Acoustic Truth - Ryan & Sarah Knott’s Journey AlongTheWay 40

When Ryan & Sarah met interning at a camp for kids with special needs they weren’t planning on music being their passion or path in life but they found their voice in each other’s harmonies. Acoustic Truth has been making music ever since and bring hope to the hurting through song.

Their AlongTheWay moments include…

• Meeting at a Camp for kids with Special needs
• Injury derailing a hopeful MLB Pitching career
• Finding their voice in harmonies
• Forming Acoustic Truth
• “Come To Me”

Acoustic Truth’s Info

https://www.acoustictruthofficial.com/

Ryan & Sarah on RealLife

https://youtu.be/paMIt0K0F74?t=860

Ryan & Sarah’s Concert

https://youtu.be/15mH5rn0rzM

AlongTheWay Links

Join My Email List

JohnAlongTheWay@gmail.com

More episodes and Social links for AlongTheWay

Watch episodes of My TV show RealLife

Transcript

Ryan Knott : 0:00

This sounds cliche and kind of weird but I can't wait until my next in you know quotes arm injury, it might be something else so that I can grow closer to God. I'm looking forward to that time of how he's going to use me through another heartbreak maybe that I have

John Matarazzo : 0:15

Welcome to along the way. I'm john better so your host and fellow traveler, thank you for joining me along my way as I try to become more like Jesus every day. My journey in this along the way conversation connects me with Ryan and Sarah not who are also known as acoustic truth. We met when they were in the cornerstone network studio for a living room concert in a real life interview. There are links to that concert and the interview in the show notes of this podcast are along the way. conversation was a lot of fun, and they share about how they met then how God led them into a new path using their musical gifting for His glory. If your life plan seems like it just hit the wall and nothing is going right then you are going to be blessed by Ryan and Sarah's STORY OF GOD together. Giving them the new direction together. I'll get to that in just a moment. I'm so excited. Whenever I find out that people all over the world are listening to this show, I pray that it blesses your life as it has mine. If you've been listening to along the way, you might have picked up that I was a missionary for a while, eight years, actually with a missionary organization called youth with a mission. I haven't been a full time missionary since 2011. But I still have a huge heart for Jesus, his great commission, Go into all the world and preach the gospel. I had been working and producing TV professionally for almost eight years now. And I have not been able to go into all the world like I used to, but that desire is still there struggling. Every time I look at my podcast host website, I can see that along the way is doing something that I can't. It is going into all the world in ways that I can't even imagine as of this episode along the way. has been listened to in 39 countries that blesses my heart so much because that is getting to places that I can't get to. I may never be able to visit some of these countries and cities. I am here in Pittsburgh, and a lot of you listen locally, but I also have a lot of people that are listening in the Houston Texas area, and Virginia, Michigan, Oregon, and many other cities in the US and around the world. Thank you for listening to along the way. I would love to hear from you. Please email me at john along the way@gmail.com. And let me know where you're listening from. All of my contacts are in the show notes. I look forward to hearing from you and where you're from. And now here's my along the way conversation with Ryan and Sarah not. Well, Ryan and Sarah not thank you so much for joining me along the way and allowing me to join you along your way whether you're walking with the Lord we met a few months ago. When you were guests on the real life program and you, you're Ryan and Sarah, but you're also acoustic truth, and that you did a living room concert with us. And it's it's always a pleasure to get to interact with the people that come on to the program. And we hit it off. And I wanted to have you on along the way to kind of share your story of how God has brought you to where you are. Because as we've talked before, Ryan, this wasn't always your plan to do music. We'll talk about some of those things a little bit later. But I want to hear your story of how you are walking with the Lord.

Ryan Knott : 3:39

Yeah, I would say it's a it's a daily thing for us. You know, I think every day that we have, there's just it's a new journey, where God takes us and, you know, I think something that I've learned over over the years is just putting your trust in Him. And I'm sure I'll talk a lot about that today. Yeah, but just the I mean, he's been present in our lives my whole life. He's never left us even though there's been times where I felt like, you know, maybe there wasn't someone with us, right? That's that human side. But I would just say every single day, I witness him a little bit more. And it's really kind of shaped the way I live my life, you know, I still have a long way to go from a Christian standpoint, a lot more to fulfill. I need to continue to dig into the word more and more every day and be more Christ like, but I can just tell you that every every single day is a new journey for me. And I'm constantly growing and shaping myself to the Christian a man that I want to be. That's awesome.

Sarah Knott : 4:40

Yeah, and I guess Um, I don't know if you want us to give like a little like backstory of who? You know, we are. I know. We did a lot of that. Yeah, yeah. So I guess I can do a little of me and then you can go back and touch on you because I think him bring up that point. And it kind of goes along with your podcast that we're always just kind of growing and learning more And more. as we learn more about God, we can read the same Bible verse and you know, holy spirit moves in us differently. And it means something else. And it means something else to us when we become a mother means something to us even a day later, six hours after, you know. So I think that's the neat thing about God. I'd say, for me, personally, that resonates a lot because I grew up in the church, I grew up doing kind of double time where, you know, we learned about God in school, and then also, my dad did the music. He did the music at our church, and he would do two services. So we go to Sunday school, we go to church services, and that's what I think put a lot of music relationship with God in my heart unknowingly. I guess I'm looking back on it. During that time, what ended up happening is, you get so much of this, you know, learning about God and stuff, but I didn't have that relationship, but I think that how it is with like a lot of people and so I knew about God I knew I had to love him and respect him and I had to do these things. But it was very much more like workspace I think, you know, for me, and I still can see all along how prayers her my both my grandmother's they love Jesus with their heart, pray for me all the time. And I can go back and see how all those things impacted my life. Just from where I am to where I am now. I'd say, you know, for getting deep into everything, I i was i was a good kid, I did what I was supposed to do. I was very into sports, too. So I played basketball. And I thought hey, I'm in you know, different Christian groups associated with basketball and so I'm doing my job and doing what I should be doing and and really never had a reason to not love God. You know how Great parents, they they always treated me lovingly and kindly and and then I went to college and I was expected to just kind of walk out and play basketball and I ended up not making the team and a close friend of the family passed away who was my age and kind of shook things a little bit. I was in an evolution class in college. And you know, things were kind of you had to kind of make or break kind of choose what you want, what you want to believe what you want to put your faith in. And so I started studying a lot more and saying, hey, this stuff is this stuff that I learned my whole life that I just accepted always. What does this mean to me? What does this actually mean? Who is Jesus? And I ended up actually there a spot opened up for doing this Fellowship of Christian Athletes on our campus and the the football coach was unable to lead it anymore and I had been taping ankles then because I wasn't playing basketball. I was doing ankle taping and stuff like that as a work study He said, Hey Sarah, I know you're Christian, you want to lead Fellowship of Christian Athletes? So I said, Okay, I'll do that. And then there was an inner varsity group on our campus that that helps. There was a leader who was really influential in helping teach me how to teach other people about this. And so that kind of sparked my love of giving back and talking to teaching people and learning myself learning deeper about who Jesus is. school did you go to I went to Lake Forest college and I studied actually psychology and studio art. I enjoyed it a lot. But yeah, it was that was a pivotal time in my life for saying, Hey, I really believe this stuff. What I'm saying Ryan and I were talking about this once that sometimes our relationship with God I always compare it to things I think it's awesome. Jesus talked you know, he related they make things relatable to people. And I always say my relationship with God is like ice cream that you know, you get a little taste of ice cream. Sometimes I had that at the beginning, where I just It was good. You know, God loved me. I could sing different songs to God, everything was good. And then when you learn more about him, you you get dig into the word then you're like, hey, it's like cone with our ice cream cone and chocolate cone, you know, and then you get, you know, hey, learn a little more about who Jesus really is what he did for you. It's a Sunday then, you know, you learn about the Holy Spirit and how, how you can fight off the enemy, you know, whoa, that's a Sunday with sprinkles and all this stuff. So I like

John Matarazzo : 9:31

your analogy.

Ryan Knott : 9:34

Side note on that one, just because it makes me laugh every time. Sarah told that story a lot what she was a heads up of what was on her mind at the time. It was purely.

Sarah Knott : 9:44

That's what that's how God speaks to I think he's I think he you know, sometimes they think he speaks to us in all these eloquent beautiful ways and you know, God can just bring something reveal something special to you in a scoop of ice cream. So

Ryan Knott : 10:01

once once that ice cream as you keep filling up that ice cream, right, it starts getting huge. You know, it's big the scoops keep piling on. And then because it's so good, you want to share it with others. So relate that to the gospel and then sharing like some of your ice cream like you would share the gospel with others. So for anyone who likes food just as much as we do, hopefully they appreciate that.

Sarah Knott : 10:21

We're gonna write a song called ice cream sundae but

Unknown Speaker : 10:26

wait to hear that.

Sarah Knott : 10:28

But we ended up then we ended up meeting at a camp for kids with special needs. It was like an internship through my college and his college because I wasn't playing basketball and you'll get into him not playing baseball. We Yeah, we met and then we kind of said we're going to start doing some music. And I, I never liked attention. I'd still don't like attention. I get nervous in front of people. But sometimes God calls us to step outside of our comfort zone with things. So um, so that's how we started doing music and then we

John Matarazzo : 10:57

let's get into the music part and just a little bit less Let's catch up with Ryan's part of the story there because you guys met at this camp, and that's kind of a pivotal moment in both of your lives.

Ryan Knott : 11:06

Oh, yeah, hundred percent definitely, you know, for me just going back to like the beginning of my upbringing, then I'll jump into the camp stuff. You know, I grew up in a small farm town, you know, at the time now, it's it's one of the largest communities in Illinois, but at the time, it was basically all cornfields. We had one church, a little tiny church that we went to, you know, and I did the whole thing. We went, we went to church every Sunday, but I never really understood the Bible at all. I never understood God. You know, it was a very formal church, like, you know, it's all done by x. You know, love is earned all of that. And, to me, like, I'll be honest, I didn't really look forward to going to church. I mean, it was one of those things that was like it's a hassle for me. I don't want to get up and go out there today. You know, there were Sunday school classes that I participated in and, and my family too, that's just that's the way they were raised. You know, we were raised in a different way, and you know, you're supposed to go to church every Sunday. And then you know, over time it just slowly started fading we went less than less. And then I just I got into baseball, baseball was my number one thing you'll find out, you know, later too, you know, I put baseball ahead of everything above God, family, all of that stuff. You know, it was my my upbringing. It's what it's who I was, who I associated Ryan not with was baseball and most people that I grew up with would tell you the same thing. Ended up you know, fast forward and getting into high school. Still no relationship with God. didn't really know much about Christianity at all. Got a scholarship, played baseball at Duke ended up getting hurt one summer and met Sarah that's where we went to the camp with with kids with special needs. And we hung out. We wrote songs. It was very like mainstream song writing that we would do, but it wasn't anything serious with kind of, it was always it was always wholesome.

Unknown Speaker : 12:59

That But

Ryan Knott : 13:01

yeah, so we started out doing that we weren't really a band. You know, she tried probably talking to me at the time about God and all that, and that was probably very standoffish. I don't really, really remember that part too much. But anyway, we remained friends, you know, we would send songs back and forth as I went back to school. But baseball was still the number one thing in my mind, and I had a couple, a couple offers a couple opportunities to make it to the professional level, went to a bunch of camps did some showcases. And it really seemed like the major league baseball is at the customer hands. So everything that I had worked for my entire life. It was coming up to this moment, and I can tell you now, one time Did I ever thank God for the gifts that he gave me the talents. He was never in the picture when I was on the mound, you know, I was a pitcher. You know, I never asked God for Hey, you know, please be with me, you know, during this next pitch or whatever, and, and then sure enough, you know, baseball got taken away from me on dark Joel Night, threw my elbow out and had to get a major surgery

Sarah Knott : 14:03

and he was good like he's being humble right now but he was throwing like, what? 96 miles an hour which is very fast for people that are you know, familiar with baseball. He was. He was he was really good. So not to make you feel

John Matarazzo : 14:14

not familiar with baseball. 96 miles an hour is fast. It's

Unknown Speaker : 14:17

fast. Yeah,

Ryan Knott : 14:18

there was a consistent there but

Sarah Knott : 14:21

94 to 96 he was good head movement on the ball, whatever else.

Ryan Knott : 14:26

Yeah, good breaking ball. So yeah, so that was that was the dream. And to be honest, when it got taken away from me, any faith and anything that was in the back of my mind about God, I do what most humans do, and that's blame him for everything, all the bad things that have happened to me, you know, and that's the human side of us. So, you know, it might just be words, but it goes a pretty long way in general and that was just the selfishness I was living for me. I wasn't living for God. And and I don't want to say most people, but you know, people who may be struggle with their faith or maybe have never had a relationship with God

John Matarazzo : 15:04

they'll take me take me back to that moment though whenever you you through this pitch and you through your your elbow out, is it

Ryan Knott : 15:11

Yeah, so I tore my on their collateral ligament which requires Tommy john surgery. And then a couple years later I was rehabbing. Still trying to make it back to the professional level and get those opportunities. I tore another tendon in my elbow which were which required another surgery. So I had two major surgeries on my elbow. And by the second one, I just I couldn't lift my arm anymore. I couldn't I couldn't throw without it hurting. I lost control of the ball. Like I was very much a control pitcher until my first surgery and then I started losing control. I couldn't hit a spot and so all this time I'm struggling, I'm angry with God. You know, I never asked him to help me get through this. You know, I was just very bitter. I was angry. Got into some bad stuff I got mixed in with with Some people that I probably shouldn't have at the time, you know, got into a lot of you know, womanizing drinking, you know, and I hate to say because it kills me to say that especially with with Sarah here because she's so pure, and it's really helped me with my walk with the Lord. But you know, it's who I am. And that's how I developed my faces. You know, I really struggle with it. I got into some of those bad things. And I just, I was at a low point in my life. And I guess Sarah, recognize that and really, I mean, Jesus, at the end of the day saved my life. But Sarah was the stepping stone back into the church. You know, her dad is the music director for the church. I've got a great relationship with him. I love him to death. He's been a really great mentor for me when it comes to the Bible and walking with the Lord. I actually I pray with him every single night. It's something new that we started nine o'clock I call him and we pray together. But anyway, she got me back in the church and

Sarah Knott : 16:56

playing music on Saturday. Yeah, they needed so

Ryan Knott : 16:58

I love the music. Still. You know, maybe didn't love God, you know, just being point blank. I love music. So, you know, they need another guitarist. This is what I do to pass time I don't mind writing and playing some music. And I started listening to the lyrics of some of the songs. I'm like, Man that like, that hurts so much more painful to hear the lyrics. You remember any of those

John Matarazzo : 17:19

lyrics that would stick out to you?

Ryan Knott : 17:20

I don't I would say well Sarah has written some songs that have touched me but her dad is also a very talented songwriter. And he has a song and I've actually ever since I heard it for the first time it's a song called Be still and obviously very popular Bible verse in there in regards to be still but and just trusting in God and and just being still and trusting his plan and like as he was singing this song, as we played it in church the first time and actually never told him this I told him It's like my favorite song, but that one actually really impacted me as far as remaining still and trust in God. So that kind of set things off for me. Now, I didn't know what direction I was going to go with music. We were in a very secular industry we put some music out there people liked it and we're like, hey, like, let's give this a go. Now I still played music in the church with them. But I had never written a Christian song. I didn't do anything like that I was focused on what we should write what sells what's popular for for people in mainstream, we should do secular and we, I'll be honest, we had a pretty successful run at that from 2013 to 2016. We had some opportunities, there were some record labels there was touring. You know, America's Got Talent invited us on there, some doors were opening up but something was missing. And, and that was God at the end of the day. So as I started as Sarah, Sarah would always write Christian music. She kind of always have always done that. But as we started reading the Bible together, and she brought me to a casting crowns concert, that was the other thing that really changed my life. So her dad was one and her entire family, but also casting crowns when I went there and Mark Hall and I heard him sing Just the realness and the trueness and the boldness in his writing. I was like, wow, like we can do this. I was so moved. I was moved to tears at that concert. I wouldn't let Sarah see that because I always couldn't be that tough guy but I was very moved. I was out in Indiana and we went and saw for King and Country casting crowns and Laura story. It was the thrive tour and and casting crowns. Really, it motivated me to like, hey, maybe we can do a little bit of this crossover and do some Christian music.

John Matarazzo : 19:30

So you were still thinking though, you wanted to do mainstream music?

Ryan Knott : 19:34

Yeah, at the time, you know, it's again, it's that human natural, you know, in it for me, you know, not God.

Sarah Knott : 19:41

We had multiple conversations about this, like Ryan, you know what? I just kind of feel like some of this is just pointless. Like, we're going out. We're singing it's great, but it's not impacting people. He goes fine. You know what if you want that you go write a song in 30 minutes, and then we'll see how you can do. So I just prayed. I said, God, I felt it in in my heart. You know, you think You get that just God's speaking to everyone knows when he's speaking to you. Sometimes you're kind of ignoring it and that still small voice was there saying, okay, and I said, All right, you know what, let's do this and God put a song in front of me wrote it. It was called come to me and Ryan said, okay, Sarah, we can do this. And

Ryan Knott : 20:17

she came back in and played it for me. I was like, Oh, okay. Wasn't expecting God to work through that quick.

John Matarazzo : 20:23

Now you you guys did that song at our living room concert? Right?

Sarah Knott : 20:26

Yeah, yeah, we play Yeah, we played

John Matarazzo : 20:28

the living room concert. Right. I remember that. That was powerful.

Sarah Knott : 20:30

Yeah. So it, you know, and that's not anything about me. You know, my life hasn't been perfect, either by any means by any you know, there have been ups and there have been downs in my life. And I think just relying on God and when you read something in the Bible, that's what I would always do is just go back and read the Bible and then have to like express it through a song like I you know, putting it it's hard for me to put into words right now. Just trying to make sense of maybe what's going Went on my life and I'm like, Hey, you know what? You're struggling financially? Hey, Matthew, you're reading about that, you know, don't worry about anything, but you know, look at the birds of the air, they don't sow or reap. And so going back to those things, and you put it out, and so sometimes when God gives us the songs, we just kind of write them and, you know, it's as much preaching or reassuring ourselves as it is, you know, trying to speak to anyone who's listening to us, right. I think that that's, that's the truth there.

John Matarazzo : 21:29

Yeah. So you guys started writing these christian songs? When did you realize that? Okay, this is the direction that you really wanted to go now?

Ryan Knott : 21:36

Yeah, I would say for me, especially that moment in time, when Sarah wrote that song, I think it was something that, you know, it touched my heart. But, you know, it was just clear as day you know, as I was, I was starting to read the Bible a little bit more, more and more, and I kept just reading all these verses about like singing for the Lord singing his praises. Jesus being our song and singing for him and just all this stuff that I was I was reading I actually have a Bible verse from Ephesians on my guitar, about Jesus, but you know, being my strength and my song, and I just kept seeing those types of signs that like, hey, maybe we should do this. And, you know, when we when we put out our first you know, song or you know, told people that we're going to go in the Christian industry was, we're a little concerned about like, oh man, what is our mainstream fans? What are they going to think? Like, are they gonna? Are they going to just completely disregard everything that we've done? But no one no one did that. And I think it was because we both just prayed about it and said, You know what, like, we're singing about the truth. It's not singing of what's what's popular and what needs to get out there. We're speaking God's truth and he's going to provide a way that we're we don't even know about and and he did, I mean, we we started playing that and to be honest, like our fan base and followers, and I mean this in the most humble way. I don't mean it from an arrogant standpoint. But since we started doing it, we started gaining more momentum from a Christian standpoint and more messages poured in like people saying this song like, changed my heart. You know, can you talk to me about Jesus? Can you pray with me? And sure enough, yeah, like, we would love to do it. So we're teaching, you know, we always say in a lot of these interviews, if we can impact just one person to know who God is, we're doing our jobs as Christians. And I can tell you some of the messages and all that that really inspired me to say, you know what, let's keep going with this. And as we did that, you know, some of these pages on Facebook picked us up to do like these live streams. And now, you know, we've been blessed enough to reach all these people throughout the world that we would have never reached unless we hit mainstream, you know, that's worldwide, but it it's opened up a platform for us in such a good way. And it just, it means so much more to us when we're singing the songs and the word and it's not really words that we've written because it comes straight from the Bible. So I like the fact that people are being moved by our songs. It's people are being moved by the word it's not our songs we're just making it run. And I think

Sarah Knott : 24:11

I think for something I think that's important to touch on when we're talking about this is you know after we had Jeremiah our first son who's three and a half years old or so we switch I think right before that to like the kind of like doing more like Christian music and then you know, we had a choice Are we going to you know, do this family life and kind of like stopped doing music, stop touring stuff doing anything like that, are we gonna end up continuing on and I you know, there's a verse Delight yourself in Lord, he'll give you the desires of your heart, and my desires in my heart, you know, I want to just have family, let the love have family, and I love Jesus. I want to you know, spread Jesus how I knew to do that my mom taught me to be the hands and feet of Jesus by making meals for an elderly person down the street. are someone who just you know, last summit or just being loving all the time and showing Jesus's love and being very Christ centered inside that, you know, that's probably for me, and then something that would hit me and say, Sarah, no, you know, what God wants more is that you know, talking about bear, you know, bearing their talents, you know, the guy who went out and doubled, you know, whatever and took a little risk. And then you have someone who kind of just kept it how it was, and you're a wicked man collecting what you, you know, don't sell and this and that. And it's like, Man, what are we doing was what God gave us. God gave us a platform for music. He gave us you know, this ability. Ryan's a phenomenal guitar player. He's so gifted, great at writing songs that you know, and God gave that to us. And what are we doing with it? If we just bury it and we don't do anything? That's not right. And I think that's one of those things. When you get a taste of that bigger Sunday, then sometimes it turns on you and you're like, well, I gotta watch my calories but in a good way, you know that you have You have to she goes again, God's kind of speaking because it's just kind of coming to me there that it turns on you God, that's the whole thing was walking with Him is that and not in a bad way but then you get to see the inside of your heart. And then, you know some of the songs are even deeper, you know if I speak with tongues of angels, but you know, I don't have love what am I? So we have a song like that that more gets more at the the heart, your own heart. And then from there we kind of can evolve as followers of Jesus, how we can be more like him. I don't think I answered a question that

John Matarazzo : 26:37

that's good. That's fine. I love the whole process of how God speaks to you guys. And I love what you what you said, Ryan, we're just, we're just taking the Bible and making it rhyme. I love that. That's such a simple thing. As simple way to look at some of the music that you're doing, which is really, really good. I enjoyed your living in concert which I'll be providing a link in the show notes for everybody that wants to come and check that out. As well as their website and everything. I want to talk some about those songs. And what are some of the songs that that you would identify with that you've written? You were going through a hard time in life, and God brought you through this. Could you just kind of tell us some of those stories? Sure.

Ryan Knott : 27:15

Yeah. So for me, one of the most powerful ones that I think, who I started writing, and then Sarah and I, both we got, we came together because she had, you know, her own vision of forgiveness. And one of the songs that we that we had written was a song called forgiven. And it's actually not recorded yet. We're in the process of recording it, but we did do it on the living room, the concert series, but it really goes back to the way when I was going through the pain and heartache of losing what I thought was the most important thing in my life, which was baseball at the time, and it sounds silly looking back and just saying that, but just the fact that like, my mind was stuck on going to be a famous baseball player. I'm going to get paid millions of dollars to play a game. I Never gonna have to work a day in my life you know it's the dream for you know any young player growing up I always envisioned myself bottom in the ninth two outs the last one up at bat, you know, hitting a home run and, you know, it was it was all those childhood dreams and you know, when I was going through that the person that I became, was not the person who God wanted me to be. That's where that song kind of stemmed from, you know, as I got into the bad stuff that I'm thinking to myself, Can God forgive me like no, like, there's no way you can forgive me? or How can a loving God take away my The only thing that I had? And then you know, I go back to those human questions. How can God take away you know, the life of a child and you know, you start questioning it because, you know, in the simple answer that it comes down to is like, we're not God, and there's a reason for everything. And as I've evolved and grown, you know, when I was going through that time, I had a hard time it was a selfishness, more pride, and I'm trying to work on that. from, you know, something that I've been praying about with their dad is like I want I want my pride to be taken away. I want all that to be gone. Well at the time, you know, I didn't want to ask for forgiveness because I was the most important thing to me. So as I grew and evolved and started reading the Bible and learning about just how loving this God is, and just how there's no sin too big for him, and he can forgive anything. That's what kind of STEM the song forgiven for us and just putting it all in his hands, and trusting him as the potter and us being the clay, repenting and being Christ like and putting your trust in His hands because we don't control anything in our lives. And I'll tell you during that time, my uprising to baseball and you know, getting close to that I never prayed to God and thanked him for you know, thank you for allowing me to play baseball for so long. You know, in my life, I never thanked him. I never gave him the glory. I didn't do any of that and I never just try rested him it was I'm going to work hard, I'm going to be the best one. That's how I'm going to get there. Not the fact that you know what, I'm going to work hard. I'm going to pray to God, I'm going to ask him, you know if this is your will, you know, I trust you today, like, those are the prayers that I should have been saying. But I wasn't. And when I became that person that I didn't want to be, how am I going to ask God for that forgiveness? So that's truly where the song forgiven stemmed from.

John Matarazzo : 30:25

Now, you said that Ryan, you went to church growing up once in a while wasn't like something that was a very important part of your life? Yeah, I'm just trying to put the pieces together. Okay. So you play baseball, and that's your gift. That's your passion. You're not using it for the Lord, but God uses that to get you to this camp. Yeah, where you then meet Sarah

Ryan Knott : 30:48

says the best of luck. It's crazy.

John Matarazzo : 30:50

Yeah. So God used athletics to bring you guys together. But it was music was the thing that came out of that

Ryan Knott : 30:58

100% and I never would have went to internship had I not gotten hurt. And to be honest, it was a last minute internship that our athletic director said, Hey, if you want to be close to home, there's this, this camp in Highland Park in here. I'm like, all right, whatever, I'll do a summer camp. And sure enough, there's my wife. And you know, and she led me it's just so perfect. If I can go back, you know, you offer me $10 million to sign you know, if whatever team or I don't have this life, and I don't know Christ, man, that wouldn't even be a decision for me like I would do it all over again. You know, I can't this sounds cliche and kind of weird, but I can't wait until my next in you know, quotes arm injury, it might be something else so that I can grow closer to God. I'm looking forward to that time of how he's going to use me through another heartbreak maybe that I have.

John Matarazzo : 31:48

Wow, that's a very interesting perspective. And I respect that. I'm looking forward to the next hardship where you're have to trust God in a deeper way. Yep. One of the questions that I always Love asking is and this is for both of you guys. What is the first thing that you remember that God spoke to you?

Sarah Knott : 32:08

I would have to say, because I was trying to think about this. I know I saw this question on there. Um, I mean, I think he's just spoken, I think so, so many times to me throughout my life, knowingly or unknowingly. And I mean, I guess one of the first times he really spoke to me, I was thinking of all these different times, you know, he's spoken to me when I was younger, just knowing like Jesus loves me, this I know different things spoken. You know, just how to love your neighbor and things like that, that you learned from veggietales and you can apply them you know, I think God loves details. You can't go wrong. I could start singing some veggietales songs if you want but if you want to be entertained, water buffalo stuff, but you know, so they're telling Like that, that I think God is speaking to us. And, you know, we hear it, how I would speak to Jeremiah and I break it down a more simple understanding way. And I think he lets us know that we're loved in that way. I think in college, he spoke very clearly to me and said, Sarah, I still have a plan and a purpose for you. Even though you're not playing sports. I want you to do this and I want you to lead FCA even if you don't think that you're, you're able to teach these people anything and you don't you're not equipped. I'll be with you. And then you know, from there, someone teaching me like pieces just falling into place. I think. You know, I really heard him speaking to me that day when I was on my kitchen floor at my parents house and writing. Come to me that song. He said, Sarah, I'm going to be with you. I'm going to give you these words in 30 minutes, you're going to write this song and Ryan, you know, you're going to be able to do this because he was pulling at my heart that we do Christian music and then I think in like this season of life, you know, we just had our little baby nail me four months ago, and I've always been a worrier. You know, telling people to trust in God and actually trusting in Him are two different things, I think. And so I'm all worried I want to have an all natural labor and delivery. And you know, this can happen, and this can happen and getting worried and, you know, they'll induce you at 41 weeks, usually I was 42 weeks in a day and they were going to be inducing me I didn't want to get induced for people who don't know what that means. That means given like, some artificial stuff to try and get you to have the baby quicker and so you know, I was 14 going on 15 days late with Naomi, and I just had this overwhelming feeling of Psalm 91 that God is going to just cover me and I'll be under his wings and and the morning I went to give birth. There's like a whole backstory to this that there was this man was a Christian man who worked at the hospital that I had had Jeremiah at We talked about Jesus and I showed him our music and he liked it a lot. And every time he was a greeter at the hospital, every time I go to the hospital, I would look for this man and I could never find them for two and a half years. And the morning I go into labor, I went and we went upstairs, and this man is right there. And he talks to me and he I said, I was nervous. And he prayed with me, and he said, it shall be well, I just knew God was speaking to me there that he said, Sarah, I got this under control. You have little faith, you know, like, I have this under control. I'm not going to let anything happen. And Naomi and we had a beautiful birth. And that's been like, the last couple months with God's been really speaking to my heart that hey, Sarah, I have you covered. I have your family covered. I love you. And you make me smile, like it sounds Goofy, but, you know, we're not doing things you know, I used to think doing things for God was what's important, but that just us loving him and worshiping Him that that brings him so much joy. And I think that's just a special And my perspective on things and in my heart lately, that's what I would have to say. And that he sees us when he still loves us when we're anxious about stuff, but that he says, Don't worry about it.

John Matarazzo : 36:11

Yeah. I love that. You said, you feel God's smiling at you. And you smiling at your baby. Yeah, your precious little Naomi. That's something that God speaking to you so God speaking to you through something that you're, you're looking at your child, the way that God's looking at you

Sarah Knott : 36:27

It's so amazing how he does that. You get a whole different view of God the Father of Jesus, of sending a child you know, sending Jesus to Earth Jesus coming to earth you know, Jesus is God but you get a such a different view than when you become that parent and you're looking down at your child knowing that I'll never want to hurt you but Jeremiah, I want to protect you from getting burned by the stove. So I have these rules. We don't touch the stove. You know, same way God has these rules for us. You know what he kind of sets forth for us and things that you know, we call them rules, regulations, whatever you want to say, but that are there to help us have as much of a pain, free kind of life we know in this life will have troubles but he's overcome that but you know, you see that with Jeremiah that I am a loving parent and want what's best for him just like how God wants what's best for us. And that's been a major shift in my relationship with God for sure.

John Matarazzo : 37:25

So that's cool. Ryan, what about you? How's God spoken to you? Do you remember your first name of God, realize that God is speaking he's spoken to me a lot.

Ryan Knott : 37:35

He still does. I mean, it's every day it's something new. I mean, I felt God speaking through Sarah so many times in our lives to like I just see the the genuine love in her eyes on a regular basis. I think that, you know, is something that it's always spoken to me and, you know, I've always told her like, I see Jesus through her eyes, even just the way she lives her life. Definitely an inspiration to me. I paid

Sarah Knott : 38:01

Chicken wings.

Ryan Knott : 38:07

But I mean, that's that's one way. But I'd say from like, if there's a time that I can remember. And actually, I don't even know if I've told you about this either or your dad. Her dad got me a Bible. And it was actually one of the first Bibles I think I ever received. And it was during the time that I was rehabbing. I was planning on getting back into baseball, and my arm just wasn't healing the way it should. And I went into like a depressed state, like, had a lot of bad thoughts. I'll be honest, like, and I hate to say that, but like i mentally being mentally stable. I was not at that point. Like I said, I didn't have a relationship or anything like that. And looking back now, I didn't realize in the moment that God was speaking to me, but as I started growing more and more my faith, I went back and said, you know what he he let me know then in there, so I had opened up just the cover page and the verse that Was there was from phillipians. And it was basically, you know, don't worry about anything instead pray about everything. And at that time, I had so many worries and anxieties on my mind and all of that, right? And I remember I read that in the cover, and I just grabbed the book and said, God's Tell me what I need to do again. And I opened it up pointed to the book in the exact verse that I pointed to was the same verse that I just read on the cover book, you know, and I highlighted it and I was like, wow, that, you know, that was cool. Okay, so I'll pray about it. But I didn't listen to God at the time. I didn't pray about I was like, This is weird, whatever. Okay, I started reading through stuff highlighting things but like, at that time, it didn't really mean you know that much to me. But looking back, I'm like, man, he was like, telling me Stop worrying. I got it like, you'll go to the summer camp, you'll meet this girl. So or no, that was me. I'd already done that. No, but he was telling me that you're going to continue on with this faith. You're going to do music and, and all this stuff. So you You know, he was basically telling me that it was all you know that it was all okay. You know the other time I would say when I was at the casting crowns concert the first time I'd ever been moved by a Christian song, you know, truly was there a Christian performance? You know, I was playing in the church a little bit but that concert was something that really touched me. And then another one a special moment maybe this is more of like in our marriage, but I still go back to it a lot. We went to this family life event. And that's a whole different story. What happened there we our car got hit with lightning in the car stop. It was I'm not even kidding. It broke down.

Unknown Speaker : 40:31

The devil

Ryan Knott : 40:32

did not want us to go to this family life thing. He did everything in his power. Like I didn't have a car. We had to take a cab someone brought us back but anyway.

Sarah Knott : 40:42

They went to the conference to they were behind us and they hitchhiked us back to Chicago is

Ryan Knott : 40:50

another hour probably that we'd have to tell you. But I'll tell you that story that sometime Oh my gosh. But in that moment, One I was like, it was right before we were getting married. So I was like, maybe we're not supposed to be married

Sarah Knott : 41:07

to this, like a couples kind of conference kind of thing, right? Like,

Ryan Knott : 41:12

yeah. And I will say like Sarah and I, at that time, we never really prayed with each other. I mean, we would say prayers here in there, but like, there wasn't a true like, sit down. And this moment, I still remember and I know you remember it, too, is that night after family life. You know, we were kind of upset with each other the family life was it was there was great speakers. One of them was an ex baseball player too. So I connected from that standpoint. But that night, we went back and we tried something different. And we both sat down in the in the living room. And we went out and we got rags and water and we said, You know what, tonight, let's just wash each other's feet and pray together. And to me, I feel I don't know if you feel the same way. But I feel like God was very present in that moment, because I had so much on my heart. That was I needed to be forgiven for from God first and foremost, but with Sarah with my past and stuff, like I needed to hear that I was washed clean, and that she forgave me too. And I think that was one of the first real like holy spirit moments that I've had where like it was just we were circled by Christ. And I will say the rest of the trip turned out pretty nice after we did that, and

Sarah Knott : 42:23

they invited us to a baseball game because they heard someone from the blaze got into, you know, got hit by lightning, actual speakers of the event. So that way we went to a

Ryan Knott : 42:32

baseball game, we did all this stuff, but it ended up turning out it turned out really nice. And it was an adventure now a story that we can share. But I'll tell you just like, and we still talk about just being married, all the things that I probably do wrong, we probably need to do it again. Get more forgiveness for her.

Sarah Knott : 42:49

No, but that's something that too. That's where I think in the last, you know, from us getting married, you know, God calls us to find someone who's evenly yoked with who you are. I was kind of blindsided. I really, really just love Ryan everything about him. He's so funny. He's so great. And that was one of those things where you know, I maybe tune that little part of it out from God. And you know, you see and I'm not saying this in a mean way we've talked about this a bunch and I'm not saying like oh I'm so this or that because that's not at all what I'm coming off as but I'm just trying to say that he has certain things to protect you like what we were saying with Jeremiah with the stove before that. We've had, we've had hardship and we've had issues in our marriage things you know, Ryan still has had problems with like even just feeling depressed about baseball, stuff like that. Some of that stuff carries over. And that's where then, you know, I found my strength in God in a whole nother way. Also, that you see how you know what, even through all of this stuff, God has us and I believe without a doubt, he knows the plans. He has for us. For me, for Ryan and I together And just everything like you're saying this journey, this walk with Jesus this whole time, you see everything put in place. And we're seeing, like the fruits of that, especially over the last couple years, you know, you know how our stories can impact others and how he uses things that we've gone through to help other people and to just kind of be real and to write about and bring peace and joy and the love of Jesus and Ryan had said, you know, he was you were angry with God at different times. And I think one of the things that helped me overcome not wanting to really pursue a life of singing in front of people on stage is the idea that there are so many people, you know, I've heard so many people say, Well, I just done too much stuff. God can't forgive me and that can crush my heart. I could cry in a second just thinking about that, that you know, that there are people out there that feel that way that feel that bitterness, and I you know, even if the Bad things happen. You know, God is there and God loves me and God loves Ryan and God loves everyone and trying to share that with someone. You know, we try to do that through our music and when we're talking on stage or anything like that, but that's the thing that in my gut, makes me want to do, you know, feel my purpose of being, you know, doing Christian music, and can add on that, too, is like, what I've come to realize is that God uses the broken. I mean, he loves the broken.

Ryan Knott : 45:34

He loves everyone, but he's near to the broken and he uses us and I would consider myself broken. I think I think everybody's broken in a way. But I think, you know, rich Mullins probably said it best and it's one of my favorite testimonies that he talked about. One of our idols too I think we've connected over rich Mullins music but he said something but he said something interesting. That said that, you know, God takes the junk of our lives and makes the greatest art out of it. And that's one of my favorite, I think quotes that I've heard because it's so true because he's taken so much garbage in my life that was holding me down, and is now turning it into something to glorify Him. And, and we've got a long way to go to fulfill our purpose. I think God has a plan for us. He has a purpose. I think we're just kind of starting to get into what that is. You know, he's got something bigger planned.

John Matarazzo : 46:33

Yeah, we've been talking a lot about identity and purpose. Yeah. And there's people listening here that may not know what their purpose in life is or who whose they are in Christ. Could you guys just speak to identity and purpose for somebody that doesn't know? Like, what would be the first step that somebody could take to try to find that?

Sarah Knott : 46:55

Yeah, I think probably just being a And trying to talk to God. And, you know, he says that if he starts to go to work, and he will, he'll finish it to the day of completion. And so I'm very confident knowing that God is going to work for someone, he's going to work something for your good, like what we said, but his plans are better and higher than ours. I don't know how else to say it, then, you know, you just reach out to him and he's gonna he's gonna hit you upside the head with a pan kind of thing where, in the sense that you more than what you could expect, like, you know, we can only hope and dream, you know, Hey, Ryan was probably thinking, Oh, I'm just gonna open this Bible back when he was talking about his thing. And I'm just going to open it and see what I was there. And there could have been a very powerful verse, But God was kind of hitting us upside the head and saying, Ryan, look, this is what I want you to get out of this. And I'd say connecting with other believers, other people who know Jesus, actually reading the Bible, there's such a difference is that reading the Bible for the sake of checking it off your list, but Come to the point where you're learning about these broken people in the Bible and learning about then ultimately Jesus and how he comes to, he comes to heal, he comes to save, he came, he just loves us so much he sacrificed you know, himself for us. That's it's just powerful to think about and I guess I'm kind of dancing around around your question, but kind of getting plugged into somewhere where people can help you and then also just kind of letting God work and being open to let God work because I think a lot of people sometimes they have these blinders up. And Ryan, I think you said this to that you kind of didn't want to hear even if God was gonna knock you upside the head with a pan, and I'm sorry if I go on that, but that, that you kind of, were not even open to this idea of God. This idea of Jesus saving us, you know, letting him you know, kind of having that hardened hearts So, I guess that's where I'd say to kind of start is to learn about who Jesus is learn about his love and

Ryan Knott : 49:07

whatnot, I'd say there's, there's a big aspect of vulnerability to that comes along with it. And Sarah kind of touched on this a little bit is asking people that maybe if you don't understand the Bible, being vulnerable and asking someone that maybe has been doing it more, you know, reading it longer than you have and asking questions. I asked Sarah questions all the time. Still, you know, I asked her dad questions all the time. I ask our pastor at church questions all the time. You know, and you're not being annoying. This is what God calls us to do. He wants us to be able to have those conversations. So I think there's an aspect for sure of vulnerability there. I think the other thing is knowing that, you know, it's okay to not be okay, if that makes sense. And if you're if you're struggling with life or you're struggling with your purpose, just remembering at the end of the day that that God sent His only Son and if people are listening if they have to Children just imagine what that feels like. I mean, I love my son Jeremiah to death, like, I would do anything for him, I take a bullet for him, you know, and just knowing I how much I love him. God loves us so much more than I love him. And he was willing to send his only son that he had to die down to die on the cross for us. Like, if that doesn't give you purpose to live, you know, in general, like that's, you know, you gotta you gotta figure that out. I would say yeah, like continuing to ask the questions. And it goes back to my Bible, verse two is don't worry about anything, pray about everything and having that vulnerable conversation with God and saying, God, how can you use me You know, it says in the Bible, Ask and you shall receive knock and the door will be open like, you will get your answer. You got to put Jesus at the center in the forefront of your life and he will tell you what you need to do, whether it's a vision, whether it's a dream, whether it's someone you encounter throughout your life, like a Sarah moment that I had that I needed in that moment of time, he will show you a way, you know, you just have to open your eyes to see it. So I don't know if that answers your question. But I think that is kind of how we, you know, how you can find some type of purpose.

John Matarazzo : 51:16

I think being willing to have your eyes opened and, like really trust that Jesus does actually care about your future, about your identity about your purpose. He has a plan for that. I think sometimes we think that God's so big, and I'm so small that he doesn't care for me at all. It's like, okay, he did his he did his thing. He saved me. But I don't really I'm just a cog in the wheel. Yeah. Now God has an individual purpose for every single person. And yes, you might be. You might be a cog in that wheel or gear in that wheel, whatever. But you're, you're important part of that because it's gonna cause the next thing to work and all these

Sarah Knott : 51:58

Yeah, and nothing's Just like the same thing, you're saying, nothing's too small for God so I can pray. You know that you know, Jeremiah and I, we could pray a little prayer that maybe two might seem nothing to someone but that God smiles on you when you do that, you know that that's, that's, I think the

John Matarazzo : 52:18

Yeah, that's powerful. Now a question that I always love asking people, if you could go back in time and visit yourself, and give yourself some advice in the past, what season of life or what's happening in your life? And kind of paint that picture for me? And then what would you tell yourself?

Ryan Knott : 52:38

Well, if I could go back and borrow that pan that Sarah was talking about, knock myself over the head, I would do it. I would say you know, I would go back to I go in a few places, to be honest, I would go as a young kid, that kid that goes to church every so often. That doesn't understand the love of Jesus that feels like I have to be a good person. I have to do good things in order to get to heaven, you know, in realize and talk to myself and say, You know what, put Jesus at the forefront of your life, accept Him as your Lord and Savior and repent. And that's all you need to do and the rest of the stuff will come along with that, you know, I would tell that that boy then and I would also talk to myself in college when I was going through that depression state you know, not being a very good person and partying and doing all that stuff not saying that people who do that are bad people but for me in my in my where my mindset was, I wasn't living I wasn't Christ like by any means. And I would seriously I would just sit down and say, You know what, there's so much more to your life than what you can even imagine. They're the best part of your life is yet to come and I still feel like the best part of my life is yet to come. I think every day it just gets stronger and stronger my faith and my love for Sarah and family and and trying to really change the world and in a positive light and I know that sounds Miss America ish, but I really like it. You only mean that like, I want to, I want to share the gospel with people. Like I said, I prayed about it every day with my father in law, like we started this thing, and I recommend it. If no one has done that, get a praying buddy, a praying partner and just set an alarm on your phone. It has been the most fulfilling thing. And we've been asking God every day, how can you use us? How can you? How can I teach someone about Jesus today, Lord, just give us an opportunity just to have one conversation. I can tell you, between the two of us we've had like 15 instances where God has opened the door and we look back and we go, thank you like prayer answer right there. But anyway, going back, going back to your question, I would just tell myself, you know that it's going to be okay, and you're forgiven. You know, everything that you've done everything, all the future sins that you've done because of the blood that's been shed by Jesus. You're forgiven. Now live your life according to His word, and you're going to be okay. And I think if I had heard those words, then You know, I think it would have definitely helped me but I had to be open to listening to it. And you know, like we were talking about, open those ears and accept it. And so that I would say those are the two instances that I would go back and the advice that I would give myself.

Sarah Knott : 55:14

I think for me, I've always had like, a, like a fearful mentality, like I couldn't sleep at night when I was little, I'd be at the foot of my parents bed or on the floor in their room, and I just couldn't sleep and my dad would say, hey, go back. You know, by the time I was a little older, you can read the Bible, you can do this, and I had this, this bookmark that was Psalm 23. That was my bookmark. So like, read through Psalm 23, and Lord is my shepherd, a shadow, and I memorize that without believing it. And I think going back to those moments and saying, Sarah, you can trust that you are not too small for God to look after that he looks after you in the dark of the night when you're five or six or seven years old. He looks after you then he's gonna look after you when you're going through high school and college and everything and The same way that you can learn a language or you can learn the days of the week you can learn the solar system, whatever it is, but until you like, apply it or you really understand it, it's not going to stick with you. It's just going to you're going to keep relearning and relearning it. And I think that was what if I could tell myself something, it would be Hey, learn it and kind of understand God's got you. He's never gonna let you go. He loves you on indescribably and, and, and so I think that, yeah, going back all that way is instead of having this, you know, this fearful mentality, and that's something that I think since becoming a mother, I, I've been trying to reverse and that God's been helping me not have a spirit of fear. Yeah,

John Matarazzo : 56:46

that's good. Now, going back to that moment, that you guys would listen to yourself.

Ryan Knott : 56:53

I think if I was threatening myself with the pan

Unknown Speaker : 56:57

potentially

Ryan Knott : 57:00

Like I was so arrogant, I don't know. That'd be it'd be a tough it'd be a tough I don't know, it'd be a tough pill to swallow. I would hope that I would say yes that I would that I would change myself. I mean, if I'm showing up as myself years down the line, it's kind of hard not to listen to myself because I'd be like, wow, that's crazy. But, but realistically, I don't know if I would have listened but I think if I had approached it from the standpoint like I said that everything's gonna be okay. The best is yet to come. I think those I mean, being that I'm saying it I think it obviously would have impacted myself because just saying it impacts myself so I would hope that you know, with with those just trusting in God and and you know, that everything's gonna be okay. I would want to say that I would listen to myself, hopefully. If not, I'd be lecturing myself a few a few years later.

Sarah Knott : 57:56

I'd like to think I would have an iota probably clung to it, honestly. And it probably would have been like an idol of some sort. You know, that's probably I feel like how my mentality being that young, I think sometimes you have to live through certain experiences, but I wish I would have 100% been able to accept that and believe that and feel it. I would like to have thought that but I don't know.

John Matarazzo : 58:18

Yeah, I like having these these thought experiments of what would I'd say to myself, and because obviously, we can't go back and do that, but also at the same time going through those experiences, has led us to where we are now, because Jesus has been walking with us along the way, whether we realize it or not. All throughout our conversation here, we've we've talked about some of those moments of how Jesus was walking with us, but we didn't realize it until we look back. Can you tell me a little bit about one of those moments that you look back and you realize, I wish I would have realized that Jesus was right there and I didn't see it right that?

Ryan Knott : 58:54

Yeah, I would say for me, it would be at the camp, you know, when I first start Getting into the word again or just talking to Sarah about faith and then getting back into the church and playing some music. Like the thing about about that question is like, he's been with us the whole time. I think he touched on that too. Like, we're just too blindsided by our own selfishness to realize that he's bet it's like that. That footprints, right that that one poem or whatever, where, you know, I've been, I was carrying you the whole time. I mean, she really has been carrying us the whole time. And, you know, who knows, maybe the whole baseball incident for me? Yeah, I get my $10 million. I'm playing Major League Baseball. You know, girls are going crazy for me because that's an idol that I would do at that, you know, would have at the time, the money, the fame, the fortune. But, you know, I think God saved me in more than one way. Maybe I would have gotten in a car accident, plane crash, maybe I would have been drinking and driving. Maybe I would have overdosed on something. We'd I don't know, you know, and I can't wait until that time that I'm face to face with God. And you know, he tells me and he shows me all this stuff that like, yeah, you would have been dead within three years of being in professional baseball. I save you, I lifted you out of that. And what you thought was that depression mode for you or your dream shattered was actually me opening up the door to know me better and to bring you, your son to bring you, your wife to bring you, your daughter to bring you to along the way podcast and in all seriousness, like it's, you know, I never would have been doing any of this stuff. And I feel so fulfilled. Deep down. Obviously, there's more room for that fulfilling this. But anyway, back to the question. I know, I tend to ramble. But I feel like you're podcasting? Yeah, he's, he's, he's always been with me along the way. And I would say, during that time in baseball, and when I started meeting, Sarah, like I said, seeing his love through her eyes. knew he was president. And then especially when I started praying, and it's things as simple like I was going through a rough patch. This is only a few months back. I decided to go on a walk. And you know, I was praying to God and I stopped and looked up and said, God, just like I need you right now. Just show yourself. Sure enough, the wind started blowing, like out of nowhere. There was no wind, my hair went back. I kind of got chills. It was beautiful scenery. Her dad calls me on the phone out. Your dad's always connected to this, but her dad calls me on the phone and he'll remember this conversation. He's listening to this podcast, but I picked up and he's like, hey, just checking in on Yeah, I just want to see how things are going. And we ended up praying right in that moment. And there was no reason for him to call me it was a random Saturday. And he just showed himself even through that. So like I've, as I've grown closer my faith, I start to recognize the little things of how much he is present. You know, we tend to recognize only the bad things that happen in our lives. It's as simple as you run to the supermarket. And the spot a spot opens up right in front of the store. Like, little like, I know it sounds weird, but it's like thank you God, like I've been having a hard day. Thank you for opening, you know, having that be open and it's just like the little things like that just thanking him for you know, you get all the green lights back to your house and you know, or you see an old friend like, those are the little things that maybe I wouldn't have necessarily noticed, you know, back in time so he's been he's been along the way the whole time in my life.

John Matarazzo : 1:02:34

Yeah. Yeah, I like that you're getting better at seeing those moments to

Sarah Knott : 1:02:39

talk we talk about that a lot is like you kind of think like different little blessings that you know, you have you might not have seen as blessings before but the little Yeah, the little things. Can you rephrase the question one more time so I speak directly to the question because I had something going and then Ryan came Ryan was saying so much water. So blames me No, no, no, I'm not trying to blame Ryan but I want to get to the heart of the question I don't want to just did we see Jesus in where do we see Jesus and

John Matarazzo : 1:03:08

when you do look back and you see those, those those moments that Jesus was walking with you, just tell me a little bit about what it is that's going through your brain and realize that Jesus was really there.

Sarah Knott : 1:03:19

Yeah, I guess I'm, I'm trying to look back at some of those moments where you know, I think I one thing that while he was speaking that kept you know, coming up in my in me is that I was always so insecure, just about myself about how I looked how I how I was, I was insecure. I was a sports athlete. So I was putting my focus on stuff like that, you know, and still doing a bunch of church stuff, but just, you know, trying to recognize like looking back knowing Jesus was with me, even when I felt insecure about myself. It it's humbling, it's a beautiful thing. And you know you you wish you had seen it before. I feel like I knew God was there like I don't I don't feel like I ever was like disassociated from him. But in those moments where maybe you're crying yourself to sleep or fearful or worried that you could just cast all your cares on him. I wish I would have just done that more. So I don't know. I think I answered your last question. So

John Matarazzo : 1:04:29

is that a similar question? Yeah, that's okay. I appreciate just the honesty that you guys have been able to share with me about some of those moments in your life. And I want to hear what's going on in your life moving forward. We had the opportunity where God cross our paths along the way through you guys coming to be on Cornerstone television network into the living room concert series and be on my show real life as well. And it was great having you and again, I'll providing the links in the show notes so that you can see that stuff. But tell me what's happening. Well, first off, before we get into that, how did the name acoustic truth come into be? And what's happening next with acoustic truth?

Ryan Knott : 1:05:09

Yeah, so acoustic truth the he talked about, like where we got the name from? Yeah, yeah. So when we originally started we just, we, it's so funny how it's evolved to be honest like, we just needed a band name. We're like, hey, let's just put something together we knew that we we played acoustic guitar that's the only thing that we knew how to play. And I'm like well maybe we just do something acoustic something. And over time it just progressed we're saying like well we sing about like real wholesome, heartfelt things. And a lot of our songs were stories like stories about our lives and I'm just again this this was before we went into the Christian industry, but it was like, well, let's we sing about the truth. So maybe we do acoustic truth. And I actually asked my grandma I gave her a few different and she she's passed away since then, but I gave her a few options and said you know which one You like and she said, I like acoustic truth.

Sarah Knott : 1:06:02

So that's got you know, that's it's Jesus walking with us and like helping us figure out that band name that would we stuck with that band.

Ryan Knott : 1:06:09

Yeah. And we just and we have his you know, and we stuck with it. And so many times people are like, Where's that name? It's kind of a weird name. And so many times we have opportunities to change it. And I'm like, you know what, like, no, let's keep it This is us. This is who we are.

Sarah Knott : 1:06:22

I think David, if he had a bad name, it would be acoustic. It's hard

Ryan Knott : 1:06:28

to think that, but it's so it's so interesting how like God had this plan in his head ahead of the time. Yeah, with with everything because now as we've evolved in the Christian, contemporary Christian music, like we are now Truly speaking the truth. And it's as simple as an acoustic guitar. And it's as simple as opening up the Bible and reading it The truth is all written therefore you don't have to jump to conclusions. It is very black and white, just like our music because we're bold in our lyrics as well. We try to speak exactly what's written and whether it's

Sarah Knott : 1:07:03

that pressure off us that yeah songwriting to because it's like, Hey, this is what this is what God

Ryan Knott : 1:07:09

said, yeah, this is what God says. And we're going to sing what he says. And whether a record label likes it or radio likes it or doesn't. It doesn't matter to us at this point whether it gets on Caleb and in the rotation. I mean, yeah, it'd be awesome to reach all those people. But we know that that the writing is true. It's it's the acoustic truth. It's the Bible. And so it's like God had that planned the whole time. And it's just it's been so interesting seeing the name unfold. And by the way, it pops up in everyone's iTunes is like the first so AC lucky. I've noticed that on the playlist, that's the first thing Yeah, alphabetical order.

Unknown Speaker : 1:07:48

There you go. So what's happening next

Ryan Knott : 1:07:50

with you guys? Yeah, so we're going to continue we're doing lives on wings of encouragement. We've done stuff on God's foreign one. We're going to continue partnering with a lot of these like Facebook page. That we've, we've kind of built a connection over the years with and really just try to do this live prayer and worship and pray for people and just continue to write we've got some things in the works with children's songs that we

Sarah Knott : 1:08:14

work with that God has put on our heart having Jeremiah, you know, we're, we're, you know, singing different things and how old is Jeremiah right now?

John Matarazzo : 1:08:23

Three and a half, three and a half. And Naomi, she's perfect age for Kids Songs. Yeah.

Sarah Knott : 1:08:28

Oh my goodness. So we have that, like, you know, and that's something that lights up my face right now that God is speaking to us saying, Hey, guys, this is what I want you to do. And you know, we're seeking His guidance and guide. How do you want us to do this in what fashion do we want? You know, there's so many outlets, you know, we have the Facebook lives that are that are helpful for reaching people and God has that platform established for us there but trying to figure out how to reach the hearts of children because I think kids That's where I wish I could have intervened and spoken to myself not to be fearful about things and being able to say that I just want Jeremiah now me to know Jesus and love him and understand His peace that he gives that the world can't. And that's something we both want and to be able to do that for other kids. How much like the cab bring a bigger smile to God's face. I know I keep bringing that up about his smiling his face, but that's just kind of

Ryan Knott : 1:09:26

just like a child to and just being able to impact. I mean, because looking back at myself when I was at the younger age, I wish I had that and like I said, My parents were great. Like they brought us to church like I their love was was fantastic for us. But for me, it's interesting, like, I wish I would have had some some of these people to come to me with maybe these children's songs are just teaching me from like a child standpoint and Sarah is one of those people that can make anything fun she can make going The dentist fun for kids like I think she was I think she's like part time clown doesn't realize it. The kids love her. She's got a great connections with kids with kids in general. And she has a way of like teaching them. So we've decided to take that to the next level. It's still in its branding phase. And we're still kind of building the project. But we've written a bunch of songs, we're going to continue we're going to put out another album. We're going to do a basically an acoustic album with just stringed instruments coming out this year, don't have a release date yet, but we're going to record probably 12 songs 12 new songs that had been unheard unreleased that we've been writing, and then we're going to do this children's project and really looking forward to just reaching as many people as we can. You know, I think we've realized up to this point that like, what however God wants to use us again, we're putting it in his hands, and hopefully doors will open up to that we can reach more people and we need to lose that personal gratification as far as like We're we've made it here, we've done this, this and this and more. So just about like, how did this song impact someone? Like, are we singing this song for the right reasons? And I think like, we both just agree that like, you know what, we're doing this solely for God going forward. We're going to put the work in, he wants us to put the work in. But if it's meant to be, it's going to be meant to be if it's not, yeah, he's gonna use us in a different way. He's still going to use us. But we're less caught up now about radio plays, and more. So about, okay, how can we use the platforms that we have right now to reach the people that need it, and maybe don't have radio? So

John Matarazzo : 1:11:37

yeah, it's interesting. So you talked about these different platforms and the Facebook pages and things like that. How do we find you guys? Yeah, what's your website? Facebook?

Ryan Knott : 1:11:48

Yeah, so our website is www dot acoustic truth official calm, and you can see tour dates, you can see our albums on there you can see all the social media links. Sorry, they've you can see all the social media links on there. But I would say are probably our biggest platform right now that we're constantly engaging and interacting with people through Facebook. So if they follow us on just under acoustic truth, they can feel free to reach reach out if they got prayer requests. We do that all the time on the lives for people that need prayers. They can just reach out directly through Facebook or through our website, there's a an email that you can reach out to her a little text box that can people can ask questions, and it'll get sent to my email directly. So Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, website, YouTube, we're under acoustic truth. We got a bunch of music videos out there. So if people want to subscribe and hear some of the music that we have coming out, they can they can go there. Yeah, awesome.

John Matarazzo : 1:12:49

Well, thank you guys for your time. I really appreciated this as kind of a little cherry on top of this Sunday. Would you mind just praying for the listeners here? Yeah,

Ryan Knott : 1:12:58

absolutely. Yeah, so dear gracious God, we just give you thanks and praise for the opportunity to just just talk about you and talk about how good you are. We thank you for for john and along the way podcast and we just continue to pray for the blessings and just allow his work to get out there to reach people throughout the world. We give you thanks for the opportunity just to be on here tonight. And we ask that people are impacted and hopefully driven to find out more about you. And we just give you thanks and praise for for all the blessings that you've bestowed upon us. And just waking up today and just having the opportunity to take another breath. We give you all the glory. And we just thank you so much for all of these blessings and just ask for special prayers and guidance for all these listeners today. That they can find comfort, healing and strength through your word. And and we just give you thanks for all of these things. And as You to continue to bless us through your Son more Jesus Christ. Amen. Amen.

John Matarazzo : 1:14:05

Well, Ryan, and Sarah, thank you so much for allowing me to join you along your way.

Ryan Knott : 1:14:11

Appreciate it. Thank you. Hopefully we can come back again soon right? Did I just invite ourselves?

Unknown Speaker : 1:14:17

Of course you did. That's great.

Unknown Speaker : 1:14:19

send you some ice cream sundaes in the mail,

Unknown Speaker : 1:14:21

you'll get some ice cream from us.

John Matarazzo : 1:14:26

Ryan and Sarah are a gifted couple that love the Lord and want to desperately be used by him to encourage and bless people. Their music really ministers to the soul, and its simplicity makes the truth behind their lyrics accessible to everyone. I appreciate their honesty in this conversation how Ryan didn't really want to be all in the Christian music world. The test that he gave Sarah to write a song in 30 minutes led to one of my favorite songs that I've heard from them. The song that she wrote come to me is a from God to us to trust Him with all of our circumstances, no matter what you're going through joy and gladness, sorrow or pain, you can always come to the embrace of Father God, where you will find rest and peace. Jesus made that way for you to be accepted and love, no matter where you are right now. Jesus is right there saying, Come to me. His arms are wide open and he will embrace you and forgive you. If you would like to come to God's loving embrace. Just stop what you are doing right now and honestly say to him in your own words. God, I am far from you right now. But I know that you aren't far from me. My sin has divided us that I repent from those things right now. And I ask for your forgiveness. I've tried to be the leader of my life, but I have fallen and come up empty time and time again. Right now. I decided to put you Jesus in the rightful place in my life. make you the leader of my future from today forward. Thank you, Jesus, that through your death on the cross and the resurrection, my life is made clean through your salvation. I receive your forgiveness. I love you, Jesus. Help me to live for you from now on. Amen. If you made a sincere decision and declaration like that one, I want you to know that you are accepted and loved by God. Please let someone know that you made that very important decision. You can reach out to me if you'd like. But please let someone in your life know that you are forgiven and your life is changed because of Jesus. Ryan and Sarah's life plan was changed for the better when they totally surrendered to Christ. Ryan even said that if he had the chance to do it all over and be a professional baseball player, he would choose the path that led him to Sarah and acoustic truth all over again. Ryan and Sarah aren't full time music artists right now. Right now. A full time office job that he goes to. And Sarah as a full time mom. They make time to pursue their God given calling in music ministry. And I believe that one day soon they will be able to be full time artists. I think that most often life doesn't go as planned. I know that's been the case in my life, but God is able to lead us in his path. And that's the best path. The verse that I believe that God has given to me to hold on to for 2020 is proverbs three, five and six. Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths. I'm learning that more and more every day. As you are going along your way. I pray that you learn to trust in the Lord with all your heart and He will direct your path to for more information about Ryan and Sarah not you can check out their website acoustic truth official.com Thank you for listening to along The way if you've enjoyed joining me along my way, please share this episode with a friend who you think will be encouraged by this podcast. Also, please rate and review along the way on iTunes that helps more people discover along the way. And please subscribe to this podcast on iTunes or wherever you listen to podcast. You can follow us on Facebook, Instagram and at my website along the way dot media. I hope that you've enjoyed this part of my journey. And may you realize when Jesus is walking with you along your way