Ruck the Way

In this deeply reflective episode of Ruck the Way, the host takes his 15-year-old son, Carlson, on his very first pilgrimage along the historic Saint Cuthbert Way in Northumberland. Recorded on the solemn 25th anniversary of September 11, the journey unfolds as a unique multi-generational exploration. As father and son tackle rugged trails, cross treacherous railway lines, and navigate the stunning expanses of the pilgrim sands leading to Holy Island, they bridge the gap between midlife and adolescence. Blending biblical history—from the Viking raids and the monks carrying Saint Cuthbert’s body to the book of Daniel—with raw conversations about modern teenage life, this episode is a moving testament to faith, family, and the sacred duty of fathers and sons walking together in the way.

Know more about our cause:https://www.rucktheway.com/Subscribe to our Podcast:https://www.youtube.com/@RucktheWayMeet the founders:https://www.rucktheway.com/about

• Summary: A father and son embark on a transformative two-day pilgrimage along the Saint Cuthbert Way, exploring generational tensions, biblical history, and the spiritual parallels between adolescence, midlife, and walking alone with God.

UPCOMING PILGRIMAGE: https://www.rucktheway.com/pilgrimage

In this raw and unfiltered "Trail Talk" episode, hosts Chris and Gabe tackle the concept of "disembodied Christianity"—a faith that exists primarily from the neck up, driven by heady knowledge rather than actual physical engagement. Drawing on the profound truth of the Incarnation, they explore how modern Christian subculture and digital devices function as portals of disconnection, pulling us away from the earthy, physical reality of daily life. From the everyday rhythms of walking and sharing meals to practicing gratitude and the evening examine prayer, Chris and Gabe discuss how to reclaim an authentic, grounded spirituality where all of human life is sacred. Join us on the trail as we learn to step out of our heads, embrace physical presence, and let the walk do the work!

Timestamps
00:00 - Introduction to "Trail Talk" and today's topic: disembodied Christianity
02:46 - Defining disembodied Christianity as faith from the neck up 04:12 - The Incarnation: God revealed in physical flesh
06:45 - Historical Gnosticism and its modern influence on Christian thought
08:59 - The limitations of overemphasizing isolated "quiet times"
14:13 - Chris’s mini-pilgrimage experience in Scotland: walking, weather, and physical presence
18:09 - Smartphones and screens as portals to a disembodied world 24:00 - Looking at the Gospels: Jesus walked, ate meals, and lived an earthy life
33:42 - Practical ways to encounter God in ordinary physical routines and gratitude
39:00 - The spiritual practice of the examine before bedtime

Summary: Chris and Gabe explore the trap of "disembodied Christianity," examining how gnostic tendencies, over-intellectualized quiet times, and digital screen portals disconnect believers from the physical reality of daily life. They discuss the deep earthiness of the Gospel, the Incarnation, and how practicing gratitude and the evening examine can help ground our spiritual walk in everyday moments.

Guest Bio and Links: Chris and Gabe are the co-founders of Ruck the Way, leading transformative pilgrimages and conversations for men on scenic trails.

Know more about our cause: https://www.rucktheway.com/
Subscribe to our Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@RucktheWay
Meet the founders: https://www.rucktheway.com/about

UPCOMING PILGRIMAGE: https://www.rucktheway.com/pilgrimage

In this raw and unfiltered "Trail Talk" episode, hosts Chris and Gabe dive deep into a profound question that shapes our everyday lives: Who really knows you? Exploring the layers of human isolation, self-awareness, and the biblical perspective of being created in the image of a relational God, they unpack why wearing masks is often a protective necessity against a broken world. Drawing unexpected parallels from superhero storytelling like Spider-Man to the unique loneliness of leadership and pastoral ministry, the discussion highlights why true personal growth cannot happen in isolation. Discover how stepping into redemptive risk and finding brotherhood on the trail can help you unmask, embrace your story, and experience the transformative power of being genuinely seen and known.

Know more about our cause: https://www.rucktheway.com/ Subscribe to our Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@RucktheWay Meet the founders: https://www.rucktheway.com/about

UPCOMING PILGRIMAGE: https://www.rucktheway.com/pilgrimage

On the Trail This Episode
Some friendships are for a reason. Some are for a season. A rare few are for life. This week Gabe sits down with one of his: Chris Payne, senior pastor of New City Church in Charlotte, Air Force chaplain, and a friend of thirty-eight years. Chris Furr, who has walked with Chris Payne for a quarter century himself, joins from Edinburgh. Gabe joins from a Chick-fil-A somewhere in the middle of Georgia. It is that kind of episode.
What starts as a conversation about chicken sandwiches becomes something much deeper. Chris Payne tells the story of how his family came to faith through a neighbor's living room, why twenty-eight years of pastoral ministry have taught him that the road to empathy runs through suffering, and how the four words on the back of his sweatshirt (belonging, truth, identity, purpose) name what an anxious world is actually longing for.
Along the way, he offers a picture of friendship that will stick with you: running your finger around the rim of a wine glass, waiting to feel the chip. That is how you find the place in another person's heart where the gospel needs to be applied. And that is how you become the friend most men are waiting to find.

Keep Walking With Us
Ruck the Way is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit walking alongside men on the road to becoming who God made them to be. If this episode met you somewhere on the trail, here is how to keep going:
Walk with us in person. Learn about upcoming pilgrimages at rucktheway.com.
Get Trail Notes. Our newsletter brings the conversation to your inbox between episodes. Sign up at rucktheway.com.
Share this one. Chris said it plainly: do not assume your pastor has friends. Send this episode to a pastor, or to the friend who has known you longest.
Help us keep walking. Ruck the Way is its own 501(c)(3). Your tax-deductible gift at rucktheway.com funds the podcast and the pilgrimages.

On the Trail This Episode
Joe Dunphy has spent fifteen years as an active-duty Army infantry officer, checking every box the world hands ambitious men: Ranger School, the Ranger Regiment, real estate success, a growing family. And somewhere along that trail he stopped and realized how far ahead of the pack he had run, and how alone he was when he got there. In this conversation, Joe walks us through the story work that changed how he sees his whole life, from a boy who wanted to fish alone on the pier while his brothers played in the surf, to a young man who wrecked a motorcycle into a bus in the middle of Honduras with twenty dollars in his pocket, to a husband and father who got a phone call from an old friend asking a question he could not answer: who is Jesus, and why do you care about him?

That question became a Saturday morning gathering of three men. Today it is Forge Tribe, a Christ-centered brotherhood of more than 150 men meeting in small fire teams across five continents, learning to walk out of isolation and into brotherhood together. This one is honest, vulnerable, and full of the kind of truth men rarely say out loud.
What's in Your Rucksack
Why the lion out front on the savannah, strong and well-fed, is also the loneliest animal on the plain
How a bus wreck in Copan Ruinas, Honduras became one of the clearest signs that Joe was never actually alone
The difference between camaraderie and brotherhood, and why the Army is great at one and starved for the other
Why men will jump out of an airplane before they will tell the truth about their soul
What the Crucible and the Ascent actually ask of a man for 40 days, and why the commitment works
How this work lands at home, restoring men as the priests of their households

References & Resources
Forge Tribe, a Christ-centered brotherhood for men: www.forgetribe.me

The Crucible, Forge Tribe's 40-day formation journey of Scripture, prayer, fasting, and weekly fire team gatherings

The Ascent, Forge Tribe's free 40-day journey through the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7), walked in fire teams of 3 to 5 men: September 14 through October 23, 2026

Watch: Forge Tribe, Joe's Story (youtu.be/6uOxk_35lgs) and An
Invitation to Forge Tribe (youtu.be/ebnITq_R-8U)

Forge Tribe on Instagram: @forge_tribe

Ruck the Way pilgrimages, Trail Notes, and more: www.rucktheway.com

UPCOMING PILGRIMAGE: https://www.rucktheway.com/pilgrimage

Most of us would have waited it out. Nick built the thing he was missing.

In this conversation, Gabe and Chris sit down with a twenty-five-year-old statistician turned double entrepreneur. Nick is co-founder and CTO of Alyra Technology, an AI consultancy helping middle-market companies cut through the hype and find real, measurable impact. He is also co-founder and board chair of Kingdom Kickbacks, a 501(c)(3) that began as a group chat between friends and now runs monthly socials, worship nights, and service projects that connect young Christians across Charlotte to one another and to the nonprofits serving their city.

But this episode is not really about AI, and it is not really about nonprofits. It is about a recovering perfectionist who decided that failure is the point — that curiosity outruns credentials, that the twenties are for learning rather than arriving, and that the only safe place to set your identity is in the One who cannot be taken from you. If you are twenty-five and trying to figure out what to become, or forty-five and raising someone who is, lace up. This one is worth the miles.

REFERENCES & RESOURCES

• Kingdom Kickbacks: kingdomkickbacks.com — Nick's 501(c)(3) making Christian community accessible to young adults in Charlotte through social events, worship nights, and service
• Alyra Technology: alyratechnology.com — the AI and automation consultancy Nick co-founded with Will Varnum
• Will Varnum: willvarnum.com — Nick's co-founder, who writes weekly on entrepreneurship, AI, and building from scratch
• RJ Caswell: a previous guest on this show, RJ helps nonprofits find structure and clarity for their future. He was instrumental in shaping Kingdom Kickbacks' board.
• Mission Charlotte: the Charlotte organization that walked Kingdom Kickbacks through board structure and their first fundraising campaign
• Chris Bruno: our very first guest, whose framework for the developmental stages of a man's life gave us the language for the "warrior" season Nick is walking through right now
• University of Virginia: Nick studied statistics and earned his master's in data science through a three-plus-one program
• Ernst & Young: where Nick spent two years leading early AI initiatives for Fortune 500 clients before going out on his own
• Further reading: thecharlotteledger.com — The Charlotte Ledger's feature on how Kingdom Kickbacks began

Connect with Nick:
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/nickkalenichenko — the best place to follow his work and reach him directly
• Alyra Technology: alyratechnology.com
• Kingdom Kickbacks: kingdomkickbacks.com — and @kingdomkickbacks on Instagram

Know more about our cause: rucktheway.com
Subscribe to our Podcast: youtube.com/@RucktheWay
Meet the founders: rucktheway.com/about

Ruck Reloaded! We look back into the deep history and spiritual mystery behind the ancient pilgrimage routes of Scotland and Northern England. Exploring the roots of Celtic Christianity, they trace how early missionary movements spread from Ireland across Western Europe through figures like St. Patrick, St. Columba, St. Oswald, and St. Cuthbert. The hosts discuss the unique, missional nature of Celtic monastics—who embraced relational hospitality, wilderness retreat, and living in rhythm with nature—and contrast their journey with modern life. Uncovering the sacred significance of Holy Island (Lindisfarne) and St. Cuthbert's Way, Gabe and Chris invite listeners to reflect on stepping back from control, embracing physical discomfort, and discovering spiritual renewal through pilgrimage.

Compelling Moments:
00:00 | Introduction to Rock the Way and the Passion for History
01:31 | Chris’s Life as a Collector of Interesting Things
02:23 | Amplifying the Hiking Experience Through Ancient Stories
03:46 | Saint Patrick and the Explosion of Christianity in Ireland
05:44 | Understanding the Concept of Missional Communities
09:13 | The Hardcore Faith of Monks in Coracles
11:40 | The Era of Anglo-Saxons and the Worship of Norse Gods
13:21 | King Oswald: The "Return of the King" and Tolkien's Inspiration
17:23 | The Battle of Heavenfield and the Dedication to Christ
19:47 | Saint Aiden’s Challenge: Spreading the Gospel with Gentleness

Know more about our cause: rucktheway.com
Subscribe to our Podcast: youtube.com/@RucktheWay
Meet the founders: rucktheway.com/about

UPCOMING PILGRIMAGE: https://www.rucktheway.com/pilgrimage

ON THE TRAIL THIS EPISODE

The last time Gabe, Chris, and RJ Caswell were in the same room, it was a Charlotte brewery, a pint, and a conversation nobody wanted to end. This episode is what happened when they finally decided to hit record.

RJ has covered a lot of ground. A master's in counseling. Eight years pouring into teenagers as a school counselor. A nonprofit counseling practice he founded from scratch, bylaws and all. Twelve years as executive pastor of a large multi-site church — the one job he was certain wasn't for him, and the one where he learned to lead a six-and-a-half-million-dollar organization. Now he leads Mission Charlotte, equipping nonprofit and ministry leaders across the region. Different rooms, different titles, one constant: RJ has spent his whole life figuring out people. Chris names it best late in the conversation — a golden thread of relationship running through every single mile.

What makes this one worth your walk is how generously RJ tells it. He talks about the mentor he wishes he'd had, and how that gap became the reason he now says yes to coffee with twenty-somethings all over Charlotte. He talks about learning that purpose and a paycheck were never meant to be rivals. He names the word he's still working out — loyalty — and what it looks like to aim a strength well. He tells about a season of unemployment when he connected three other people to jobs, and says he'd do it again tomorrow. And he lets us in on the quiet joy of finding himself, in midlife, baking bread at the kitchen counter because he wanted to make something he could hold in his hands.

If you've ever suspected that the gift you give away most freely is the one you're worst at using for yourself, lace up. This walk is for you.

Worth adding to your pack

• Give and Take, Adam Grant — the research behind what RJ lives instinctively, including the trap of the giver who never asks.

• Working Identity, Herminia Ibarra — on midlife career transition, and why you act your way into a new identity rather than think your way in.

• How to Know a Person, David Brooks — seeing others as a learnable craft, not a personality trait.

• Emotional Intelligence 2.0, Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves — a practical on-ramp to the self-awareness RJ calls pivotal.

• Halftime, Bob Buford — the classic on moving from success to significance in the second half.

Connect with RJ

• LinkedIn (the best place to reach him) — linkedin.com/in/rj-caswell-704

• Mission Charlotte — missioncharlotte.org

• Faith Driven Jobs — faithdrivenjob.com

There wasn’t a day when I remember being better. But there was a day when I remember checking on him, and he was almost too light to feel.”
— Madeline, on the slow lifting of depression

On the Trail This Episode
Some conversations you prepare for. This one, Gabe has been walking toward for nineteen years.
In part two of our Daughters series, Gabe welcomes his daughter Madeline to the trail — a Gen Z college student, certified personal trainer, brand-new podcast host, and a young woman who has already packed and unpacked her life more times than most of us will in a lifetime. Born in South Carolina, raised barefoot in South Africa, uprooted at eleven, and now finding her own footing after her first year away from home, Madeline has thought hard about what it means to belong somewhere.
Her answer reframes the whole question. Home, she says, was never the house. It was the people. And if that’s true, then every goodbye is less an ending than a handing-off — you carry what you became with them into whatever comes next.
But this is not a tidy conversation. Madeline walks us into the hardest stretch of her story: the three-month gap between one life ending and the next beginning, when depression and anxiety arrived before she had names for either, and a thought she never asked for showed up on a back road in South Carolina. What happened next — a father pulling the car over, taking her hands, and refusing to let the lie stand — is one of the most quietly holy moments we’ve had on this show.
Chris turns the microphone toward Gabe mid-episode to ask what it’s like to hear your daughter tell that story back to you. What follows is a father and daughter on the same path, walking at the same pace, for a little while in front of all of us.
There is also levity: a rental car meeting a South African curb, an AI-generated Father’s Day card featuring strangers as family, and a party trick nobody saw coming.
A NOTE FOR FELLOW TRAVELERS
This episode includes an honest discussion of anxiety, depression, and a passing thought of self-harm experienced in childhood. It is handled with care and hope, but please listen when you have the room for it. If any part of your own story is close to the surface right now, you don’t have to walk it alone — in the U.S. you can call or text 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, any hour of any day.

“We long for security and to feel like we are on fully stable ground… but that is what God calls us to — to trust him. And it's not trust if you know at all times where you're stepping.”
— Maren Furr

On the Trail This Episode
This summer, both of our households have adult daughters home from university — so we're walking a two-part series simply called Daughters. In Part One, Chris sits down (about thirty feet away) with his daughter Maren Furr, a newly minted twenty-one-year-old and theology student at the University of Edinburgh.
Maren has lived a whole pilgrimage already: born in North Carolina, a childhood in France, tween years back in the States, and now teenage and university years in Scotland. That road has left her with what she calls a “split heart” — always slightly longing for the place she isn't — and a rare gift for seeing the world from more than one angle.
The conversation finds its shape in an unexpected place: foraging. Maren has taken up gathering elderflower, dandelions, and (cautiously) mushrooms from the forest near home, and it becomes the episode's living metaphor — for a season of life spent out in the world discovering what's nourishing and what's poisonous, working hard for small harvests, and learning that abundance isn't always better. From there the trail winds through studying theology at a secular university, becoming okay with not knowing, embracing mystery as an act of trust, art as a balm for a wrestling mind, and what it looked like for her parents to raise third-culture kids with room to struggle and space to become.
What's in Your Rucksack
Why “where are you from?” is the hardest question a third-culture kid can be asked — and how a split heart becomes a gift
What foraging in a Scottish forest taught Maren about slow work, small harvests, and the beauty of toil
What happens to your faith when you study theology at a big secular university — and why Maren says it's the best thing that could happen to it
Life isn't a line, it's a spiral: why coming back around to the same struggles is normal — and holy
A father-daughter exchange on raising kids across three cultures, letting them struggle, and keeping your eye on thirty, not eighteen
Maren's current favorites: burned CDs, Celtic animation, elf monologues, and a second run at The Lord of the Rings


Keep Walking With Us
Walk with us in person: explore upcoming pilgrimages at rucktheway.com
Trail Notes: subscribe to our newsletter at rucktheway.com for reflections between episodes
Share the trail: if this conversation walked with you, pass it along to a friend — especially a parent of a young adult or a student wrestling with big questions
Support the journey: Ruck the Way is an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit. Your tax-deductible gift at rucktheway.com keeps these conversations on the trail.