How J.H. Ranch is Transforming Families Through Faith and Adventure

What if one week away could transform your relationship with your child—and your relationship with God?

In this episode of the Dad to Dads Podcast, host Robert sits down with Rob Hinkle, Guest Engagement & Generosity Advisor at JH Ranch, to unpack what makes this legendary Christian guest ranch one of the most life-changing experiences for fathers, families, and men.

From its humble beginnings in Northern California to its global impact, Rob shares the powerful story behind JH Ranch, a faith-based guest ranch focused on restoring hearts, strengthening families, and creating generational transformation. This conversation dives deep into father-child relationships, biblical leadership, men’s spiritual growth, and why intentional, distraction-free environments matter more than ever.

You’ll hear about:

• The mission and history of JH Ranch
• Why they say “We’re not a camp—we’re a guest ranch”
• Father-son and father-daughter experiences that change lives
• Men’s retreats focused on healing, purpose, and masculinity
• Faith, vulnerability, and community among men
• Teen anxiety, technology, and why unplugging matters
• How every activity—from zip lines to wilderness solos—has purpose
• Global impact through JH Outback and leadership programs worldwide

Whether you’re a dad, husband, or man searching for deeper purpose, this episode will challenge and inspire you to invest intentionally in your faith, your family, and the legacy you’re building.

🔗 Learn more about JH Ranch: jhranch.com

Dad to Dads Podcast on IG www.instagram.com/dadtodads

🎧 Subscribe for more conversations on fatherhood, faith, leadership, and personal growth.

Transcript

Robert Poirier (00:00)
Rob Hinkle, welcome to the Dad to Dads Podcast.

Rob Hinckle (00:03)
Thanks, Robert. Happy to be here.

Robert Poirier (00:04)
Hey, so you are, you focus on guest engagement as well as, uh, generosity or generosity advisor at J H ranch. And, uh, look, I appreciate you coming on. want to hear more about it. reason why is, and how I heard of J H ranch is a client of mine had attended this past summer with their daughter. Uh, and literally when he got back, he could not stop talking about his experience.

And how transformative it was for, for their relationship, but also for them individually. And then, um, I'm at a opening season dove hunt down in South Alabama. I'm sure I think it was South Georgia, South Alabama, South Alabama. And we're sitting there big spread for lunch and everything else. And I don't even know if I've told you this story. Um, big spread, big spread.

bunch of people, probably 30, 40 people in randomly two guys, uh, sitting kind of catty corner from each other. And I'm somewhat in the middle, start talking about JH ranch. They had been down, they had been to the, to the camp with, you know, each of them with one of their children and were going on and on about the time they had had and, know, and how impactful it was. So that led me to, okay.

I got to find out what is J.H. Ranch. So I'm literally out there at the edge of the field Googling J.H. Ranch. What is it? And so I'm all right, I want to have one of these guys on here. I want to find out about it. So look, I appreciate you coming on and I want to learn more.

Rob Hinckle (01:51)
Well, one thing right out of the gate, and I hope you don't take offense to this, our founder will appreciate that I clarify this. We're not a camp. We are a guest ranch. We don't have campers. We have guests. And that's really, we're very purposeful about not calling us. It has a lot of similarities to a camp, but it is a guest ranch. We got horses. We got horse riding. It is a full-on guest ranch. And that's what we try to promote is the fact that we're a guest ranch.

Robert Poirier (02:03)
Okay.

And it is amazing with the pictures and everything that all the activities that you guys do. And it's, it's a Christian focused, ⁓ experience as well. Yeah.

Rob Hinckle (02:24)
⁓ it's beautiful.

Absolutely, yes it is. ⁓ All biblical principles

behind all of our content and everything that we do for sure.

Robert Poirier (02:40)
So, but before we get into that, I would love for you just to give me an overview of J.H. Ranch. Like how did it get started? How long has it been around? And what, you know, what's the mission? And then eventually I want to get into the different activities that you guys provide or the, you know, the different experiences. Cause I know there's several, I know there's some with father and children. I think you have a mother and children.

And then there's some for individually. know that when I was looking at, there's some just for men as well. And so really just kind of wanted to go through the history of it first and as well as the overall mission.

Rob Hinckle (03:19)
Great, happy to share it. So, ⁓ I guess to clarify, I've been with the organization full-time capacity for, it'll be three years April 1st. So I've had three summers at the ranch on staff and this will be my fourth summer coming up this year. And it's been around for 45 years. And really it goes back to the father of our founder. Our founder and president is Bruce Johnston and his parents, Jean and Joy Johnston.

are really at the heart and the birth of this story. A couple in California met when they were young, got married, had 12 children along the way. So actually a dozen children they had. And early in Gene's life, he made this commitment to God. He said, God, if you will provide the resources, I will invest them in a manner that will have eternal value.

And it wasn't something that he said a lot or told even his wife about. the the the lore of the story is that his wife overheard him making this commitment that God, you give me the resources, I'll use them on a man who has eternal value. That's in his 20s, so 12 children. He was a real estate developer, apartment complexes, rentals in Orange County in California, south of LA.

And they lived, if you talk to any of the children, they lived sparingly. They all knew the value of a penny, a nickel. They were taught to provide for themselves at the earliest age possible. Bruce tells some great stories of growing up and the house was so packed they lived in that he would build a tree fort in the backyard and actually moved into the backyard and ran extension cables out and all kind of stuff.

In his early 50s, Gene, and he'd had a successful run at some apartment and complex development and rentals and management. He had a banker friend that had heard about a piece of property up in Medford, Oregon, and encouraged Gene to fly up there with him. And historically, Gene had been very opposed to small planes, private jets, being the father of 12, just from a safety perspective, he didn't trust it.

And this guy said, well, I've got a banker that's got a private plane and he's willing to fly us up. We can get up there and back. It won't take much time. at this time in his life, his kids had gotten older. He said, you know, why not? Let's let's take the plane. And as they were flying up, they hit a front that was coming down from from the north and they were forced to land. They could not make it to Medford. They landed in Scott Valley, which is in northern California.

and it just began snowing. They were going to be there for two or three days. And being a real estate guy, he said, well, let's get a car and let's just drive around and look at property that's maybe for sale and see what's available here. it's Siskiyou County is the county that we're in. Scott Valley is the beautiful big valley. And then we're off up a little street called French Creek. ⁓

Robert Poirier (06:22)
Okay.

Rob Hinckle (06:30)
At the bottom of French Creek where it comes in a little highway going through the Scott Valley, he saw a sign J.H. Ranch for sale. And it was actually called J.H. Ranch back then. So they drive up this winding road several miles up into the forest and up a mountain and along this beautiful creek. And they find it looks like an old hunting lodge. It was kind of the Scott Valley men's weekend. Go and get a drink.

and pretend you're type lodge, not in very good shape. he ends up, I haven't heard this, but I have to believe that he got a sense of the Holy Spirit and was like, is how I'm going to fulfill my commitment I made to God. He through, he finds out how much, you know, he negotiates a price and

Robert Poirier (07:01)
Right.

Rob Hinckle (07:25)
Before he decides to purchase it, he calls his oldest son, is Bruce, who is our, who we consider our founder, who was very, started a very successful career in youth ministry at some churches in Southern California, had really had some major impacts on a school and just grown a youth program from a dozen kids to over 150 in a matter of a couple of years. And it really found his niche in catering to

teenagers, middle school, early high school children, and develop messaging and content around that. So Gene calls Bruce, says, hey, I found this property, describes it a little bit to him. He's like, I want to purchase it and I want you to come up here and run it as a youth camp. And Bruce is like, well, that's great, Dad. You know, caught me little off guard. How much time do you want to give me to consider this? And he said, well, I...

actually I need to know in about 24 hours. So why don't you call me tomorrow and let me know what you decided. And, you know, of course I wouldn't be sitting here Bruce hadn't called back the next morning and said, OK, I'm in. And he said, Bruce tells a story of when the whole family drove up to see the new property that Jean had bought, which the other part of that was Jean had been saving up that entire, you know, 20 to 50 and not.

sharing it with the family, but I mean they've been living minimally and he had been saving to hopefully fulfill this promise one day that if he had the resources he would be able to do this. So they purchased the ranch, Bruce says they get up there and the pool is green with frogs in it. There's not one fence that's standing straight. There's like an anorexic horse standing out in the valley.

Robert Poirier (08:53)
Right.

Hahaha

Rob Hinckle (09:14)
with brown grass surrounding it. And he said it was just like, what have we done? know, what dad just spent the family fortune on this, you know, money pit. And so they started, the family began working on the property, getting it up to shape, cleaning it, restoring it. And Bruce started across the country trying to recruit his first round of guests. that's 1979 was when they bought the property and

Bruce planned in 1980, the summer of 1980, he would offer his first program and called it Second Wind. He named the program Second Wind. Targeted at young teenage boys as kind of a rite of passage, ⁓ guest ranch experience, slaudering a cow, killing like a real like things that we just don't do anymore. But it's kind of there's some value if you know where your food comes from.

Robert Poirier (09:48)
Okay.

Right, right.

Yeah,

yeah.

Rob Hinckle (10:09)
using the outdoors, using some challenging adventures, and then some biblical content along with it. And for his first summer, he had five girls that showed up. And two of the five were his sisters, And for some reason, he attracted some from here in Alabama and Birmingham and ⁓ had just a great first summer.

His dad approaches him after that first few sessions that summer with just five girls and says, hey, I'm going to start building some more cabins. And Bruce is like, Dad, we just had five girls show up. Why are you why are we building more cabins? And Gene just had the faith he knew something eternal was destined for this property and he knew it would continue to. God had just anointed it. ⁓

that the fruit came of the first five and it just started growing from there. And it grew consistently. Again, that was 1980. And over the next 12 years, they kept adding ⁓ more sessions, more people from across the country were coming, but it was a heavy Southeastern ⁓ kind of presence for some, know, the Bible Belt maybe, it was biblical. ⁓ Didn't get a lot of Californians coming to it.

Robert Poirier (11:25)
Yeah.

Rob Hinckle (11:29)
And it got so popular that the demand parents started witnessing their teenage children come home literally transformed just a different person. And they're like, we want to come, but we want to come out and experience the ranch. And I'll kind of hit as I'm going through this history, I'm probably going to hit on some of the programs and then I can come back and revisit the programs a little bit later, more detail.

Robert Poirier (11:50)
No, want, yeah, I want you to.

Rob Hinckle (11:55)
So in 1992, we did our first father son program. And the really the the heart of this program and it's really become more of almost a flagship than our student programs was it's supported by the verse Malachi 4 6 that he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the hearts of the children to their fathers. And that is our that's our verse as an organization. He mentioned.

vision and mission and the way our handbook states that our vision is to transform communities one family at a time. So when we have a family, a couple, a person, a member of a family that come to the ranch, our intention is that if nothing happens at the ranch should stay at the ranch. It should all be transferable back into your life, back into your home, your friends, your community. So that's

That is our vision is to transform communities one family at a time. And our mission is to teach and model how to love God and love others through the use of practical applications and the use of practical applications. You might say, what does that mean? And it's through challenges. It's through risk. It's through putting people in physical situations, not them hearing and seeing, but actually doing and then experiencing and learning through that experience how to love God and love others.

So everything we do has a purpose. Nothing is just to fill time. Like every activity is designed about reinforcing some of the content or some of the messaging or the lessons that we're trying to teach while someone's at the ranch, whatever program it may be.

Robert Poirier (13:23)
Yeah.

And real quick, ⁓ that's what I heard too, is, is when we were, when they were telling me the different activities they were doing, ⁓ that was what really got me to like, but everything, whether it's the zip line, the rope walk or whatever, I can't remember what they called it. ⁓ the big blob out in the water. Yeah.

Rob Hinckle (13:57)
Yeah, that's the blob. It's called the blob.

Yeah.

Robert Poirier (13:59)
Yeah, yeah. But they said that

there's a purpose. It's not just, we're going to go jump on the blob for an hour. You know, we're going to do that. Like there's really a purpose behind everything.

Rob Hinckle (14:10)
There is, ⁓ I hope we do stay focused on the ranch, but as the history goes, there's other arms of the ministry that have been born out of this walk that the Johnston family have been on. One of them was they had an encounter with ⁓ the mayor of Ariel Israel, Ariel Israel, Ron Nachman, and this was in the late 90s.

And through their connection and relationship they built with Ron Nachman, there was a student foreign student exchange with Israel for them to send some of their teens over to the ranch to serve on our crew and for us to send some students over to Israel. Through that, Ron actually came to the ranch and spent a week at the ranch. And by the end of the week, he pulled Heather and Bruce Johnson. Heather is Bruce's wife aside and said,

We have to have one of these in Israel. And I want to help make this happen in Ariel Israel, which led to the building and development of the National Leadership Center, J.H. Israel's National Leadership Center in Israel, just outside of Ariel, which now is a for the officer training in the Israeli Army. This is a requirement. Every officer that's in the Israeli Army goes to the National Leadership Center.

And since it got finished in 1997, I believe it's actually no, was 2010 was when it was completed. 1997 was when they had the encounter with Ron Nachman. 2010 was when the National Leadership Center opened. They've had over 100,000 Israelis go through the National Leadership Center, which out of Israel now was born USIA, which is United States Israel Education Association. And Heather.

Robert Poirier (15:56)
Wow.

Rob Hinckle (16:03)
is the founder of all of that. So Bruce's wife is the lead on everything Israel. And she's now she takes Congress trips with congressmen to Israel to teach them on the history of Israel to stress the importance of the partnership between the United States and Israel. She was behind some of the funding of Iron Dome ⁓ in Israel for us for our Congress to sign off on the funds allocation to help Israel build the protective

infrastructure that they have over there. And she continues to consult our Congress and probably through them, even our president ⁓ on Israel policy and how our relationship should be with Israel.

Robert Poirier (16:46)
that's interesting. Is that Christian based over there? Or is that more Judaism? Old Testament.

Rob Hinckle (16:50)
It is Old Testament. It's based on

the Torah and Israel scripture. They use, think, the life of David to do a lot of the lessons at the National Leadership Center. So it's primarily focused on Old Testament. But Heather nor us or any of our employees that work, we don't hide what we believe. we, you know, we hope that one day all of them will come on board with us ⁓ to believe Jesus is who he says he is.

Robert Poirier (17:01)
Okay.

Right. Right.

Yeah, yeah. All right. That's interesting. I had no idea about that. Let's go back to the ranch So tell me more about that.

Rob Hinckle (17:27)
⁓ So okay, so parent-child, 92, so we start having parent-child and the dad-son grows into dad-daughters and eventually into moms and sons and daughters. So every summer we have six week-long sessions of parents and teens. ⁓ There is one week that is father-daughter only. We call that sweet week. I went to that one with my youngest daughter in 2018.

And we have it's about 120 to 125 pairs come through each one of those six sessions throughout the summer. So that's our parent-son-daughter program. And that program focuses on and I don't want to give away too much of the week, but there's this rhythm of the week. There's an initial day of fun with fun at the lake. You mentioned the blob. There's a lot of other apparatuses around the lake. It's called

Robert Poirier (18:14)
Right, right.

Rob Hinckle (18:24)
We call it ice breaking. We want to break the ice on day one. So we do that through fun first. So we have lake day, rodeo day is the first day. So we have a rodeo where there's both like traditional rodeo activities, but also competitions between the different teams of parents, sons and daughters. And then we have an open lake day that afternoon where people are doing just crazy life threatening stuff on our lake. But it's, it's, we call it challenge by choice.

Everything is challenged by choice. We're not forcing you to do everything. But it's amazing how many dads ⁓ act like they're in their teens again when they get out there. We have more injuries on that day than any day of the whole program. Yes, absolutely from the dads. ⁓ Then we get into the there's there's four activities. So there's Rodeo Lake Day.

Robert Poirier (19:03)
That is what I've heard. Yeah, I've heard that. I've heard that.

I'm sure. Yeah, from the dads.

Rob Hinckle (19:20)
There is four activity days and then there is a what we call solo banquet day. So rodeo lake day and solo banquet day are the of the bookends of the week and the activity days you kind of get into a rhythm of ⁓ solo time in the morning. So we give everybody an hour in the morning before breakfast to just be in the word. We take them through the book of James. We give them the book of James in their notebook. There's five chapters in the book of James. So each morning they read a chapter of the book of James.

⁓ breakfast and then we call it family time where you have an hour with the person that you came with. So this is really it's about building the if I could sum up the week it's building your relationship with God and building your relationship with the person that you came with and through building those two when you go back into your community your family you're going to it's going to change how you relate to other people as well.

Robert Poirier (20:13)
And that's exactly what I've heard. When they said transformative with their relationship, for my client, with his relationship with his daughter, but also them individually and their relationship, individually being their relationship with God.

Rob Hinckle (20:27)
Yeah.

If you think about it, I don't know of many opportunities for a dad or a parent period to take a week and spend it with one child. And I think just a parent doing that carries weight with the impact on that child.

Robert Poirier (20:50)
And it's just one child. So I have two sons. couldn't go and take both of my sons. I'd have to flip a coin. Okay. There you go. There you go. There you go. Okay. But it'd be, I would be there with one of them individually and then the next one. Okay. And that makes sense to get that one-on-one time. Cause otherwise it would be too challenging.

Rob Hinckle (20:55)
That's correct. You'd have to, you'd get to, you would get to come twice, not have to come twice, you'd get to come twice.

That's right.

And we have the content and it's most of it is activities during the day. I mean, it's really program activity risk based. We've got the ropes courses, which I think you were mentioning. We've got zip lines. We have this thing called the screaming eagle, which you've probably seen an amusement park where they they strap you in with the person you came with. We pull you up 50 feet and you swing out over the valley. ⁓

Robert Poirier (21:30)
That's it. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes.

Rob Hinckle (21:39)
There's low courses, which are some of the most powerful exercises that we do. It's just you, you know, with your the person that you came with going through some low course activities that stress communication, trust ⁓ the. So you do a lot of it together, the afternoons when we get into the content, it's typically later in the afternoon and we'll separate the parents and the children.

The dads and moms go to a lakeside venue to hear content there. The children, the teenagers go to poolside to hear content there. Similar messaging, but just delivered more age appropriately based on the two settings. ⁓ Dinner, and then that night we have a big top. We have a big top tent that's at the very bottom of the valley that the ranch is situated in.

Robert Poirier (22:17)
Right.

Rob Hinckle (22:28)
And again, can't reinforce if someone just goes to the website, jtrench.com, just the landing page and look at the picture there in the video there. It is that beautiful, if not more beautiful if you're physically there. But the Big Top will close the day with ⁓ worship and then ⁓ we call it an impartation. the themes of the those are the the the big rock messages happen in the Big Top.

When you're with your child, you're all together on your team. Life purpose, you what did God create you for? And it's to love him and love others. Now, you may have a vocation, you may have these other things, but your purpose in life. And Bruce does an amazing talk about, you know, if we're a creation, then therefore there is a creator. And if there's a creator, most creations are created with a purpose. If you think about the automobile.

Henry Ford created it to get you from point A to point B. It didn't just evolve out of a parking lot. And all of a sudden you had a Ford, you know. Right, correct. And it took it took the will of an intelligent being to create it. And if you think about how complex we are and not to get into a whole, you know, discussion on evolution versus Christ, but there is there is a creator and there is a purpose.

Robert Poirier (23:32)
Right, right. Wasn't just to sit there.

yeah,

yeah.

Rob Hinckle (23:54)
And think the Bible is who tells us what that purpose is. And it can be summed up in loving Him and loving others.

Robert Poirier (24:01)
So tell me also there's individual or not. don't know if it's individual, but I know that there's some, uh, just men only programs as well. Correct.

Rob Hinckle (24:14)
Yep, so that's parent, son, daughter talked about that. The children, they're still student programs. So Second Wind, which was our initial flagship program, that still exists. there's, it's, there's Challenge, Second Wind, Track Two Bike, and Track Two Mountain. So after my daughters, I have two daughters, after they came out to the ranch with me,

They had aged out already by the time I took them to go to the challenge program, but they came back and they went to Second Wind, which is a two week program for, I think you need to be a freshman or sophomore in high school to attend Second Wind. And it is really just for, yes, just for kids. And it is, it is, it's a leadership program, biblically based, but it is building young leaders that will hopefully be

Robert Poirier (24:58)
And that's just for the kids. Okay. Okay.

Rob Hinckle (25:10)
adult leaders that help lead this country in the future. And that second wind program is anchored around a 24-hour solo in the wilderness. So we're surrounded by federal lands, the Klamath mountains are behind us, and then Russian wilderness is this big wilderness area, federally designated wilderness area. This right kind of sits above, like if you're in the ranch proper and you look up,

you're looking up into the Russian wilderness in Northern California. We have a ⁓ location we take the students to and then we disperse them into an area where each one of them is by themselves, cannot see. They're in hollering distance if they need help, but they're visibly can't see anyone else. So it's complete solo time in the wilderness just to get with God, wrestle with him.

contemplate the lessons they've heard, learned, and just see where they're called in life. That's kind of the heart of the Second Wind Program. Challenge is a little bit younger. That's eighth and ninth graders come to the Challenge Program. It is really fun focused. It's surfing in the Pacific. It's camping in the Redwoods Forest. It's jet boats on the Rogue River in Oregon. There's some great content, but it's

Robert Poirier (26:12)
Just listen.

Rob Hinckle (26:32)
At that age, it's let's have fun and then come back for second wind, which I just described. And then after you go through the second wind program, you can come back for track two. And both of my girls did well, because of COVID one only did one. But my oldest daughter did track two bike and mountain. And then my youngest daughter did track two mountain. Track two bike is a hundred and nine mile bike from ⁓ not far away from the ranch all the way to the Pacific coast. So it's an overnight bike trip to the coast.

And then Track 2 Mountain is attempting to summit Mount Shasta, which is a 14,000 foot mountain in northern California. Yeah, and they're

Robert Poirier (27:12)
Sounds

sounds fun. I mean I we had nothing like that when I was a kid nothing at all. Are you are you getting? No Where do you draw? Where do you draw kids from all over or is it?

Rob Hinckle (27:15)
So many.

I don't feel that there's much like this anywhere else that I don't care about.

yeah, all over. ⁓ I typically do the welcome at the parent-son daughter and kind of the opening thing. We see where's everybody from and we'll have anywhere from 20 to 30 states represented at any given week and a lot of times one or two countries as well. ⁓

Robert Poirier (27:47)
I was going to ask

you if there's ever been anybody from outside.

Rob Hinckle (27:51)
yeah, Canada, we typically have, you know, a handful of Canadians that attend during the summer. We've got one of our one of our anchors with our outback arm is New Zealand. And Australia, New Zealand will typically have, you know, a couple of couples from there. And then we've had Europe, different countries in Europe as well that have attended.

Robert Poirier (28:14)
That's wonderful. You know, the, the other thing that I have that all three of the people speaking, um, talked about was the staff and how phenomenal they were, they former guests of, uh, you know, of J H ranch or

Rob Hinckle (28:34)
Amazingly enough, not all of them are. The majority are, but not every single one. It depends on year to year what ratio have never stepped foot on the ranch before. But I think even in the last three years since I've been out there, think there's Kylie, a third seems high, but I want to say one summer, like a third of the crew, we call them crew is what we call it. It's about 150 college students.

that volunteer to come out for the summer and give their summer to us. Of course, we house them, we feed them, we have a program for them throughout the summer where they're getting content as well. I would say it's even more the premier leadership program than our second win program is too. So they come out and learn how to be servant-hearted leaders for our guests. And they're really, I always use the term secret sauce, but they're our

It's not a secret. ⁓ They're our special sauce. They are who are our guests during contact more than our staff. I they're they're in contact more with our crew than they are with us, the full time staff. Now we'll bring them out two to two and a half weeks ahead of the first guest arriving. And there's a complete curriculum. We take them through. They learn their areas they're going to be working in. They know what we mean by excellence. They know what we mean by hospitality. ⁓

Robert Poirier (29:35)
Yeah. Yeah.

Rob Hinckle (30:00)
one of our sayings at the ranch around hospitality is the answer is always yes. What is the question? So if you have a need, we're going to do our best to meet it regardless of how crazy it might be, which most of time we don't get a lot of crazy ones, but we have had some for sure. And we had, I want to say it was 40, 40 some odd, more than 40 colleges represented last summer with that college crew with a heavy

Robert Poirier (30:14)
I'm sure.

Rob Hinckle (30:30)
Sanford here in Birmingham, Auburn is a huge anchor for us. then Clemson has begun to be another big ⁓ anchor college for our crew, ⁓ where they're even taking some of our content and doing some college programs on J.H. Outback University at Auburn and soon to be at Clemson is another, just it's another way we're But they, so they're, yes, they could have come through.

Robert Poirier (30:54)
Gosh, that's wonderful.

Rob Hinckle (30:58)
It could be word of mouth from someone who's been through. It could be through our recruiting and social media campaigns to attract people to sign up and interview. We're finishing up hiring right now. Actually, by the end of this month, we should have all of our crew hired for this summer. And yeah, there'll be a good number of them that have never set foot on the property before.

Robert Poirier (31:20)
That's interesting. Well, again, they went on and on all three of them, all three of the men went on and on about the staff and even one of them was talking about, you know, well, I'll tell you what, I mean, if I'm ever looking for, you know, juniors to come in, if they have J.H. Ranch on their resume, they're automatically hired. ⁓ You know, so obviously, it made quite the impression, they made quite the impression on the guests there.

Rob Hinckle (31:39)
You

I tell you, they

work their tails off and they love it though too. We had, and the other program I want to mention, which I think you kind of brought up was the men's program. Last summer, so the men's program is at the tail end of the summer. We only have that window of when kids are out of school that we can do the full programs with parent and teens and students. So the men's program was at the tail end of the summer. And a lot of, most of our college crew had to go back home as well.

Robert Poirier (31:52)
That's it. That's what they said to

Yeah, that's what I want to go into.

Right.

Rob Hinckle (32:18)
And we had a remnant of the crew stay. We only had 61 men, which was we had 30 that we've had two years of our men's program. So had 30 men come out in 2024. We had 61 men come out last year in August. And this remnant of crew that stayed and volunteered to stay longer and help us put on the men's week. They had to work in multiple different departments, which is not something they're asked to do all summer.

and they worked a lot more hours. And I had multiple of them the last night of our men's week come up to me and say, this was my favorite week of the whole summer. Even though they worked harder, slept less. Granted, it was maybe a new program. So they were getting to see something different and watch these dads and older men come through in a solo capacity. But I can't speak more highly of our crew that we hire and come out and work. And it's typically

Robert Poirier (32:52)
Really?

You

Rob Hinckle (33:13)
Maybe most are one and don't you want they give us one summer, but the longest tenure of most crew is a three-year They'll come back out my youngest daughter did it three years in a row and at that point by your third year You're kind of like the senior in high school. Like I'm ready to graduate. I'm ready to go on and do something different

Robert Poirier (33:27)
Right. Yeah. Yeah.

Well too, you're out of college by then and you don't have those free summers anymore because hopefully you're out of college and you're, ⁓ being productive and you don't, you don't get summers off anymore. That was the end. Tell me more about the men's program.

Rob Hinckle (33:32)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

So when I came on in 23, and this was from a really probably from a selfish guest perspective, like I said, I came through with my two daughters, 2015, 2018, through the parent-son daughter program. My wife and I had come back in 2021 and Scott River Lodge is a married couples retreat that's about 40 miles away from the ranch. So it's a five-star resort that is all marriage programming.

But I always thought, man, I wish I had more kids just so I could come back to the ranch one more time. And then I started thinking, well, why don't we? Like, how many other men are there like me that over last 45 years have come through a program with their child and then watched their child go out two or three more summers and come back with these amazing experiences and growth and just stories? And what would it look like if we tried to do something?

just for men. we started, I did some kind of, during dinner during that summer of 23, I would talk to some of the dads like, what if we did a men's program? What would it look like? What if we did this? Would you get, could you give up a week of your life? Because coming with a child is one commitment. Coming and leaving your family and your business all by yourself for a week is a whole nother level of commitment. And

Robert Poirier (35:01)
You can justify that. Right.

Rob Hinckle (35:09)
I was trying to come up with new stuff that would attract them. And then I finally asked, so what if it was like the Second Wind program? Like that program your child came to right after they'd been out here with you. And we had 24 hours in the wilderness, solo time, and we modeled it a lot after that student program, Second Wind. And it was amazing the number of dad were like, I maybe could get back out here for that. Like that really sounds intriguing. ⁓ Sounds like something that I would like to do. So we did that and our

When we come up with a new program, we try to start with what's the mission of this program. And the team, it was a team of us that developed the Men's Week. We spent a lot of time on that initial mission. And it was fully reconcile the hearts of fathers to their Holy Father. And then we got into some John Eldridge. I don't know if you've read Fathered by God. And the journey of masculinity.

Robert Poirier (35:59)
yeah. Yep.

Rob Hinckle (36:03)
wounding. mean, there's a, and I think John Eldridge is happy with people using his content, but there's a lot of reconciling our hearts to our Heavenly Father, but then that journey of masculinity and using that as a roadmap for men as to how we become who we are, stages that maybe we didn't go through well or skipped altogether, where wounding might have occurred. ⁓ What does it take to heal those wounds? ⁓ It's

This past one, our second one, this last August, which we really, I would say it was a beta ⁓ program in 24. We learned a lot. We shortened the week where it's not a full week. It's, I think, five days maybe to travel to come out and do the men's program. So we shortened it. And at the end of any JH program, we have what we call testimonies. So at the end of a week or the end of an outback weekend, ⁓

We open the stage to our guests and they get to come up and share, what did God do in your life this week or this weekend while you were at this JH program? So we had a testimony night at the end of men's week. And this one young dad, I think maybe 30ish in the neighborhood of his 30s, three kids had been to multiple, actually when he got up and started sharing, he said, I've been to every JH program I can go to. He said, I came out here with my dad. I did challenge. I did second wind

I did track two bike, track two mountain, I've served on crew, I've gone through an outback weekend. He said this week was the most impactful week that I've ever had at JH event. Yeah.

Robert Poirier (37:44)
Is there, yeah.

Rob Hinckle (37:44)
Here's the key. Here's something

I want to point out about the whole, and it's not in our vision and mission, but it is in what we tell people on day one. Our main goal is to create an undistracted environment. So it's hard to get to the ranch. I mean, is a, fly into Medford and it's an hour and 45 minute drive. You fly into Sacramento and it's a four and half hour drive.

It's not easy to go across the country to Northern California and get to the ranch. So it's hard to get to. For the men's week, have a cell phone policy We take up all cell phones at the beginning of men's week. For all of our student programs, we take up cell phones at the beginning of the program. For our parents, son, daughter, we strongly encourage, and we're actually debating if we need to even actually go to just taking them up, but we strongly encourage leaving all technology in the car that you arrive in.

Robert Poirier (38:15)
Right.

Rob Hinckle (38:42)
Like, totally be focused on what you're here to do this week. No distractions. The food, hot, good, the scenery, green grass, beautiful horses, beautiful mountains. Like, there's nobody's going to leave thinking, man, that food was terrible or that place was ugly or I couldn't believe how loud the music mean, we do our best to create an undistracted environment for you to hear from God.

Focus on your relationship with him. And if it's a couples program, whether it's your wife or a child, focus on your relationship with that person. And it's amazing what you can hear and what can happen if you do that.

Robert Poirier (39:23)
That's beautiful. Hey, so with the men's program, is there a lot of community as well in the factor? Which I think is so important. feel, you know, men being able to get vulnerable and be vulnerable in front of other men. You know, I think we as men, I was just talking to somebody yesterday, we miss that. We've gotten away from that and my goodness, give women

Rob Hinckle (39:29)
There is.

Mm-hmm.

Robert Poirier (39:53)
props. mean, they do a very good job of talking and carrying on with their friends and discussing stuff and voicing life's challenges where, I mean, we always have kind of taken it on our back and not shared it and just stuffed it. And I think we have even more so since COVID. ⁓ But I think that I think it's so important for men to really be around others and to

Be vulnerable, shed a tear, you know, to talk about when you failed or what you might be scared of, you know, those things, because we just don't.

Rob Hinckle (40:23)
Yeah. Yes. Yeah.

And it's actually, you the world tells you not to do all that, you know, the world tells you just suck it up, buttercup and just, you know, tough it out. But that's not the way it's meant to be. And it's not healthy. And yes, we do. So every night after the Big Top Talk, and we have Big Top Talks, whether it's parent, son, daughter, student program, men's program, we always culminate in the Big Top with worship and an impartation. And then following

Robert Poirier (40:35)
Yeah, yeah.

Rob Hinckle (41:01)
every big top talk is what we call it's huddle group. So you're in a cabin. The men's program, it's six men per team with a coach. So there's seven people in a cabin. And then the men's program is the only one that does this, but we have fire pits around the lake and chairs set up around, seven chairs set up around each fire pit. So you come back up the lodge.

This is maybe getting too granular, but the way that's designed, the lodge is on a, it's probably a half mile away from the Big Top and it's a climb. So after dinner, you have a downhill walk to get you to the Big Top. And like I said, everything has a purpose. There's a why behind everything we do. That is for you to prepare for what you're getting to receive in the Big Top. After the Big Top, the worship and the word shared there.

is the walk back up to the lodge, which is to digest the content you just received in the Big Top. So there's a purpose even in this walk back and forth between these two venues. And when you get back up to the lodge, ⁓ if it's any other program, you break out into your huddle groups around the lodge. The students typically go back to the cabin with their coach and have huddle group there. For men's week,

Robert Poirier (42:05)
Yeah.

Rob Hinckle (42:21)
We actually serve dessert out at the lake and there's fire pits with chairs and every team breaks into their huddle group. And your coach has some questions to prompt and then help facilitate those. It's like a small group. You try to manage a small group, make sure everybody that needs to share has an opportunity to share and the people like I'm probably being on this podcast that like to talk too much don't talk too much.

Robert Poirier (42:44)
No, that's

why I have you on here is to talk.

Rob Hinckle (42:47)
And yes, people get vulnerable and yes, it gets real right out of the gate. And one of my roles during the summer is our college students that coach the parent-son daughter teams every morning at breakfast while they're having breakfast. We have a debriefed or we can update from the previous night's huddle group. get any prayer requests or any praise reports from each team. But it also gives me visibility into what's happening and what's coming in.

Robert Poirier (42:53)
That's beautiful.

Rob Hinckle (43:17)
But, you who's dealing with suicidal thoughts? Who's dealing with divorce? Who's dealing with adoption? Who's dealing with self harm? ⁓

I think this past summer, you lot of summers it's technology, pornography, these type things. Anxiety has been like the number one growing and maybe that's a product of COVID, I don't if it's a product of social media technology, but both for male and female young people, anxiety is the number one by a long shot issue that they have coming into the ranch.

Robert Poirier (43:40)
Huge. Huge. Huge.

I just

had an expert on a few weeks ago talking about that, talking about teen, teen anxiety and just how devastating it is.

Rob Hinckle (44:05)
Yeah, crippling. I mean, to the point of self-harm, not many are at a suicidal level, it's, I mean, depression.

Robert Poirier (44:17)
Yes. A lot of it is social media though. A lot of it is social media driven. is 24 seven access and she was telling me about it. ⁓ you know, one, it's just the comparing, know, the comparing, they look this way. They're happy. Look where they are. Look what they just bought at the mall. There's that. And then it's also knowing where everybody is. So, you know, the different apps where you can see where your friends are. think snap might be one of them.

Where you can see where different friends are. Well, all of a sudden you see where there's five people in your group at the same location, but you're at home and you didn't know anything about it because you weren't invited and why didn't they invite me? And so it's, you know, it's, it's a constant. She was talking about it. I, I knew that that was something that teens were facing. I did not realize to that degree. So that's interesting that that's

Rob Hinckle (44:57)
Yeah. Yeah.

⁓

yeah.

Robert Poirier (45:16)
And

look, I think it's something we're going to have to deal with for a while.

Rob Hinckle (45:19)
yeah, for sure. Well, you're just now, we're just now getting the actual scientific data on what it's been doing to us for the last 15 years or so.

Robert Poirier (45:29)
That's something.

Rob Hinckle (45:30)
So I guess to go back to the original, there is vulnerability, there is community. Most of the time, and we encourage it, we don't always facilitate it. It's probably something we could do a little bit better job at. But once they leave, now the men's week, our coaches did continue to meet with their teams weekly for I think three months after men's week. And some continue beyond that. From a personal perspective, when I went through with my two daughters,

Robert Poirier (45:50)
I was going to ask you that. That's great.

Rob Hinckle (45:58)
I'm still in communication with the dads. Now it's not every day, but if there's major milestone things of marriage or a baby or... Yeah, yeah, yeah. We still have the group me's of when we were coming out of the week we had at the ranch together. it's just good people that have a shared incredible experience once you go through it together and it builds bonds.

Robert Poirier (46:03)
Right.

have like a little brag text group, you know?

Yeah.

That is, mean, that is what I, what I've heard. ⁓ the people you meet, the other, the other dads that you meet out there. And I'm sure it's the same with the kids. You know, they meet other kids from all over and, that, that, that's, that's wonderful. I love what you guys are doing. I love what you guys are doing.

Rob Hinckle (46:44)
Yeah, the kids

definitely lifelong friendships are formed for sure. And then I hate to keep using my own family and self as an example, but my oldest daughter met her now husband at the ranch as well when she was back in one of the student programs. And there's a lot of couples that have come out of the ranch. And Bruce will tell you, don't know statistically if this is accurate, but he says there's

Robert Poirier (46:58)
wow.

Rob Hinckle (47:10)
There's only one divorce that he's aware of, of any couple that is married that met at the ranch. And that's over 45 years and a lot of marriages. So I can neither support nor deny that statistic, but that's from the founder.

Robert Poirier (47:18)
That's pretty amazing.

Well, you know, it makes sense too, because they're pointed in the same direction and they have the same. Yeah. And they have that same base that is so important and necessary to have a, you know, that same spiritual base to add that's so necessary to have a successful marriage. So that makes sense. Yeah.

Rob Hinckle (47:32)
Common values.

Yeah, just a quick story and just

the faith part of it that comes out of it. This is that I grew up Episcopalian. My wife and I married Episcopal Church, raised the kids majority of their life Episcopalian. And then we got exposed to J.H. in 2013. And ⁓ we stayed Episcopalian then. I'm not anymore, but we were then.

I had spent the majority of my life sitting in the car on Sunday morning blowing the horn like, okay, everybody get out in the car. We're going to church. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. COVID hit. My oldest daughter had come home from Auburn because everybody had to go home. She had started going to church in Auburn, Auburn Community Church, ACC. And they were one of the first churches, young pastor tech savvy to be on YouTube after everybody was quarantined at home. So one of the first Sundays after we're home in COVID.

Lauren says, hey, know, ACC is going to be on YouTube at 10 o'clock. Can we watch it Sunday morning? Like, yeah, absolutely. So we watch it. The next Sunday at 9.45, I look around, my entire family is set up in our den, YouTube on, Bible and journal in hand, waiting to go to church together through YouTube. And I would give J.H. Ranch, J.H. Outback, J.H. Adventures,

Robert Poirier (49:04)
Wow.

Rob Hinckle (49:09)
a lot of the credit for the entire family being that way because I was not always that way. ⁓ But spending time in the Word, abiding and journaling is another key message that we reinforce at every program we do. You've got to give God your first fruit every single day.

Robert Poirier (49:26)
That is so important and so beautiful. Tell me what we've missed. Have we missed anything? You think we've covered it? It's a lot. Well, tell me this for those that are listening, how can they find you guys?

Rob Hinckle (49:32)
There's no way to cover it all.

So jahchranch.com, that's probably the easiest way. And then there's branches to get to every other ministry arm of JH Adventures from there. I do want to point out JH Outback. And that was a program, I think Bruce realized early on, there's no way we can get everyone out to the ranch in Northern California, whether it's our capacity, financial constraints, which we do have. I hope no one listening to this thinks they can't go because of the price. We have a giving tree program.

We have donors that give specifically to fund a giving tree program. And we don't want anyone that wants to come to the ranch to not come because they think they financially can't make it out there. We will work with any guests that wants to make it to the ranch. We verify their needs, but we do have a giving program that can sponsor people to come to the ranch. Regardless of that, we have the summer. There's only so many beds at the ranch. We're never going to be able to get enough people through to impact the world like we would like to.

Robert Poirier (50:20)
That's wonderful.

Rob Hinckle (50:41)
and Bruce in, it was actually 1996 in Dallas, bought a big top and had thousand people come to what he called J.H. Outback. And it was a one weekend event. He boiled down a lot of the program content at the ranch into a very tight weekend worship content, some low, low course activity events and called it J.H. Outback. Had a one-time deal. Well in 2000,

Years later, ⁓ man, Viltrick, who had been to the ranch, been impacted, very successful businessman in Tuscaloosa, had gone, ⁓ I think he'd done the Walk of Emmaus, which is a weekend event with the Episcopal Church. And he saw some overlap between what Emmaus did and what J.H. Ranch was doing. And he said, we're going to do a weekend event in my city. I'm going to help put it on. We're going to do it in my city, Tuscaloosa. And we're going to do it twice a year. And then

We're also going to start a men's huddle group that meets every week of the year, every Wednesday morning, 6 a.m. And they just they're coming up on their 25th year celebration. Tuscaloosa has some of the same men that have been meeting every Wednesday, every week for the last 25 years in that group. But it's where a city can take ownership of the J.H. have men and women that can do huddle groups weekly and then twice a year at a local venue. We have the whole recipe.

Robert Poirier (52:00)
Yeah.

Rob Hinckle (52:09)
We can give you all the content, the talks, the agenda, the activities. We can help set you up. We can even help fund your initial event if we need to. And we now have, I think this last fall we had 27 events across the United States and we are in, I believe it's seven countries around the world, New Zealand, Poland. ⁓ We actually.

Mac Ogren, our Outback International guy, has been in Kenya and South Africa this week and then flying back through South America, I think Argentina. ⁓ So a city or a country can kind of take this Outback model and start impacting families and communities in their local community through a JH program, which is actually where I came from. I went to Mobile, Alabama's Outback weekend in October of 2013.

And that was where I got my first taste of the Kool-Aid and been drinking it ever since. I got plugged into the men's group in Mobile, started volunteering on the weekend events in Mobile, eventually became the city leader for Mobile in 2018, and then came on full-time staff in 23 with the ranch.

Robert Poirier (53:25)
That is, that's wonderful. had no idea about that. No idea. ⁓ do they? Okay. I'll have to look into that. Is there information on your site to get plugged into that is okay. I will.

Rob Hinckle (53:30)
Atlanta actually has one too. Atlanta's got an Outback. Yeah. Yeah. I'll send you, I'll send you some contact. It is. It is. Absolutely. Yep. Like I said, you just

go J.H. Ranch is the simplest one to go to and we've said it so many times, jhranch.com. And then at the very bottom, you can go to J.H. Outback. You can go to Scott Rilage, our couples, five-star resort in Northern California. You can learn more about J.H. Israel, Outback International.

the whole nine yards.

Robert Poirier (54:00)
Well, I will be sure to link that ⁓ and also your social media as well, because I know I have links to that. And so I'll be sure to link that with the interview and everything I post. And look, Rob, I appreciate you taking time out of your day. I know you're busy, but thanks for coming on. Thanks for giving me, telling me more about J.H. Ranch and sharing it with everybody else. And look, just I pray you guys have continued success and so much appreciative of what you guys are doing.

Rob Hinckle (54:27)
Thank you.

Well, I appreciate you having us. It's been an honor and I hope this, I hope we reconnect in a few months and maybe somebody heard this podcast and got out to the ranch this summer and we'll have a cool testimony about it. Yeah.

Robert Poirier (54:41)
That would be wonderful. That would,

that would be wonderful. And you'll definitely have to let me know. Definitely will. Hey, and that, yeah, thank you. And thank you all for listening to the dad to dad's podcast. You can find us on Spotify or Apple, as well as most, podcast platforms. can also find us on YouTube and Instagram. Don't forget to hit the like and subscribe button and, ⁓ please leave comments. I read every single comment and,

Rob Hinckle (54:46)
Absolutely. Thank you, Robert.

Robert Poirier (55:07)
I love hearing your feedback and also your topic suggestions as well. Thank you all again, and we will talk with you next time.