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I've always turned to the Psalms throughout my life for the place to turn when you don't know where to turn. There are definitely some victory psalms in there, and we celebrate those. And my book talks about some of those time and time again. The psalmist has a very challenging circumstance. Someone's trying to kill them, or there's reflections on being exiled even, and how they've lost the land. And there's not an immediate answer to those prayers. And what we find is so relevant to our lives when there's not an immediate answer to our prayers. Well good afternoon. Welcome to another episode of the Covenant Eyes Podcast. Great to see you again. We have a wonderful guest and a dear old friend with Covenant Eyes. Karen, you want to introduce our guest today? Yeah, of course. Noah Filipiak is an old friend of Covenant Eyes. But also, you're not old, though you're technically just, you know, young guy, but you have been part of the Covenant Eyes family and ecosystem for a really long time. You've done a lot of great work, and I'd love for you just to share a little bit about what you do in your ministry. You've got a new book coming out and all the things, so just go ahead and jump right in. Yeah. Thanks, Karen and Rob, great to see you both again. So I'm a pastor over in Grand Rapids. I planted a church 4 or 5 years ago. I been a pastor over 20 years. And through my pastoral ministry, my testimony of overcoming pornography in my early 20s, I should say, in college, and then kind of coming back in my early 20s when I was a pastor, that testimony God used to just open the door into writing Beyond the Battle subtitle, Beyond the Battle, is a man's guide to His Identity in Christ in an over sexualized world. And Karen, I always give you a shout out when I on your this podcast. It was eight years ago. Fall of 2018, the independently published version of that book. It just came out and you said to me, you should start some online groups where guys can go through the book with you. And I did that eight years ago, and on Saturday we just launched the 47th. Our group, 47, just launched this last Saturday, which is which is really awesome. And then we have a vibrant alumni community as well. So that book got published in 2021 by Zondervan, an updated edition. And I always like to welcome men who are looking for connection community support into Beyond the Battle. You can just go to BeyondTheBattle.net. It's very affordable and man, the alumni community that's developed from that which is free, has. I've seen greater discipleship in that space than I have in my 20 years of pastoring. So I wrote a book a couple years ago for teens called Needed Navigation Teen Guys and Girls. Short little book. Hopefully teens will actually read. And then just coming out this September 1st with our Daily Bread Publishing is a new book, shelter in the storm. And this book is unique. It's not just to men, and it's not a it's if you look at it on the cover, it's not a book about recovery, sexual, you know, unwanted sexual behavior stuff. It's a book for kind of anyone in any phase of life. I say you can give it to your grandma or to your high school graduate. But within that, and really within the Psalms, it's a 40 day devotional through 40 different psalms of seeing God's faithfulness in really tough situations. And I have found in my own journey and in the journey of the hundreds of Beyond the Battle guys I've gotten to walk with, we often go towards sexual temptation, unhealthy coping mechanisms when our circumstances don't turn out the way we want. So it could be in our singleness, it could be in a divorce situation, it could be with our spouse. This could be for men or women. This thing isn't changing and something happens in us where we then go towards the coping mechanism of porn, lust, fantasy. And so there's a lot of overlap there that are things going to help a lot of people who may not even realize that this is the connection of their struggle. Yeah. That's amazing. Both the Beyond the Battle work that you've done over the last 7 or 8 years. And now this book in your right there is a great connection there. I mean, so many people are struggling today, maybe not more than ever, but I guess you hear about it more and more in there looking for answers in maybe in a world now that there's less of a true north leading back to to Christ and where they really can get help. And so they're seeking all kinds of different avenues to, to help these struggles in this. So I love how the Psalms really begins to address all of those issues, because they're I mean, really, it's about God's faithfulness. And, you know, he never promised that we would not have struggles in this world, but he has promised that he'll be there for us and walk us through. So talk a little bit about really how what led you to write this. And then really some of the some of the deep things that you're pulling out of this. Yeah. Well, there's a I don't know what to call it, but there's like a lightweight prosperity gospel within the church that goes kind of undetected within evangelical churches. And I think it's natural as humans, it's not always it's not done in a, in a malicious sort of way. But we're taught about prayer. I'll be kind of maybe a little I'll be a little crude in the way I some this up. I mean, just this will be a little clunky maybe, but we just kind of think God is Santa Claus, you know, we we we ask for things like, here's your prayer request to God, and God is good. And there's a lot of theological, let's just face it, theological confusion around the goodness of God, the problem of evil in the world. That's sort of an unsolvable theological issue that people have been dealing with for a long time. But what I've seen in my life, the lives of a lot of the begun the battle guys, is when we pray for something, and this is for anybody listening of any age, no matter what your struggle is, no matter what your circumstance is, we're praying for good things, like we're praying somebody has cancer and we're praying that it would be healed. What happens when it isn't healed? You know, I'm praying for something to be repaired in my marriage. What happens when it's not repaired or a single person praying for this godly spouse? What happens when it doesn't happen? And we're not left with a lot of great options, right? The options sometimes can feel like, well, God doesn't love me. He didn't, so he didn't answer my prayer or I don't have enough faith. I'm not a good enough Christian. So he didn't answer my prayer. And there's a lot of shame that goes along with that. And both of those lead to negative spaces of depression, further isolation. So to your first part of that question, Rob, I started diving back into the Psalms during the pandemic. It would have been 2020 or so, you know, kind of crossed over into 2021. But I, for my own spiritual formation, needing God in that space, a lot was going on in my life at the time, outside of just the pandemic itself. There were a lot of things outside of my control that were having. I felt very stuck and I didn't know where to turn. And I've always turned to the Psalms throughout my life for the place to turn when you don't know where to turn. And the Psalms give us permission to not have everything, have a neat bow at the end of it, because for there has definitely some victory psalms in there, and we celebrate those. And my book talks about some of those. But time and time again, the psalmist has a very challenging circumstance. Someone's trying to kill them, or there's reflections on being exiled even, and how they've lost the land. And there's not an immediate answer to those prayers. And what we find is so relevant to our lives when there's not an immediate answer to our prayers. And so it's this book started for me as a series of blogs I was doing. I mean, I don't remember if it was 20 or 21. It was the beginning of the year, January. I was quite board in the I was in a ministry job, like everything was shut down. There wasn't a lot to do that. I'm just going to write a blog every day on a song like Psalm one, two, three, four, and I got through 45 of the Psalms and life kind of picked up again. And then later it was, what would this look like as a book and pitch that to our daily bread? And now we have we selected 40 Psalms out of the first 50 that really hit on this piece of God's faithfulness, so that a reader can have that theme of God's faithfulness when things aren't really adding up. I love that we just did women's Bible study on the Psalms a few few weeks back, and, you know, it was just so refreshing. You can go through them an unlimited amount of times, and each time God reveals new things to us. And it's so encouraging to see people in their human nature struggling, questioning in fear, having anxiety, you know, shame all the things that we experience. And you can find that in the Psalms. And then you also find God's love and his hope. And it's just it's such a refreshing thing. So I'm excited for this to get out and for people to have a chance to go through this. You mentioned something that I wanted to kind of go back to. You mentioned the Santa Claus effect in the church and, you know, kind of how we live our prayer life and things like that. How do you think that technology is really kind of feeding that? Because I think we live in such an instant gratification world that we often think that if God doesn't answer our prayer right away, all the things that you listed out could be true. We're not a good enough Christian, or, you know, he doesn't love us or, you know, we're living in sin. So that's why he's not answering. How do you think technology is also fostering some of that? Because I think that may be an issue as well. Oh yeah, I mean, I am so I'm 43 and you know, I grew up with some technology, but I'm not like like I have three kids that are in, you know, two in middle school, elementary where they're definitely of what do they call the internet generation. You know, we got dial up when I was in middle school. That's part of my testimony with pornography. Right. Like that's when pornography came into my life. And things today, for the actual internet generation that have grown up with cell phones in their hand, they've never known a world without it. Like, right. The there's lots of research on there about how that is not good for our brains. It is not good for the child's brain. Right. And it leads to depression because, I mean, where do you want to start? Like with social media, for example, the depression that that leads us to, because we're constantly comparing our lives to the lives of other people who are literally just putting on a fake front. Not always intentionally, but you're putting your best pictures on social media. We just did this great vacation. Look at our great family, and you can easily read someone's glowing report on their anniversary of how much they love their wife or husband, and how great their family is. And you're dying inside because you're going. That doesn't sound anything like my marriage. I wish I had that, and who knows if that's their daily experience or not, right? I haven't met many married couples that are that way 365 days a year. So when when a child is being shown that not with a marriage necessarily, but with celebrities, with their friends, their brains can't, their brains aren't formed yet enough. They're not even developmentally strong enough to process what's real, what isn't real. So it comes back to what is reality and what isn't. And in reality, when we create a fantasy world, whether that's sexually with these temptations or it's like a theological fantasy world, I think is what we do. Where, like you said, Karen, instant gratification, boom, boom, boom, and just getting used to buying things by pushing your button over, you know, you can just get anything you want. It's natural that our brains are going to associate God with that. Hey, God, I need my I need my answer. Boom. I need to buy. I need you to give me this boom. And it's like we're the customer. God is the he's the, you know, business. And I mean, there's it's just it's sad what it cheapens our relationship to cheapens our relationship with God to something that it was. That isn't real. Absolutely. Spot on. Yeah, absolutely. You also touched on on something a little bit ago that really sparked an interest because so many people, whether they're struggling with pornography or just other things in life, they often don't know how to how to deal with that or cope with that, and they don't know how to interact with God on that issue. So you mentioned, you know, people can grumble a little bit. You think you use that word but can really bare their souls a little bit to to God. Not not everything is this very neat, easy answer around some of these addictions and struggles. And why can't I leave those? But when you talk about the Psalms, you really a lot of the Psalms, people are pouring out their angst. They're mad almost at God at times and questioning, why is this happening to me? What's going on? But yet God is is always true, always faithful through those things. And I know you developed a discussion guide along with with your book, but how do you help people really deal with that, that inner struggle with me and God with, you know, around these struggles in their lives? I think it's so huge because I have personally been on the precipice of this, and I know so many friends, people from church, ministry spaces, family where you have this glass sculpture that that is formed of what God is supposed to give you. It comes from these things in our church upbringing that aren't meant to be maliciously forming this. But then when the crisis comes and I mean, these are real crisis. And if if things God doesn't answer our prayer right the way we want it, that we've prayed it, that glass sculpture crashes. It falls from the from this place. We have it and it hits the cement. And people leave their faith and they lose their faith over it. And the Psalms, there's no prayer formula in the Psalms. And I hear prayer formulas taught in churches. And I love the Psalms, that it's Bible like, this is this is theology. We are safe in the Psalms. We can we're not we're not going outside of Scripture here. There is no formula within the Psalms for answers to prayer. And there's something I mean, I wish there was. I don't like it, but there's something that's so refreshing and brings us peace to know that it has always been this way and that many have walked this path before us. There's always a level of redemption in the Psalms that reminds us that God is with us. He is faithful. It's going to look different than we think it's going to look. It's going to look outside of our circumstances. But to me, this is an essential prayer. Language to God is praying with those types of emotions. Rob like that. The psalmist gave us permission to pray in anger to to yell at God, I mean, right, I mean, these are traumatic things. If some awful thing happens to you and that God can handle that. And in the church, we don't really act like that, right? Even in our corporate worship for the Jews and God's people in the Old Testament, the Hebrews, I mean, they're singing these Psalms corporately. And they had a lot to lament. They have a whole book. We have a whole book in our Old Testament, which is the Hebrew Bible called Lamentations. And this was part of their journey with God. They there wasn't a glass sculpture here of God's always going to give me what I want, and then it shatters when he doesn't. There was an expectation that their suffering in the world, the world is broken and fallen. We do not have the answers to all of these questions, and when we are able to add that to our discipleship, our relationship with God, our prayer life, it gets us through without having to abandon God, because that it's like a caricature of God. You know, when you're at the amusement park and they're drawing the picture of you and it looks it kind of looks like you, but it's different, very bizarre, cartoony. We're getting rid of that, and we're getting into the real guts of the Bible and people's lives. In the Psalms I mentioned, I reference Elijah in the shelter in the storm book. You know, Elijah sees this amazing miracle in 1 Kings 18 and we turn to chapter 19, and he's super depressed, having suicidal thoughts under the broom tree. And that stuff's in the Bible. We just have to be when we're real about it. To me, it opens up a whole avenue of people getting help, people seeking mental health, people seeking counseling, people coming out of these addictions that they've been going to for coping mechanisms and saying, hey, maybe I'm not the only one. In fact, Elijah experienced this, the psalmist experienced this. So this has been going on for a long time with people that have walked with God and even the ones that have written scripture. Yeah. You know, one thing that came to mind when you were kind of sharing was just, you know, as Christians, I think we've kind of lost the art of understanding. Maybe it's not an art, but an understanding of how to suffer. Well, like suffering is part of our life. And and comfort has kind of taken the place, I think, in many spaces in our faith walks, you know, we like to seek comfort. We want things to be easy, you know, and and unfortunately, if you read the Bible, there's a lot of suffering that we endure in this life. And it's being able to to walk through that suffering in a God honoring way. I mean, it doesn't mean that we don't feel emotion or that we don't feel or anger or frustration, but it's knowing how to sit with that and communicate with God and pray to him and let him walk you through the issues. So I just I feel like there's something there that maybe we just need to focus on how we can suffer well, as Christians because we're going to I mean, that's the reality of life. Yeah. That reminds me

of Hebrews 4: 19:08

14 to 16, which I reference in one of the so sheltered in a storm. It's a 40 day devotional. This is like your time with God. Time you read the psalm and then, you know, I've written out my devotional, so I'm able to touch points with other parts of Scripture. But with Jesus we have a God who suffered, and we will never have all the answers to suffering. But we we have this model example of Almighty God who came to earth in flesh, in human form so we could relate to him. And that's

what Hebrews 4: 19:39

14 to 16 lays out. It's that he can empathize with our weakness because he's experienced it in every way. And you think of what Jesus experienced the gamut of, yes, the crucifixion, which would have been just the most brutal physical torture getting his back ripped open, suffering, dying. But the mockery leading up to that, you know, them mocking him. Oh, King of the Jews, save yourself the crown of thorns. But the betrayal of his best friends, the betrayal of his disciples who fled, and Peter, who denied him. And nobody's close to him at the cross except John and his mother Mary, that we know of and like his whole movement, looked completely dead. As a church planter. That's like my worst fear to have a failed church plant, which is such a small little, you know, tiny blip on the map here. Jesus says at the end of his journey, and at least to his disciples, it sure looked like this. Things over. Remember there in the there in the room, locked up like, we're next, we're going to come in for us. I mean, this thing looked like a total disaster. We forget the emotional suffering of that for Jesus, the the social suffering of that for Jesus. When your friends have backstabbed you and Judas turns them in the authorities, and this is the God that we pray to, and that's Hebrews four, it says, come to this throne room. Jesus is throne room. He's he knows what you've gone through. And he says, come to my throne room with boldness in order to find grace in your time of need. I mean, that is an amazing invitation. God didn't have to do that for us, but he chose to out of love. And that brings me a lot of comfort just in and of itself. Well, no. Let's take a step back. You are leading a church, a growing church. You're still doing the Beyond the Battle group, she said. 47. You've got a new book coming out. You are podcasting. How's how are you keeping up with all of this? And so personal? I see how. It is. Okay. Make sure you're okay. Let me tell you, though, I made a huge change. This was a God thing. Try to keep it brief. So starting in October 1st, we sometime in the middle of last year, I made an announcement that I was raising my support through Beyond the Battle. We turned it into a nonprofit a couple years ago because one of my alumni guys wanted to donate, and I was like, oh, okay. Yeah. So turned it into a nonprofit. And that was the first seed God planting that. Yes, Rob, I was in the process of burning out, stretching myself too thin, not obeying the limits God has put on us. And when we do that, it's not pretty. Like God wants us to be in our in margin and boundaries and to, you know, enjoy life and not not burnout. And major changes were needed. I made the small changes. And so I started fundraising for my primary income through the Beyond the Battle nonprofit, and that was to our alumni guys. Alumni community is free. But I said to him, hey guys, if this is helping you, here's what I'm trying to do because I was going to have to quit mosaic my church, or I was going to have to quit leading Beyond the Battle. And I didn't feel led. I couldn't do either one. And so long story short, I was able to raise close to my full salary through Beyond the Battle, the nonprofit. I went down to $0 in salary at my church that started in November of 2025. When I got I finally got down to $0. We were able to hire a pastor of discipleship and operations, and so I'm still the lead pastor. But I work at Mosaic, my church, Tuesday, Fridays and Sundays. And then because we're a small church plant, I had to end my salary there in order to create this new position. And Pastor Jack's doing a great job. He is running the systems of the church that I was doing before. I have ADHD. That came about 5 or 6 years ago, and there legitimately was a space of, I can't keep doing the logistical stuff that I was doing and needed to do more of the creative stuff. So that's how it's happened. And yeah, took a sabbatical in December, came back in January, kind of full out with this new on Wednesdays and Thursdays is when I do my podcast and when I write. And it's allowed me to do both within margin and boundaries. And it's really been beautiful. It's not been perfect because it just takes time to get those new norms set up. But that's how that's how I'm doing it. Yeah. And so I want to keep working. I'm working on a science fiction book that I started four years ago, and that, like, this is my most fun thing that I do in my life. And I'm going to get that try to get that published here next year sometime. So it creates space for me to do some of those things as well. I love that that's so that's an important lesson. I think that all of us, you know, need to take into account that, you know, there's a time and I think the Psalms actually reflect this beautifully to us that, you know, in Psalms 23, the Lord is my shepherd. And, you know, he makes he makes me lie down in the pasture, you know, all of these things, like there's a time where, like, we do need to, like, take a step back and actually reevaluate. And sometimes that means letting go of good so that God can do great in our lives. Because oftentimes, I think people that are really out there serving the Lord, they can give everything they've got until they're burnt out. And now you're of no use because you've, you know, burnt through everything. So it's like, I love that you did that. And I think there's a lot of wisdom for all of us. And the Psalms, like, there are so many places throughout the Psalms where, you know, the Lord actually teaches us these things. And I just I think that's a beautiful reflection. And hopefully that Psalm 23 is in your. It sure is, yes. I love it for it. Yeah. Good good, good. Awesome. Well, you know, Beyond the Battle, that is like an amazing study. And in a group that men can join. So I want to talk a little bit about that, because there are a lot of guys that listen to this podcast that might be looking for something next to do. Maybe their church doesn't have a group, or maybe they're just looking for that community. That connection, and I know Beyond the Battle is a great place to start. Can you share with our listeners a little bit about that? Yeah, absolutely. And Beyond the Battle is very supplemental as well. If you're in another recovery space or in your church, you don't have to trade one out for the other. I think where we really specialize, so what we do with a seven week group, that's what you sign up for, BeyondTheBattle.net. It's it's 100 bucks to do a group and we scholarship those as well. So you'll go through the book that'll be with me and with another leader. I'm there for week one and seven, and then we have a leader, one of my leaders, who goes through the seven weeks of the book with you and in a group, and there's amazing community that builds there. And we tell guys, you're not completing a class, you're not graduating from this. At the end of your seven weeks, we are inviting you. I mean, as a pastor, I'm like, begging you. This is this is the the alumni community. Is it? It's indefinite community and support with a whole bunch of guys that love and care about you and are in the same boat as you. And so what has happened with alumni as it's grown, as we're up to seven groups a week that are at different times on different days, and again, with my limits and boundaries, I don't lead all of those. I have some amazing leaders, I lead some of those and we have a Slack community. We have Marco Polo Channel and we do two in-person retreats a year, and those are great. One of them is always in West Michigan, near where I live. We get a place right on Lake Michigan and gorgeous, and we're always out in nature with the Lord. It's just such a great. It's the spiritual formation that happens in both the ceremony group and the alumni group. It's it's amazing. Like the vulnerability of it, the desire, the need for Jesus. We are literally going to Jesus to give us what we're looking for from women, romance, sex, lost, all these things. And the second retreat a year, we go somewhere around the country, try to pick a place where there's some alumni guys clustered and that's all free. And man, I, I just it's been such a blessing to me. I do the alumni community on a peer to peer basis. I, I'm a I'm a human. I think that's one of the biggest reasons we see leaders fail is because we get to a point of thinking we're the answer, people. And if I shared I had struggles or vulnerabilities, then it'll ruin my brand or something I have. I just throw that all out. I wrote that in the updated edition, the 2021. I have a chapter at the end that talks just about that and the alumni community is it for me. I created that we created that three, four years in when I had some more margin and boundaries and had some other leaders to help with the seven week groups. And the alumni guys have saved me from so many things. I mean, potentially leaving my marriage, just really dark seasons of depression. Incredible. And I mean, I'm in three of those a week and I love it. These are my best friends. Yeah, I can't speak enough about about the alumni community. Oh, yeah. Community is so important, whether it's just our walk with Christ or certainly for recovery and walking through some tough things. I'll add this in with community. Rob, Karen, you said about churches I love churches doing in church in person stuff. I think it's amazing. We've seen some churches take Beyond the Battle. There's a seven week curriculum within the book. It's turnkey. You can do it at your church. If you have a church that's up for that, please do it. Go for that. Most guys do not have a church that's ready for that or where it's super consistent. What we'll have is a lot of our alumni guys that have gone through it, and then they go, hey, I want to I want to take a bold step and start a group at my church. And we've seen some cool things happen there. But I will say that sometimes guys are way more vulnerable online, like with strangers, but it's in a safe place and you're building this community. You're like, we know we're here for this reason, versus an in-person group at your church where you guys know each other's wives, you know, like, you just it can be weirder sometimes for guys to be super vulnerable in person right off the bat. So don't let the online thing scare you away if you're listening. I've seen more fruit, frankly, in the online aspect, we use zoom, you know, than I have with in-person stuff. It's way more consistent to it's always there, you know, you don't have to worry about it fizzling out. It's it's really been great. That's that's great. Excellent. Well, Noah, just kind of wrapping up, tell us when is your book out. And then where do, where, where would people find information about Beyond the Battle groups or connection with your ministries. Yeah. That's Rob yeah. Beyond the Battle groups is Beyond the Battle.net. If you want to connect with me and just kind of my writing in general podcast, that'd be NoahFilipiak.com you'll have to get the spelling for that from this podcast title. The new book is Shelter in the Storm 40 Psalms on God's Faithfulness. That's with our daily bread publishing. I don't know when this will be released, but the release date of that book is September 1st, and you can get it pre-sale now on Amazon and on Barnes and Noble. And then just mentioning you guys said it before, there's a six week curriculum within Shelter in the Storm that comes with it. So I love I made that so churches, Bible studies, Sunday school groups anyone can do that. It's not like Beyond the Battle, you can't just go to your like coed Sunday school class and do the Beyond the Battle study. This one anyone can do. I think it's a great first step into some vulnerable conversations, but there's ways to interact. I did the curriculum so a community can interact out loud through the psalm, which is how the Psalms would have been interacted with when they were first written. And it's a 40 day devotional. So if you're looking for a tool to help you spend daily time with the Lord, do that. And then independently. I'm working on a little book for guys in recovery like the Beyond the Battle guys. That will be its own. Add on to the daily devotionals, and then add on to the if you wanted to do a shelter in the storm six weeks small group with your recovery guys, it's going to be that. That'll be through my website. It'll just be an independent, short, little cheap book that I make that should be out this fall as well. Nice. That's awesome. Well, we'll make sure we put all the links in the show notes so that people can easily navigate to all of these great resources. Noah, thank you for your passion and your heart to serve men and just your vulnerability and your own leadership. And just it's always such a joy. There's always something new that we learn from you, and it's just such an honor to have you on the show. Thank you so much, Karen. I'm just so glad for our friendship over the years, and it's just cool what God's doing and may he continue to bless you guys at Covenant Eyes. I love to see everything you guys are doing, and I love endorsing Covenant Eyes to all of our guys. So thank you. We do appreciate that. Yeah. Well, and again, to our listeners, thanks for joining us today. I hope you enjoyed this. Please do share and like this. But I'm sure we'll have Noah on again. But you know how to reach him. And that's it for today. So God bless and take care.