From Garage to Global Impact: How Seth Barnes Built a Mission-Driven Empire

[0:00]  what's one thing you want people to remember from today's conversation that uh there is greatness locked up in you and uh it often takes healing we have to come to believe in ourselves uh and believe that even as a weak vessel God wants to use us for that great greatness to be released and you know God has limited himself to human skin to touch people he's not going to just kind of come down in a thunderbolt he's going to use you so I I would you know dig into the possibility you can make a difference welcome back to another

[0:48]  episode here on the heart and hustle podcast where we speak to leaders that are making the changes in the world today and look look who we have here we have Seth Barnes from Adventures ad missions so excited CEO and Founders been doing this for so many years but seph let me know man I meet you at a coffee shop I meet you at a networking event and ask you the question SE tell me a little bit more about your mission tell me more about the nonprofit what does that sound like yeah so we're about raising up young people to realize the greatness that we believe God has deposited in them the world is telling them that they can't do things and um what I found is that it's amazing what young people can do if they're just given the opportunity to make a few mistakes and encouraged along the way they can make a difference and we've

[1:36]  seen that over and over again and so I love even as I get older you know to continue to find new young people that we can invest deeply in and and that's what Adventures ad missions does Seth you spent your whole pretty much your whole life just empowering young people through missions what's the most rewarding part of that Journey for you the most rewarding part is um you know it's it's two things one it's uh being able to address the people that God himself cares about the poor the needy The Prisoner the orphan the Widow like he I think he cries over them and at the same time to kind of shock and wake up young people to the opportunity that

[2:24]  they have to make a difference I I love both of those sides of the coin and and so yeah you experience that every time you get to take somebody who has got a lot and bring them in Con in contact with those who have very little and uh and watch what God does through them God is good isn't he he is yes he is I want to go back to that moment in in Cambodian refugee camp you were 20 years old what did you see that really made you say you know what this is my calling I found my purpose yeah well I knew that that you know from the Bible it says that we should take care of widows and orphans in their distress it says that Jesus went out and healed people and he he did all this stuff that you know you look at it and you go well I could never

[3:11]  do all that but I sense that I should at least try and so you know when I was a senior in college I saw this uh genocide that was occurring in Cambodia two million people killed and I I just felt God saying go and there was no easy way to go it was it was um you know now there are planes flying back and forth all the time and get a ticket back in in my day it was hard and and God did provide a way and I was pretty quickly in a refugee camp and I was able to all these people that were just stumbling across starving and and to to help them just um to feed themselves and to get back on their feet and to recognize that the world had not completely ended that

[3:59]  there was still life to be had and wow I just like I felt like I was making such a difference what and what a contrast with the life that I had been living which was all around meeting my needs and my pleasures and you know to to be able to go and use my time and talents to actually change a life was a revelation for me I didn't know that I could do that yeah um you know I love it I'm a I'm a story person so I always love to hear someone's story and you're and it's for me a selfish cuz I'm learning from people in your case it's almost selfish cuz you're able to help people and while you're helping people and really you're helping yourself such such a a a powerful move and something that really started in your garage what was the hardest part of of getting started and what really kept you going you're in the garage sometimes probably

[4:46]  cold sometimes hot tell me a little story more about that well it wasn't anything that was dramatic and wonderful it was actually out of pain I I had been fired so I didn't have any choice and and I uh really was kind of try tired of trying to do good and I had um I thought that I might be called of God to continue to do good but I it was too much work and so I was really at a bad place I was at a place of giving up and the garage was like the last place it was next to the rakes and the lawn equipment you know it's the it felt like a pitiful thing I I felt pitiful I didn't feel like a great VIs Visionary but I I had enough resilience that I didn't give up and um and and so I I

[5:36]  think that's a thing that I I love to impart to young people that Small Beginnings are okay and and you don't have to be wonderful you just have to start and you have to be able to recognize that there's going to be pain along the way so use the pain as raw material for you know getting to the ultimate calling that you you may have so it was it was I wish I could tell you that that it was uh magical it was not it was hard Seth but as I listen to the story right I kind of break down I always feel that God does things in mysterious ways um getting fired a blessing in disguise um working next to the rake well you got to get down and dirty Seth if you want to do this work right and as I sit here and think about it I always think that God shows up in ways that we've never really imagined so as I'm listening to you and maybe you

[6:23]  didn't at that moment it didn't feel like that at that moment it felt like yeah what what do you want me to do God right but as I sit and I kind of really break it down it's like man he was really showing you and he was he was testing you in a sense exactly that's so that's so true and I think what I've learned is that you have to get to the end of yourself and so really if I've got a Ministry the ministry is helping people get to the end of themselves like we'll take them and put them in the same kind of hard place as I was in um when I went to Cambodia and it just seems like impossible and in that place of impossibility when God shows up now you've got something that approximates intimacy because you trust him in ways that you didn't before before you're able to like just go to your own bank account and pay for it but when your bank account's empty and when you don't have what you think you need and God

[7:11]  shows up now you you trust him in whole new ways and that that's the that is the magic that I found that I I want to impart to young people that's that Faith having faith right that he's going to um show up if you can sit down with the 24y old you which wasn't long ago it was a couple of years ago Seth right what's that one piece of advice that you give young uh 20-y old SE how about that 20-y old SE getting started into this yeah yeah yeah now I love uh you know I still get to dis disciple and Mentor um people who have a lot of ambition and I had a a young man come to me his name is Josh and he'd finished the world race so the world race is a year around the world and you're

[7:57]  encountering a lot of different countries and experiences he came and after that uh I knew that he had entrepreneurship in him and he said if you could send me to the toughest country in the world with the hardest assignment what would it be and at first I thought well maybe Uganda working with South Sudanese refugees and helping to educate their young people but then I thought no a tougher place is actually India where there's persecution and um and and so I actually sent him there and you subsequently he and I did a project for two or three years together and uh and at the conclusion of that now he was ready to go and to do something on his own and uh his business is has become very

[8:46]  successful and and so I think in that story in that process is my advice my advice is go Apprentice under somebody and do a hard thing do something that seems impossible but you're appr pring you're learning and give your yourself some space to not just go to school but to go and and try things with somebody else mentoring you and subsequent to that you're going to learn enough of the where are the handholds in this Cliff I'm trying to climb in life to be able to do it on your own and I I think that's that' be the the most important thing it's it's so cool as I we spoke the first time and then I was able to look at the website and I was able to see that over 100 1 70 young people have been on mission trips 170,000 70,000

[9:34]  sorry yes let's let's make that correct 170,000 young people have it's a lot of people a lot of lives that have been touched which is so incredible but how do you manage that momentum how do you keep it going it all stopped at you know Co so when Co we we brought 600 people back within a week from all over the world you know dozens of countries it was quite a logistical thing and but so now we've had to start over again so I had to go and find more young leaders that I had not trusted before and and kind of reboot and and I think just taking a chance on people is the key like you've gotta throw them in the deep end and see if they swim and sometimes yeah yeah it's and most people in the church they

[10:23]  want to control and they want to make it too safe and parents hate to kind of uh see their kids maybe floundering in the deep end and will they swim or Dr you know those are hard things for parents but yeah I don't know for better for worse my calling is to make it hard and see if they live you also in this place a place where there's so many different backgrounds and language earlier you were talking Spanish to me so I can only imagine that you know it but how do you make sure your young missionaries actually connect with communities that they serve wow that's a great question I mean so remember sending a number of people to Thailand and they went for a couple of years and it wasn't enough time and I I Mentor a a young man who has a mission agency and they go for at least five

[11:11]  years to begin with I think that's probably an appropriate time frame so I'd begin with a time frame and say it's going to take you time to learn culture and language and if you're serious about this thing really making a difference uh plan to to make that investment and then you'll begin to reap the benefits of the inv investment maybe in your third and fourth year and um so yeah I I think resilience is one thing and time frames that are longer would be another resilience Man shows up in so many leaders conversations you have to have that resilience and what you're saying is you're building young leaders so yeah that Brazilian definitely you know is going to be one of those big you need deal young people need more Cycles failing like you know have you they go well I failed four times in life and I'm like by your age i' probably failed 25

[11:59]  five times so get more Cycles like Go fail more you know that's a big piece of advice one of the yeah one of the biggest mentors uh one one of the biggest lessons my mentor told me was um it's okay to fail you're you're only learning you know you won't make same mistake twice at least now you know exactly it's not just okay it's necessary it's you have to fail like there's not a better way to learn so just make friends with failure I actually was talking to a friend the other day and he was Sly man ephra life feels like a roller coaster it's like so many ups and downs I said good that means you're living cuz if you're not on that roller coaster you're not really living man you know up down part of life yeah change your frame change it is life is meant to be that way look at the heroes of the Bible look at David or

[12:47]  Moses or Abraham they all had a roller coaster like there's no other way to live it Jesus had a roller coaster Paul had a roller coaster when you're a hero to somebody you're going to have setbacks and and hard times and uh it's a great thing to be a hero but it's a hard thing to be a hero 100% And with missions today looking different than they did 10 20 years ago what's changed the most in how young people actually engage with the faith based work well they a lot of young people don't have faith uh because they've been overprotected and so they've not had to do it you know when I describe being in the garage like I didn't have any other Alternatives so I had to lean on my faith and and that's happened so many times in my life where I didn't have any alternatives so there was only Faith

[13:35]  left and I think for a lot of young people because they've been overprotected they don't have the same steel inside that says God is going to show up because he did show up for me in these other times and so I I kind of look at that and it makes me sad and that's why I don't feel as much um remorse about giving them pain pain is the raw material that allows them to get to the place of resilience and faith um I don't know did I answer the question you asked yeah you did you did I I would I would it depends how young right because I feel like we're actually seeing a different at least it's it's different everywhere I feel like I'm in in a generation where I'm actually seeing more young people going to church you know I think what's changing is the church itself which is then leading others to go into them so there's a hunger there's there's a hunger that's awesome I love it and I I think also

[14:24]  there's a a cynicism about all the lies that you know frankly we Boomers have voiced it on to young like oh trust this politician he'll be great trust this pastor he'll be great no no no no all the pastors all the politics they all like have messed me over so why should I trust you I love the hunger it's it's a beautiful thing how about someone that's listening right now if someone's tuning in maybe a young mind that wants to follow in the steps as Seth Barnes and they're they're saying to themselves I want to be a part of something bigger what would you actually say is the best way to even get started let's have a conversation you know I think you got to find somebody who's actually doing the sorts of things that you want to do and go have a conversation with them I was listening to a podcast today and it's a it's a younger person I don't know how old he

[15:11]  is but maybe he's you know in late 20s and he's doing stuff that like I want to do so I want to go have a conversation with him like I'm gonna I'm gonna call him up or email him or you know like tell me what you've learned you know and I I'd say the same thing for somebody like you said who's just starting out i' I'd figure out well where could I have a conversation um you know texting is is often what young people do uh but but I I think what they really need is the opportunity to just kind of do in a cannonball into the deep end and see if they can swim or not a lot of times seph I would also just to piggyback off of that that's really true leadership is that you have to surround yourself with people that just know more than you because I I don't care how old you are there's something to learn every single day se you talked about someone younger

[15:58]  than you that know something a little different you know sometimes you may have to go a little older than you to find a little different right and for those leaders that are listening yeah that that is that is a very very good um advice to provide them is go learn it you know take take that risk yeah and sometimes you need structure around that so I I'm uh you know when I started the world race I wanted wanted to build enough structure that you go for a year try a bunch of different things learn from it it's going to be different each month and uh and then you can get a sense for kind of where you resonate and I currently am in building a a school for young people that would go and try and figure out what is my career and we're calling it Journey school and we'll begin with in in September going to Italy to start a coffee shop where we

[16:46]  get we make we give away a cappuccino for free and if people want prayer we'll give that away for free too and you know it's I think people just need a project to engage in and um so Journey school is is something where uh we give young people projects to grow instead of just books and so so I got a question right you're you're you're working with different cultures language experiences have communication ever been a big hurdle for you and in your mission always it's always a big it's the biggest hurdle I mean there's a communication of the heart often the words are are fine but are we really expressing our heart and and that's hard it requires vulnerability yeah it's and and and uh

[17:34]  you know there's the generation so I'm an older man and I'm dealing with younger people I I struggle to really speak the heart language of a young person so just knowing that that awareness allows me to more effectively partner with people who can communicate in ways that I'm not equipped to we got to find you a tool that maybe helps you Mentor effectively especially when you're spread across the globe it's it's so cool because a lot of times people do mission in one location you're doing Mission around the world and you don't see many people get into that um so I definitely love it and I'm happy that you're finding passionate young minded individuals whether you have to re you know had to restart during the pandemic or not this was actually really good sometimes you have to kind of rebuild right sometimes you have to Pivot and that's so I love entrepreneur for that reason and Leadership because there's

[18:22]  times that you have to look at something and say okay well how do I go about this now not give up because there's going to be those moments where you want to give up and I'm pretty sure Seth there was those moments that you're like what am I doing right I could be doing other things but you you haven't given up you've contined to find those ways um but there's only one of you but so many young people who could learn from experience have you ever thought about how Tech might actually help scale mentorship not just thought about it I've invested in it there we go there we go you on it you know simple Investments uh my first one was maybe 22 years ago and it's paid off spectacularly and and yeah I I've I've had to learn um not how to code but how to work with coders and how to move from just coding websites to uh web 3 and blockchain and you know and

[19:14]  now it's all about Ai and so how do you apply AI to the medical um issue that we've got in you know with with First Responders in America and how do we apply AI to that it there's all this stuff that at my age a lot of people kick back and they go I'm not going to continue learning and I'm just uh the kind of person who I love to learn I'm constantly a curious person digging into something that's new and you're right uh with what you said before fing you uh may be the kind of person who could actually help me continue to do that so maybe we need to partner because if communication's a problem for me you know it's not a problem for you and and so I'm constantly looking for that like where are the people who can help me in

[20:02]  ways that I'm weak that's it a lot that's all about leadership listen you're not the strongest in the room you you just know how to lead the team you got to find those strong people in different suits so yeah maybe we have those you know offline conversations one thing I also want to talk about that you've mentioned to me last time and we spoke briefly um was storytelling how crucial is part of the mission work um but you said that young people struggle with their stories telling their I watched that I I uh I I don't know social media tends to give the stories to us in smaller packets so even this conversation we're having right now is a half an hour conversation well that's a longer so you know uh look at Tik Tok or look at Instagram you know what what amount of time do we allocate to the stories there as we flip through

[20:50]  scroll through it's just off in seconds so I I think we had more time around a campfire yeah storytelling be easier and uh and so with Millennials uh it was a lot easier for me we gave everybody that went on the world race a Blog and they would blog usually two times a week and they would write these great stories of what God was doing in their lives hard stories of you know their pain and why they struggle with projection and how this was complicating their ability to care for other people you know complicated things and it was so wonderful to be able to just share their stories with people now I I just watch um you know words like uh typed words don't work for young people they'll maybe use a video and uh and so I'm

[21:39]  really kind of digging into that how do we use video to capture a person's story when you think about a story you're thinking about a character you care about with a problem and somewhere there's suspense and what they're sharing about that problem and I I just uh I I love for young people to dig into those elements of a story and and figure out what works for them I mean very true when you think about uh a lot of people not reading they're watching you mentioned Tik Tok one of the biggest platforms right now we we see what happened when they took it off for a day here in America and people were crazy right because that was their thing and I'm one of those people that definitely uses Tik Tok often and it is it is very short it's telling a story in 60 seconds 60 to 90 seconds because the attention span has changed for people right when you have all types of social media you

[22:27]  have you know the internet now um you know I feel old when I say this but I'm I'm pretty still young is that I remember when the internet was just a thing or when my space was just a thing you know now there's so much to consume that you can only watch a 60 seconds right and you see it happening shifting even even media look what happened at at um now where they're allowing Tik tokers to actually be a part of the press right because they tell stories shorter right like versus the media so if if you can kind of go back to maybe that one Mission story that stuck with you one that if more people heard it would actually change your perspective do you do you have that in mind so many so which to choose from I I look at Matthew 10 and what Jesus did and he said you

[23:15]  know I'm going to send you out like I sent like you saw me go out and you know you're going to preach the gospel you're G to heal the sick you're going to raise the dead I think of all right so what's like most dramatic probably the raising of the dead and and we have actually seen that so I could tell you stories about you know there's a story in South Africa where a couple of our world Racers encountered an accident that had just happened and a a young boy had just died you know it and um and heart stopped and the Sheep being put over them and the racers came up and said can we pray and you know here's this child that's been declared dead and they pray and the child coughs and comes back to life and like that is that that's

[24:04]  Matthew 10 that's what Jesus did and he promised us you know that we'll do greater things than than these and I don't think we really give ourselves the chance to see if that's true or not I think a lot of us maybe want like I did I wanted to see if it was true I was a little I was scared but also was ready to take some risks and I I just think that young people need to be given those kinds of risks I've seen the last uh coaching job I had of 60 I had 60 young people 13 years ago and uh they're going around the world and man they encountered so much danger but boy did their lives change so I'm like those kinds of stories that they encounter

[24:52]  will stay with them for life they just need the opportunity they needed the opportunity and now these guys got married and they're raising children those children are going to need the opportunity too to see if God's real and to trust him in ways that seem extreme this is so good that's so good if you could design something that can help you the perfect tool to support your young missionaries something that is a 247 uh Mentor coach or even guide to help missionaries globally what does that even look like for you looks like a relationship it looks like a phone call it looks like a phone call not a text it looks like it you know me getting on a plane if it's if it's necessary I've got a a friend who um is in a new uh Mission field it's and it's Tech and he's got

[25:41]  extraordinary leverage and millions of dollars and there's a place in the world that he's going to go to in um in a while that's going to require me to change everything about my schedule I'm going to have to CH I'm going to tell people no that I already made commitments to just to be able to go and be with him in this extraordinary new phase where he's meeting you know key leaders in the world at a time uh that you know they need Jesus too and so you know I I just think I'd give them a relationship I love it if you could look ahead 10 years Seth where do you see global missions heading what excites you about the future when it comes to that uh I've got a young well he's not so young anymore but when he first got to know me about 20 years ago on my blog

[26:29]  uch uh isora from Nigeria was um was a younger man and he's got kids that are growing up now and uch uh felt God calling him to the South sudanes and South Sudan was going through a Civil War and eventually the war became so bad that the refugees uh the people of South Sudan had to go as refugees to Northern Uganda and in that place uh uch help form a school which is now you know a thousand people a lot a thousand kids go there and the parents really help do that and I got a chance to kind of help sponsor him uh in his project uh with my donors and and uh and I continue to speak to his uh young people that he disciples

[27:19]  that have remained behind in South Sudan and there's this uh now we've got Starling so I was able to actually communicate um you know in person in a way you know not not with my face not just my voice and that excites me like to actually 100% develop relationship with those people that were not refugees as well as the refugees and to help I tell them you guys are not refugees you're Nation Builders change flip the script here it's time for South Sudan to rise up and to to take the mantle of authority that God's given you and to show a better way you know and that's something I can do because I've seen it I've seen it with the cambodians that changed um their country and and so let's let's you know take a new

[28:08]  generation in a new place in a hard place give them hope give them resources and see what they can do in the power of the Lord we're gonna start wrapping this up so I got some questions to put you in the hot seat here okay sure all right uh if someone wants to well let's actually go back to this one once what's one unexpected lesson you learn from leading thousands of young people in missions it's going to be messy the church wants it to be clean it's only going to be messy and it only works when it's messy so dive into the mess be vulnerable create space for vulnerability expect the mess and and stop you know appropriate Grace in fact create a space that's so messy you have to have Grace or you're going to die I love it I just love SE how you're just so just to the point right here if

[28:58]  one's listening for all those people that I want to listen and they they feel that pull to just serve what's the first step that should actually take you need to again it goes back to that apprenticeship thing and you know find somebody who actually knows uh where there are some pain points just in your own neighborhood or your own Community you when we were raising our five kids uh my wife bless her heart she went to the church and said what can I do they said well we don't have a janitor you can you and and your kids could clean the toilets she did that like that's a way to serve so go to the people who know are the pain points in your community I begin with your community don't go overseas until you've actually uh Gone across the tracks to see who's hungry in your own Community I love that I definitely do love that um especially like you said going to your

[29:46]  community because so many people look outside first but there's so many people your neighbors that are are still struggling and if you can help those those are the people that can help you then go help the world so I love that you talked about that so if someone wants to support a ventures in Mission where's the best place for them to start is it website social media what can they get started I'll give you two yeah websites are the easiest so uh you know there's adventures.org gives you any number of you know we take thousands of people every year and a variety of different trips and um so if you're a college student if you don't want to go to college but you want to keep learning uh check out journey school and you'll find that on the web but if if you just want to engage in a conversation with more questions then you can find me uh my name Seth barnes.com and um and I I

[30:36]  believe in engaging with hungry people if you're a hungry person that's what I look for and I I don't mind U being present even if I don't know you but you've got legitimate questions about how can I step up and do the sorts of things that I believe God has called me to do love it final thought before we get to that blind question that we ask every single leader what's one thing you want people to remember from today's conversation that uh there is greatness locked up in you and uh it often takes healing we have to come to believe in ourselves uh and believe that even as a weak vessel God wants to use us for that great greatness to be released and you know God has limited himself to human skin to touch people he's not going to

[31:22]  just kind of come down in a thunderbolt he's going to use you so I I would you know dig into the possibility you can make a difference perfect this is that blind question this is what everyone loves every leader before we end the podcast they ask they answer a question and they ask the next leader a question so the question for you would actually be if you could build one tool to make your mission just 10 times easier what would that look like um so I I I go to the technology and uh but technology gets you the first I know five or 10% of kind of being able to possibly engage in a relationship so I would maybe uh I especially want to connect with

[32:09]  homeschoolers why because the moms especially care enough to invest their personal time in those homeschoolers so if I could build anything I would build some way of connecting with hungry homeschool moms who have dreams for their kids that they need help with love it and what would be your question for the next leader that I I interview myself or Keenan on the podcast wrate yourself on a Matthew 10 scale uh on a one 1 to 10 so it's Matthew 10 is the chapter but yeah how much of Matthew 10 have you personally implemented in your life one to 10 I love it well that being said Seth it's always been a pleasure I know that we can do another 30 minutes

[32:55]  if you really wanted to but I want to respect your time thank you so much for serving the way that you have for so many years um actually I'm looking here 36 years and 2 months to be exact and that's probably not even the whole amount of time because it probably started before that in the garage right but uh for those still watching thank you guys for for being here make sure you guys subscribe another great leader Seth has been a pleasure what's up it's a it's a pleasure God bless