thing.

Ash: And then I don't know, I don't have the same seasons. I don't have the same patterns, I guess, but it just, it just comes in waves. And so maybe it's, I'll pull up something that I, an idea or something that I jotted down in the middle of the night years ago. Or maybe it's just a melody that kind of, I can't get out of my head. Or maybe it's, I don't know, it just like a, something you'll, you'll get inspired by something and you jot it down really quickly. And honestly, I just have a phone full of voice notes that are absolutely horrendous. But sometimes you just go through it and you're just like, what was that idea?

Ash: And why did I think it was important enough to jot down? Or more importantly, like why, what's this, what's this lyric sheet that was dated 2020? I don't know, or something like that. And you pull it back out and see, and hopefully something comes out of that. And so I think, yeah, for, for example, Pete, for example, found a lyric sheet that I have no memory of putting down. And we've thought about, this is another one that was like, no, you wrote it. No, you wrote it.

Ash: No, you wrote it. That was apparently written in 2019.

Pete: Yeah. So honestly, it is a beautiful age to be a creative and a songwriter with, with the internet and with things like Google drive. We're very much just in the habit of, if we write some lyrics, we'll just write it and upload it. Or if, you know, like I said, if there's, you know, a melody idea or just, you know, a fragment of a song that will come to mind for one of us. You know, Ash and Sam and Mitch and myself have all got varying levels of home studio setups in our homes. So despite the fact that we are in the room together, you know, four hours a week, once a week, maybe. We've all got the ability to capture just, if something comes to us, to be able to capture that and then just upload it and it'll sit there.

Pete: And then when someone's feeling inspired or when one of us has time to sit there and go, actually, I just really feel like I want to spend some time writing something. You know, there's been plenty of times where I've started writing a tune and I haven't really got any idea about the lyrics. And I'll just open up our lyrics folder and just see what either I uploaded, you know, two years ago or, you know, like Ash said, what Ash uploaded four or five years ago. And, and just see. I think that's part of that process is just capturing stuff in the moment and then just, yeah, letting it sit there and then coming back to it later and seeing what still feels good, what fits with something else that we've made.

Pete: And then completely different to that. There have been times, I think for both of us where we've just sat down one night and in the space of three hours, God will give us an entire song. And then we'll take that to the rest of the bands and everyone will listen to it and go, that's great. I don't want to change anything. You know, we're just going to lead it as is. So that was very much the case for. To vehement may concern.

Pete: To vehement. To vehement may concern. Yeah. Some of that. Yeah. He's now a single. Yeah.

Pete: I remember writing that and shooting it to Ash just to, you know, say, Hey, like I've got a melody and some lyric ideas, but what the, I think the other thing for our process that we have really come to. To not just say, yeah, it's very much true. We don't hold tightly to any of the ideas that we have. We're happy for each other in the band to fiddle with what we've done. We really try and leave pride and everything at the door in that regard. But if there's an idea that, you know, we feel is really crucial to the song, there's still permission to get action. I really like this one thing and I want that to stay the same, but, you know, Sam, you know, do whatever you want, you know, with that and Mitch and Ash.

Pete: And yeah, it's, it's just, I don't know, really collaborative and just really fun. But that's, that's kind of been, yeah, a bit of the process and approach, I guess, for, for us.

Ash: It took us a while to figure out because I think especially starting from zero, it's not generally something we've done together in the same room because the zero part usually comes from an idea that when, for, for, I'll talk about myself now. If an idea comes to me, it's, I need a couple of days to sit in it and think about it before it's formed in a place that I feel like it's shareable. And then, then I'll put something down and then it'll go. But like, if the idea comes often, like the guys will see me in the corner with my laptop and they'll be like, they'll be cooking on something else. They'll be like, Ash, are you okay? And I'm like, no, I'm just, I need, like you, I'm not listening to what you guys are doing right now.

Ash: I just, there's, there's something here. Come back to me in 20 minutes. And I'll be like, you're so focused. Are you okay? And I'm like, I'm just in my ball of thinking. Like, I'm fine. Give me, yeah.

Ash: And then it'll, it'll, it'll, it'll form itself and then I'll share it. And so, yeah, that's been kind of cool to say as well, is that we allow it, that, let's allow each other to give that space. And sometimes it's, yeah, 20 minutes, sometimes it's in the room together. A lot of times it's just, let me have this for the week or let me have this for however long it is. And then it'll come back because, and that's, I think maybe what we're privileged with as well. There isn't like a deadline. We're like, we need to get this out by this time.

Ash: We will set up some soft deadlines to try and make sure we make progress. And yeah, so it's not an infinite thing, but it's not like a, we need to have it by this, blah. We try and make sure it's at a good place and already those decisions are made by the time it gets to that point.

Flatcap: It's interesting. I'm, I'm on a different kind of rhythm and schedule with, with sermons gotta be there every Sunday. So you, but I also have, you know, material that I'm working with. So I'm not, I'm not creating anything from zero in order to, to start with anything. But the, the rhythm of writing is, is interesting. And I, and I love the idea you're talking about of having something inspiring and writing it down. I've been trying to do more blog post ideas, which I blogged back in 2006 for probably about two, three years.

Flatcap: I blogged back then. I haven't done it since, but it's this past year. I'm like, wait a minute, I've got, I've got my ears on listening for certain things to say, I keep seeing gaps in the church and how we are missing people. That's, that's really what I've got my antenna up to. So it might be, Hey, wait a minute. Our, our high school kids are going off to college. They're leaving their faith community.

Flatcap: What are we doing? Why aren't we doing something? They're just, we're just hoping they find a new community. We're not guiding them. We're not meeting them. We're not, we're just abandoning their faith community so that they can't maintain it. Why aren't we doing something?

Flatcap: So I keep seeing gaps like that. Or if you have a, and I had a friend who was talking about his church and says, yeah, we have a lot of people in the military. So we have a bunch of people that have deployment and we have deployment widows. They disappear when their husband's deployed or vice versa, whatever spouse is deployed. This spouse who stays disappears. Cause they're taking care of the household. They're taking care of the kids and we can't reach them.

Flatcap: What are we doing? I'm like, so these are the things that I, so I was just like, write that down. I need to go and write about this circumstance that the church faces here. How do we address it? How do we do it? So, so that idea of like, I wrote that down. I probably came back to it two, three months later to write an article to say, Hey, here's some ways to address that issue.

Flatcap: So it's not quite the same thing, but I love that idea of like, I know the inspiration for this idea was there because I heard it in a conversation and a need. Now I can go address it later and then, and then work on it. So that's kind of cool. Similarities.

Pete: Yeah.

Flatcap: It is.

Pete: And it's, it's definitely a learned skillset I feel in. I think it works for both having the discipline to, when you have that light bulb or that idea or that inspiration, whatever that thing is to, to learn, to stop and capture it real quick. And then I think in doing that, that actually, yeah, is really helpful because I think often you can have an idea and think, Oh, I'll remember that later. I'll come back to that. And then later you'll remember that you had an idea, but you're like, what was it? It's the worst feeling.

Ash: It's the worst feeling.

Pete: But just that simple act of having the discipline of just stopping and capturing it, however it needs to be, whether it's writing it down or a voice note. Just cute. Yeah. It's such a blessing to yourself later. Yeah.

Ash: I kid you not. There was a song stuck in my head about three weeks ago. It was such an earworm. It was like one of those ones that I had to get it out. I had to put it down because it was annoying me and it was my own creation. And then I, like two days of that, and then I hadn't even put it down properly, but then all of a sudden it just disappeared. And if I hadn't had those sketchy voice notes in my phone, it was, I just could not remember it at all.

Ash: It just kind of deleted itself. It was like those dashcams that kind of auto deletes over time. And I had to listen to the voice notes to come back. I'm like, Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. It's back. We're back.

Ash: Let's put it down properly before it happened again.

Pete: Yeah. So whatever it is, I think whatever you're creating, you're absolutely right. It's different in context, but it's that same principle. It's like when you have that moment where something comes to you that, you know, is important that you want to work on. It's like, yeah, just having that discipline to stop and just, yeah, just capture it real quick. It doesn't need to be a complete thought. It's yeah.

Pete: Oh, there's a, there's yeah. A heap of songs that you guys don't even know about. They're just four words. It's just a topic or a concept that six months ago I was feeling really passionate about. I'm like, I want to, and I need to write about that thing because I feel strongly that that is going to be involved. That is going to be important for someone. And then it's going to impact someone and, or be encouraging.

Pete: And so right now that song is five words that may not even actually be in the finished song because it's just the idea. Send them my way. So, sorry.

Ash: Send them my way.

Flatcap: She'll add, she'll add four more words to it and then put it back. And then put it back. That's right.

Pete: Yeah. Yeah.

Flatcap: Well, just, just thinking of, of songs. Has there been stories that someone just shares with you how a song impacted their life?

Pete: Hmm. In little ways. Yeah. Yeah. We released a single a couple of months ago called masks. And I think we, there was a few of us in the band. Like there was some, some comments on YouTube of people just really resonating with the message.

Pete: The song you wrote it, didn't you? Yeah.

Ash: Don't know anymore.

Pete: I always, I'm pretty sure Ash did. I always feel like I did because it talks about basically my story growing up as well. So I resonate really strongly with it. It's just, yeah, the song just talks about basically this whole thing of pretending to be someone that would not to fit into. To feel accepted of being afraid to show who we really are. Yeah. And it's, it's called masks.

Pete: It's, it's, it's, it's a song about masks and about just how suffocating that actually is and how it just really stifles, you know, who God's made us to be. And like, yeah, we, we, we definitely had some comments about that, that song when it came out with people just going, yeah, yeah. Like I resonate with that. Yeah. Like that's something that I struggle with or yeah, that used to be me.

Ash: Or it still is me. Yeah. And cause it, it also talks about like the struggles it is to try and accept how to take that mask off. That it's a really hard thing to do. Yeah. And it comes back on and off and things like that. And you have different ones.

Ash: And there's a whole imagery aspect to it. Yeah. I think is, yeah, I, I was quite floored actually when that came out. The people who were like, oh wow, this is a super relatable message. And when I hear, like, I, I love listening to people's stories. I, I, I'm a, I'm a yapper. And I love, I love getting, but even more than me, I loving myself yapping.

Ash: I love hearing other people. Yeah. Because I want to, I love hearing their stories. And a very common thread that I see through all of them is that desire to fit in. That desire to feel and want to feel included that desire, but then not knowing how much of yourself you can show. And not knowing how much, yeah, of like, if I say this thing, then they're not going to accept me and I don't want that to happen. So I'm going to hide that.

Ash: And so it's a very common thread. And I think it's just, it's a part of that. Like we've been, we were built for community. Jesus built us for community. Right. And so it's one of those ones where it's the easiest way to find community often is to try and just find a group that will accept you, but then it's okay at what cost. Yeah.

Ash: And Jesus says at no cost with him, but in human society, it doesn't quite work like that. And so we find ways to mask to try and fit in. And so it's that whole thing of when you approach Jesus, you have to learn how to take that mask off. And it's, it's really difficult. And you have to accept yourself. You have to take it off yourself as well. And the lines blur.

Pete: Yeah. I think beyond the songs that we've written as well, something else, which is really key to all of our life shows, which a lot of the Twitch community, there's a growing number of people from our Twitch community that have seen, seen us live, which is awesome. But there's, you know, still a majority that have it. And so they haven't probably experienced this is that we're really intentional about taking time between the songs in sharing parts of our stories as well. Just in some intros or just, you know, extended times where it is just talking. And like in those spaces, it's usually one of us. So at, at the moment this year, this year, Mitch has been sharing a bit of his story growing up and just how he's seen God at work in his life.

Pete: And some of the stuff that he really struggled with it than how Jesus made a huge difference in breaking through in his life. And like, he's had a heap of kids come up to him after the show and yeah, just very sincerely, like very heartfelt. Just thanks for sharing. Like that's, that's me right now. Like that's yeah. You just, just, you know, you really described my situation. Just thanks for sharing.

Pete: Just thanks for sharing and just giving that real time feedback to us as well from the stuff that, that we're verbally sharing beyond the songs as well. So I think, yeah, we, yeah, that's definitely a few, yeah, stories of what, you know, and how we've seen that kind of stuff.

Ash: I think it's really important as well in sharing stories because like we were talking about earlier, it's, it's really easy sometimes to be the one on the camera or to be the pastor in your case and people to forget that you are, that you are human. And so when you start to share these stories as well and show some of these vulnerabilities, it becomes a reminder of actually, you know, everyone struggles. What you see isn't real. And so it's, it's, you see a slice. And so it's being able to share these stories, like sharing these stories, shows, or sometimes Pete does it, sometimes Sam does it. And it's, it becomes, and even through our songs, it's a good way to allow others to admit that they also don't, they also don't have to be perfect.

Ash: They also don't have to pretend they're not struggling because it's actually not healthy to pretend you're not struggling. And so it's, it's good to release that, but also, so it becomes a connector and then that connector, then it, it's, well, once again, it helps you feel less alone. It helps you to almost admit it so that you can seek what you're actually figure out one step closer, what you're actually seeking.

Flatcap: Yeah, absolutely. And, and I, I wouldn't say right now music is that important in my life, but there have been times in my life when music was vitally important and finding a song that expressed my emotions was valuable.

Ash: Yes, absolutely.

Flatcap: You know, I, I say back, back when I, I was in high school, broke up with, with, uh, my girlfriend and I, like my world fell apart and a song, you know, I don't know. I don't know. Everybody will know it. Cause it's an old song. Anyway, girl, don't go away mad. Just go away. Was the only song I wanted to listen to for about three months, just because it expressed how I was feeling.

Flatcap: I wanted it. I wanted to get that emotion out. I wasn't necessarily controlling in the best way, but the song helped me to maintain some kind of connection to this is what you've exactly expressed what my life is like. I want to sing this song because I don't know how to express it any other way.

Pete: Yeah. Yeah. And just knowing that there's someone else that you've got that connection. It's like someone else, you know, feels the same way that I do or has felt or, and just creating that. Yeah. That medium to be able to connect your emotions and help process that. Yeah.

Pete: I think, yeah, I'm sure everyone has got a song that they, every time he, it happened to me in the car drive over tonight. Actually I thought I'd listened to this, this band that I haven't listened to in a few months. And I was like, bang, straight back two years ago was something that was going on when I was listening, listening to that band, when that stuff was going on. Uh huh. Man. Right back there again. It's just, it's incredible how God's wired us to, um, yeah, just all of those things to connect together, you know.

Ash: Yeah.

Pete: It's crazy.

Ash: We actually had a, quite a similar conversation about this a couple of weeks ago and like, and how we want to, what we potentially want to be creating. And it's like, but there were any, whether there's any messages we can be sharing that kind of encapsulate some of those emotions. Yeah. Yeah. Cause it's, it's such a huge important part of, of music kind of, of the human condition of wanting to connect and wanting to know you're not alone in those emotions or expressing them exactly that.

Flatcap: Yeah. Well, but talking about old things, you know, uh, there was just a list of top 10 albums that came out that turned 40 this year. And I, and I remembered like all of them and felt like really old, but it also, I w I started going back and listening to them this week. So, so it was like, man, I haven't listened to this album in, I don't know, 20 years. And so I've been, I've been living in that nostalgia of 40 years ago, uh, this week of listening to those old albums, uh, like licensed to ill by the beastie boys came out 40 years ago. That's one of them. What?

Flatcap: Yep. Yep. So yeah, I, I feel really old now. That's what that was the, that's actually the post I did. I, I, I shared it with my wife and I go, I didn't feel old until I realized these albums were 40 years old. Now I feel old.

Pete: There's a lot of those posts going around at the moment, man. Yeah. Yeah.

Flatcap: You're not alone. I know I'm not alone, but like, I try to deny that I'm old, you know, I, I'm young. I'm young at heart. I'm dapper. So I'm not old. Right.

Pete: You know, absolutely. Absolutely.

Flatcap: Yeah. Well, let's, let's, let's kind of shift and let's look to the future. So is there something that you're planning individually, you know, in life, or is there something that, uh, you're doing or planning? As a band that you're looking forward to, uh, the rest of this year being able to do or accomplish or begin?

Ash: Oh, like I am loving the work, the songwriting nights we're having. It's actually like, so we did have to, as Pete said earlier, we did have to pause streams to be a fortnightly thing instead for the full band version. But every other week where, yeah, putting down ideas and songs and coming together and just refining and recreating and things like that. And it has been a lot of fun, but also just a really good switch up, I think, to get those ideas that we've been talking about and thinking about and, and praying about to actually see them come to life has been wonderful. So I know I'm, I'm, I've been really keen for that for the rest of the year.

Pete: Yeah. You found that really light giving, aren't you? You were sharing the other week? Yeah. It's been like, I've really enjoyed it as well. It's good to be working on some new music together. We've been telling the community for like multiple years now that, you know, we're writing songs and, you know, all that.

Pete: So I only have been, but when you lack the time to finalize ideas and just lock parts in and actually go and record and, and produce and all the rest of it. It's yeah. It's hard to, to actually finish that stuff off. But so I'm looking forward to that as well. I think something that. Yeah. Other than that, cause I would have said that as well, but something else that I'm looking forward to is I think mentioned before as well.

Pete: Our, our heart is, um, goes beyond just what we're doing as well. We're, you know, we're one group of people that can only do so much, but we really desire to see what we do being done by others as well. And we do look for ways to be a catalyst to help other people be mobilized to do that kind of stuff. And so in a couple of months, yeah, there's, there's some, some guys that specifically. Like Mitch and Sam are going to be working with, but that we've all sort of had involvement in helping, you know, bring together and launch out. They're going to be touring and doing some of the same stuff that we've been doing in the live space. We're just trying to come alongside them and get them started and have a taste, you know, come and see a bit of a taste test of, Hey, like what would it look like to come and speak?

Pete: Thinking a little bit more intentionally about incorporating who you are, what you believe and the music that you're playing in the live space. And so I'm really looking forward to those guys and like that band getting out and touring in November and just looking to see what they come back with and the experience that they have. So like, and it's funny what sort of saying that, cause that's actually nothing about Amber Lights specifically, but it's something that we're, we're blessed and privileged to be alongside and, and help, you know, be a catalyst for. And just championing some other people that, that are keen to do that. So yeah, I've been here.

Pete: So no. No, not them. Not even repair by breaking. So repair by breaking is another, another band that, yeah. Yeah. That we've had some involvement with. So this is, yeah.

Pete: This is another crew that's called limited time only, actually. I don't know if that, that might be the first time that we've said that. Well. No, but yeah, more band. Yeah, I've been here. So just really looking forward to that. And.

Ash: I think it's been really cool. Just seeing the heart that this ministry, I guess, has in trying to equip others in the different capacities. And so I think for a really long time, it was just Amber Lights. And coming back to that burnout thing as well, I think a lot of us felt almost the responsibility of being that. And I don't know if, especially myself, I found my limited time to be able to be with Amber Lights, something that I was really worried I was holding the rest of them back with. And so seeing then, just seeing how all these other bands and all these other projects have come out of this and the way that it has nurtured new people to come into it.

Ash: Different perspectives. And like we met Mitch through one of these and he's now our bassist and being able to see how it's grown in a way that we couldn't have fathomed back when I guess we carried the weight of it all on our shoulders. It's been really, really humbling and really, really, I'm really grateful for it as well, because God does call people when needed. And I definitely felt the need, but I didn't identify it. And then I guess these guys just kind of, yeah, really fostered this community where it was like came out also equipping other people to experience it and see, actually test the waters of, is this something that I also feel called to?

Ash: Is this something that is an avenue for me to work in and use my gifts in, in a way that I didn't think was possible before? And also hopefully just upscaling them in a way that's going to equip them for other things that even if it's not to do with us and our organization.

Pete: Yeah. It's exciting.

Flatcap: Yeah. That's definitely exciting. I love that contributing by giving back and investing in others. I don't think that we, we do that often enough because if what you're doing is saying, well, we've got to make it as a band and you just focus on yourself. How are you learning and how are you growing? If all you're doing is focusing inward, when you begin to focus outward towards others, investing in others, I think that's one of the best ways to get better at something. I often tell people you want to learn the Bible, go teach other people.

Flatcap: You will learn the Bible because you have to teach someone else. Like when you're teaching it, you have to learn it. Don't just sit in a class. That's not the way to learn the Bible. Go teach it. That's the way to learn the Bible because you have to. So investing in other bands is going to make you so much better as a band.

Flatcap: The other thing I, I learned because I did a bunch of coaching and also while I was a pastor, I did coaching. When I was in Iowa, I coached cross country and I coached wrestling and I wanted to be a state champion. I don't know what the equivalent would be in Australia, but you know, you, you compete at the high school level. You're the champion in your, in your, your state, your province. I wanted to be that. I strove for it. I was working towards it.

Flatcap: You know, we were talking about getting sick earlier. I got sick every 13 months while I was in high school. I'm wrestling with pneumonia at the state meet and I'm still competing. And I really thought I should have been a champion and it didn't happen. It's so much more satisfying to have coached state champions than it ever would have been for me to be state champion myself because I helped someone else get there. I've coached a state champion in wrestling, a two-time state champion in wrestling and a cross country state champion. Like I get to say that forever.

Flatcap: Nobody gets to break my record of helping someone else succeed in the thing that they could, you know, could have done on their own. But I was there to help them be able to do it. And so I love the idea of you as a band investing in others to help them be able to excel. Whether they become better than you or not doesn't matter.

Pete: Oh, 100%. It shouldn't be a competition, right? Like we believe wholeheartedly in, you know, in what we see as possible and what God wants us to do. And like, you've got to acknowledge that as human beings, there's only so much that we can do. But if we really believe in that vision, then you've got to bring other people around you and you've got to be able to pass on what you've won't so that they can continue that on and go further. Right. And hopefully teach them to be able to do that as well, just so that it can continue.

Pete: If you really believe in that vision and that heart for what you say you're about, then at least to me, I think to us that that just feels like the natural extension. It should never be something that we hold closely to ourselves and be like, no, this is what we do. And where we're worried about someone else doing it better. I know. Great. Go and do it better. Like, because then it means that we all get close to the goal that we, we see is that desired future.

Pete: Right. Yeah.

Ash: It's a team sport.

Pete: It should be at least anyway. Yeah. It's good to get out of your own way sometimes.

Flatcap: Well, yeah, you know, if you're doing it for Christ, we're building up the body and one person is the hand, one person is the feet. Well, you know, if, if you're saying musicians are whichever part of the body, more musicians is more parts of the same body. You know, it's, it's not, there's only one group that gets to be musicians. Go, go book, pull the book of Psalms up. There's the sons of Korah who are writing in there. There's David who's writing in there. There's, you know, several others that are, are listed as well.

Flatcap: I don't remember Asaph or somebody, I don't remember all the names, but we, we attribute it to David. He's not, he didn't write all of it. He didn't, he didn't write all of it. Maybe he collected it. Maybe Solomon did. It doesn't matter. It's a collection for the enjoyment and the blessing of the whole body of Christ.

Flatcap: It's, it's not alone. So I love the, I love the investing in other people. But I believe it's in Leviticus where it says that the priest at age 50 should stop serving and start investing. This is my language. Start investing in the younger people says assisting, but I think it's investing in them to be able to excel at what they're doing. And what, what, what I am most excited about in the next 10, 15 years is how can I invest in other people and see them hit the, hit the, hit the things God's calling them to do. Because, you know, if I just think about it as a streamer, I'm only going to be on so many hours and only so many people are going to watch me.

Flatcap: But if I can invest in five other streamers, I've just multiplied what the kingdom is doing. And we don't always have that perspective. So I love that you're doing that as a band.

Pete: Yeah. And we're trying to extend that in the Twitch space as well. You mentioned wild for me before. Yeah. We've been intentional about even within the community, looking for those that have got the same heart and yeah, that we can journey alongside together, have a joint discord server. I think that's something else that we're looking forward to as well, is to seeing that community collectively grow over the rest of this year. And we've got some things planned that we're hoping are going to continue to foster that.

Pete: And again, just, you know, really just reiterate that, you know, Amber Lights isn't just interested about Amber Lights. It's like, no, we were really trying to foster this sense of like, let's all come together and do stuff together. So yeah, looking forward to that as well. Very cool.

Flatcap: Anything else? Plans coming up? Personal things? Rest.

Pete: Oh, personal things. Nothing. Nothing stand out-ish actually. Yeah.

Ash: No, I've got family coming from overseas at the end of the year that I've really been looking forward to, but that's not me doing that. That's them doing that. That's them doing that.

Pete: It's still looking forward to it. Yeah. I'm going, I'm going to New Zealand next week. You know, we're talking before about you wanting to come down to Australia, New Zealand, but I do get to go there next week. It's for a, it's for a conference, which would be good, but that's coming up. It's always, you know, a trip away is bittersweet in that, you know, you leave family and friends and the normal routines behind for a little while, but you get to go and experience something different. So that should be good.

Pete: And then, I mean, we are also coming to the point of view where there's, there's a few band birthdays that we'll celebrate in different ways. Yeah. There's varying levels of enthusiasm within the band about our birthdays. I won't say who's excited and who isn't. So there's that. And then yeah, Christmas is close as well. So you get to that, that quarter of the year and just, yeah, things feel like there's a few celebrations going on.

Pete: There's, you know, that natural end of year wind down and you start thinking and drinking about next year, which is also something that we're doing, which is exciting. It's where, yeah, we're starting to plan a tour for, for next year on around, around June. So like, this is how far out we have to think about these things. Yeah. So, you know, in some ways, you know, some of their minds are already in that space in 2027.

Flatcap: So when, when, when you tour, do you just stay in Australia or do you hit, uh, some other islands out there around nearby as well?

Pete: So far it's been Australian based. We were, we were in 2020, very early stages of talking about heading over to the Philippines for a few weeks. Okay. But something happened, which interrupted international travel. Yeah. Something. I can't quite recall what it was, but that kind of blew those, those planes out of the water and then we never got to revisit them.

Pete: So.

Ash: I was really looking forward to everyone thinking I was local. It happens wherever I go in South East Asia. It would have been so good. That's right. Yeah.

Pete: Um, but no, so far, so far it's, um, yeah, we've sort of been based mostly, mostly in our state. This year we did a tour that dipped, uh, briefly over the border to one of our neighboring states. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Next year is actually, yeah. Looking at it at a completely interstate tour, which will be a lot of fun.

Pete: Just getting to a different part of the country and connecting with, yeah, with some new people. So.

Flatcap: So I'll just, I'll just have to stick watching you online until I come down under. So. Yeah, man.

Pete: Yeah. No, no plans, no plans for the US yet. Despite the fact that we frequently have people asking us when we're going to get up there. So.

Ash: You guys have a really big country.

Pete: Yeah.

Ash: Even if we made it over there, it would be a real challenge to get you all in one space.

Flatcap: Well, yes, it definitely is a challenge to do that. I'm, I'm still working on trying to get to every state, getting closer. And for a lot of that, it was driving to a lot of places. So, you know, a 24 hour straight drive was nothing. You know, 20 years ago, I would do that and go on vacation and. Yeah.

Pete: So how many states have you got left to visit?

Flatcap: It's less than 10, I believe. So I haven't hit all of New England. So past New York, I haven't hit Vermont, New Hampshire or Maine or Connecticut, Rhode Island. So I got five out there. I have not been to Idaho, Oregon. I think I might be one other out west that I haven't been to Utah. I haven't been to Utah.

Flatcap: So. Okay.

Ash: So.

Flatcap: Yeah. Yeah.

Ash: And, and I just found out hearing you have been to Alaska and you have been to Hawaii. Yes. Well, you know, the external ones.

Flatcap: Yes. Well, I can say, actually, what I, what I, when I went to Hawaii, it was because, you know, everybody celebrates certain milestones and I wanted to do different because that's how I am. So what we did 12 and a half year. Yeah. Anniversary. Instead of, yeah, instead of 25, halfway to 25. So did 12 and a half years.

Flatcap: So we went to Hawaii for 12 and a half years and we went to Alaska for 25 years. So.

Ash: There we go.

Flatcap: It's special.

Ash: What can I say?

Flatcap: Yeah. What I, what I did not know at the time, which I kick myself for this is when we got off of the cruise in Alaska, it was the last week in Alaska, the cruise was going to Hawaii for a week and then it was going to Australia for a week. And it was like, oh my goodness. I could have got on board, got to, got to Hawaii, went to Alaska, spent three weeks on vacation. Why didn't I think about this? I didn't know it was a thing. So.

Flatcap: Don't wait. Yeah. Time. Yeah. Next time. Next time. Actually, it probably better just to fly, fly to Australia and get on a cruise there than to all of those days at sea.

Ash: Yeah. You'll see all the Pacific islands here.

Pete: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. How long would the cruise be from? Yeah.

Ash: Yeah.

Pete: At least a day. At least.

Flatcap: Uh, yeah. Mel asking. Yeah. Did you say NCMS is going to Oregon? Yes. They're going to Portland, Oregon. They were, they, they were talking about going to Orlando next year.

Flatcap: Um, and it, they just announced this week that it's going to be Portland, Oregon. So it's, you know, it's closer than going to Orlando for you. If you want to just pop up in April, you know, I'll get you a gig. Yeah. I won't promise. I'll get you a gig in the, the, you know, cafeteria. You can play for us there.

Flatcap: Um, look, if you can cover.

Pete: Yep. Accommodation.

Pete: Yeah. If it can cost us nothing. Yeah. Yeah. We might be able to go.

Flatcap: Yeah. I'll, I'll just start shelling out all of my, you know, residual incomes from the podcast. And, uh, yeah, we'll, we'll have that.

Ash: How many listens does this podcast need to get? We're talking.

Flatcap: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we'll, we'll be able to cover it in 28 years. You know. All right.

Flatcap: We'll put it in calendar. We'll put it in calendar.

Pete: We'll put it in calendar. That'll be like our 35 year anniversary. Oh, wow. There we go. We're already planning the celebration tour for 35 years. I am.

Flatcap: It's older. Bit of perspective. Think about it. Like it's not older.

Ash: Anyway. Uh, we would love to. Yeah.

Pete: No, we would love to, yeah, if it was that, like, there's just an ever-growing community of, yeah, just beautiful and lovely people from your part of the world that, yeah, that we get to spend time with every week, that we've never been able to be in a room with face-to-face, and that would just be so special to be able to do that. We've definitely loved being able to do that with the guys in Australia that, yeah, that are part of the community. We've, we've had people pretty much from all over the country that have come through Sydney for something, and we've just been able to sit down and, yeah, have a burger together with, and, yeah.

Ash: It's always a burger. It's always a burger.

Flatcap: Okay. Okay.

Ash: Yeah.

Flatcap: Is it a kangaroo burger, or?

Pete: No, but kangaroo burgers are good. It's, it's a nice me. I'm just going to say that. Okay. Probably the only country that eats, uh, natural wind.

Flatcap: Yeah, I, I, I, I love to eat exotic animals. Uh, I think it's fun. Or, or just to try something that, say you tried it, like I was in Africa, I tried Caterpillar, just to say I tried it, it's not good. Well, let's go.

Pete: Deep fried, or just, yeah.

Ash: Just out of the ground, wait, off the leaf.

Flatcap: So, it, it was cooked, I'm not sure if it was sautéed or deep fried, it was one of the two, but. Yeah. It, it still, you could tell, had the, the fur on it, and it. It was still furry. Yeah, it was still furry. It was, it couldn't. Yeah.

Pete: Would you do it again?

Flatcap: Well, I would do it again. Yeah. Cause you know, it's, it's been years, so I got to try it again. In case, in case they did it better this time.

Ash: So when he comes here, he's doing the witchery grove. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

Flatcap: And it's, it's definitely not going to compare to kangaroo meatball, or no, sorry. Ostrich meatballs. That was my, my favorite thing in Africa was ostrich meatballs. They were fantastic.

Pete: Okay.

Flatcap: So.

Pete: Yeah. So I haven't tried any yet, which would, I guess is like our ostrich equivalent, right? Although there's still a lot of different, but yeah. Kangaroo meat is quite lame and very good.

Flatcap: I, I love when we get silly and that's, you never know where conversations are going to go, but is there anything that you were thinking about wanting to share or talk about that we haven't touched on?

Ash: This has been a vast conversation. It's been, it's been very, yeah, it has. Uh, nothing comes to mind for me is what I came on mic to say.

Pete: Yeah. I mean, we've talked about like live stuff, about Twitch community stuff and songwriting and probably the only thing that you have on us that we always do. And it's completely fine. You don't need to. It was like, how did you guys all meet? Um, it's always a fun, no, but I wasn't coming here thinking that I wanted to talk about that. I was just, yeah.

Pete: Just thinking out loud. No, it's, it's been a really great conversation. Yeah. Appreciate it. Hanging out with you and just talking about life and yeah. What's going on.

Flatcap: Yeah. Well, I, I, I love, you know, because Twitch isn't a thing that is commonly known through, through every culture. Or, or even globally, or even in the U S it's not that popular. It's, it's niche. And so I love to learn. How did you come across this? And once you're here, there's a level at which it's like, it's not like anything else.

Flatcap: There, there is a level. It's like, I like, I just keep talking about it all the time. And I talk about discord and I get the eye rolls of what do you mean? You have community on discord. Discord is anti-community because you're against community. No, no, no. It's a platform.

Flatcap: Okay. It's get, don't get hung up on the word. It's, it's sarcasm. I, you know, we'll just say that, but it's, it, it's so fascinating to realize that something is happening and be a part of it and know that it's something that could be beneficial and blessing the rest of the church. And they have no idea what's going on. So, uh, you know, that's, that's, that's part of the reason for the podcast is to encourage someone who's, who might be feeling called to do this, uh, if they need to go to their church or their parents, depending on their age and say, this is viable, this is real. I'm not making it up and I'm not delusional.

Flatcap: Uh, God's calling me to this. Then great. The podcast is there to, to help say, look, this is what others are doing and God's using it and blessing it.

Ash: And don't let, yeah, I guess physical limitations and not being able to get that physical community stop you from finding Christian community. Cause it's out there, it's online. Yeah. Yeah.

Pete: Yeah. I mean, I would just absolutely say, and yeah, I guess similarly, just encourage. Yeah. Anyone in this space, like we, we started streaming as we talked about, because we just, we felt this sense that the internet was not a safe place and especially for young people and for vulnerable people, that there needed to be more safe spaces online where people could come, feel accepted, feel loved, cared for, prayed for. And so that was very much in the forefront of, of our minds when we started streaming and something that we'd always wanted to be a hallmark of our presence. And that was it, with no other expectations other than we're just going to show up and we're just going to trust Jesus to do what he wants to do.

Pete: We're not going to come. We know with a particular agenda, we're just going to, we're going to care about whoever shows up and we're going to see success as if we get to make one person feel loved, that's a successful stream. And that's, you know, a successful time online. And so, you know, just, so whoever is listening to this, I think, you know, if, if that resonates with you, then that, that's all it needs to be. And that's, you know, the only thing that you sort of need to put on yourself is just be present and be willing to care for people and just ask Jesus to help you do that. And I remember really early on, yeah, one guy in particular, who is part of our team in the background at the moment, who also streams came across us and, you know, saw us just modeling prank with someone in that moment.

Pete: And then he was like, I can, I can do that on Twitch as well. And then he started, you know, when we, when he was streaming, he just started offering to do that same thing for people as well. And he started having his own stories of like, oh, you know, this person showed up for the first time and just shared that their daughter was going in for surgery and I wasn't looking good and I got to pray for them and, and just hearing those stories and just, just those encouragements. So yeah, I guess our hope is that anyone feels that they can do that because like we talked about before, it's actually not about us, right? As long as we're just faithful in, you know, if we feel that that's what Jesus wants us to do, just show up and love people and we'll do the rest.

Pete: So yeah.

Flatcap: Now I love how simple that is. I mean, and I love, I love the, the idea too, of if it just encourages one person, because that's all, that's all it needs to do. Sometimes you have bigger ideas. I've got to reach this many and I've got to do all of these things. I used to do drama ministry and that's one of the things I would, I would tell whoever was, you know, acting that day or whatever. It's like, if we do this drama for church and we impact one person, that's who we're supposed to reach. Don't worry about the, don't worry about the reaction of the audience.

Flatcap: Don't, don't. We're not here for the audience. We're here for the audience of one up above and the one person that, that is scheduled to be impacted. That's it. And if there's no one else that's impacted and if they don't tell us, it doesn't matter. Uh, we may never know. Uh, so I love, I love that.

Flatcap: It just reminds me of that, that, that like you're showing up is the faithfulness of it. The, the person receiving the encouragement is going to, because your faithfulness is there to show up.

Pete: Yeah. Our very first stream, we, before we were live, like, you know what? If one person who shows up, that's, we're going to call that a win. And two people showed up. Dang. So that was like a double, that's, that was a double win. That's double win.

Pete: That's right.

Ash: We were like, oh, 200%. That's right.

Pete: And we, and we, and we celebrated that, man, and like five years later, like, we just can't even, like, we had no idea. Yeah. Like, and, and on Twitch and social media standards, like the community that we have on, you know, from the world standard.

Ash: Oh, it's tiny.

Pete: It's tiny, but it's huge for us.

Ash: Yeah.

Pete: And we just, we just are so blown away by just the number of people that we get to hang out with every week and just the stories that we get to hear from them. And I don't think any of us thought that five years down the track, this is where it would be at. Um, and we're just, yeah, we're just incredibly thankful for it. So yeah, again, just that encouragement, you know, if, if this is a space that you feel like God wants to use you, just, you know, just start doing it and always remember the reason why you started. Never lose track of that, never make it about the numbers, always make it about the people.

Ash: We actually found that there was a couple of weeks where we were, for whatever reason, the algorithm was promoting us and we were getting a lot more numbers. And while it looked good, we were really struggling to connect with the community. Oh, it was, it was really difficult. We were missing things and we were missing all these kinds of stuff. And we were so reliant on our minds and we were kind of like, actually, that's not sustainable. Yeah. Not for us, at least anyway, because what we're trying to do is foster, is foster personal relationships in the chat.

Ash: And we couldn't do that when the chat was flying. And we just, and we were like, we don't want, we don't want anyone to feel as though they're feeling invisible. And right now we're really struggling to not make people feel invisible when things are moving so quickly. So we've actually become to be quite grateful for the size of our community, even though as Pixar in the grand scheme of things, you know, some people would, would, would consider it too small to bother. We're like, no, no, no, this is perfect.

Flatcap: Oh yeah.

Pete: Yeah.

Flatcap: But the comparison game is easy, but you always lose, you know? I mean, we, we could talk about as, as Twitch streamers of, I can look at someone else in the same category, doing more than I'm doing, larger than I am. They started after me. So I can be disappointed that they, they climb the ranks faster than I am.

Pete: What's wrong with me? What am I doing? Yeah. What am I doing? Yeah.

Flatcap: All that, all the self doubt, all it's, it's, it's no different than in the church. Like the, the congregation down the road has 50 more people than I do. The pastor's younger and hipper than I am, you know, which is always the case.

Ash: Impossible. Look at those hats.

Flatcap: I know. Well, no one will be dapper. Well, no one more dapper, but more hip, you know?

Pete: So it's, no, something, something that I think like most people in my life, in this point of let me say a bit of this year is the comparison is the joy. Yeah. Oh yes. Yeah. I love that thought. Yeah. And I just feel like it's so true.

Pete: And like the, the other thing that goes along with that, you know, I think for all of us as well is just be faithful with what you have. Like there's a sort of scriptural verse about that. You know? There is. Be faithful with a little bit.

Flatcap: Be faithful with the large things and he will give you larger things. Isn't that how that goes?

Pete: Yeah. Something like that. Maybe we're about different bottles again. I don't know. Yeah. I think just that those two things just need to bring so true. Like you never want to compare in any space.

Pete: You have a line like, you know, the social media space and the streaming space, you know, what someone else is doing to what you're doing. You just got to be faithful with what you, you know, with what you've been given. And, you know, whatever happens with that, it's like, that's okay.

Ash: And as Jag, the news is in the chat. Can't be jealous of flat cap dapperer passed off because he's not the measuring stick.

Pete: Who is this dapperer passed? There is none. There is none. That's my brain demon. I love the flat caps. Can we get Peter to wear more, please? I couldn't find mine to bring it on to the.

Pete: It's right. I was very sad about that.

Flatcap: The day I can't find mine is going to be a problem, you know. Lost access to that room.

Pete: Well, there's a few. If I recall correctly, because it's been a long time since I've actually had a chance to sit and like to hang out on your stream in a focused way. But there's a story behind each of those caps, isn't it?

Flatcap: Most of them. Yeah, there's a story behind several. I'll just grab one a second.

Pete: Yeah, this is where we get to interview you. Yeah. So what's the story behind that one?

Flatcap: So I did this a few years ago for stream for streamversary. I said, chat, I'm going to let you pick the hat I'm going to buy next. So I picked four or five hats and they voted each day. This one was in fourth place after day one. Okay. And and then somebody said, hey, wait a minute. That's that's made out of burlap.

Flatcap: Essentially, that's sackcloth and ashes. So if you wear that, you're wearing sackcloth and ashes. Wait, and it's made out of coffee bags. So it's redeemed. It's a hat that's been redeemed and it's repurposed. All of a sudden, it's votes just start climbing. And then everyone in chat is trying to come up with new metaphors for this hat.

Flatcap: It's repurposed. It's redeemed. It's sackcloth and ashes. Then I got it. And then there's there's a G on here that that must be it's God's hat. You know, it's actually so it says product of Brazil, but it's from New Zealand. So the coffee was imported to New Zealand.

Flatcap: Then they repurposed the coffee bag into a hat. So this is this just fantastic. This one doesn't leave my house. I only wear it on stream and around the house. I like I don't want to get this one dirty. It's got to last a long time. So it's essentially my stream, one of my stream hats.

Pete: So beautiful. Does it still smell like coffee as well?

Flatcap: No, no, it doesn't. Oh, and I should show you the inside is lined, too. So it's not uncomfortable. Yeah, it's not scratchy or anything. But since it does have, you know, the burlap on it, like I'm worried about getting it dirty. If I wear it out, that it'll get in the grooves and not be cleanable. So that's why I like, you know, it just it just stays home.

Flatcap: It doesn't go anywhere. Although I did. I did. Actually, I brought it to reach conference last year when I was teaching because I brought five different hats and I asked people to to vote on which one they thought was my favorite. And it actually wasn't any of the five. It was it was the one on my head. So I, you know, I pulled a fast one on there.

Flatcap: It doesn't smell like coffee. It doesn't smell like coffee. Disappointing. Yes, it's washed clean. It's part of the metaphor. It's been washed clean. Your, your old stank ain't on you no more of.

Flatcap: That's right. You know, the coffee stains. Oh, yes. Yep. You've been white as snow. Well, not quite as white as snow on the hat.

Pete: Yeah. Brown as dirty as snow. I don't know. Can I see a policeman's hat there as well? Oh, I'm going to make you. Oh, it's work.

Flatcap: It's, it's, it's, it's a, it's a chauffeur hat. So my son, when he went to prom, I was going to show for him. So I had a, a nice, uh, you know, button up like a Jackie Chan jacket that goes all the way up here. It's just straight buttons, no collar really. And, and I got a chauffeur hat. So I chauffeured him and his date for prom. Uh, so that's why I got the hat.

Flatcap: So.

Pete: Beautiful.

Flatcap: I didn't know we're going to talk hats. They didn't wait, but, but you asked if there was anything else that. Yeah. Yeah. Anything else. Yeah. You're just dying to know about all my hats.

Flatcap: Okay. I just want to know.

Ash: Anything he's missing there is a hard hat. I reckon. I do not have a hard hat.

Flatcap: I used to, but I don't have one anymore.

Ash: I mean, one of them might be still capped. You never know.

Flatcap: Well, I, I don't have it sitting here. I do want. And I, and somebody out there probably makes it, but I do, I do ride bike a lot. I want a flat cap that fits on top of my bike helmet. That's, that's what I want. I want to just be able to put a flat cap on top of my bike hat and, and look like I'm wearing a flat cap out there. So.

Pete: Oof. Do you reckon you could tell him?

Ash: No, I don't know how to make hats. That's all in construction. Although I'd be, I look, true, try my sewing machines in the shop though.

Flatcap: Well, mine's right over there. So.

Ash: Oh, he can do it. Okay.

Flatcap: I, I, I've actually, I, I don't know if you, you get Jerry Garcia ties or if you know what those are anyway, Jerry Garcia from the grateful dead did some designing for ties. So rather than normal ties, they, they have like tie dye and color splash and they're really creative. I want to design flat caps that are in that vein of instead of a, you know, herringbone and, and traditional, I like maybe Hawaiian shirt would be a better way of describing it. The Hawaiian shirts of a flat caps. I just, I would really like fancy designs in the material. I don't know anybody doing that. So if somebody ever wants to, you know, make hats and I design them and they'll be all flat caps and I'll be your spokesperson.

Flatcap: There's my idea.

Pete: So there's, there's gotta be someone on the internet that, yeah, that, that would do that.

Flatcap: I don't know. Or I just need an investor, you know? Somebody that just wants to invest in flat caps. And, uh, you know.

Pete: Just a quick shout out if there's anyone out there to invest in.

Ash: This podcast needs to sponsor.

Flatcap: Yeah, you could sponsor the podcast. Absolutely.

Ash: I mean, we're not going to get to the States otherwise. There we go.

Flatcap: I, I will bankroll the flat cap money into a concert tour.

Pete: We will wear them. We will wear them. For the entirety of the tour.

Ash: I would have to.

Pete: You would have to, yeah. Big EL on the top of. I'm just seeing like a half black, half orange, like amber.

Ash: Absolutely. I would wear it. At some point I'd be headbanging. It would fly into the audience and that's now a freebie.

Pete: It is. Giveaways. Like, thank you so much. But yeah. Yeah. I'm just, I don't, I don't know if there's anything else that we have to.

Ash: Yeah. I don't know. A lot's been covered.

Pete: Hmm.

Ash: Yeah.

Flatcap: That's, that's great.

Ash: I, yeah.

Flatcap: Yeah. Um, one of the things I, I normally do when we get to the end is invite you to decide where we're going to go raid to. So somebody from your community that might be streaming that we could go over and bless them by raiding them.

Ash: Should have been an hour ago. We've had a perfect one.

Flatcap: I'm going to have to come up to the end and see. Yeah. You'll have to take a look and see. Let me know if there's someone.

Pete: Otherwise we're happy to defer to, to your, your discretion.

Ash: Oh, hang on. Yachting here says I see Next Tempest.

Pete: Is Next Tempest still live? Absolutely.

Ash: Why are you saying quick, wild free me stream?

Pete: Wild free me go live again.

Flatcap: Oh, next, next, next Tempest sounds great. All right. Okay. Well, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I am so glad we worked this out to be able to have it.

Flatcap: I know it took some time to get it together. Uh, but, but I really, I guess at the beginning, I really, really wanted to, because I really saw what Twitch could do because of your community. Not yours alone, but, but that aspect only happened because of the gap, which I wouldn't have noticed otherwise. And it was an unintentional gap. I had no control over, but when I came back, your community was still there. So that, that was such an amazing piece to me. That was why I keep seeing digital as a way now to bridge the gaps that we have in the church where we lose community.

Flatcap: And so, uh, it doesn't mean Twitch is the answer, but, uh, it's a place that exists that allows us to have ongoing relationships with people globally that we wouldn't have otherwise and see the body of Christ in its fullness. And so I'm just amazed by it and love it. And so thank you for coming on and hanging out with me.

Pete: No, and thank you. Yeah. I think you might've put it in chat, but thank you for being patient with us for almost a year. You've just been graciously checking in with us every few months going, Hey guys, is this possible yet? And yeah. Yeah.

Ash: This has been on the virtual whiteboard for a while. So I'm glad that we could finally get this up.

Pete: It's been so great to have fun and see that we just appreciate your grace in, yeah, continuing to chase us up in the midst of busyness and everything else until, you know, a good point of time in the, that way. So thank you for that. Yeah.

Flatcap: It's been a, been a pleasure.

Ash: Anyone who's chilling in chat, enjoy Next Tempest. Thank you so much for coming along and listening to us. Yeah. And yeah. Keep supporting. The dufferst of pastas.

Flatcap: That's right. There is anyone. There is. There can be only one. All right. I'm going to give some credits, which will show what other podcasts will be coming up. If you're interested in hanging out for any of those, love to see you.

Flatcap: Thank you everybody for hanging out with us today.

Ash: Bye.

Flatcap: Bye.