What really happened behind the camera on The Chosen? Ruben Martinez was there for all seven seasons — appearing in 23 episodes, playing everyone from a Pharisee to a fisherman — and what he witnessed off-camera was just as extraordinary as anything that made it to the screen.

In this conversation with John Whaley, Ruben pulls back the curtain: the international prayer team that prayed through the entire cast and crew roster by name before every episode aired, the day he was caught on camera praying during a shoot without realizing it, the physical healings he witnessed, the man who gave his life to Christ in a holding area because the actors showed him real love, and what it felt like to say goodbye to Season 7 knowing it was the final one.

Ruben also shares the story of the independent film he made about Paul the Apostle — a young crew, crowdfunded budget, and a premiere that raised money for handicapped students to attend prom. And he talks about the unexpected road that brought him to The Chosen in the first place: Baylor, a business consulting career, and a stranger who looked at him and said "hey, you look biblical."

With The Chosen Season 6 dropping November 15 on Prime Video, this is exactly the kind of story fans have been hungry for.

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What if the church’s biggest problem isn’t culture, politics, or persecution — it’s that it simply has no plan? British evangelist Dennis Pethers has spent 12 years traveling more than 70 countries with Rooftop International, and the pattern he sees everywhere is the same: the church has become a location, an event, a program — and lost the plot of what Jesus actually called it to be.

In this conversation with John Whaley, Dennis shares the moment he gave his life to Christ on a train at 19 while reading C.S. Lewis, the alarming generational strategy he witnessed Islamic leaders pursuing in Mombasa, Kenya, and a conversation with a young Muslim man who told him exactly why they were winning the city. He also breaks down the forgotten Gospel of the Kingdom — the message Jesus preached most — and why he believes that until the church recovers it, it will keep losing ground.

This is one of those conversations that unsettles and inspires you at the same time. Dennis is honest, global, and urgent — and the message lands hard.

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What does God say when everything falls apart? In this episode, John Whaley sits down with pastor and author Michael Brewer to talk about the one truth that changed his life: grace is the exception, not the rule. Michael watched his wife Susan fight a brain tumor, then cancer, through 13 rounds of chemotherapy — and walked through her death holding a faith that had been tested at its core. Out of that season came his book Broken but Graced, and a message for anyone who has ever asked, "Why is God letting this happen to me?"

John and Michael get personal — sharing their own experiences with church betrayal, prodigal children, family illness, and the moments where God felt completely absent. What they found on the other side was intimacy with God they never would have discovered any other way. This episode doesn't offer easy answers. It offers something better: an honest look at what brokenness really produces, and why the broken places are exactly where God shows up.

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Kyle Reno is the Senior Pastor of Crossgates Church in Brandon, Mississippi and co-host of The OneCry Podcast. He grew up outside the faith in rural Alabama and came to Christ at 19 as a broken college kid — kneeling at an altar he'd never heard of, and walking out free for the first time in his life.

In this conversation with John Whaley, Kyle unpacks what God has been doing at Crossgates over the past three years: 708 baptisms in a city of 3,000, a Better Man Conference that launched 700+ men's groups across Mississippi, and a Sunday morning when 104 people were baptized between 9am and 2pm after a congregation prayed 7,000 names of lost people for months. He also shares the story of a supernatural moment — the baptistry water churning audibly while those names were being read.

But this conversation isn't just about what's happened. It's about what's coming. Kyle believes the church is in the foothills of the greatest awakening in American history — and why being "Revival Ready" is the most urgent call for believers right now.

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Bill Elliff has spent decades studying revival. He's read everything. He was in the room when God moved spontaneously at his own church in 2011. And he stood in the balcony at Asbury as a broadcast that normally reaches 100,000 people a year went to 10 million — and felt God speak to his soul about what was coming.

In this conversation with John Whaley, Bill connects every sign he's been watching. He talks about Romans 1 and the reprobate mind — people who now fight and kill to defend their sin — and why that level of moral darkness has always preceded major revival. He explains why entire denominations missed the Jesus Movement because they couldn't get past a debate about guitars, and warns that the same trap is waiting today. He walks through five specific questions the Holy Spirit is asking every believer right now. And he makes a claim that stops the conversation cold: he believes this awakening could be the greatest in human history.

The harvest window is open. This conversation is about what it looks like to actually step into it.

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What happens when a TV show brings 30 people back to church — in a single congregation? That's just one of the stories Demetrius Troy shares in this episode.

Demetrius plays Lazarus in The Chosen, the most-watched Christian drama in history. But long before the cameras rolled, Demetrius was a cradle Orthodox Christian — baptized 40 days after birth, raised on icons, prayer at the table morning and evening, and the ancient faith tradition of "come and see."

In this conversation with John Whaley, Demetrius opens up about what it's really like to be part of a show with that kind of reach, what he does when someone is moved to tears by meeting Lazarus in a grocery store, and why he believes The Chosen is the iconography of our time. He also shares the surprising darkness of his current project — the Suicide Trilogy, three films about faith, grief, and a pastor whose daughter has taken her own life.

And: over 1,000 people in 62 countries are praying for him and the cast by name. He shares what it feels like — and what he asks them to pray for.

Find us on YouTube @rooftopperspectivesPod and Instagram @rooftopperspectivespodcast.

Austin Bradford is the producer of Rooftop Perspectives. In this conversation, John Whaley turns the mic around.

Austin shares his full story: growing up in church, walking away at 22, hitting rock bottom while bartending, and being relentlessly pursued by a campus minister who wouldn't stop showing up at his coffee shops and parks. He talks about driving solo to Utah to learn how to hear God, sitting under a tree on a mountain in Capitol Reef National Park, and hearing one sentence: "surrender your passions." He came home to find all his camera gear stolen.

Out of that stripping-away came something unexpected — a men's Bible study he accidentally led in November 2021 that grew to 30 guys in his living room by December, and eventually to a movement of over 1,000 young adults in Knoxville doing daily community together. He shares the night a friend's doctor said he'd never walk again, the prayer gathering that felt like a mandate to meet monthly, and the moment they filled a warehouse they thought was too big with 250 people and 10 spontaneous baptisms.

Austin also speaks into what he's watching in his generation right now — the shift from hype to depth, the hunger for authentic relationship, and a simple takeaway that's reshaping how he thinks about everything: prayer is not a resource for ministry. It is the ministry.

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Cyril Rayan came to America in 1991 from Mumbai, India — chasing a master's degree in electrical engineering at Mississippi State University. He wasn't looking for Jesus. But a campus minister named Stephen Foster made it his mission to share the gospel with every foreign student he could find. Over several months of coffee and onion rings Bible studies, Cyril came to faith. His wife Jemima would later say what became the defining line of his life: "You were born in India, but you were born again in America."

Today Cyril is co-founder of Potter's Ministries, founding pastor of Blessing Church in San Jose, CA, and the author of a new book — "35 Defining Moments of Faith That Shaped America" — written in under 90 days in response to what he believes is America's most critical hour in generations. In this conversation with John Whaley, Cyril shares the staggering stats behind America's spiritual crisis (176 million identify as Christian; only 6% hold a biblical worldview), the 1579 prayer by Francis Drake that most Americans have never heard about, the Moravian prayer movement that ran for 100 straight years, and why he believes this is not the moment to give up on America. He also shares what God showed him about redigging the Wells of Revival — including a September 18 prayer gathering at the U.S. Capitol that took 9 months to secure.

Learn more at wellsofrevival.us and pottersministries.org. Find us on YouTube @rooftopperspectivesPod and Instagram @rooftopperspectivespodcast.