What if the worst moment in your life isn’t the final chapter?

In this Easter episode of Your Weekly Calling, Brad Lowe reminds us that the resurrection of Jesus didn’t just change history — it changed everything about our future.

Good Friday looked like total defeat. Jesus was beaten, mocked, crucified, and buried. His followers thought the story was over.

But then Sunday happened.

Brad shares the powerful true story of Romanian pastor Richard Wurmbrand, who celebrated Easter in a communist prison after being tortured for his faith — proving that resurrection hope can’t be chained, silenced, or taken away.

In just a few minutes, this episode will challenge you to:

• Identify the “Friday” in your life — the place that feels hopeless

• Remember that God still writes Sundays

• Bring resurrection hope to someone who needs it this week

Because the empty tomb means something powerful:

The worst thing is never the last thing when Jesus is involved.

If this episode encouraged you, subscribe, follow, and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify so more people can hear God’s Word every Monday morning.

Your calling isn’t just what you do — it’s how you live.

In this powerful episode the conversation of marriage continues with our in house counselor Ana Simmons. This time we go into the often-unspoken struggles faced by those suffering silently within their marriage. We expose the emotional and spiritual challenges that come with hidden pain, offering thoughtful insights on how to present these struggles before God with honesty and faith, even in fear and denial. Join us as we discuss practical ways to navigate these difficult circumstances, find hope, and seek healing while honoring both your personal journey and your commitment to your marriage.

And Ana tells a story of a personal friend who visited the afterlife in a near death experience and saw his favorite dog that had passed. Plus a sad baby Opossum update from Nina.

This week on Movie Torture, Brad, Jacob, and MTD set out to review Agent Recon… and accidentally spend most of the episode questioning reality, anatomy, and whether MTD is secretly the Matrix.

The movie itself? Chuck Norris plays a robot… kind of. There’s red ash, magic mana, aliens, and a rule that you can only kill enemies by shooting them in the liver—which immediately sends the guys into a full breakdown because none of them know where the liver is. At one point, the conversation turns into a survival strategy of “just aim somewhere in the torso and hope for the best.”

But the real highlight isn’t the movie—it’s the spirals.

Within minutes, they’ve:

1. Debated uploading MTD’s brain into a cyborg and whether he’d save humanity or just bring a TV remote to a gunfight
2. Planned a full production of Monkey Cop like it’s a legitimate Hollywood contender
3. Argued about who would survive an alien invasion (spoiler: nobody, because they’re all aiming for the wrong organs)
4. Gone deep into Total Gym infomercials and somehow turned it into a Rocky-style training montage between two grown men in an apartment
5. Discussed who’s dying first between Dick Van Dyke and Mel Brooks like it’s a Vegas betting line
6. And briefly turned the episode into an emotional moment about not wanting each other to die… before immediately going back to poop jokes and cyborg dads

Meanwhile, Agent Recon keeps happening in the background—barely. There’s a random daughter subplot nobody asked for, villains that look like the same three guys in different hoodies, and Chuck Norris showing up just long enough to remind everyone this movie technically has a legend in it.

By the end, there’s an explosion, a memory chip, and zero clarity—just like the episode itself.

It’s less of a movie review and more of a chaotic hangout where the movie loses and the tangents win.

Follow Movie Torture here:

https://www.instagram.com/movietorturepod/

Buy Merch here:

https://www.bonfire.com/store/the-hopecast-network-swag/

This show is brought to you by The Hopecast Network

https://www.instagram.com/hopecastnetwork/

This week on Made Up Movie, Brad Lowe brings what he confidently calls “the greatest idea of his life” (ranking just behind his marriage), and Nikki immediately realizes she’s either witnessing genius… or the beginning of a cinematic crime.

Welcome to the birth of Monkey Cop.

The episode starts normal—talking musicals, Muppets, and whether anyone over 25 should legally be allowed inside Spencer’s—before Brad drops a fully developed, slightly concerning cinematic universe that he’s apparently been building in his head for years.

We’re talking:

1. A chain-smoking, beer-drinking chimp cop
2. A washed-up human partner one write-up away from getting fired
3. A PG-13 movie that somehow includes drugs, bar fights, and monkey hookups
4. A VHS intro featuring a monkey watching edited adult tapes (yes, really)

And that’s just the pitch.

From there, things spiral beautifully.

Brad unveils:

1. A full trilogy (with escalating banana-based subtitles)
2. A spin-off called The Splooge (yes, that’s a real sentence)
3. A cartoon series
4. A prequel origin story
5. Merchandising plans like he’s already met with Disney

Meanwhile, Nikki is trying to keep things grounded by asking reasonable questions like:

“Should this be CGI or a real monkey?”

…and Brad responds with a deep dive into real-life monkey crime documentaries and a former coworker who is now apparently in prison.

Because of course.

They also:

1. Debate casting like this is actually greenlit (Glenn Powell, Sydney Sweeney, Channing Tatum—Monkey Cop is STACKED)
2. Accidentally turn the movie into a mashup of Ted, Superbad, and Miami Vice
3. Create a musical number about cocaine mid-conversation
4. And somehow land on a stalker subplot where Nikki plays a woman obsessed with Monkey Cop’s clothing… and potentially his poop

Yes. That happens.

By the end, no one is entirely sure what just happened—but they are sure of one thing:

Monkey Cop is either movie gold… or the exact reason Hollywood should have stricter rules.

Either way, this episode proves one thing:

You don’t need a real movie to have a better time than most real movies.

Just another completely normal episode of Movie Torture. Follow Movie Torture here:

https://www.instagram.com/movietorturepod/

Buy Merch here:

https://www.bonfire.com/store/the-hopecast-network-swag/

This show is brought to you by The Hopecast Network

https://www.instagram.com/hopecastnetwork/

In this episode of Your Weekly Calling, Brad Lowe dives into the tense relationship between David and King Saul in 1 Samuel 18–24 and what it teaches us about leadership, integrity, and trusting God when the person in charge has completely lost perspective.

Saul couldn’t see what God was doing. Jealousy and fear turned him against the very man helping his kingdom succeed. Spears were thrown. Trust was shattered. Yet David refused to become the villain in someone else’s broken leadership story.

Brad also shares a powerful historical moment from Abraham Lincoln and Edwin Stanton that shows how choosing character over revenge can change everything.

If you’ve ever worked under a difficult boss, a controlling leader, or someone who simply refuses to see things God’s way, this episode will challenge you to guard your character, trust God with your future, and remember something powerful:

You may not control your leadership, but you always control your integrity.

Listen in for a quick challenge that could completely reshape how you handle tough leadership this week.

And if this episode encouraged you, make sure to follow the show, subscribe, and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to help others discover Your Weekly Calling.

Because your calling isn’t just what you do — it’s how you live.

Follow Brad Here:

https://www.instagram.com/bradlowe1979/

This show is brought to you by The Hopecast Network

https://www.instagram.com/hopecastnetwork/

The Heart Convictions Podcast welcomes The Hopecast Networks own Brad Lowe for an episode about marriage. One of our biggest earthly lessons. Brad and Nina hammer out the hard parts of living for your spouse along with lighthearted joking. Like why are men leaving their beard confetti all over the sink!?!

Nina also announces her new found pet, a baby Opossum, and Brad questions her and the opossum’s longevity.

This is will be a series favorite. Follow Nina Here:

https://www.instagram.com/ninapalmertexas/

This show is brought to you by The Hopecast Network

https://www.instagram.com/hopecastnetwork/

On this episode of Movie Torture, Brad, Jacob and MTD attempt to review Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle, but instead spend most of the episode debating who’s hotter (Lucy Liu vs. Cameron Diaz), planning MTD’s funeral, and figuring out who inherits the Hopecast Network when Brad inevitably dies mid-podcast.

Before the movie even gets going, Jacob celebrates his 85th episode milestone while Brad reminds him that his job security is entirely based on pretending Jacob is the funniest person on the show. Meanwhile, MTD continues his role as the mysterious, silent, possibly imaginary overlord of the podcast, but with worse communication skills and a tendency to ignore texts.

Eventually, they remember there’s a movie.

Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle is described as a film where Hollywood gathered every famous person from the early 2000s, paid them millions of dollars, and then forgot to write a coherent plot. Instead, the movie focuses on three “agents” whose primary mission appears to be fighting crime while wearing increasingly impractical outfits and defying every known law of physics.

Highlights include:

1. A Mongolian bar fight that looks like it was filmed in 1845 but somehow includes a mechanical bull
2. A helicopter that gets started mid-air while free-falling (a moment Brad compares to Kobe Bryant)
3. Drew Barrymore sliding across tables without moving her feet like she’s in The Matrix: Low Budget Edition
4. Lucy Liu being criminally underpaid while also being the only competent person in the movie
5. Cameron Diaz earning $20 million to act confused for two hours

The guys also uncover the true plot of the movie, which involves:

Two magic rings (basically Lord of the Rings for people who failed geometry), a witness protection list nobody understands, and Demi Moore showing up to remind everyone she’s still the coolest person on screen.

But the real story of this episode isn’t the movie—it’s the complete unraveling of the podcast itself.

Somehow, the conversation spirals into:

1. Whether MTD died by driving into a Country Kitchen and ordering waffles afterward
2. A full succession plan where Jacob inherits the network and immediately cancels everything to avoid paying podcast hosting fees
3. Brad forcing his son into podcast slavery via his will
4. A hypothetical skydiving scenario where Brad tries to take Jacob and MTD down with him out of spite
5. The possibility of replacing Brad with a hologram or re-releasing old episodes like he’s a podcast Tupac

Follow Movie Torture here:

https://www.instagram.com/movietorturepod/

Buy Merch here:

https://www.bonfire.com/store/the-hopecast-network-swag/

This show is brought to you by The Hopecast Network

https://www.instagram.com/hopecastnetwork/

Most of us push through exhaustion, convinced it's a sign of weakness. But what if true strength lies in recognizing when you're running on empty? Brad unpacks a powerful biblical story about Elijah that reveals how God meets us not in our triumphs, but in our lowest moments—and why rest is a spiritual act of courage.

After one of his greatest miracles in 1 Kings 18, Elijah faces a threat from Jezebel and crashes emotionally. What follows is a surprising lesson: God doesn't rebuke Elijah for his exhaustion—instead, He cares for him physically before caring for his soul. Through gentle whispers, food, and rest, Elijah learns that sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do is pause, listen, and restore.

You'll discover:

1. Why spiritual lows are often a sign of human limits, not failure
2. How God prioritizes physical care before spiritual correction
3. The power of quiet moments and rest in renewing your faith
4. Why vulnerability and exhaustion are part of the human experience, even for the strongest believers
5. Practical steps to rest well without guilt, especially when you're emotionally drained

In a world that champions hustle, this episode reminds you that true strength comes from acknowledging your limits—and trusting God's care in your lows. If you're feeling spiritually tired, overwhelmed, or just in need of encouragement to pause and reset, this conversation is for you.

Perfect for anyone navigating burnout, seeking deeper faith, or desiring to understand God's gentle approach, this episode offers hope, practical wisdom, and a fresh perspective on God's presence during our most vulnerable moments.

Let's learn from Elijah: sometimes, the greatest act of faith is resting in God's whisper.