Before Dontae Ralston ever preached a sermon or stepped on a stage, he knew survival. Not the kind that gets romanticized in music videos but the real kind, raw, painful, and relentless. His childhood wasn’t framed by bedtime stories or after school programs. It was shaped by addiction, betrayal, poverty, and gang life. He was selling dope before he ever learned how to hope. Numbness became his only protection. “I wore trauma like armor,” he says, “and called it normal.”
But buried in the chaos God was quietly planting seeds.
Ralston’s early life was a cycle of silence and self destruction. Pain raised him. The streets taught him how to move, how to survive, and how to keep his emotions buried beneath the surface. “Loyalty without purpose leads to destruction,” he says, a lesson he learned too many times. He had heard of God in church but never truly met Him. “Church felt like culture not covenant. I said ‘Amen’ without understanding what I was agreeing to.”
It wasn’t until his life hit a wall legally, spiritually, emotionally that something shifted. Facing time for trafficking, balancing fatherhood, and struggling with guilt he didn’t know how to unload, Dontae was outwardly stable and internally breaking. “I was functioning but barely. I was making moves in business but I had no peace.”
It was in that breaking point that he surrendered.
HOG MOB (Hooked On God Ministry Over Bizness) wasn’t born in a boardroom. It was born on the corners, the ones most churches avoid. Founded by West Coast rapper and minister Sevin, the ministry formed to reach men like Dontae: wounded, gifted, misunderstood, and seeking redemption beyond religion.
“HOG MOB isn’t a label,” Ralston says. “It’s a lifestyle. It’s a brotherhood of men who came out of trauma, addiction, incarceration, and broken homes. We don’t just rap. We disciple.”
Ralston credits men like Sevin, IV Conerly, and Zaydok for showing him what it looks like to be solid, Spirit led, and surrendered. “They didn’t just teach me, they lived it in front of me.”
As HOG MOB grew, so did its reach. Their music hits hard, heavy with 808s, laced with theology, and dripping with authenticity. “We go where the Church won’t,” he says. “Prisons, recovery centers, neighborhoods society gave up on.”
Out of the same heartbeat came Project West, Ralston’s nonprofit focused on transitional housing, reentry support, and life skills for people battling addiction or trying to rebuild after incarceration. “We walk with people from detox to discipleship,” he says. “We don’t just hand out a flyer and disappear. We stay connected.”
From the cell blocks of San Quentin to the streets of California’s toughest neighborhoods, Dontae and his team are sowing seeds daily. “Only heaven knows how many people we’ve impacted. Thousands, probably. But I’m not counting numbers, I’m counting souls.”
For Ralston, this isn’t a hustle. It’s a calling. And it’s personal. He shares the story of Scooter, a young man he mentored from childhood who passed away at 22. “He wasn’t blood, but he was family. That loss broke me, but it also reminded me why I do this. We may not always see the transformation in full, but we plant the seeds and trust God with the rest.”
But the work isn’t easy. “One of the hardest parts is watching people turn ministry into marketing,” he says. “Too many are chasing clout instead of the cross.” And on a personal level, Ralston admits the hardest part has been confronting his own sin. “Looking in the mirror and realizing I was the problem. But my wife’s forgiveness and God’s mercy showed me grace in 3D.”
Still, he never wanted to quit. “I come from a place where giving up gets you killed. That same mentality applies to this mission. I didn’t survive all that just to fold now.”
What keeps him grounded is accountability and submission. “I stay in the Word not just to teach but to survive. I talk to God more than I talk to people because most people only see the surface. When my mind gets loud, I shut everything down and go serve.”
His faith isn’t performative. It’s protective. “I didn’t just survive the streets, I survived myself. Religion didn’t reach me, but Jesus did. He met me in the middle of my mess.”
“Healing starts with humility,” Dontae says. “Repentance is the real flex. You don’t have to fake perfection to be accepted by Christ. Bring Him your mess. He already knows.”
And to believers? “Don’t forget where you came from. Don’t let salvation turn into self righteousness.”
When it’s all said and done, Ralston wants to be remembered as someone who stayed solid. “I didn’t fold for fame. I didn’t water down the message. I went back to places most people ran from and pointed people to Jesus.”
Right now, he’s launching a nationwide prison tour starting with Angola, San Quentin, and Donovan State Penitentiary. He’s also expanding Project West into new cities and dropping music that speaks not only to the pain but to the promise.
Everything he’s building is about impact not image.