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10 Questions with ... Mike Weaver from Big Daddy Weave
August 2, 2021
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1. Please tell us how 2020 changed your relationships?
I think for my family, it deepened our relationship. My immediate family, my wife and kids, we became so tight. And like every morning is at the breakfast table together, around God's word and having conversation. A lot of evenings we'll eat in the living room and we'll watch some favorite show and we'll talk about it and we'll laugh and we have a great time. It just felt like such a gift to our family. As somebody whose vocation is mainly on the road and traveling and being away from family, it was really a sweet time for us all to be together at home. There are other relationships that I literally just feel like it feels they like somehow pushed the pause button on them, if that makes sense. All of a sudden it was like, we didn't see some people anymore and we weren't around people anymore. And sometimes you call them on the phone and it just isn't the same thing. People who you normally interact with, like in person. And so I keep forgetting, like, I'll go back to a memory and I'll refer to something thinking it was last year, but really it was two years ago now, because it's almost like we skipped a year and we had this year at home.
2. Share the most challenging part of the past year.
I think the most challenging part was the uncertainty of last year. Because every time you would make some kind of plan, it would be pushed aside. And so for me, I think that was the challenging part in the bad way. It was the thing that threatens to kind of pull my attention away from God. But then at the same time, it's the thing that would force me to have to focus on the certainty of who God is in my life. And we saw him come through in the microcosm of every day, if that makes sense. We would see him come through every single day, whether it was some kind of like monetary provision that we were needing because we couldn't go and work because our jobs are on the road. And now all of a sudden we're sitting at the house, we would see God come through in that way, whether it's some kind of emotional need. Because literally like the tap dance that the enemy was doing on all of our nerves, at that time we would see God come in. And just when we felt like we couldn't take it anymore, God would somehow, he would show us a way out of it. He would show us something else to look at it. He would give us something else to do find some kind of new facet of something at home. And we got through it. And that's the beautiful thing of being able to say that, that we got through it now because the whole last year was a crazy thing. So the good and the bad.
3. Some really great advice you received recently was…
I believe that the counsel of God's word is such a powerful force in our lives. And I feel like it's underrated because we're church people. So because we live in like subculture of Christianity or whatever, we're used to hearing certain things. In fact, we're used to hearing them so much that we kind of lose the power of them. We kind of don't really internalize them and really have them in our lives. We just kind of know them in our minds. So one of the greatest verses that was encouraging me over this last season was Philippians 4, 6 and 7, be anxious for nothing. Right? Because there was a lot of anxious right there. And to hear that voice, to hear the voice of the Lord, be anxious for nothing, but in everything with prayer and supplications like crying out for help to God, right? With Thanksgiving, bring your request to God. So all these things: praying, asking for help with Thanksgiving though, man, that is the greatest thing that happened to me over the last season. The greatest thing I heard out of God's word, I think, and the greatest thing that as I get glimpses of me internalizing that and really having it. Because here's the deal: We bring our prayers and our asking for help with Thanksgiving to God. And then his peace is promised to come and guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. And that is what I experienced happening again and again, over the course of this last year. So that's the greatest piece of advice, Philippians 4, 6 through 7.
4. How do you continue to deepen your relationship with Jesus?
By crying out to Jesus. And also recognizing when it's Jesus who's showing up in the midst of situations that I was so bogged down by that I didn't even cry out to him over. It's in real life. It's in my experience with other believers. It's in my experience with people who aren't believers, experiencing God's heart for them. Feeling his call and feeling the love that he has for them, over complete stranger sometimes. I mean, that's where I meet Jesus when Jesus is loving other people and he wants me to get involved in it. If I'm willing to get involved with what he's doing in the lives of others around me, I'm telling you that makes me way less miserable of a person.
5. Share about that new song of yours.
By crying out to Jesus. And also recognizing when it's Jesus who's showing up in the midst of situations that I was so bogged down by that I didn't even cry out to him over. It's in real life. It's in my experience with other believers. It's in my experience with people who aren't believers, experiencing God's heart for them. Feeling his call and feeling the love that he has for them, over complete stranger sometimes. I mean, that's where I meet Jesus when Jesus is loving other people and he wants me to get involved in it. If I'm willing to get involved with what he's doing in the lives of others around me, I'm telling you that makes me way less miserable of a person.
6. Tell us about someone who you really respect and why?
By crying out to Jesus. And also recognizing when it's Jesus who's showing up in the midst of situations that I was so bogged down by that I didn't even cry out to him over. It's in real life. It's in my experience with other believers. It's in my experience with people who aren't believers, experiencing God's heart for them. Feeling his call and feeling the love that he has for them, over complete stranger sometimes. I mean, that's where I meet Jesus when Jesus is loving other people and he wants me to get involved in it. If I'm willing to get involved with what he's doing in the lives of others around me, I'm telling you that makes me way less miserable of a person.
7. What would surprise people most about you?
I don't know what would really surprise people the most about me. I'm kind of an introvert. I actually kind of like staying at home. When pandemic hit and sure there are lots of uncertain elements about pandemic, but it was kind of the break that I needed for the last 20 years or something. And there's an element of that. There's lots of other terrible things about it, but to look for a silver lining was just getting to have some of this time to myself. Because when we're on stage, you have to be kind of out there. You have to put yourself out there, but that's not really the natural thing for me. My natural inclination is kind of towards isolation. And that really is something that the Lord has to deal with me about in my life. I'm not the in front of people guy that people would think. I'm the kind of shrink back from the crowd kind of person, that I am really.
8. What’s on your nightstand?
That is the first time I've ever been asked that question ever. So, I'm literally, as I'm coming up with the answer to these questions sitting next to my nightstand and I have a premium nature, 100% beard balm, this is it. Another thing on my nightstand is some kind of aloe vera skincare lotion. I think this actually must be my wife's and she must have passed it over somehow. I must have had dry skin or something. And she's like, "Here you go." And then also there is like an official ball mason jar. These are all over the South. Usually, you're jarring something up to them. I have one because we drink out of them in our house. So, I will keep this next to my bed to get a little hydration in the middle of the night. If you wake up from a trip to the bathroom or whatever, and you come back and you're like, "Oh, I need some water." And then that's this in this mason jar right here. And then there's actually this little like Wicker box that is just holding all kinds of stuff that I don't know what else to do with. Spare change, a random battery, a random cell charging cord, that kind of stuff, that's all sitting on my nightstand right now. Now, right next to my nightstand, are pictures on the wall of my favorite people. My wife, Kandice, my son, Eli, my son, Zeke, and my daughter Naomi. And then right next to the pictures of them is one of my favorite acoustic guitars that hangs on a wall hanger on the wall socket. I grab my guitar, if I come up with a song idea late in the middle of the night. That's what's over here on my side of the bed.
9. What are you most excited about this year?
Just new. I really feel like we've been doing this and playing music with big daddy weave for 20 years. And I hope to continue to do that, but I also am believing for something new. I think that God is leading me in some new directions as well, to be open to minister in new directions, to be ministered to in new ways. All of that stuff.
10. What do you do for fun?
Whatever my kids want to do. A couple of them are gamers. And my daughter, Naomi is constantly bothering me about you need to come down in the garage and play ping pong. I love to play ping pong. It's just something that I grew up doing and it's like therapeutic to my mind. And so, to hit the ball around with my kids is a lot of fun. Whatever the fun is going to be is probably going to be with them. We love watching movies together. Whatever new series is out that we're keeping up on every week together, we love all of that, but the fun really happens when we're all together as a family.
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