unSeminary Podcast

Welcome back to the unSeminary podcast. We’re talking with Lee Coate, the executive pastor at The Crossing in Las Vegas, and the president of Growmentum Group. Today Lee is talking with us about Growmentum Group, how they are helping church leaders accomplish their missions, and how to use the different seasons of leadership that are found on your teams. Accomplish your mission. // Growmentum works with churches to help them accomplish their missions. They value partnerships and offer a full access relationship with the executive leaders that come to them. By providing an outside voice and reaching out to church leaders on a regular basis, they help you to work on the ministry while working in it. Become farsighted again. // The last few years forced church leaders to plan more short-term. As a result we’ve become shortsighted in our leadership and vision and are struggling to think in a more futuristic way. Growmentum works with churches to become more farsighted in their vision and examine if their values are more actual, or aspirational. It’s ok to have aspirational values, but then we need to build some farsighted vision around how to make them more actual. Work on it, not just in it. // As leaders we have to be really intentional to model farsightedness by looking ahead in ministry and not only focusing on today. Schedule “work on it” meetings that are isolated from your normal work. Get your team together to work on ministry, uninterrupted, at least once a month. Hold quarterly half-day “work on it” meetings with the decision makers, and annually get away a day or two away to set the farsighted vision. Widen the targets. // If most churches could get a 10 year target, paint a three year picture, and operate on a one year plan, quarter by quarter, on a regular basis they would start to see their mission gain some ground. Target more widely and not only specifically. Seasons of life and leadership. // Everyone wants high capacity leaders on their teams, but would we be prepared for what they’d demand from us? Different age groups translate to different seasons of leadership, and each brings different strengths and weaknesses to the table. Lee has identified these four main seasons as: Princes and Princesses (18-25 year olds), Warriors and Warrioresses (roughly between 25-40 years old); Kings and Queens, and then Sages and Muses. You can find Lee Coate on most social media sites or send him an email. If you’d like to know more about Growmentum Group you can learn more at growmentumgroup.com. Or follow along with The Crossing at thecrossinglv.com. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Portable Church Industries Doing Church in a Rented Facility can be a Challenge. Questions about Multisiting or Portability?Click here to connect with our Multisite Specialist for a free evaluation. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Well hey, friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in today. Super excited for today’s conversation—a repeat guest—which you know when it’s a repeat guest, this is somebody that you are going to want to lean in on. Lee Coate he is the Executive Pastor at The Crossing in Vegas as well as the President of Growmentum Group. Growmentum Group offers executive leadership coaching, strategic momentum consulting, and customized really solutions to help organizations reach their full potential. Lee, so glad that you are here today. Thanks for being on the show. Lee Coate — Rich, thanks for having me back, man. I enjoyed getting to connect with you, and it’s good to to connect with you even when we’re not riding our Pelotons and actually being able to have a conversation. Rich Birch — Exactly, exactly. Lee Coate — So I feel like we should be on our Pelotons riding as we have this conversation. But… Rich Birch — It’s true. It’s true. Lee Coate — It’s good to be with you guys and all the church leaders that’ll be listening. Hopefully this will be a helpful conversation. Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s true. I do love the Peloton. We’ve gone through this this challenge, every day of the month challenge, which is really fun actually. And it was people all from all over North America and which is really cool. This is small group was kind of a fun. The Peloton’s been fantastic. Yeah. Lee Coate — I was waking up every day. I was waking up every day to those messages, you know, hey I did my ride I did my ride. So it was very motivational for those of us on the west coast that were coming in later to the process. It was great. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah I don’t I the people that ride at the end of the day, I’m always like that’s impressive. I cannot do that. Like the guys that ride like at night, I’m like that’s crazy. That’s that’s unbelievable. Lee Coate — Now I’m a first first thing in the morning. Whatever it is has got to happen or it’s not going to happen. Rich Birch — Yeah, absolutely for sure. Well what we want to do today, I want to take advantage of the fact that you have ah a really… well first of all, fill out the story. Tell us a little bit more about Growmentum; tell us about you know the church. Give us what what did I miss there in that description? Lee Coate — Ah, you you did well; you didn’t miss much. But you know, Rich, you know after about 35, 40 years of ministry, you know, and and this season where I still feel like you know there’s a lot to contribute. I’m still operating on a day-to-day basis as an executive pastor here in Vegas. And so um, kind of boots on the ground on a regular basis, but also over the last few years have come together with K Chung who is really the founder and the CEO of a group that we call Growmentum. And it really kind of accelerated like many things in COVID as church leaders kind of you know took hit after hit and were really looking for some um, someplace to come together. Lee Coate — And so Growmentum really has evolved, but it’s also accelerated. We’re working with churches all over the country, even have a couple now in Canada, so there you go, Rich. Rich Birch — Nice. Love it. So good. Okay. Lee Coate — And it’s it’s really just um, us partnering and our mission is really to help them accomplish their mission. We really value relationships and partnerships in that process. And so some of what we do uniquely is kind of a full access relationship. So we have a lot of guys that are on the executive level that you know are not only doing some of the formal stuff that we, do boots on the ground with them and with their team. But also you know hey they’re reaching out on a regular basis which makes my text messages and emails and all of that really interesting. But if I can contribute from an objective standpoint, right? Rich Birch — Yes. Lee Coate — We all need those individuals that are not there in it, so that we can work on it with them. So one of our things that we say, our axioms, is we want to be that group that helps you work on it when you’re in the midst of working in it. And what the challenge is when we are pulling away, we’re pulling our team away or we’re just having a meeting that the agenda is work on it, we all realize that the work in it is not happening. And so it has to be really really intentional. Because the drift to the work in it is always going to be the pull. And so part of what we’ve tried to do with clients and then just people that are in our network is just one, that encouragement to work on it. And then tools and things that they can have that conversation around. Lee Coate — I mean you see this all the time, Rich. It’s like guys going man I’ve got this meeting. Or I want my culture to get better. I don’t know what to do. Like I’ve got a meeting in 20 minutes and I want to build the [inaudible] culture; I have no clue what to do. Rich Birch — Yes. Lee Coate — And so we try to provide them with regular tools as well, both in conversations and through other resources to do that. And so hopefully today’ll be a bit more of that, maybe on a wider scale as we kind of talk together. Rich Birch — Yeah, I love it. So good. And I love your heart for serving church leaders, and you know, friends, I’m a huge fan of us having a strategic outsider, someone who can provide that like you say work on it ah, you know when you’re in the midst of working in it. And so just so good. And I so want to encourage people to get it make it make sure they get a chance to connect with you and and with Growmentum. I think you guys do great work. Rich Birch — So you have an interesting vantage point because you see a lot of different churches. A lot of different um, whether it’s you know, direct coaches the churches that you’re coaching or it’s just through you know discussions with other folks in Growmentum. When you think about um, you know, the issues that seem to be top of mind that you keep coming back to time again, or maybe you keep seeing the impact of those like oh here’s here’s like a um, you know a thing that we just keep seeing you know as we’re as I look around the landscape, what would that be? What would be some of those things that come, you know, time and again that that you think might be interesting for us to tackle today? Lee Coate — I think I’ll start with this one… Rich Birch — Yeah. Lee Coate — …and what we like to say is this is like you know we we’ve kind of become so shortsighted in our leadership in, in our vision, so we’ve become we’ve got into the habit of being shortsighted in our vision that now we’ve we as leaders are struggling probably in life, but specifically in the church to really begin to think in a much more futuristic way. Let me explain what I mean. Like during COVID, and again I I don’t want to have COVID conversations, as you don’t either, Rich, right? We’re like we’re we’re all so fatigued. Rich Birch — Yes. Lee Coate — But I think one of the things that we learned there is we were forced habitually to think as leaders in a very shortsighted manner, right? We were you were doing it. We were doing it. You were encouraging and coaching guys like we don’t know what’s going to happen. You’re you’re on a 30 to 60 day plan, right? Rich Birch — Yep, yep. Lee Coate — And that’s what we were doing, and that was necessary. But what happened I believe as I’m starting to talk to guys is that sort of became ingrained. Rich Birch — Right, right. Lee Coate — And so now it’s like all of the sudden we start to emerge and it’s like how do we get farsighted again? We’ve become so nearsighted in our style. And then you couple that with whatever leadership fatigue they’re they’re dealing with, whatever the team exhaustion they’re dealing with. And then to go, Okay, how do we get farsighted again? Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — So a lot of the work that we’ve been doing specifically in the last year and a half is helping guys to build some structure that would begin to bring that farsightedness back into view for them, right? When we talk a lot, and we’ll talk in a minute about some team health things, I think one of the key components of team health is also making sure that the team actually understands the unique missional objective that we as a as church are trying to accomplish, right? Lee Coate — We say something at Growmentum. We say, strategy drives our vision through our values towards our mission, right? And so mission mission is the same for all churches – Matthew 28 Jesus kind of gave it to us, so we can’t really change it, right? Rich Birch — Yes. Lee Coate — We don’t have that option… Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yes. Lee Coate — …but we all say it in different ways. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — We all use our own language, right? So then we get to values, and values are really unique. I think values are actually under underappreciated. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — So that’s a secondary thing we’ve been looking at with churches. It’s like sometimes churches just kind of throw values on the wall, or you know it’s something on their website, but values to me should be what’s unique. Why do you exist when our church exists up the street, or that other church exists? It’s because there’s a uniqueness to who you are, what you guys care about, and so we’ve got to filter all of our decisions through that. So we challenge teams right now really to get more farsighted in their vision, and then are your values more actual or more aspirational, right? Rich Birch — Oh that’s good. Lee Coate — And really have a conversation around that. Like are these values that were just and it’s okay to have, Rich, a few aspirational things. There’s nothing wrong with that. But to just be aware that currently, whatever it might be, you know we want to be a come as you are environment. Is that actually happening or is that just more aspirational? If it’s more aspirational… Rich Birch — Oh right. Lee Coate — …maybe we can build some more farsighted vision around how to make that more true. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — And then the last thing really goes to vision, which is like ten or three years, and then strategy which is like what do we need to do tomorrow? Like what do we need to do tomorrow… Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — …to make sure that that mission gets accomplished. So that’s a long answer but I really see that more and more being the case of like how do we get leaders farsighted, and how do they lean back into why they uniquely are positioned where they are. Rich Birch — Oh I love that. Let’s talk about that farsighted issue first. What would be some of the kind of evidence that you’re seeing in churches that maybe we’re not thinking far enough down the road that we’re you know we’re we’re being too, you know we’re thinking too much about this weekend or we’re caught too much in in ah, you know this kind of current situation, rather than looking up over the hill. Lee Coate — Um, yeah I think it’s a continuation of that work in it conversation, right? Rich Birch — Yep yep. Lee Coate — The the demands I mean that’s not a new that’s not new ground we’re treading, right? The demands of the day and and all of those things. I think as leaders like if you’re an executive level leader or you’re leading a team, I think part of it is we have to really be intentional to model that. Right? If we’re affirming all the work in it all the time or every meeting that we’re having it has an agenda that’s very “work in it”. That’s going to become just by nature very nearsighted. Rich Birch — Oh That’s good. Lee Coate — But if we’re having time that we’re intentionally setting aside to say listen, we’re going to work on it in this in this environment. Like we actually I actually believe that teams need a rhythm in meetings that doesn’t just have a part of the meeting that’s “work on it”. I don’t think that works I think the work in it will always invade and overwhelm. I actually would encourage our listeners, whatever their rhythm of meeting with their team is, to actually isolate that “work on it” time. Rich Birch — Oh love it. Yeah. Lee Coate — And it needs and it needs to happen minimally on a monthly basis, right? So then it’s not just a quarterly or ah or a yearly annual offsite. But it’s ah a it doesn’t have to be long. It doesn’t have to be it doesn’t even have to be any longer than your normal meeting rhythm, but just like we’re clearing the decks and we’re going to work on it a little bit. I mean here at The Crossing where I’m at serving every day, man we’ve we’ve we’ve wrestled with that same challenge. Rich Birch — Right. Yes, yeah. Lee Coate — So it’s not something I’m just observing as I’m out there doing it. It’s something that I’m I’m living out in a in a real way, you know? And so yeah, so that’s part of it. Rich Birch — Um, when you think about the ratio, even if we’re thinking at a high level around okay, our team’s time invested. Do we think like is it like a you know a third of our time, 10 percent of our time? How much you know when you think of what is a good healthy rhythm. It probably depends on the church. But how often should we be thinking about like I need to get my team away to be thinking about stuff that’s up over the horizon? Lee Coate — I would loosely say there should be a once a month rhythm of a normal non non-evasive meeting that’s work on it. Rich Birch — Sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Lee Coate — You know where it’s like yeah we’re just in the room and and we’re just all coming together. I would say quarterly I would encourage at least a half day with your executive – those that are decision makers. And then of course annually a day or two away to really set that farsighted vision that’s going. We’ve we’ve we’ve introduced a lot of churches to EOS and using that system; some of your listeners will know it. Um we we don’t dive deep into it because we believe that you know 99% of churches (I just made that number up, Rich), but you know the large large percentage of churches if they could just get a ten year target, paint a three-year picture and operate on a one-year plan, quarter by quarter. If they just did that on a regular basis and just wash, rinse, repeat, they would start to see their mission that we’ve been given this huge mission we’ve been given. We would start to see that actually start to gain some ground. If we could just get there. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — So that’s a big deal. Rich Birch — Right. Love it. Let’s… Lee Coate — I think it’s funny, Rich, we actually chart we actually challenge guys, we’ll we’ll say hey tell us what your, you know, give us a sentence or two or two or three bullet points when we start a relationship with them, like what is your ten year target? You would be shocked how hard that is for senior level leaders. And I know some of it is because the recent coaching has always been everything changes so fast. You should think further out. I think I disagree with that a little bit because I think target is very wide. It’s it’s not specific, right? Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — So like here at The Crossing I’ll I’ll rattle off our target. Our target that we’ve come up with is in 10 years The Crossing will be a multi-generational multiethic network of churches with a median age of 35 that has doubled its outward focused impact. Now what does that mean, what does that mean? What is a network of churches? We actually don’t know yet, right? Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — Like what does that mean, but I’ll tell you what if we have a target of a median age of 35 because our power lead pastor is going to be moving on in that realm… Rich Birch — Yeah. Lee Coate — …we got to do some strategic thinking around that, don’t we? Rich Birch — Right, right. Lee Coate — That’s not going to happen magically. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — So we put that in our targets so that now when we start painting a picture and working every every year, and every every quarter, we’re thinking about how does this contribute to that target more likely being hit. And there’s the last thing, if we don’t hit the target and we fall a little short who cares? Rich Birch — Yeah, you’ve you’ve gone a long way. Lee Coate — Because the target… Rich Birch — Exactly. Lee Coate — Correct. And so we’ve got a coach guys to get them out of thinking that target is like ah is ah is something that’s like restricting. It’s actually free. Rich Birch — Well and I love that because there’s there’s like ah you’ve identified even in your ten year target there like durable long term um, yeah, aspirational and actual goals for the organization that kind of regardless of what happens between here and there like the getting younger is a durable issue. We’ve got to figure out how to do that. The becoming multi-generational, becoming multiethnic, like those are like it’s not like 10 years from now the world’s going to change so much that we’re going to say, you know what? I think we should have a less multiethnic church like that’s just not the way the world’s going, right? The reality of it is on that issue alone every zip code in the country is more diverse today than it was ten years ago, and it will be more diverse 10 years from now. And so our church unless we get passionate about how we’re going to do that, um, we’ll just drift. We’ll drift in the wrong direction. I love that. I think that’s so good. Lee Coate — And what’s what’s what’s exciting is as as I mentioned a moment ago as, Rich—that was so good—as as challenging as it is when we get the team in the room, and the and the lead guy has we’ve worked with us ahead of time and he’s got that sentence or that 3 or 4 points. And we we make him the hero. Rich Birch — Sure. Lee Coate — So we step away… Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. Lee Coate — …and he stands up in front and goes, here’s what I believe the target is. And you know what happens to the team that’s sitting there, right? Rich Birch — No, I love it that. Yeah. Lee Coate — All of a sudden they’re going, you know, yes! Like right? And some of that is just give us a target. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. It’s rallying. Lee Coate —But then on top of that is like I can get excited to get up every day and rally around… Rich Birch — Absolutely. Lee Coate — …that objective because that informs what I’m going to do on a daily basis. Rich Birch — Yeah I love that. That’s so good. Well let’s let’s let’s hone in on the team issue specifically. You know you mentioned the team there. I know lots of folks that are listening in are executive pastors or senior you know, lead pastors and we’ve got a team. What are you seeing on that front? You know as you’re helping leaders lead their teams, are there regular patterns you’re running into or things that we should be wrestling with and thinking through in this age? Lee Coate — Um, I think this is probably a pattern that has always been there I think it’s probably a little bit accelerated at the moment. Um, and that is the dynamic between some of our more mature leaders and some of our emerging leaders. And that dynamic, again, I know that it’s always been there but I believe that maybe with some of the acceleration that we’ve seen with especially our emerging leaders like maybe a little bit, and I mean this in ah in a kind way, but a little bit of impatience sometimes that emerges there. I think the dynamic between our emerging leaders and our more mature leaders is definitely something that is an ongoing conversation that I’m having and also an observation. So when I’m sitting with teams, it’s like, Okay, how do I rally these younger leaders while also maintaining a bit of like um my experience, or or my desires, or my my best practices as me as the senior leader needs to see. So I’m personally wrestling with that as well you know in this season of my life. Lee Coate — You know I’ve I’ve changed my life mission in the I went on sabbatical last summer and came out of it. And one of the things—it’s not a perfect statement, but—I’m still wrestling with is you know personally I believe as I’m in my fifties, the next ten years of my life is really you know how is God how is God powerfully positioned me to influence and serve the leader that I once was – these younger leaders. Rich Birch — Oh that’s good. Lee Coate — So how can I how am I now powerfully positioned by my experience, etc. not to just continue to be Lee accelerating, but to influence and serve the person that I once was, that I can see that was me, right? And so that’s driven a lot of the conversation around that and how leaders… because we want younger leaders, don’t we? Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — But we really don’t know what to do with them sometimes. Rich Birch — Yes. Yeah, let’s let’s pull… Lee Coate — Because they they can be challenging. Rich Birch — Yeah, let’s pull that apart like I think you know this is so I think germane is at the core of so many of our of issues whether it’s um, you know, succession issues, or staff development issues, or even that that aging down issue we just talked about. It’s like we all, you know, I remember years ago a friend of mine said you know the the problem with deciding that you want to lead leaders is that they want to lead. And so when you gather young leaders around you the problem with that is they’re young leaders. Rich Birch — And so um, you know I think you know you and me are in that kind of like I don’t feel like an old leader yet, I just feel like a leader but I’m definitely not a young leader anymore. I know that. So help us think that through a little bit. What how what how should we be wrestling with it? As maybe someone who does have a few more lap laps on the, you know, on the car. What are some things we should be looking at to kind of engage next generation leaders? Lee Coate — It’s interesting listening to when you said that because I’ve talked to pastors all the time, both with their staff and probably even with the volunteers, which is another conversation, but they’re constantly saying to me (I know you’re hearing this too), like how do I how do I get more high capacity leaders, right? How do I get stronger leaders? Lee Coate — And I’ve rarely said this but I’ve often thought this that I don’t know if we are actually prepared for what a high capacity leader would demand of us. Think about the high capacity leaders in the workplace. If if I get some of—and I’ve experienced this—if I get some of those people engaged at the church, they’re not playing. Like they need to know what are we doing, where are we going. Rich Birch — Right, right. Lee Coate — I have a limited time; I have limited resources. What do you need me to do? So I think sometimes there’s a false narrative where leaders go on I need these high capacity leaders. And if they had them, they wouldn’t know what to do with them. It would freak them out. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — So I think we have to think about what is that. But specifically with our staff, one of the things, one of the conversations I’ve been working through with my team is something that I jotted down on a napkin at breakfast. I kind of do some of my best thinking with a napkin and a really sharp Sharpie. Um I sit at the same breakfast place all the time. And the other week I was sitting at the same table and I noticed some of my Sharpie was on the table itself. So probably I probably probably owe them a new table. Rich Birch — Love it. Lee Coate — But one of the things that occurred to me is I was thinking about seasons of life and leadership right? Not just younger leaders… Rich Birch — Yeah. Lee Coate — …but like what are the seasons. And there’s probably a little Richard Rohr and a little John Eldredge woven into this… Rich Birch — Yes. Lee Coate — …but it’s it’s the idea of like it… And what I’m about to share with you is really not about age, though. There’s obviously some age… Rich Birch — Some connections. Yeah. Lee Coate — …built in. Correct. What I mean when I say it’s not about age, I don’t think you get to a certain age and you necessarily transition into this next season. Rich Birch — Oh good. Yeah yeah, that’s good. Lee Coate — I think that there’s probably some ballpark of like this is a season based on age. Um, so let me just give them to the listeners and then you and I can banter around about them, you know? Um, ah we start with prince or princess, right? And I think that’s probably like our 18 to 25 year olds, right? I’m talking about your staff leaders, and what’s interesting about these individuals is we call them princes and princesses. I think the term is is really great because I think it it makes sense for um, for that season that they’re in. And what’s great about the prince and princesses, Rich, is they have passion… Rich Birch — Yes. Lee Coate — …and they have curiosity. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — Like they are curious, they are asking questions. They are doing all those things. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — And so I love having those princes and princesses around. My son is 24; he’s just joined our staff here at The Crossing. Rich Birch — Love it. Yeah. Lee Coate — He is a prince, right? That’s where he is. He’s passionate his life his season of life allows him you know a little more leeway. Um, as far as how engaged he is, right? So their biggest contribution as a prince or princess, if you’re listening right now, your biggest contribution is passion and curiosity, right? Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Lee Coate — But but there’s a dark side. Rich Birch — Okay. Lee Coate — And we can stop at each of these. There’s four of ’em, Rich, if you want to. Rich Birch — Yeah, yep. Lee Coate — There’s a dark side and um, it’s not going to surprise anybody, but the dark side of a prince or a princess is entitlement. It’s the idea of like I want to move fast. I know it all. Rich Birch — Right. I know it all. Yeah. Lee Coate — Right? And I want to be at the table, right now. Rich Birch — Right, right, right. Lee Coate — You know I’ve been serving here for six months, why am I not making the the decisions for the direction of the organization? Rich Birch — Yes. Lee Coate — Right? And if somebody’s listening and they feel like I’m an old guy being cruel… I’m not. Because I was that person too. Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yes. Lee Coate — So just so you know we’ve all been there and been that person, and felt that tension. Rich Birch — Yes, yeah, yeah. Lee Coate — So that’s the prince and princess stage. That’s really important. Rich Birch — Yeah, let’s so when we think about… so yeah I think that’s a really vivid picture. I think that’s a you know I think we can picture those people in our um, in our circles. If we don’t have those people I think sometimes those those people can be flushed out of our organization because it’s like we’re scared like you say of passion and curiosity. We don’t know what to do with that. And so it’s funny you say that about your own kid, like my the lead pastor at our church recently, my my daughter is 22 and she’s like super creative and all that. And she and he said to my wife recently he’s like, man we got to figure out some way to how do we harness that – that’s just is so exciting. And I thought that’s an interesting word when you think about the prince and princess. It’s like well there’s a lot of good there. But it’s like hey how do we get that kind of you know in in the right spot. Um, what are the other ones? What are the other kind of categories? Lee Coate — Somebody once said with prince and prince as I was sharing this a few months ago somebody told me there was parallels with Paul the apostle. And they kind of broke it down and said like when Paul was a prince he was the one holding the coats while they were stoning Stephen. You know he’s kind of there, curious about what’s going on. It’s an interesting playout. So the second one is um, warrior or Warrioress, and this is probably your 25 to 40. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — You know, it’s that season where there’s a degree of either purpose that has been discovered, or purpose that is at least desired, right? Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — So it’s like I have a direction that I want to go. Um the warriors in warrioress, man, they are so vital. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — Because they bring the energy to your organization. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — Like my team right now is filled with warriors, man. And they are getting bloody every day; they’re strapping the sword on. They’ve got the armor; they are going. And they have it seems like they have unlimited energy, right? And they want and and the the healthy warriors want to, you know, cliché but they want to make a difference. They want to provide value. They want to do all those things. Rich Birch — Right, right. Lee Coate — Ah the dark side of the dark side of warriors is um, burnout, basically. It’s that idea of you know I’m in this prime season… Rich Birch — Just keep running. Lee Coate — …feel like um yeah, they keep running and maybe the purpose that they’re chasing is not discovered or it it starts to be elusive. And so I think some of that can also produce the burnout. I’m doing this over and over and over again and nothing I’m not really ah I’m not really getting where I want to go. I’m not winning the battles, right? What does that mean? So that can lead us to some burnout for sure. Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Lee Coate — So prince/princess, warrior/warrioess… Rich Birch — And then what’s next? Lee Coate — …um, third is king and king and queen. Um I don’t know where you are, Rich. This may be you. Um I’m definitely a king. Rich Birch — Yep. Lee Coate — And when I say those words sometimes people can think well, you know, that’s ah that sounds kind of arrogant. That’s not the direction. What what it really means is the kings and the queens bring experience. Rich Birch ‑ Right, right. Lee Coate — That’s their contribution to the organization. And they provide direction, right? So my biggest contribution right now is I’ve got all these warriors… Rich Birch ‑ Right. Lee Coate — …and if I’m constantly going hey guys, let’s go this way and here’s what you need to be aware of, right? And let’s sit down together and let’s review everything so that I can use my experience to help you avoid things. And they’re like cool, right? Here’s the thing that’s interesting with my warriors is I need to strap the armor on once in a while; I need to put the sword on. I need to get in it with them. Rich Birch ‑ Right. Lee Coate — There’s certain moments where it’s like I need to get in there. But what’s interesting is they love that. But then there’s also a moment where they’ll say, leave; we’re good. We got it. Rich Birch — Right, right. Lee Coate — We’ll let you know if we need you again, right? Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Lee Coate — And so again and and I don’t want I don’t have the energy to be in there now. The the dark side of Kings and queens is they get they can check out, right? We can get to the point where you know we’ve kind of arrived maybe; we’re not as ambitious anymore. Um, we don’t have the energy, and so in some ways we can check out and just put our lives put our leadership lives on cruise control. And nobody nobody even knows it cause sometimes as a king and queen it’s pretty easy to just kind of sit on the throne and not really do anything… Rich Birch — Right, right. Lee Coate — …that’s moving the organization forward. Rich Birch — Wow. Lee Coate — By the way, Rich, if if you walk into a room and you have to tell someone you’re a king, or you have to announce that. You’re not. Rich Birch — You’re not a king. Lee Coate — You’re not a king. Rich Birch — Yes, exactly. Lee Coate — So if anybody listening if you’ve got to go in and say, guys, I listened to Lee and Rich and I’m a king. Rich Birch — Yeah. Lee Coate — You’re not the king. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, totally. Lee Coate — The king whenever a king walks in the room, people know the king’s in the room, or the queen’s in the room. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, that totally, absolutely, yeah. Lee Coate — They just know; they defer. Rich Birch — That’s vivid. That’s very and that’s interesting you say the dark side around that kind of like being checked out that being, you know, like not not as engaged. I remember ten years ago I was with a lead pastor of a very large church and definitely in the king phase, and I remember him saying, he said—and it was like a bit of a shocker—and at the time I was like I don’t get what you’re saying because—maybe it was more like fifteen years ago—he was like well you know this is not like a full-time job. Like this isn’t this doesn’t take all of me. Like I I and I remember at the time thinking that’s very odd, like that’s an odd thing to say. I’m like you’re leading a church, at this point was like you know tens of thousands of people and, but now I can kind of see that where I’m like there’s it. It can create that opportunity for you to just as you know on the negative side of you know, being a king just kind of amass your kingdom and sit back and let all the let all the warriors take care of everything. Interesting. Lee Coate — Where I where I think this is important to talk about with your team is I think warriors will get frustrated with kings and queens… Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — …if they experience that, right? Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — Because again the warriors they just want direction. They don’t need you fighting every battle, but man they’re going to get frustrated if you don’t provide them. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. Lee Coate — And by the way if you’re a warrior, nobody wants a warrior that acts like a king. Rich Birch — Right, right. Lee Coate — So if you’re in a warrior phase, be a warrior, right? Rich Birch — Yes. Lee Coate — When it’s time to be a King… Rich Birch — Yeah, yes. Lee Coate — …we’ll all know that and and lean into it. The last one, Rich, is what we call a sage or a muse. This is you know, what that latter season of life and their greatest contribution is wisdom and being advisory um, as they’re on the team. I think this can also be maybe kind of as a side note something that we can look at even as our church, you know, there’s something about this probably that also speaks to our church, our congregation, our volunteer structure, all of those things, right? Because there’s always that tension between what do we do with the more you know mature people in our church. But man if someone’s a sage and they know that, and they embrace it, that is so amazing. Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s huge. It’s huge. Lee Coate — That is so healthy they can bring that with time now. The dark side of a sage is they have an agenda. Rich Birch — Okay, what do you mean by that? Lee Coate — So well I mean and we all experience. It’s like when you’re a sage and I bring you into the room and you say listen, here’s here’s what I’ve learned, here’s what I think, here’s what I would suggest you do, go do that, let me know how that goes. Right? Rich Birch — Okay, okay, yeah. Lee Coate — And and and they’re kind of like, you know, it’s not that they’re disengaged. They just understand their role, right. But if you’re a sage and you’ve got an agenda behind the advice that you’re giving, that can be unhealthy, right? It can be it’s that older staff person that really is giving advice based on I don’t I don’t like these changes, or I don’t I don’t think this, right? They’re they’re giving advice with a personal agenda. Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — That can be the dark side of being a sage or a muse. Rich Birch — So then… Lee Coate — And we have to work really hard to move people along, rich, in this. We do… Rich Birch — Yeah. Lee Coate — I had a prince that was on my team in the last year and as their role evolved, we really needed them to start warrioring and they literally said, not not with words but with action, I’m not ready to do that and I don’t want to do it. And so they chose to do something else, right? Rich Birch — Interesting. Lee Coate — Because they like being a prince. I mean think about a prince. Princes aren’t princes are usually like they’re not like; they’re born that way, right? Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah. Lee Coate — Like when you’re a prince, it’s like you just all that’s all you know. I’m a prince. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Lee Coate — And so you have to move them out of that stage… Rich Birch — Yes. Lee Coate — …into like no, it’s time to go to battle. So. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s I think that’s a really helpful framework. It’s a creative framework ;I think it’s a helpful framework too to think. Because I’ve even said I’ve said to young leaders, like it doesn’t bother me as ah as a leader to look at somebody in their twenties who is kind of they’re still trying to figure it out like they’re they’re trying different things they’re like in and out of stuff. And but there is there’s a weird moment there which I’ve so I’ve said to people I’m like there, I don’t know when it is I don’t have a way to prescribe it, but it’s like if you keep doing that it goes from being like a normal behavior which in this case is I would say is a princely behavior, or a princess behavior, of like hey I’m trying to figure out I got lots of passion I got lots of curiosity I’m trying different things. But then eventually if you just keep keep stuck in that phase then you get passed over. Because people are like no well we actually need warriors. We need we need you to settle down on something and to, you know, take up arms and and push forward. Um yeah I think that’s really fascinating. What a fascinating work. Rich Birch — Now this is interesting framework. How have you found this helpful as you’ve been engaging with your team at the church or with other, you know, with other churches. Lee Coate — Yeah I mean I think so pretty simply it’s it’s you know it’s something that you know just trying to kind of build out obviously… Rich Birch — Yeah. Lee Coate — …it’s something new but you know in the culture meetings that we have here at The Crossing when I stand in front of the team. It’s become language that you’ll hear them use. Right? And so as we’ve kind of unpacked it a little bit… Rich Birch — Love it. Lee Coate — …in a facilitated way now you’ll start to hear, yeah, he’s that you know that’s a prince thing. Or he’s not in ah, not in a detrimental way but more in a like understanding way. Rich Birch — Yep. Lee Coate — And then as so as as this is something that has started to take some form, there have been a lot of occasions with teams and churches that this has been really helpful, you know in that work on it rhythm that I’m talking about, this would be an example of something where hey we’ve got an hour or 2 hours we’re gonna sit, and we’re gonna we’re gonna wrestle with this. Where are you; where is your team? What is your best contribution? Are you leaning into the dark side a little bit? I mean you know your listeners are already going, yeah, this is a rich conversation that they can have. Rich Birch — Interesting, interesting. So good. Well I love this. This is so helpful. Um, what ah what a cool framework. As we went through this, you know, I was just recently in the last six months I was talking to a king um, in your language, who um they they were they’ve come to a bit of a a crossroads where they’re they’re feeling that pressure of like okay, so now what? They’re like now now what do I do? And um, are are really asking the question am I going to warrior for the next ten, fifteen years? Am I going to you know do I do I have you know it kind of in me to continue on in a purpose, or do I need to say do I need to really switch to being a sage or a muse? And and and and they definitely are feeling that, you know, I think that checkout thing really strongly because they’re like like my life just keeps running. It’s fine like it’s all it’s all fine; nothing’s not you know there’s no, nothing’s really nobody’s burning the bridges at the door. We can keep going as we’re going, so I just think this is really helpful, Lee. I appreciate this framework; this is great. Lee Coate — Absolutely. I wonder if there isn’t I mean anything to the quietly quitting conversation again. Not a conversation we want to have again. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah. Lee Coate — But I don’t I think this could I think this could also contribute to some of that… Rich Birch — Sure. Yeah. Lee Coate — …if there was frustration on a team where they could have a better understanding of where they currently were… Rich Birch — Right. Lee Coate — …and what that would demand of them. So I think I think that would be really key. I would say, Rich, as well before we close up is that, you know, somebody asked me and I think it’s true. I think that again I said this is an age. I think there are things where it’s a season like I would say in my executive pastor work I’m a king. I would say in my Growmentum work I’m probably in a warrior season, frankly. I’m using that king experience and direction. But as far as like what I’m doing and digging a new thing out of the ground. It’s kind of a warrioring. Rich Birch — Oh yeah, that’s a good phrase. Lee Coate — So that’s where I think sometimes even a king might say—some of the people you reference—it may be time for them to find, if they’re not ready to be a sage, they need to find an area of their life where they can warrior again a little bit, right? Rich Birch — Yeah, totally. Yep. Lee Coate — And lean in a little bit if they’re feeling bored or those things. So I think it’s just a I think it’s a I think it’s just a healthy conversation to have… Rich Birch — Yeah, interesting discussion. That’s so good. Lee Coate — …thanks for letting us have it rich. Rich Birch — Yeah it’s so great. Now we’ll we’ll in our show notes what we’ve got. Like ah you put together a slide that talks through all of these. Um I’d encourage you, friends, you should take that, print it, maybe hang it in your desk somewhere or you know in your office. It might be something that could be interesting to ah come back to time and again as you’re thinking about your team and wrestling through. Rich Birch — Now, Lee, I want to make sure people get a chance to connect with you just as we close up. Where do we want to send them online to to talk to connect with you, with the church, with Growmentum – where are all the places that they can chase you down? Lee Coate — Absolutely; it’s really simple. Obviously if you’re a social media person I’m there living life on social media like everybody else. And so it’s just simple; all of the handles there are @leecoate. I haven’t left Twitter yet so you can find me there, but mostly on on Instagram. Lee Coate — But then more importantly you can follow Growmentum Group. We’re on Instagram and you can email me specifically and I can have some conversations if you’d love for me or our team to have more conversations with you. If this conversation would be helpful to have in person or Zoom we can do that. But it’s Lee—very simple—lee@growmentumgroup.com Rich Birch — Love it. Lee Coate — lee@growmentumgroup.com – I’m sure it’ll be in the notes as well. Rich Birch — Yeah, totally; we’ll link to it there. Lee Coate — So I love to have a conversation with anybody who wants to have it. But praying for the leaders out there. It’s not easy; lean in. We’re gonna we’re we’re gaining ground. So let’s keep doing this thing. Rich Birch — Love it. And and, friends, you know I don’t so first of all I think if if anything today you’ve said like oh I think I’d like to talk to Lee or the folks at Growmentum, act on that instinct. Don’t don’t just let that pass you by; reach out. So I I don’t do this for everybody; I really do trust Lee. I think he’s he there’s there are people (shocker) who are in this market who see it as a market, but that like Lee doesn’t. Lee sees it as a chance to try to help church leaders. I know he wants to help you, wants to come alongside you and be a strategic outsider to help you think about these things. And I would strongly encourage, recommend, endorse that you reach out to him if you’ve got any question. This would be a perfect year if you do not have someone like Lee in your corner, this would be a perfect year to do that. So thanks so much Lee; I appreciate you being on the show. Thanks for coming. We’ll have you back in the future. Love, love talking to you. Thanks, buddy. Lee Coate — Thanks, Rich; appreciate it, bud.

Thanks for tuning in to the unSeminary podcast. We’re with returning guests Scot Longyear and Heath Bottomly today. Heath is the Lead Pastor of the Creative Teams at Pure Heart Church in Arizona and Scot is the Senior Pastor of Maryland Community Church in Indiana. Scot and Heath talk with us about their book Fight For The Future: Creating The Right Blueprint For Building God-Sized Dreams. From dreaming to doing. // Individuals, ministries and churches often talk about things that they should do, things that are a good vision or a good dream, but we don’t take action. In Fight For The Future, Scot and Heath talk about moving from the dreaming stage to the doing stage. This process consists of three key elements: the right things, the right reasons, and the right people. Right things. // One of the hardest things churches wrestle with is believing that the right things are simply good things. Because we all want to do good things, churches can have an avalanche of good things thrown in our laps. Before we know it, we’re giving a small amount of energy to a large number of good things and aren’t accomplishing significant milestones in any of them. Fight For The Future asks what is that thing you are called to; what is that dream in your mind and heart, and how can you intentionally pursue it? Discovering the right things. // To find what your church is called to do, ask what are your church’s passions? Where has the Lord placed you in your city or in certain relationships that you have? What are your resources, and what is the Lord stirring up in your heart? Right reasons. // We are all creative beings and we’re all building something. The question is why we are building what we’re building. Is what you’re building largely about yourself and your empire or legacy, or is it about God’s kingdom? Right people. // We all struggle with finding the right people in ministry. At Maryland Community Church, the team filters potential hires through a long process to see if they are the right culture fit. During this process Scot asks the potential hire just two questions: What am I going to learn about you in six months that will surprise or embarrass me? If I have to stand in front of our congregation and read a resignation letter from you because of a moral failure, what would that moral failure be? Missional unity. // In some cases we need to hire people who are really specialized at what they do. But if someone is super-talented and not aligned with the mission of your church, they are not the right person. The mission needs to be more important than the talent, and the work can’t be about perfection, but rather excellence – knowing you did your best. Hand off leadership to the next generation. // If we’re not in the process of working to figure out how to hand off leadership and responsibilities to the next generation, it goes back to the mindset that we’re building an empire around ourselves. A kingdom-focused mindset goes out and multiplies. You can learn more about the book at www.scotlongyear.com and pick it up online. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Leadership Pathway If you are trying to find, develop and keep young leaders on your team look no further than Leadership Pathway. They have worked with hundreds of churches, and have interviewed thousands of candidates over the past several years. They are offering a new ebook about five of the core competencies that are at the heart of the leadership development process with every church that they partner with…just go to leadershippathway.org/unseminary to pick up this free resource. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Well hey everybody welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in. It is a great day today. We have got, in fact I think this is the first time on in the history, you know, 600 episodes in that this has happened. We have previous guests who have both done solo episodes that now are coming on a combined episode. Super exciting. What does that mean? That means you’re in for a real treat today. We’ve got Scot Longyear and Heath Bottomly with us. Heath is the Lead Pastor of Creative Teams at Pure Heart Church which has two campuses in Arizona if I can count correct. Ah, he’s also the ah the co-owner of Media Maven Publications and he’s a creative strategist beyond incredible experience called the Experience Conference. Scot Longyear is the senior pastor of Maryland Community Church which is one of the fastest growing churches in the country, not in Maryland though, in Indiana just to throw curve balls because he’s so creative. Um, and he is also the Pastor of Experience Conference and is is a co-host of the really popular and incredible Worship Leader Problems or Probs podcast because they’re so cool. Ah Scot ah, Heath, so glad you’re here. Welcome to the podcast. So so thanks for being on the show today. Heath Bottomly — Thanks for having us. Scot Longyear — Hey, thanks for having us. Yeah, yeah. Rich Birch — Now this is going to be good. I’m excited about this. I saw recently that you guys released a book and today, again, we’re breaking with tradition. Normally, friends, I like to talk with our guests, and then if they got a book, talk about it at the end. But actually I want you to check this book out so much I want to get it right up front. So the name of this book is Fight for the Future: Creating the Right Blueprint for Building God-sized Dreams. Um Scot, why don’t you tell us why did you guys collaborate on this book? Why this book? Why take the time, effort, and energy to put this thing together? Scot Longyear — Well I think, Rich, we’ve we’ve just found you know there are a lot of people that talk about like, man, we should… and we should do this, and man, if our church did this and did this. And and’ll I’ll couch it in a story. Um, ah just ah, probably one of the one of the biggest lessons I learned when I had lunch with John Maxwell, which sounds really awesome, doesn’t it? To say like ah um… Rich Birch — It’s a nice name drop. That’s a great name drop right there. Just right you should have rolled right past it. That would have been great. Well, you know me and John, so I sometimes call him Johnny ah, love it. Heath Bottomly — Yeah, yeah. Scot Longyear — Right, it’ll seem less impressive when I tell you how we did it. So… Rich Birch — Yes. Scot Longyear — Years ago we’re at a we’re at a conference. There’s about 2000 people that are there. I’m attending a conference with some of our staff. And John Maxwell is teaching on stage, doing his thing. And in one of the sessions he says, Hey I was teaching you know last year and there you there were three guys in the front row while I was teaching, they just flipped up this sign that said: Lunch – we will buy. And so John just tells the story. And so I look at some of the guys that are with me, and we’re younger and we’ve probably got more ambition than brains. And we’re just like, Whoa. Rich Birch — Let’s do it. Scot Longyear — So we break we break from that session. We go back and we’re we’re finding the church staff. We like we need some cardboard and a Sharpie. So we we get a cardboard in this Sharpie. They start the second session. Again, this is there’s about 2000 people. It’s this this new, but very traditional church so they have this giant choir loft. So John starts teaching from stage and as he’s teaching we go up behind him in the choir loft the three of us walk up sit down and then we just flip this sign up that we made says this says: Lunch – we will buy. Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Scot Longyear — So John’s teaching and some people just start they start laughing. And so he stops; he doesn’t know what what to do. And then he turns around. And and I don’t know ah, Rich, if you’ve ever had one of those occasions in your life where time kind of stops. And then you think… Heath Bottomly — You’re questioning everything. Scot Longyear — So it was kind of this slow mo thing he turns around and and he looks at the three of us. And I had two thoughts going through my head. I thought this was a terrible idea. Rich Birch — Love it. Scot Longyear — And I think I think we’re going to get kicked out of a John Maxwell seminar, right? Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yes. Scot Longyear — So he looks at us and he’s quiet for like 2 seconds, which seems like three days. And then he starts laughing. And he says, hey Charlie—which is an assistant or something—he says, make room for three more guys for lunch. Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Scot Longyear — And I’m like so takes us in a back room. We have lunch with John Maxwell, and like a few other guys. And we’re like that we’re just we’re just the peasants that came like to the king’s table, right? Rich Birch — Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, yes. Scot Longyear — But I didn’t care. We’re in the room do the thing. But the most surprising thing to me, Rich, was after that we’re walking the hallways a little bit as the hero, to be honest with you. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Scot Longyear — And people were like, whoa man, how was lunch with John Maxwell? And I’m like well how was your lunch you know? Like um, but what surprised me is that is that several people in different conversations said this: man, me and my me, my guys, we talked about doing that. Rich Birch — Oh that’s so good. Scot Longyear — Man, when we heard John when we heard John say that, we thought about that. And the only the only reason I had lunch with John Maxwell that day is because I acted on the dream, right? Rich Birch — Right. Bias for action. Love it. Scot Longyear — And so many times we’re just like here’s a good dream, here’s a good vision, but we get locked up in that, and we don’t do anything. And so we took a real hard look at the book of Nehemiah, put our heads together, and said how is it the Lord teaches in in the book of Nehemiah, which are principles for today. How do we move from just this dreaming stage to this actual doing stage? Rich Birch — Oh love it. Yeah, and I love this book I think this could be a real gift. Here we are, you know, at the beginning of the year where all this is the natural time of year where we’re all thinking like, hmm I wonder what’s this year going to be. This would be a great thing I think to process with your team together friends. Now um, Heath, I wonder if you could… So this that you’ve broken it up. I love this book because you’ve broken it up into just three really big ideas. Stuff I can get my head around. I’m a simple guy. Right things, right reasons, right people. Talk me through right things. Maybe I’m the guy maybe I’m the person who’s like the bias for action dude. I’m willing to do anything. How do I know if I’m heading in the right direction? I’m doing the right things. Help me unpack that. Heath Bottomly — Well I mean I think we even jump into a few different myths in the book um, confronting them and and a lot because a lot of times we think the right things are simply good things. And and that’s probably one of the hardest things that churches wrestle with because we all want to do good things. Ah, and so because of that though we end up getting this this avalanche of good things thrown in our laps, and if we don’t come up with them someone else in the community is coming up with and you know what you should do. You know, and and before you know it um, you are giving 2% of energy to each individual thing. Rich Birch — So true. Heath Bottomly — And not really accomplishing… I mean I don’t want to say you’re not accomplishing anything but you’re not accomplishing significant milestones in any of these areas, because you’re not actually giving them the energy that they’re due. Heath Bottomly — And so ah the right things in the context of this book is going, what is the thing that you know that you can do, and that you’re called to? What is that what is that idea that dream in your mind and your heart and focus in on that and then intentionally take the steps in order to pour the the most amount of energy towards accomplishing those things. Heath Bottomly — Ah and because otherwise the the thing that will derail the the biggest dreams of God for your life are good things. Because they aren’t bad things, because it’s easy to say no to bad; you can just go, no we ain’t doing that. Good things, man, it’s it’s hard to talk yourself out of doing some of these good things. Rich Birch — Absolutely. Heath Bottomly — And that’s probably the biggest derailment that I see happening, in in my life and in churches that I work with. Rich Birch — Scott, unpack that a little bit more I can see that that issue really clearly like so many churches. It’s not that they’re lacking of doing things; they’re doing a lot of different things. The question is how do we pick the right things. What is… Scot Longyear — Right. Rich Birch — What does that look like how what how should we be straining that out. Maybe we’re we’re looking around in all the different things that are happening in our church and we’re trying to figure out what are the right things for us to do – not not give we don’t want to give 2%; we want to provide more energy, narrow the focus, all that. What’s that look like? Scot Longyear — Yeah, well for sure you know you got to lean into the Father and like what are you calling us to and that, and he speaks in a ton of different ways. He’s going to speak to us through our quiet time and and that. But I think you’ve also got to you know, not really read the tea leaves; we got to read the days, right? Like you’ve got to look at what are your passions, you know? Because he’s not going to… I guarantee he’s not going to call me into be in a CPA somewhere, like that’s not that’s not the right thing for me… Rich Birch — Right. Scot Longyear — Nor for any organization, right? So what is it your passion or the or a lot of the passions in your church are doing? And what are some of the resources, and we talk about resources. I think one thing that we don’t talk about is the resource of proximity. You know where has the Lord placed you in proximity – whether that’s certain location in your city, whether it’s ah certain relationships that you have. When you when you look at the book of Nehemiah, he was like I was cupbearer to the King, right? And so like like there’s a proximity that’s in the middle of that. Scot Longyear — And then it’s the whole Blackaby thing of find out where the Lord is moving and get there. Rich Birch — Right, right. Scot Longyear — You know some of the best things that we’ve done in our church have been because the Lord has started to stir some stuff up, and I’m and I’m like I sense the Lord’s moving here. Maybe we should put some resources here. And ah, you know it’d be easy to go like hey man that’s [inaudible] great leadership and the Lord’s like um, or maybe you’re just doing what I’m already doing… Rich Birch — Yes, yeah. Scot Longyear — …and moving that way and you start seeing the traction on that. You know what but one thing that we um ah, we kind of explored in the book—which was real helpful to me that Heath came and brought with—was he talked just a little bit about this whole idea of empires versus kingdoms. And that’s really this that was really eye opening to me. Heath Bottomly — Yeah, and it really ties it really ties into this whole element of focus is on creatives no matter or in leaders whoever they are. Everyone has a natural bent toward building. We’re all taking items and creating something because we’re all creative beings. I work with my with creative teams and everything I tell them the fifth word in the bible tells us the first characteristic we know about God. in the beginning god created… Rich Birch — Created, yep. Heath Bottomly — …and and we are given that same tendency, and and and talent um embedded and it looks different for everyone. But we’re all creative beings. We’re all building. It’s a matter of what it is that we are building. Heath Bottomly — Now ah we can we can build things that are personal ministry elements and everything um or we can build personal ah companies and things like that. At the end of the day their intention, your mindset towards those things will determine whether or not that’s an empire or is it are you building the kingdom. I know great guys who build incredible companies but they’re kingdom-focused; they go this is for the intention of doing ministry and for taking… A good friend of mine Kevin Rowe he owns a body shop. But his whole thing is I own this body shop and I employ these employees because I am providing for these employees’ families and providing a space where they can hear about God. Scot Longyear — Awesome. Rich Birch — Love it. Yeah. Love it. Heath Bottomly — And so that even though he’s building something he’s building a company, he’s doing it with a kingdom focus. Um but I think a lot of people, even I’ve caught myself doing this, we can lean in toward empirical thinking in ministry. And we start building and putting blocks upon blocks and creating things that are actually more about creating our establishment, and creating our programs, creating our our legacy—you hear legacy a lot as a buzzword around—more than their long lasting impact on the kingdom. So when you start focusing, again the right reasons is when you start taking a look at that, if you’re doing the right things you have to then take a look and go are I doing them for the right reasons. Rich Birch — Right, right. What’s the drive behind it. Yeah. Heath Bottomly — Is it kingdom focused or is it empire focused? And ah, and we even talk about a couple things of ways that we can kind of check ourselves and check our teammates too on going, hey if you have a tendency toward this if you react this way towards things, It’s a good litmus test to determining ah the the empire focus or the kingdom focus, even within ourselves. Rich Birch — Yeah, I love it. Heath, sticking with that idea. Um, so let’s assume you know maybe I’m a pastor of a church of 1000, 1500 people; I look around and I’m like man I feel like we’re doing too much. And I’m you know we’re we’re spread thin. You know one of the things we see on the church growth side is larger church churches actually do less things. They do them with more energy than than smaller churches. Like I’m always surprised you know, talk to a church of 150 people and they have like 25 committees, and like all this stuff. I’m like I don’t know how do you do that like it’s crazy. But um, what is the difference… I know you’re a great strategy you’re a great strategic leader. What’s the difference between discernment and strategy? How do I how do those two kind of interact with each other? How do we how do we bring the Lord to bear in our decision making process while at the same time use the brain that he’s given us? How does that fit together in your brain and what’s that look like? Heath Bottomly — Yeah, well I think there’s some other one of the biblical examples that I’m always drawn to in this because what you’re talking about I get asked a lot. They’re like ah you’re just thinking business strategy. Um, there are things where you have heard the voice of God an angel of the Lord appeared – you know you you see these stories in in scripture all the time of or the Lord spoke or spoke through something… that is you know and discerning which of these voices are true um, which of these are from God. Um, that’s ah, that’s a Holy Spirit connection then there’s also things that are just um decisions that you make based on what you know to be true about God. Heath Bottomly — And so and it’s going I know this is right; I know these these elements are true because the principles are right. And a great example of that is is um Jonathan ah with his armor bearer. And ah once again, Israel’s fighting you know the Philistines, and so Jonathan and his armor bearer kind of go off to the side or whatever and they go and Jonathan makes this this profound move. He said you know what? Let’s call up to these Philistines that we see at this camp. If they ask us to come up, we’re going to take that as a sign that God’s giving us this army. Heath Bottomly — Now this wasn’t based on, at least in scripture, it wasn’t based on anything where he had in his devotional time, you know, or a good friend had come to him and said, hey thus sayeth the Lord. This was a moment where he said based on what I’m feeling, and based on what I know about God, I’m going to take a risk. And I’m going to take – this is a gut feeling. Heath Bottomly — And he went up and the consequences of that were not like if he’s wrong, it’s not like hey, you know, reset you know and better we’ll try again tomorrow. This was I I die. Um, but I love at the end of this little story, ah they end up winning and then it says that the earth shook. Heath Bottomly — And what hit me so hard is that so many times we are looking for something we need the earth to shake around us. We we just think in our ministry and our lives or whatever and why isn’t something powerful happening? And a lot of times it’s because we’re actually not taking the steps to do the things based on that gut instinct, and also what we know about God to be true. And because here’s the thing with the earth of shook if Jonathan hadn’t taken that step, that wasn’t a thus sayeth the Lord’s step. He took the step and it resulted in the earth shaking. Rich Birch — Love it. Heath Bottomly — And so that that that’s how I see those two things working together. Rich Birch — Yeah I love that That’s so good. Again I love the the framework right things, right reasons, right people. Um, Scott one of the things I appreciated about you I’m a very casual observer of you, ah your ministry. It seems like you’re one of these people who actually believes in team leadership. Like even in this conversation it’s like you guys wrote a book together. Like you know, um, my impression of you as a lead pastor is like you’re always like talking about other people around you and like you’re gathering team around you. Rich Birch — You’re you know at the Experience Conference like even in the earlier this before our call today you did this. I was like, oh it looks like the Experience Conference went great. And you were like oh the team did such a good job. Like you’re constantly pushing and that so that’s a compliment to you. Right people is we all struggle with how do we find the right people. To attach to, to draw in, to find, to get plugged in – talk us through that. How does the book of Nehemiah… what is it how is that you know story from thousands of years ago relate to us today as we’re trying to build teams here? Scot Longyear — Yeah, well he’s [inaudible] realize he’s got he has a vision that that he can’t accomplish himself, you know… Rich Birch — Yep. Scot Longyear — …which I think God often does, you know. And people like I can’t do this on my own. Are like well yeah, duh. Right? So you’re going to need to you go need some help. Rich Birch — That’s the point. Scot Longyear — Yeah. And and I think you know maturity you know realizes that like I don’t want to be the smartest guy in the room. Um, and so you want to you know you want to create a team of just like like go-getters. Let’s go. But having I mean it’s the whole Jim Collins thing, right? The right people on the bus. You know it’s the who, then the what, um and that’s been a hard leadership lesson. Ah, for me probably for a lot of leaders over time because you’re just like I think you’re a nice guy and we’ll get along. Let’s do this. Next thing you know you got to fire your best friend. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Scot Longyear — You know you go through a couple releasing people into some other ministries. We’ll say it like that right help you to find another ministry… Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Scot Longyear — …outside of our ministry, like there you go. Rich Birch — Finds you better place, position you better in the kingdom. Scot Longyear — And that is and I’m an enneagram six so it’s like that’s death to me, right? So like that gives you motivation to like you have to have the right people. And so how that’s translated for us is you know on our team at at our local church, we have worked really hard at ah, sustaining attributes and we’ve got the same thing. We call them permission to play. So if you’re interviewing at our church here’s what it means that you have to have to play on our team. We’re looking for that culture fit, right? And we want to go slow in hiring because we’ll be slow because I don’t want to I don’t want to release people. I don’t want to go through that as I don’t want the sideways energy. I mean I need the right people on the team that’s motivating other people, and you’re taking your lane, and you’re even coming out of your lane to help other people, and like we’re going and we’re not fighting about it. Scot Longyear — But um, here’s ah, here’s and I don’t know it works for everybody but but here’s in our context, we’ll run everybody through ah a, really long hiring process. There’s a battery of tests because again we’re looking for a culture fit. And you might be amazing, but you’re just not in nothing wrong with you. You know nothing immoral… Rich Birch — Right. Scot Longyear — …just not a cultural fit. So um I usually by this, unless it’s a really, really high level position, um, by the time the team um, have have done their due diligence and they’re like here’s the person that we want to hire, um, I’ll come in with the person if it’s midlevel or above, and I’ll do ah only a 30 minute interview with them and I’m asking them two questions. And these are my favorite questions and I say to them these may be… Rich Birch — Love it. Oh lean in, friends, this gonna be good. This is gonna be good. Love it. Scot Longyear — …these may be the hardest questions that you get all weekend. Um, but they’re going to tell me… Heath Bottomly — Where’s my coffee? Oh sorry. Rich Birch — Love it. Scot Longyear — So the first question I ask ’em is this. What am I going to learn about you in six months that’s going to surprise or embarrass me? Rich Birch — Oh that’s good. Scot Longyear — And and I just shut up. And um, it has been super helpful and and I’ve gotten gotten comments all the way from, gosh man, I don’t really don’t know if there’s anything at all. You know, ah to when I was younger I attempted suicide. Um, there’s a bankruptcy in my past. Here’s something… Again, um ah and I’m asking very intentionally. I’m asking for culture fit. How honest can this person be; where are you going to fit on the team? I’m not looking for anything that’s going to disqualify them, right? I mean there may be something that comes up like, hey we need to talk about that… Rich Birch — Yeah. Scot Longyear — …that guys be like I’ve got pornography in my past. Okay I need to know that because I’m going to help put some fences around you. The second question is sometimes tied to that, sometimes it’s the same answer but sometimes it’s different. And I say to them this I just asked this question last week with the hire that we were doing. I said if if I’m going to have to stand in front of our congregation and read a resignation letter from you because of a moral failure, what is that moral failure going to be? Rich Birch — Wow. Scot Longyear — Again then I just this shut up and you know there’s a lot you know people like well I don’t think it’s going to be anything. I’m like okay, no need to talk, brother. Like come on. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah. Scot Longyear — All of us has something. But again I I want to know when are you going to be a fit, and then two what is how can I help you in that. Because I don’t want us to get to that. And so that kind of helps me determine like is this a right fit, is it not the right person or not. And if not like will and we’ve had to make this hard decision. We’ve had to say no when there’s nobody on the bench. Rich Birch — Right. Yeah, those are hard. Yeah. Scot Longyear — Especially right now. It’s really hard to hire people um for a myriad of reasons and in the church world and so we’ve had to say we’re going to say we would rather hire the right person than than make a ah bad hire and and hope. So yeah, that’s kind of where we are. Rich Birch — Interesting. Heath Bottomly — Um I I think a lot of times I think a lot of times too we we get blinded by really talented people. Scot Longyear — Oh gosh. Heath Bottomly — Ah and and we we lose sight of this thing called missional unity. Um I’ve had I’ve been on teams where it’s like, okay everyone knows what what they’re doing, but they’re all slightly off… Rich Birch — Yes. Heath Bottomly — …target of what we’re doing missionally. Now you know everyone goes, oh well hey you know we got a love on them. We got, you know, yeah, you got to love on them and and encourage it. But at the end of the day you have to make a decision based on is missional is the mission that we’re called to more important, or strong enough ah, to be willing to make some hard calls on this even though they’re really talented at what they do? Is the mission more important than the talent that we’re experiencing? And and that’s a hard thing to do because man there’s some really talented people out there that are not in missional alignment. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. That’s good. And I you know I think there’s ah when a church gets to a certain size, you can end up hiring professionals. And some of that you have to do you have to find people who are really specialized in things. But that’s a particular risk in that area. It’s like just because this person has done this amazing thing at this other church does not mean that they’re aligned with your particular mission. That’s a very good insight, Heath. Rich Birch — Sticking with you around this whole idea of the right people, and you know one of the things so one of the things you’re known for is crafting great experiences, and crafting really creative experiences and things that are compelling and people want to be a part of them. There’s an interesting tension there particularly on the creative side between kind of getting the pros—people who are already fully baked ready to do the best thing ever—and they’re like you know, slot them in and they’ll nail it. And then the other side is like developing people; people who are, you knowy or maybe not quite there yet and how do we safely do that. Talk us through what that looks like. How do we wrestle through getting the right people you know the development versus the fully baked situation. What’s that look like for you, Heath? Heath Bottomly — Well, it’s really tough because a lot of times we see creative elements and we think um, well creativity is is really only happens the stronger the collaborative process is. And that’s actually just not always actually most of times not always true. The collaborative process usually dulls down the creative level to the to a common denominator that is shared by the amount of people in the room. So you could have a really sharp creative idea that those usually stem from 1 or 2 people. Rich Birch — Right. Heath Bottomly — Ah collaboration usually so how many people get that creative element. And so that principle that’s in place is happens on the on the talent and development route as well. So you get some really talented people; you can get some really cool traction. You can get some really cool movement. You may not have as much buy-in on it because not everyone gets it. But if everyone gets it. It’s not always the most creative thing. Rich Birch — Right, right. Heath Bottomly — And so what we tend to do is try to go, okay, let’s you know it’s not a magic formula. But let’s take ah a let’s take your your music team, for example. Um what we tend to do is go, hey, on any given weekend, you only have you have one project on the stage. And so what that what it means by that is someone who you are leaning into and developing who’s not there yet, um, but the rest of team can shore them up and work on them… Rich Birch — Right. Heath Bottomly — …and so and then that rotates around. Now every team is going to be different. You got to figure out what that percentage and what that is, but it’s an intentional Lego fit that you’re doing going how many pronged Lego are we going to be. Are we a two-pronged Lego, are we a six-prong Lego – what can fit to it without taking down um, what we have said this is our level of excellence. And this is the other thing I tell my team, we are not in the business of perfection. Perfection will always point out where you fell short. It will because none of us are perfect. Rich Birch — Right. Heath Bottomly — But excellence, at the end of the day you can go I brought my best, and I did my best for the guy standing next to me the girl standing next to me over here. We can all look each other in the eye and say yeah we brought it to the very best that we could. So there’s a there’s a book called—what is it—Canoeing the Mountains. And there’s a line in there it says, it’s it’s okay to fail; it’s not okay to suck. And I’m like and I’m going, dude I want I want t-shirts that’s say that. Rich Birch — Right. Yes, yes. Heath Bottomly — Because that is our mantra going… Rich Birch — Yep. Heath Bottomly — …we can fail all day and that’s part of the development process. We want people to know if you’re you’re not failing, you’re not trying. Rich Birch — Yes, yeah, yeah. Heath Bottomly — If you’re you’re not experimenting enough. You know you need to be able to do that. In the process of failing. It’s not okay to suck it. Rich Birch — Right, right. Heath Bottomly — Don’t let the failure be because you didn’t do it well. You know, and so… Rich Birch — Yeah, you didn’t put in your part of it. You didn’t develop. Heath Bottomly — Exactly. Rich Birch — You didn’t yeah you didn’t practice your craft – all that stuff. Yeah. Heath Bottomly — But if we are not in the constant business of working to find out how to hand off things and responsibilities and and real leadership to the people around us, the next generation, if we’re hoarding it, again it comes back to that mindset of Imperialistic mindset. It is an empire that we are building around us instead of a kingdom mindset that goes out and multiplies. If I’m not ready to if I’m not okay with handing off some of the biggest authority responsibilities to my team and letting them run, not saying abandon them, but provide the parameters and go here’s what I need at the end of this, but whatever decision you may I’m not gonna overrun you. Um if we’re not doing that meaningfully in some ways, we’re actually without even maybe realizing that we’re building an empire around us. So that when we’re not in the room anymore, it can’t function and it can’t… Heath Bottomly — I heard a leader say, yeah but it doesn’t it doesn’t feel like me. And I’m like that’s probably one of the best things that you can actually be bringing into an organization is that it doesn’t feel like you. Um, because if it feels like you, then if you’re not there the whole thing crumbles. And that should never be the goal of kingdom-based building. Um, but unfortunately that is the goal of empirical thinking. Rich Birch — Interesting, interesting. Okay, that’s that’s good that’s good. I think that’s a tension we feel we sense in lots of things, right? We want to find a way to we all we should be developing people, but how do we, you know? I love that – some really good thoughts there. Rich Birch — Let’s let’s, Scott, let’s talk a little bit about the book. So Fight for the Future. When I so when I checked this out I really did think this could be a great team resource. Could be the kind of thing, hey let’s let’s work on this together as our staff team. Let’s, you know, read through this; you’ve got discussion questions based right in there. Um, tell me what you were hoping its impact would have, you know, particularly maybe in the church context. That’s who’s listening in. How could you see this resource being used by church leaders? Scot Longyear — Yeah, so you know I’ll go back to the, you know, implementing the dream. And you make such a great point. There’s so many good things to do. We need to you know you got to whittle those down and and do the right things. And so you know, I think it’s I think it’s a unique resource, Rich, because Heath and I come from some different perspectives. Um, but we’re all the the same direction, different voices. You know he is one of the most creative people that I know as you’ve heard, you know, in strategy and all that, and thinks like very he’s he’s like a right brain/left brain like creative. Like like sometimes like you got to break that down like for me a little bit more like it’s like so. And I’m like I’m the I’m the 3-point preacher guy, want tell you some stories and give you some practical like stuff, and and roll. And so… Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, sure. Scot Longyear — Ah way we approached it was we said, man, hey here’s the framework out of Nehemiah. It is right things, right right reasons, right people. And so we each took a chapter in there um and spoke from our own voice in that. And then just ah, you know again, those discussions they’re real practical and I think like anything else they get some discussion going. Scot Longyear — Because most of the time we’re moving like super fast and we’re just doing this stuff but we just got to pause and go, like now wait a minute. Are we going the right the right way? Are there new things that we need to be to be pursuing? What might that look like? Scot Longyear — And we take a you know a super deep dive as we go down and and we talk about you know, being the kind of person that God wants to use. And ah you know your how how you know what’s what’s done in in quiet with the Lord really informs everything else. And so it’s it’s much deeper in the middle of all that. But, you know, our dream that people would would read it and go like yeah, let’s start taking action on these dreams that the Lord has. Because if it is his dream, he’s going to use somebody to do it. And so if he’s calling you, like do it. And if you if you pass on it, he’s going to use somebody else. Rich Birch — Right. Scot Longyear — And then if we can be a help to you in in that. Um you know I can tell you a thousand ways not to do things… Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Scot Longyear — …you know or a thousand mistakes we’ve made it, like don’t do that. Don’t do that. You know we would. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. Scot Longyear — We’d love to come beside you. Rich Birch — Love it. Heath, want to more add to that? Heath Bottomly — Yeah, um, something that I really appreciate about about Scott, I mean at first off thank you, Scott, for those wonderful encouraging words; you you pet my ego. Scot Longyear — You are welcome. Heath Bottomly — Um, no, but no serious in all all seriousness. Ah you’ll see the chapters that that you know the ones that I’m penning or whatever that I’m writing, they’ll they’ll be very much this is how the structure will look. These are how the pieces move together. This is how these steps. And then you you flip the page and you go to Scott, and Scott really just penetrates right to the heart and he goes, and this is what God is going to need to do in your life in order for this to be something that’s lasting. In that that I love that that mindset um that Scott brings to that. Because at the end of the day, you know, there’s this tension that you hear a lot with strategy and and ministry – I’ll just call it that. Heath Bottomly — Um, there are people going hey it’s not about strategy. It’s not about that, hey we’re too we’re too planning, you know, we have to be more Spirit. You know, let and everything as if these are two things that are opposite each other… Rich Birch — Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Heath Bottomly — And actually they’re most efficient when they work in tandem with each other… Rich Birch — Yeah together. Absolutely yeah, for sure. Heath Bottomly — …and in the same way, what is ah the example of, you know, people go, well hey, you guys are strategizing too much on how to build, how to fight. I had someone tell them go this isn’t a fight for the future; God’s got this. And I’m like actually it is a fight because there’s an intentionality. God will build his church. How much, like Scott just said, how much you want to be a part of it is up to you. Rich Birch — Right. Heath Bottomly — You know in the same way the kid who had the, you know, the loaves and fish or you told me no one else there had any food. Um but he was the only one who stepped up. And because of that he’s the only one mentioned in that story, you know and was a part of that story. Rich Birch — Yeah I love it. Right. Heath Bottomly — When we’re talking about fighting for the future, it’s asking how much do you want to be a part of the story. God’s gonna do what he’s gonna do. Rich Birch — Right, right. Heath Bottomly — He doesn’t need us to feed the 5000, but he invites us in and going so what are we going to do with that. So. Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. So good. Well this has been a great conversation. Could you give us you know a two minute shot as well, Heath, on the Experience Conference? So I think you guys do such a great job on this. If I’m an executive pastor—we know there’s lot of executive pastors listening—and to me I think this could be a great conference for you to say, hey I want to take my creative folks together. Let’s go and do this together. I think it could be ah, just a fantastic experience for your team. Ah, give us the you know why Experience? What’s unique about it? Why do I need another conference—those kind of things—but give us that that sense there, Heath. Heath Bottomly — Yeah, absolutely. And what I love about Experience Conference and what drew me to it to begin with was the fact that it is less about the um, the stage in the floor, and it is more about peers talking to peers from experience, or from you know here’s the journey thus far that here’s some hurdles that I’ve faced. Um and sharing that with each other and in that room you have you have such an even blend of voices on so many levels, both in in speaking but also in you know singing you know in everything. the fact I love how Scott you know has shared in the past that it’s one of the few experiences where he’s been able to sit next to his team and worship together… Rich Birch — So good. Heath Bottomly — …you know in in song. Um, but that’s one aspect of it. The mindset, being able to talk to people and share a mindset that tells them you’re not alone in this. Oh you thought maybe you were the only one struggling with this, you’re not. You’re in a room full of people who are all doing this together. Ah, that community is something that’s truly I’ve found unique because it’s less about a concert, and nothing against concert – I love concerts and I think there’s something very powerful about just bringing people together and just celebrating together. Um I don’t I don’t downplay that at all, but this is not that. Heath Bottomly — Um, this is much more about ah that communication and that bond peer-to-peer. And it’s a great way for whether you are in the music ministry or creative Ministry or any other area of ah your church ministry to come together with the same mindset together as a team. I think there’s a lot of potential there for your team to walk away with something truly unique. Rich Birch — Um, love it. Yeah that’s just at experienceconference.com – like again friends I would encourage you to check that out. I know you know there’s a lot of it. It seems like there’s a lot of conferences going on obviously all this stuff kind of post pandemic is ramping back up. But I really do think this is one that you need to at least make the decision against like look at it take take a look is this the kind of thing that you could and should take your team to it’s right at the end of August beginning of September – August 29th to September 1st if I’ve got those dates right. Um, so yeah, and there’s discount cliffs and all that, so make sure you check that out. Rich Birch — Scot, if people want to pick up copies of the book, I’m assuming they can get them at Amazon. I think Amazon still sells books; they seem to sell everything else. They can get them there. Is there anywhere else we want to sell send them online to pick up copies of Fight for the Future? Scot Longyear — Ah, yeah, several places – you can grab you go through my website scottlongyear.com; grab them there. It is Amazon. Ah Heath, we also he did the other side of the the marketing – we’re on Barnes Noble, right? Heath Bottomly — Yeah yeah and Apple Books of course for ebooks and everything like that are also available. Rich Birch — Love it. Heath Bottomly — Amazon provides both the the Kindle version and they do; they have the physical copies as well. Best way to get a physical copy though is scottlongyear.com. Rich Birch — Yes, love it. Heath Bottomly — Um so that that would be the and he’ll I believe he’ll sign copies of the books that leave his his establishment. Rich Birch — Oh nice. Look at that – great. Scot Longyear — I’ll sign Heath’s name too. Heath Bottomly — He’s been doing that for a long time. Rich Birch — Yeah yeah, yeah, that’s fun. Heath Bottomly — [inaudible] checks. No wait. Rich Birch — Well, this has been great. Scot, why don’t we give you the last word; what anything else you want to say just as we wrap up today’s conversation? I really appreciate you guys coming on and investing in us. And this has been super helpful. I’ve got a page of notes here stuff to to chew on. So I appreciate that. Anything else, you’d like to say. Scot Longyear — Yeah, no I think I would just encourage leaders. Um man um, thanks for staying in the game. I know the latest stats are somewhere between 38 and 40% of us are like if we could if we could take and another job with the same benefits, we’d jump tomorrow. Um. and and I’ll go back to I was I was talking with a friend. I don’t want to name the ministry placement agency they were with, and they just said we’re just talking to a lot of folks and they’re a lot of folks who are looking for jobs and they’re no longer talking about calling. They’re talking about I want this position, and I want it in this city. And so I just want to say thank you for being true to the calling. Scot Longyear — Ah, that your work, even though it is hard, it is not in vain. It is not in vain. Rich Birch — Amen Amen. Scot Longyear — Like this is a this is a holy work that the Lord has called us to. I know it’s hard, man. I know there’s a grind. I know there’s a frustration. There’s an exhaustion that has come. But it is not in vain. Rich Birch — Love it. Scot Longyear — And I want to just tell you you’re doing like well done now and we’re one day going to hear from the Father as he turns to us, you’re going to say well done. So keep up the great work. Rich Birch — Love it. Appreciate you guys. Thanks so much. Again, friends, I would check out their book and you know and jump in with Experience Conference. These are great folks – you should be following along. Thanks so much. Thanks for being on the show today, guys. Heath Bottomly — Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Scot Longyear — Thank you, Rich; appreciate it.

Welcome back to the unSeminary podcast. We’re talking with DeWayne McNally and Paul Schulz from Hill Country Bible Church in Austin, Texas. DeWayne and Paul both serve as executive pastors of ministry by dividing the responsibilities; DeWayne handles the operations, multiplication and family ministries while Paul takes care of the personal/spiritual growth related ministries, including the worship experience and multisite. To reach people in our communities, our churches can’t just grow; they need to multiply. Listen in as DeWayne and Paul share how Hill Country Bible Church has used both church plants and multisite campuses to reach the city of Austin and how disciple-making starts at the individual level. Spread out on each level. // Everything Hill Country Bible Church does is driven by their God-given mission to saturate and reach Austin. Their strategy is two-fold, including both the launch of new multisite campuses, and planting new churches around Austin. The original Hill County location is on the cusp of the suburban part of Austin, so campuses will be placed in locations that are congruent with the psychographics of this area. Church plants, on the other hand, are established in areas that might have a different makeup which Hill Country can’t reach as easily. Either way, the goal is for multisite locations or churches to continue to multiply.Multiplication starts with you. // At Hill Country, multiplication starts at the individual level, then moves into small groups, and then becomes what they do at the church level. If you’re a disciple-maker who isn’t reproducing disciples, then you’re not multiplying. Start from that point and then raise up a church planter who will in turn infuse the DNA into the elder board of a new church plant. Here the church planter’s purpose is to reach the people close by, but also send out the next set of church plants.Create a disciple-making focus. // Hill Country casts vision for multiplication on all levels of ministry. In addition to small groups there is a disciple-making initiative which is a more focused and intentional program. People either self-identify that they want to grow in this way, or they are invited into discipling relationships. The whole goal of these discipling relationships is to teach people to multiply and become disciple-makers.Three step ministry philosophy. // Personal connection and discipling relationships are key to Hill Country’s DNA. DeWayne shares how he is currently discipling three men and they in turn each disciple three men which leads to exponential multiplication. This structure includes a three step philosophy of ministry where they ask: Who are you? Where are you at spiritually? How can I help you take your next step? All of these questions are explored within personal discipling relationships.Are you actually creating disciple makers? // If you want to multiply, begin by looking at yourself and how you’re doing discipleship. Are you actually creating disciple-makers or are you just creating scholars filled with head knowledge? How are you multiplying your leadership? Now is the time to think about multiplication and create a strategy. Normalize it while your church is small and make it a part of your culture and DNA. You can learn more about Hill Country Bible Church at www.hcbc.com and connect with DeWayne or Paul on the staff page. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: CDF Capital Since 1953, CDF Capital has helped Christians and churches embrace their part in this story by providing the 3 kinds of capital every congregation needs for growth—Financial Capital, Leadership Capital, and Spiritual Capital. At CDF Capital, we care about each of these components. When a church is properly resourced financially, spiritually, and in leadership, lives are transformed. Sign-up to learn more about CDF Capital and how we can help your church grow. Receive a 50% discount on a monthly subscription to the CDF Capital Subscribe & Save Bundle.

Thank for joining us for the unSeminary podcast. We’re talking with Shaila Visser, the Global Senior Vice-President for Alpha International. Alpha is an 11-week course that creates a space for people to invite their friends for a conversation about life, faith and Jesus. Worldwide, an increasing number of pastors believe evangelism is wrong. This mindset, on top of the changes of the last few years, has caused the Church to lose sight of its God-given mission. Listen in as Shaila reframes the beauty and call of evangelism, sharing how churches can create a culture of leadership development, love in action, disciple-making, Spirit-led living, church building and more. Look outside your walls. // Pastors are working hard right now getting their churches up and moving again after all the changes the last couple years have brought. Many churches have seen a lot of core leaders, volunteers and staff leave which has shifted the focus to what’s going on inside the church. It’s hard to think about how to mobilize your congregation to reach people externally. But Shaila says that we need to get people back on mission and look outside our four walls.Focus on evangelism. // Alpha found in their global surveys that 31% of pastors think evangelism is wrong. Among them 46% of children’s pastors and 48% of youth pastors think evangelism is wrong. Furthermore, 65% of pastors are not prioritizing evangelism in their churches. These statistics raise alarm bells because God has given the Church a mission, and there are many people in crisis who don’t know Jesus.Redefine evangelism. // Shaila says we have to redefine evangelism and reframe the beauty and call of it. Evangelism isn’t about tactics. Rather her friend defines it as joining a conversation that the Holy Spirit is already having with another person. Thinking about evangelism this way gives people relief in knowing that they’re not converting someone themselves. Instead they are participating in helping others come to faith. It’s okay if they don’t have all of the right answers to people’s questions because it’s the Holy Spirit’s work.Evangelism culture. // Evangelism can’t just be a strategy; it needs to be part of the culture of your church. Be intentional about talking about it at every level. Infuse your whole church with a desire to reach their neighbor. Tell stories of evangelism to your staff and during weekend services. Don’t just talk about salvation decisions, but simple stories of someone inviting their neighbor or praying with a colleague.Celebrate invitation. // We love to celebrate baptisms and people’s decisions to follow Jesus, which we should. But if those are the only things we celebrate, it gives people the idea that if they can’t convert someone to follow Jesus they are failing. When we celebrate invitation, however, we help the church to realize what their role is. People get on board and take part in it. And when the church starts inviting, people will come to the Lord.Alpha as an ecosystem. // More than a course or curriculum, Alpha is an ecosystem that helps build the future church, develops leaders, exemplifies radical hospitality, demonstrates love in action, teaches reliance on the Holy Spirit and so much more. It helps the church be what it was meant to be, and helps to build the type of disciples you want at your church. Learn more about Alpha at www.alphausa.org or www.alphacanada.org. Or come and participate in the Alpha USA Conference on January 26 & 27, 2023 in Florida to see what it’s all about. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Chemistry Staffing One of the things that they never teach you in seminary is when to move on from your current church. Over the last couple of years, we have been having a TON of conversations about this with pastors all over the United States. Of all the ministry decisions you make, leaving your position will be the toughest. Download this two-in-one resource that walks you through the decision-making process. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Well hey, friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in. Man, I’m super excited for today’s conversation. In fact we’ve had this one lined off for quite a while. Super excited to have Shaila Visser with us. She’s the Senior Vice President, International, with Alpha. If you don’t know Alpha, you really should. It’s an eleven-week course that creates a safe place, whether it’s online or in person, where people can really bring their questions. It’s an amazing tool and really an incredible movement that started at a church in London called Holy Trinity Brompton in 1977. You maybe heard of Nicky Gumbel. He took it over in 1990 and really has repositioned this to to make a difference all over the world. I think somewhere around 30,000,000 people have taken Alpha all over the world. It’s been translated in over I think 112 languages. Ah Shaila, welcome to the show. So glad you’re here today. Shaila Visser — Aw Rich. It’s so good to be with you today. Rich Birch — So fun to connect and get a chance to spend a little time on the microphone. Fill out the picture – kind of tell us a little bit about Alpha. Give us what did I miss there? Tell us about your role. Shaila Visser — Well first of all, you didn’t miss much. It is true that just about 30,000,000 people have taken Alpha. We have a massive vision to see 100,000,000 people take Alpha through local churches around the world. And it’s just fun to hear stories of Alpha in Nepal, Alpha in Vancouver, Canada, Alpha in Chicago, Alpha in Lima, Peru and just to know that God is on the move. And I, you know, I think Alpha is the thing that makes Alpha a little bit special is some of our key values that play out in it. And we we really believe in radical hospitality, radical love and warmth, and and acceptance around a table and food. And you know so we just have some key values I think that have made Alpha pretty sweet for this season, and you know for Gen Z and and Millennials in particular. Rich Birch — Love it. Well friends I need to declare conflict of interest right up front. So I although I’m super excited to talk ah to Shaila really from her perspective globally around some issues that we need to wrestle with and think about as a church, I actually volunteer at my church as an Alpha leader. Love it. I love ah, those conversations. I love being around the table. The thing that I and I love that particular environment I’m just the guy who you know helps with Alpha, which is wonderful. It’s it’s ah it’s amazing and I love seeing consistently the people that end up in our in my Alpha groups. Like man these people are wrestling with huge huge issues and what an incredible environment. What a privilege as a church leader to sit and listen to someone um, explain really where they’re at. It’s it’s amazing. So ah so I declare that right up front I love love Alpha. Rich Birch — Well why don’t we talk about you have an interesting vantage point on the church because you interact with church leaders, not only, you’re Canadian as well – we won’t hold that against you. Hopefully our listeners won’t hold that against me either. Ah but you not only across Canada but around the world, and you know one of the things that we’re seeing kind of in this kind of post-covid whatever this is this season is, we’re talking to leaders like yourself saying hey what are you seeing? What are some of the things that you’re seeing around you as we kind of pivot out of all that as we look to the future? What would be some of the maybe either problems or issues or things that you see church leaders or churches wrestling with in this season? Shaila Visser — Well I think what’s common to church leaders, and I’m going to talk about all over the world… Rich Birch — Yep. Shaila Visser — …because you know we network and talk to and listen to pastors all over the the world, is their their resiliency has been amazing. Rich Birch — So true. Shaila Visser — Like I really like even though they’re exhausted and they have taken hits, I just want to honor pastors that they’ve been resilient. Rich Birch — So true. Shaila Visser — But what I’m noticing is in the midst of all that, church leaders are regathering, they’re wanting to know who is in my congregation now. Rich Birch — Yes, yes yep. Shaila Visser — It’s a big change. You know, people have moved around, people have left. I mean key volunteers have left which is really heartbreaking. So people have left. And then people have come in and they’re trying to discern who is our new core team of volunteers, and people that we can really count on in the congregation. But in the midst of all that, they might not be looking outside the four walls and wondering, you know, who’s out there who doesn’t yet know Jesus that we need to be thinking about as well. Because it’s hard. I get it. We’ve got to regather, ah get people back on mission. Get people meeting in small groups again. How do we then mobilize them to think outside, especially if you’ve have less people coming. It’s hard to think about how you’re going to run what you’ve got internally let alone what you might need to do to galvanize people to reach externally. Rich Birch — Love it. Yeah I I love that. I want you to push us on that a little bit. Shaila Visser — Okay. Rich Birch — So you’re so you’re super kind. You’re nice, which is great, but I I see this even in my own just my own personal life like it’s easy over this season. It’s like the kind of I’m live closer to home, I spend a lot more time in my neighborhood. It’s easy to not look around and see people around me. Ah, when we think about that at a church level, what would be some of the kind of evidence that you’re seeing that hey maybe maybe we’re not looking outside the walls as much as we should? We’re maybe being a little too insider focus, not enough outsider focus. Shaila Visser — Well I will say that we’ve done some surveys globally, and particularly in Canada just with pastors, and what we found is that there’s an increase in pastors that think it’s wrong to do evangelism. Rich Birch — Really? Tell me about that. Shaila Visser — So the 31% of pastors surveyed say they think it’s wrong to evangelize. Rich Birch — Wow. Shaila Visser — What was more alarming for us is 46% of children’s pastors and 48% of youth pastors thought it was wrong. Rich Birch — Wow. Shaila Visser — And it goes to 65%… Rich Birch — That’s stunning. Shaila Visser — …65% of pastors said they they are not prioritizing evangelism. So if you think about just those stats, it really raises the alarm bells to say, okay Church. We have a mission. God has given us a mission. And yes, it’s been very difficult. But what about all those people that are in crisis that don’t know Jesus? Shaila Visser — Give you just one small example. Ah this past Saturday I went and met with my husband’s a police officer and his former partner, she just had a baby, she and her husband. And the baby isn’t gaining weight and isn’t doing well. And so I offered to come and pray for them. And neither of them are Christians. She has she went to Catholic school and hasn’t been to church since she was in grade 12. Her husband’s an atheist, but they were desperate. And just the ability to see beyond ourselves to the pain, but not just see it, not just say, “oh I’m going to pray for you” which everybody says fine, thank you. Shaila Visser — But actually run towards it and offer something in a moment that is beyond our capability to help them, which is offering prayer, which is calling on on the Father to come in by the power of the Holy Spirit and make a difference. And you know I laid hands on their little newborn and they wept and they wept and… Rich Birch — Oh so sweet. Yeah. Shaila Visser — And at the end they said you know maybe we should be going to church. I mean here’s an atheist and a person who’s not been to church in years. Rich Birch — Love it. Shaila Visser — And it’s because the Spirit of God is calling people, and ministering to people outside of our four walls, and he’s inviting us to have eyes to see them, and hearts to consider their needs… Rich Birch — Love it. Shaila Visser — …in the power of the Holy Spirit to meet that need. So I just think I don’t want us to miss it. So we’ve got stats on the church. Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — But then we’ve got an ah increasing need out in the world today of people that are longing for hope. They’re longing for someone to offer them something they can’t access themselves. And if the church doesn’t run towards that, we’re going to miss it. Rich Birch — Right, love that. I love what a beautiful story. Love that picture of um, you know, people receiving prayer, being really open to that. You know, we I had a very similar experience in my current Alpha group where um, we we actually at our church, we had a mutual friend of ours, Tammy, was speaking and she was offering prayer at the end of the service. And um, a lady who had been actually was only her second week attending on a Sunday, she came to Alpha first before she came to our church, and she was saying you know I’ve never had anyone pray for me in my entire life. And she was she was talking about how like incredibly special that was, and she was like I didn’t really understand it. But wow that was amazing and, you know, in the midst of everything that was going on and, you know, on the wrestling, that’s you know that’s amazing. Interesting. Shaila Visser — And can I just say, Rich, that I think the secret sauce of evangelism right now, particularly in North America, ah the way into hearts is through prayer. Rich Birch — Interesting, Interesting. Shaila Visser — Because it’s so um, caustic, right? Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — …in the world of politics right now. And the church is in the mix there, which doesn’t help the narrative that Jesus is good… Rich Birch — Yes, yeah. Shaila Visser — …and loving and kind and compassionate and slow to anger, and all those sorts things. And when we come in just person to person offering a supernatural opportunity when we pray the Holy Spirit’s presence and present with that person. So don’t miss the opportunities around us; don’t get stuck in the greater narrative of the church, you know, what people think of the church and the cultures against us. But get actually stuck in with real people that have real problems… Rich Birch — Yeah. Shaila Visser — …and offer prayer and see how the Holy Spirit leads you. And watch as he opens eyes and hearts because that’s what he’s inviting us into… Rich Birch — Love it. Shaila Visser — …the one by one loving our neighbors. Rich Birch — Love it. So good. Well I’m hoping ah listeners, as you listened in, that you were shocked by those statistics around you know 31% say it’s wrong to evangelize. 46 and 48 of you know children’s and youth pastors. I’m hoping yeah as Shaila said that, that that shocked you. I know it shocked me. Um, but Shaila, let’s come back to that. Shaila Visser — Yep. Rich Birch — That we ah we can’t we can’t be content with that. Ah, we need to push back against that. What is the you know what’s the solution there? How do we um, how can we as leaders push back against that in our own churches? What, you know, maybe we see that maybe we look around and say like, oh man I can kind of see that growing in us. I see this culture maybe growing up around us of of, you know, maybe walking away from evangelism. What would be your coaching for us? Shaila Visser — I really think we have to redefine evangelism. Rich Birch — Okay. Shaila Visser — I think when people especially if they’re you know—I’m a Gen Xer—especially if they’re younger than Gen Xers. As soon as they he… hear the word evangelism, they immediately jump to method. You know it’s like this natural tie-in… Rich Birch — Here’s this pamphlet; here’s this thing… Shaila Visser — Yeah. Rich Birch — Here’s this tactic. Yes. Shaila Visser — Yes, exactly. And so there’s a hangover of a tactic that may have worked in a different generation that’s been thought to but still be fruitful in some way here, and in Canada and the US, and therefore they opt out. And they have they really don’t like it. So what we want to do is redefine evangelism, reframe the beauty and call of evangelism. And so I want to give you a definition of evangelism… Rich Birch — Okay. Shaila Visser — …that my friend Darryl Johnson has given that I think is not only biblical but it’s helpful to address this very issue. And it’s: evangelism is joining a conversation that the Holy Spirit is already having with another person. So let me say that again… Rich Birch — Love it. Shaila Visser — …evangelism is joining a conversation that the Holy Spirit is already having with another person. So that means before you go in to talk to anyone, the Holy Spirit’s already been at work. When you’re in the conversation, the Holy Spirit’s at work. When you leave the conversation, the Holy Spirit’s at work. And so we’re not the initiator. And when we start to remember that and realize that evangelism is joining what the Holy Spirit’s doing, it gives you first of all relief that you’re not converting someone. You are participating in someone coming to faith. but it also makes you realize that if you really screw it up, if you really say the wrong thing, don’t have the right answer, can’t answer their very complicated questions, it’s okay. Rich Birch — Yeah, love it. Shaila Visser — It’s okay. Rich Birch — Love it. So this is friends like I this is a part of why I love Alpha as a movement is I, having seen this firsthand of the training that you that you know your organization provides and then the coaching on the ground around like it’s not our job it’s not my job to do like bible jujitsu with people, and like get them to like take a certain step, get them to say a magic thing. That at the end of the day, I love it for me as a Christ follower, it stretches my faith to say you know what? The Holy Spirit’s at work in these people’s lives. My job is to come alongside and to maybe play a role to ask the Spirit, hey what part of my what part of this conversation do you want me to part of? Where do you want me just to shut up and not say anything, you know? How do you want me to listen? Um man that’s that’s really life-giving. I find that incredibly life-giving. So but what does that look like? So how do we how do we in in our churches join that conversation? How could we, you know, find a way to um, really try to cultivate that with our people? Shaila Visser — Yeah, so I’ll give a couple of examples of churches that I think have done it really well. And it always starts with the senior leadership of any church, right? And it starts with what are the conversations that you as a staff, or you and your elders, or your board are having around this very topic? Because it’s going to leak from there. If you realize as a leadership team at your church that nobody’s talking about who they have relationship with that’s outside of the four walls, that should set off a little alarm bell. Rich Birch — That’s a problem. Yes. Shaila Visser — And yeah, but but it does happen. We it happens at Alpha Canada… Rich Birch — Yeah. Shaila Visser — …that we’re talking all about, you know, strategy and ah the people we’re working with and the church leaders we serve. And then suddenly we realize we haven’t talked about the guest who at the end of the day is our motivation. Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — And so churches like look at your conversations first and say, does this come up at all?And I know the churches that are the most um, activated in reaching their communities are the ones that at the staff level it’s talked about regularly. And I’m not just talking about like the senior staff. I’m talking the janitor talks about it, the person who’s doing maintenance, the person who’s, you know, taking care of the facilities, like everybody’s talking about it. And it’s got to leak out as culture. Rich Birch — Love it. Shaila Visser — If it’s not culture and it’s just one strategy as part of the church, it’s not going to infuse your whole church with this desire to reach their neighbor. So I’d say that’s where you start. What does it look like at the top level… Rich Birch — Love it. Shaila Visser — …ah um of your church. Rich Birch — Yeah, love that. That’s a real practical takeaway, like even this week to say, um, maybe you you do a week of just observing your team, just kind of mentally in your head. Like does that ever come up? And does it ever leak out of my life? And you know and where are those conversations I’m having with people? When you know when am I not just, you know, here in Canada it’s becoming winter. It’s very easy for me not to talk to my neighbors in this season because it’s like it’s so cold out, doing that—well at least my part of the country, not and where Shaila lives – it’s never cold there. It’s beautiful there all the time. Ah, but where you know what does that look like in my life. But then and then maybe next week you try to stir that conversation with your team. I love that. Practical. Shaila Visser — Exactly. And then there’s two other things I’d say to it. What are you storying? And what I mean is ah if you are in executive leadership at any church there are stories you’re telling. So how often are the stories being told by staff members, whether it’s on stage, you know at the front from the pulpit, or whether it’s just like in small groups, how many people are telling stories of evangelism? And not just like someone came to faith, but hey I hung out with my neighbor or I offered prayer for my husband you know partner at work. And you know, how are those stories coming about because that’s also forming culture – the stories you tell. So even having ears to hear, okay, yeah, we’re talking about it on our staff team. But what stories are we telling that are leaking out… Rich Birch — That’s Good. Oh. Shaila Visser — …and then becoming intentionally out. And then the third thing I’ll say is what are you celebrating? So in the church as you know we love to celebrate baptisms. We love to celebrate people coming to Jesus. We know that the angels rejoice, as they should, as we should, when someone comes to faith. But here’s what that does in the church if that’s the main thing we celebrate is what it does is it means average Christian who doesn’t have the gift of evangelism, who is terrified to invite their friend, thinks I’m not that person. I can’t convert anyone. I’m not going to do that. Rich Birch — Right. Shaila Visser — But when we celebrate what our part is, then people get on board. So let me tell you what I mean by that. Celebrate invitation. Rich Birch — Love it. Shaila Visser —I’ll give you a story from my friend Gary who is the senior pastor of a very very large church here in Canada. They decided to do a big Alpha campaign. They wanted a thousand guests to come to their Alpha. They were going to run at workplaces and ah in ah, schools for kids, etc, etc. and in the church. And he had a celebration Sunday. They’re pentecostal so you know they’re going to like do the whole crescendo to the best story, right? So the congregation really gets ramped up to this is exciting. Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — But and you know he started with someone who said, oh I invited two friends; they came to Alpha, you know, I’m so excited see what happens. But the story he ended with was a woman woman in her mid 50s who said she invited 50 people to Alpha – her whole neighborhood. Rich Birch — Wow. Shaila Visser — Well you know in a Pentecost Church they’re clapping, they’re like this is amazing. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Shaila Visser — And he said what happened? And she said no one came. Rich Birch — Wow. Shaila Visser — And he said, today we celebrate you for doing your part. You invited. Rich Birch — Oh that’s so touching. Oh my goodness. That’s beautiful. Shaila Visser — You you invited. Rich Birch — That’s beautiful. Shaila Visser — And see when we flip that narrative. We’re helping the church realize: I know what my part is to play. Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — Get them inviting… Rich Birch — Yes, love it. Shaila Visser — …and some people will come. Rich Birch — Yeah, love it. Well and and we know that you know it takes two or three, five or six, twelve or fifteen different invites with some people, right? They have to hear it about it a bunch. They’ve got to, you know, they they think about it. They might go online, see something. What is this Alpha thing? What is this or what is this church thing? What is this before I would would plug in? I love that. Do you have any examples of so one of the things that Alpha does well as ah I would say as a movement, as an outsider looking in, is this whole storying thing. Like retelling the story time and again just like woven right into what you guys do. You’re constantly even in today’s conversation you’ve done a very good job of that. What are some other ways you’ve seen churches do that well? Um, you know some other examples of that of, you know, kind of, you know, storying the right things as a church? Shaila Visser — Well, you know for churches that have run Alpha what we have seen is they always bring up people onto stage, you know, during a service to talk about tell us your story. And they asked 3 simple questions. Um, what was your life like before you came on Alpha? Ah, what was your experience like on Alpha? What difference has Jesus made in your life? Just 3 simple questions. Rich Birch — Yep, love it. Shaila Visser — It could it doesn’t have to be Alpha, it could be anything. Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — But they do it so regularly that the church is familiar with hearing people that don’t know Jesus or didn’t know Jesus six months ago, three months ago, a year ago, that the the story is being told so often, that the church just thinks this is normal. But the problem is if we just do it one Sunday a year or two Sundays a year, it doesn’t feel like people are coming to faith on a very regular basis. And so what you want to do is tell simple stories. It doesn’t have to take up very much time. Rich Birch — Right. Shaila Visser — These stories, typically when I hear Nicky Gumbel do them, or other pastors, it’s a minute. Rich Birch — Right, right. Shaila Visser — It’s a minute and a half. It’s so quick. But what you’re doing is you’re giving people a vision that this is normal to expect people to come to faith. Rich Birch — Right. Shaila Visser — So I think that’s the kind of story I mean people may film it as video because then they can edit it… Rich Birch — Right, right. Shaila Visser — …make it as short as they want, but there’s something about the… Rich Birch — Put some music under it. Shaila Visser — …yeah, but you know what, there’s something about the beauty of a raw moment. And I love that they do this at Holy Trinity Brompton in London – these raw moments with real people on stage. Because when you do the video, it may be produced beautifully, but in the moment something’s going to be said that’s absolutely hilarious or really deeply touches you… Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Shaila Visser — …because it’s an embodiment of the story in front of them. So don’t get away from that that raw kind of messy testimony … Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — …that you may have scheduled for a minute and a half and it goes four. Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — But but it’s beautiful and the congregation is really motivated to say, that could be my friend. Because what the the congregation is hearing is so many stories that they know people like that. Rich Birch — Right, love it. Shaila Visser — And it gives them confidence to invite. Rich Birch — Okay Shaila, I’m hoping our relationship can sustain this. Shaila Visser — Oh gosh. Rich Birch — We are two thirds of the way into this interview and um, you haven’t even told us about Alpha. Like this is a part of what I love about your movement. It’s like humility is baked into what you guys do. Like it is It’s at the core. and and you know earlier you just rolled over ah—which I loved, it was this which again I was like very classically well, it’s classically you and it’s also classically Alpha—you’re like yeah we’re trying to you know, get Alpha in front of 100,000,000 people. Like if that was me I would be like I’d be leading with that and hammering that but not Alpha. Shaila Visser — Well, because… Rich Birch — You guys are like there’s there’s humility baked right in. It’s amazing. Shaila Visser — Could I say, Rich, that this is the reality… Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — …including Nicky Gumbel the pioneer behind Alpha… Rich Birch — Yes, yes Shaila Visser — We all want people to meet Jesus. Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — Alpha happens to be a tool… Rich Birch — Right. Shaila Visser — …and a ecosystem that really helps everything from church planting… Rich Birch — Right. Shaila Visser — …to um to create a culture in a church of Holy Spirit dependency etc. It does lots of things. Like most people think Alpha is just a plug and play tool. They don’t realize it’s an ecosystem that can really help the church. Rich Birch — Right. Shaila Visser — And when people get the ecosystem, it really flourishes and it helps build leaders, develop leaders, etc, etc. But we’re we’re so much about Jesus. We’re so much about spirit-filled living that Alpha is not what gets us up every morning. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Shaila Visser — So so people coming to know Jesus does. Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — So really, that’s why the posture is, we’re not trying to sell Alpha. Rich Birch — Yes. Shaila Visser — We’re trying to say, guys, if this can help, let us help you. Rich Birch — Right. Shaila Visser — But we need the world to know Jesus and that’s what is motivating to us. Rich Birch — Okay, so I’m going to push you on that though. Shaila Visser — Okay. Rich Birch — Because I want people I think there’s folks that have this is what I have this what happens when I talk to people about Alpha… Shaila Visser — Yeah. Rich Birch — …Church leaders across the country, they’re like that’s like a curriculum, right? It’s like ah that’s like what is it a bunch of videos and and they think about it at that level. Um I totally understand, appreciate, and have seen how it’s so much more than that. It’s a culture. Shaila Visser — Yeah. Rich Birch — Talk to us about that. For folks that maybe have a sense of it. It’s eleven weeks long, there’s a weekend in the middle. There’s videos. There’s a guy from England. Like I don’t know much about it, but help me understand how. Alpha could be or has been used as a kind of culture reinvigoration tool. I know it’s not it’s not the only one. And I know you’re not just interested in that as the only one. But talk to me about what that actually looks like in churches. Shaila Visser — Well I think what we hear, and why church leaders when they really get to understand Alpha, and we do trips where we take pastors over to London. We have our Alpha USA conference coming up at the end of January in Florida. That’s a terrific opportunity for people to really get a feel and an understanding. But here’s what’s beneath Alpha. so it is what you just said. It’s eleven weeks. It’s you know it’s got an Alpha weekend. But here’s what it does for the church. People that are new to faith or have not even yet heard about Jesus or ever given their lives to Jesus, ah, it is building the type of disciples you want at your church. Shaila Visser — So that’s why many churches will just say if you’re new to our church, we want you to go on Alpha. And they’ll put one group of Alpha that’s like people that have been christians for a while, but they put it through because they want them to understand what radical hospitality looks like. What love in action feels like. What it is to be Spirit dependent. What it even means to be filled with the Holy Spirit. What it means to pray for people reliant on the Holy Spirit. What it means to develop leaders who come in who’ve never taken Alpha, they don’t know Jesus, they come back as a helper because they’ve come to Jesus. They come back as a small group leader. Shaila Visser — So there’s leadership development baked into it. There’s a heart for reaching more people baked into it. There’s so many things that a local church is like if I had resilient disciples in my congregation that knew how to pray for others and trust the Lord, how to be outwardly focused, how to be deeply prayerful, I would want that they realized that Alpha creates this ecosystem. And at Holy Trinity Brompton in London they always say Alpha is the front door, and church planting is the back door. And they’ve planted over a hundred churches. Rich Birch — Right. Shaila Visser — So it’s like they’re just seeing people come in, but they’ve got a certain type of DNA in them when they’ve taken Alpha that really helps grow the things church leaders want to grow in their congregation. So it’s it’s it’s the secret sauce that if people understand it is more than a tool. It gives you way more than that. Rich Birch — Love it. Yeah and I’ve seen that firsthand that you can see this kind of cultural. It’s sneaky because you you think about it as a church leader as a program, but it has a much more um pervasive or can have a much more pervasive impact on you know on the entire church, which I just think is wonderful and beautiful. And um and at the core is this idea that we’re trying to create a place for people who don’t know Jesus and are wrestling with what it means with all the big questions in life. We’re trying to create a place for them to feel welcome at the table. One of the things that’s super obvious um is this culture of hospitality in Alpha. Talk to us more about that. Why why why does Alpha see that as a kind of ah it seems to be like a key part of of the of how God’s used Alpha over the years. Shaila Visser — Well we see it all over Jesus’ life, right? Is just this radical hospitality and welcome of the stranger… Rich Birch — Yeah. Shaila Visser — …of someone who’s very different but also sitting at a table and eating with people. And so pre-pandemic ah meals and food are a very significant part of Alpha. Rich Birch — Yep. Shaila Visser — People often evaluate Alpha looking at the videos. Are they good quality? You know and we create Netflix quality videos. But they’re actually just evaluating that. But what they should see is as Alpha as a mini little ecosystem within the church is actually about the radical hospitality at the table. Then you watch this little 25 minute video, 20 minute video and then you have open discussion. And so what it is doing for people is it’s teaching your already existing church members who are volunteering how to be a listener. Because as you and I know, Rich, ah Gen Z in particular want to know that Jesus is good. And they have to have an experience of it. Shaila Visser — And Alpha provides an experience of it but also teaches your leaders how to be listeners, how to join the Holy Spirit, how to shut up and not tell people what they should think. And the younger generation needs that so hospitality, food, listening that are those are core components and that is not what the church is known for. And we train it deeply into everyone who’s running Alpha. Rich Birch — I love it. So good. Well I I’ve just this has been a great conversation today. I love that you’re pushing us on this and thinking in a new way. You know, as you look to the future kind of as you’re wrestling with how do we how do you help encourage churches build this kind of redefined evangelism culture, what are some of the questions that you’re thinking about as we look to the future things that you’re wrestling with? Shaila Visser — Well I am really wrestling with the next generation. Alpha has always been target locked on on young people in their twenties. That’s who we design Alpha for. So if you’re like I want to hit Gen Z and the youngest millennials, then Alpha is really thinking always about everything we do is about that that age group. Shaila Visser — But then we also have Alpha for youth which is really radically ah fabulous in our our network of churches around the world because it’s not just, how does a youth worker use it? It’s actually how do students run Alpha for their friends. And we’ve really got a student led movement happening. but in the midst of all of this um and coming out of pandemic life, I hope we’re coming out of pandemic life. Rich Birch — Yeah, yes, me too, me too. Shaila Visser — I hope we’re hope we’re through it. Um I’m asking four questions, Rich. I’m asking the question what if the future leaders of the church Aren’t in the church today? Rich Birch — Oh that’s good. Shaila Visser — Then the second question I’m asking is what if the future leaders of the church aren’t even christians today? What if the kid you pass at the mall, at the restaurant, wherever is going to be a pastor… Rich Birch — Love that Love that. Shaila Visser — …but today they don’t know Jesus. And then the third question, especially in this North American culture where we understand media’s against us. It’s just it just feels like there is there is no longer any Christian majority to speak of. What if the harvest is actually plentiful all around us and we don’t have eyes to see it? Rich Birch — Wow. Shaila Visser — And then the last question I’m asking church leaders and Alpha Partners is: what if all three things are true – what should we be doing differently? Rich Birch — So good. Shaila Visser — What should we be doing differently? And the Holy Spirit and your team and your friends, they start to actually answer that question. And when you start to answer those questions, you start to see possibility. Rich Birch — Love it. Shaila Visser — I think we’re living in the most fabulous possibility time even though the world is dark, even though things are tough. The bright morning star shines the brightest when the night is darkest. And I’m excited. I really think, Rich, the harvest is plentiful all around us. And I can’t wait to see what the church does. Rich Birch — Love it. Shaila Visser — Because people are longing for hope. They’re longing for peace. They’re longing for purpose. And we just got to we got to reach them… Rich Birch — Love it. Shaila Visser — …in the power of the Holy spirit. Rich Birch — Love it. So good. Well, Shaila, this has been what a what a gift this has been today. Friends, I hope you’ve been encouraged and ah, reinvigorated. Lots to chew on. I think I’ve got a page of notes here – things I need to wrestle through and think about in the coming weeks and months. So I really appreciate that, Shaila. If um is anything else you want to say just as we kind of wrap up any kind of final thoughts as we as we close down today’s conversation? Shaila Visser — I think I just want to encourage and challenge church leaders. You know I’m a Canadian, so I say it softly. I I want to encourage and challenge church leaders: in the midst of pulling people back together, don’t miss who’s outside of your four walls. Rich Birch — So true. Yeah. Shaila Visser — There is opportunity. Your future best leaders. Your future best um staff members. They’re out there. And they don’t know Jesus yet. And you can make a difference. Rich Birch — Love it. So good. Well I appreciate this, Shaila. Hey where do we want to send people if they want to track with Alpha? Where do we want to send them online? How do where do we want them to kind of plug in with you guys? Shaila Visser — Yeah, go to alphausa.org. you’re going to find all of that and then you know please consider going to the conference. You’ll really understand the cultural ecosystem and it’s not just an Alpha sales job. Please like hear us. We don’t do that. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yes, yes. Shaila Visser — Um, but come to the Alpha USA conference. I think you will love it. And if you’re in Canada, ah, do come over to alphacanada.org, connect with us online. We are so happy to serve churches around the world, and particularly in the US and Canada. Rich Birch — Love it. Thanks so much. Thanks for being here today. I really appreciate it. Shaila Visser — Thanks, Rich! Love what you’re doing and so happy to be with you today.

Welcome back to the unSeminary podcast. I’m happy to be talking with Johnny Scott, the lead pastor of Generations Church in Trinity, Florida. Ever wonder what a self-sustainable church might look like? Curious about how to use business as ministry? Listen in as Johnny Scott shares how churches can use holy-owned businesses to reach their communities in creative ways while also developing a revenue stream to fuel future missions. Theology of city building. // At Generations Church, viewing business as missions is a core part of their DNA. From the very beginning of scripture we see God at work creating. Prior to Genesis 3 work was a gift from God rather than toil. We are invited to partner with God in meaningful work no matter our occupation.An exile mindset. // In Jeremiah 29 God’s people living in Babylon are told to pray for and seek the good of their city because if it prospers, they too will prosper. Johnny believes it’s important for us to have an exile mindset while we are on earth. Instead of living comfortably separated from the world, we need to go out into the marketplace and serve our communities. Go to them. // Churches can no longer simply wait for and expect our communities to come to us. Jesus taught in synagogues and the temple, but he also often went to the marketplace and into the city. We need to do the same.Becoming self-sustainable to give more. // How do we turn the church into a place that is fully sustainable on its own? Johnny’s goal is to get to the point where the church doesn’t need to operate on the money people give. Instead every dollar will go straight to local and global missions.Exhale and move forward. // One of the things Generations Church has learned is that they will probably do less in a year than they wanted to, but will do more in ten years than they ever imagined. Growth and reach may start slowly but it quickly becomes exponential. Believe that God wants to do more than you can imagine.Change the church mindset. // There is a biblical principle never to be a slave to the lender. Scripture also teaches to use man’s currency to get kingdom currency, which is people. Leveraging the world’s resources to gain influence can help lead people to Jesus.Cultivate the resources. // Every resource your church needs to dramatically impact the community around us is embedded in us. Our job is to cultivate that. You can learn more about Generations Church and their ministries at www.generationscc.com. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Portable Church Industries Doing Church in a Rented Facility can be a Challenge. Questions about Multisiting or Portability?Click here to connect with our Multisite Specialist for a free evaluation. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Well, hey, everybody. Welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in. Super excited about today’s conversation. Today we’ve got Johnny Scott with us. He is the lead pastor at Generations Church – church in Florida, North Tampa, which has been through a few things ah, recently. Super excited to have Johnny on the show. Was recommended to us by a mutual friend, Chris Hahn. Welcome to the show, Johnny. So glad you’re here. Johnny Scott — And so glad to be here, Rich. Heard about, you know, what you guys do from Chris and yeah, we’re we’re excited to be where God has us here, in Trinity actually, just north of Tampa ah, you know, kind of like a bedroom community of Tampa Bay. And you know when I started this position as lead pastor—the first time being a lead pastor um—never never never thought you know in 20 years of pretty much traveling the country and playing guitar and being a worship pastor that God would call me to this. But through a series of events [inaudible] and ministry, God does that. Um had an incredible time in bible college. But, you know, I kind of get the premise that you know some of the things, while I I learned how to exegete scripture and expository preaching… Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — …and I had a great time there, some of the things that I’m called to do and I’m doing now in my daily, I just have to step back and be like like God, what what are you doing? Like this is… Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — …it’s crazy. And for us, you know, business as missions ah, we call it like maybe maybe even a church 2.0 model is just that idea of what what is a church like that’s you know self-sustainable okay? And and for me this is ah a deep theology of what I call the theology of city building. Um which is our God given DNA. You know the first time we see God, God is creating. That God is a creative God. God is a work God. There is there’s no toil in work before Genesis chapter 3. The famous chapter in my house is my boys quote all the time. Why are we doing this? Because of Genesis chapter 3. They’re like, they quote it. It’s this mantra because… Rich Birch — Um, ah because we live in a fallen world. Johnny Scott — But it’s toil. Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — And you you guys, it’s you don’t know work without toil. Well God does work, right? And then Jesus Jesus says I’m going to prepare a place for you. Jesus is working. Our last picture of Jesus is working. I believe that there will be work when we get to heaven. The idea that we’re going to be lounging around on on clouds playing harps, that sounds boring. I’m with Kenny Chesney. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — I don’t want to go right now either if that’s what it’s like. Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Johnny Scott — It’s not going to be like that. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — It’s going to be work with the most creative being ever, right? And and and then we’re going to have no inhibitions of toil. And until that we have got to have ah like a proper exile mindset. And we don’t have an exile mindset. We’re we’re comfortable. I’m comfortable. We live we live in a great neighborhood, and I’ve got you know TVs… Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — …in multiple rooms. Okay? I mean like there’s water… Rich Birch — Yes. Yes. Johnny Scott — …there’s running water. I don’t feel like, God saved me from Babylon. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — I don’t want to move. Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — But when you get that exile mindset like Jera Jeremiah was preaching to a people that were exiled and they say, God, save us from where we’re at. God’s answer to them, and people misquote it all the time, “Surely I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord.” You know, Jeremiah 29:11. That verse is tucked into a big fat NO from God. I’m not going to. Rich Birch — Yes, it’s so true. Johnny Scott — No, you’re gonna be here for 70 years. So if you’re my age, if you’re 46… Rich Birch — Yeah. Johnny Scott — …you’re not going to live to see it. So what God tells them to do is plant gardens, marry your sons and daughters… Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — …pray for the city that you are in. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — And when it prospers, you will prosper. And it wasn’t, hole up in your synagogue, these bastions of isolationism, which is what, you know, church was when I grew up. As a youth pastor I would I would go and say, Hey, why don’t you quit coming to that school event on Wednesday night and come to church. Rich Birch — And come to and come to our thing. Yeah, yeah, totally. Johnny Scott — Yeah. And we would say, come to see our show (we never said that but that’s what it is) at 9am or 11am on Sunday morning, and we’ll be ready for you then. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Johnny Scott — It, the the hubris of that, and we never felt that way, you know… Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — …in the 80s and 90s when I was growing up. And we’re in attractional church model. Jesus, you know, communicated the gospel at the end of the sermon on the mount. It says people were astounded and amazed. Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — I have no problem with having art. And we spend money on that, and we do a good job at that. But we will not demand people, hey come to our show. So we started to get this idea of let’s be a serve first idea… Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — …because Jesus was always invasive with the gospel. Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — Jesus says, Zacchias, I’m going to your house today. We know he was in the synagogue. Rich Birch — Yeah. Johnny Scott — But most of our stories, he’s out in the city and places where we should just go to the marketplace. So, the deep theology… Rich Birch — Love it. Johnny Scott — …the deep theology for this in my life goes back to Moses on the mountain. Marketplace ministry, business ministry, business as ministry um… Rich Birch — Yep. Johnny Scott — …for me, it goes to the setup of the temple. Okay, the setup of the temple, if you read Numbers 35, Moses is on the mountain. He’s getting all the all the culture. The first time in the history of humanity the culture has been, here it is. Like we go out and we invent culture through war, and crazy things that happen, in traditions that develop over hundreds of years, and that’s not how culture developed for the the God-made culture, this Judeo mindset. It was given. Here’s your seven festivals. Here’s when you work. Here’s when you party. That’s how it is. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — And wrapped up in that in Numbers 35 is how the temple will work. He says, I’m going to give you these cities. Rich Birch — Yep, yep. Johnny Scott — I’m going to give you the land around these cities. You’re going to do all the livestock and all the wheat, barley, oats. All of that is for the temple. That is that is to sustain sustainability, the work, the Levite family will do at the temple. Rich Birch — Interesting. Johnny Scott — God didn’t come to the people and say, I need you to tithe 10%… Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — …so that the temple can function. No the temple was going to function. So what was the 10% for? This is very clear throughout scripture. It’s a thread. It and one of the words used in the Old testament is the word lavish. Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — It is for the 7 festivals that God sets up for us to regularly—7 the perfect number—how do we how do we party in God’s culture perfectly? That’s how we party. Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Love it. Johnny Scott — And so there’s this perfect setup of regular parties that the 10% goes… so the storehouse of the Lord is full. So there’s no party like a God party. Rich Birch — Yes, love it. Johnny Scott — He owns party. Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — So Numbers gives us that, then you move to the old testament and we see paul Paul’s selling tents. Now Paul wasn’t selling christian tents. Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — Paul wasn’t selling tents for christians. Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — Paul was just selling tents. Now just I’m I’ve been living in this this scriptural narrative of Paul in a city like Corinth. I mean this is a major metropolitan port. Paul… Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Johnny Scott — Paul rolls up in here and he’s like I’m gonna sell tents. And I’m just thinking you think that they don’t have tent sellers already, right? Rich Birch — Yes, love it. Johnny Scott — That the people of Corinth are like [inaudible] oh my goodness we’ve been looking for a tent guy. Hey everybody we got a tent guy finally. Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — The tent guys in Corinth, they like: hey bro, I’ve been selling tents here. My dad sold tents here. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, my great Grand Pappy sold tents here. Johnny Scott — And my grandpa sold… Rich Birch — Yeah. Johnny Scott — Yeah, who are you? And so Paul is doing this commerce thing. And just think about how that is, you know. He’s not like inviting people over to watch the Superbowl and then the halftime show you know trying to get them at a multilevel… Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — …marketing thing with tents. Okay. Like I’m going to work your [inaudible]. He’s that’s not what he’s doing, okay. Paul Paul is he’s he’s in the trade. And so I have this picture of Paul in the shop on Monday and he is a christian who’s living out his world faith, and he’s helping other businessmen. And after like a very short season because he is just for other people, there’s a guy’s like I’ve got to get tar. Well go see Paul. Well don’t that Paul guy sell tents? Well yeah, but he helps so and so out with shingles and I know that he does ship tar. Yeah. Rich Birch — He knows a guy who knows a guy. Yeah. Johnny Scott — He’s just he and and the word is like yeah but man if you go over there, I mean it’s it’s you’re going to have to put up with like this Jesus thing he’s talking about. You know it’s like yeah but he knows everybody. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — I think that if he would have had a poor quality tent or a tent that didn’t hold up and I’m like, well, you know, he’s a really good motivational speaker but the tents are just crap quality. That… Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — …what would that have done to the validity of his gospel? Rich Birch — Right, right. Oh love that point. Johnny Scott — So he he had to be in a marketplace, and compete in a marketplace, and go through the politics of the local Chamber of Commerce. And come in in such a way where he brought value, and served people, and did not defame the gospel he preached in any way. And it’s such a a word picture or like a narrative for us to get in and say, how do we is the church enter into a place that is actually our rightful place… Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — …to be fully sustainable on our own… Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — …stand on our own feet. And when a when a preacher says, I’ve said this, God we don’t need your money. You you get to give to a church because that’s going to bless you. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — But then really to be able to say, like every dollar that you give here goes straight to local and global missions. Rich Birch — Fascinating. Johnny Scott — I’ve never I’ve never been able to say that. Rich Birch — No, but that’s the goal? Is that is that ultimately like we… I love. Well first of all, this has been great so far. I love we it’s like we jumped in midstream, which is fantastic. Johnny Scott — I know, I know. Rich Birch — It’s so good. Johnny Scott — We just we just went right there. Rich Birch — But is that ultimately—let’s but let’s get to that—is that ultimately where where you’re hoping things will get to? Johnny Scott — Um I’ve stated that goal from from the pulpit and there’s a couple of caveats to that. You know, ah first of all I’ve only been here 5 years, church has been around 50 years. There was a great church before the guy before me, before the guy before him. It’s been… Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — …it’s a great church. Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yes. Johnny Scott — And so I didn’t come to this church with this missiology. You know when you come to a land… Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — …you come into a land, you’re like well what do you already have? And um I was just in ah a I just love church. I grew up – I love church. Church rescued me as a sixth grade boy when my family is going through divorce, and I was just loitering. And so everything about church I believe it is the answer for everything and culture. It’s our birthright. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — You know, Erwin McManus says in “Barbarian Way” it is the the birthright of the church to be the fountainhead of creativity to the world. Rich Birch — So good. Johnny Scott — I mean we could do an entire podcast on that. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Johnny Scott — We could just get wrapped up in what does that mean for business as ministry? Rich Birch — Yeah, what does that look like. Yeah. Johnny Scott — And that’s that’s a part of our fabric. And so as I come into like this church and I see what they have. And we start looking at this. And you’re like is the final goal here, Johnny, that you’ll be able to tell people on Sunday every dollar given 100% of it goes straight to… I would say yes. But however, however, what’s changed a little bit in my mind is, you know, Jesus says the gospel is Jerusalem, and Judea, then the ends of the earth. Okay? Johnny Scott — And and I’ve told our people—like famously, I think they’re sick of the line—I’m not in charge of um, you know Target, right? Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — The the national the my my wife is drawn to Target like a moth to flame. Rich Birch — Mine too. Mine too. Johnny Scott — You know she she’s like a diviner. She’s got a stick in the woods and she’s like it’s over here and she can just kind of find it, right? Rich Birch — Yes. So true. Yeah. Johnny Scott — Like finding water underground. And I’m not in charge of Target nationally it’s a national… man, but the Target up the road from our church, I call that my Target. Because I am spiritually responsible. James 3:1 – not many of you should presume to be teachers of law but knowing that you’ll be judged more strictly. That’s what that’s what that means deeply to me that I will be responsible for that Target. I’m not allowed to drive by Target. If my car drives by it on a regular basis, it is in my realm. It’s in my 360 degrees of being able to touch and care. And God always expands our care, right? He is this… Rich Birch — Mmm-hmm. Johnny Scott — And we’re creatures that like oh if I just care less. and we’ll eventually get our care down to not-very-much, and it will only be about things that give ah… So God is in this process of telling the people in Babylon, no, you’re not going to pray for just your synagogue of that which you can control, where people who agree with you. You’re going to pray for the whole city. Well you know what? The Jews didn’t care about? Babylonian holidays, Babylonian customs, Babylonian anything. They hated them. And God says, no, you’re going to pray. Think about how difficult that was. Rich Birch — Yeah, absolutely. Johnny Scott — And what we were not there. I love the school across the street. I mean we we have a school across the street. It’s a high school, has 4000 kids in it. Then there’s a junior high next to it with 2000 kids in it. Rich Birch — Wow. And our church built a student center 6000 square feet with an occupants of 350. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — I mean it’s just like we said like well we’ll we’ll try… Rich Birch — The majority that won’t come here. Yeah. Johnny Scott — …that it’s it’s going to hell in a handbag. Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — We’re we’re we’re looking at um, $380 million dollars worth of businesses mission growth in the next, I don’t know 2 years, on our property, and MPUD right now on a hundred acre live, work, play community that has no dedicated space for students. Rich Birch — Wow. Johnny Scott — And here’s why. Students just go to the business department and book whatever space you want for the rest of the year. You get first dibs. Come early. Because when you’re done booking it, we have a full on event center. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — The largest farmers market in the county. Um, you know a winter concert series. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — Just like guys you’ve got 20 bookable venues, like I don’t care. Book one. Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — And so that mentality of are you going to stand on stage one day and say every dime… Well, when I pay a youth pastor, like we don’t have a youth pastor on our staff. We’re hiring missionary youth pastors. Instead we we have Florida Premier Soccer. They’re 11,000 families, probably one of the most successful soccer organizations on the East Coast, okay. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — They’re here on our campus. We have a turf field. We’re trying to build five more. That whole clubhouse and for-profit entity that is G-Sports for us has the elite of those kids practicing on our turf field on Wednesday nights. Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — And when I first started this journey in my heart, the elders were like okay, we’re going to rent the field out. We’re going to get people here um, but we’re never going to have games on Sunday and we’re not going to let them be here on Wednesday night, right? And I’m like old school youth pastor. I’m like oh yeah, that makes sense. And then I’ve completely changed in the last two years of watching this happen and being on the field and seeing kids. And and now our mentality is instead of telling kids: stop being a soccer player, come to youth group on Wednesday night. We’ll have—today’s Wednesday for us—so we’ll have 300 kids at youth group. That’s just where we’re at right now during junior high and senior high. And I will show up at the beginning of high school tonight because my my whole family’s here. My kids are all here leading worship and serving. Whatever. Johnny Scott — Then I’m going to walk over to a soccer field where we’re putting a missionary there. And we’re never going to tell the soccer kids to quit soccer and come to youth group. Instead we’re going to say how can we give them a small group experience and be in their coach’s lives, and start to win coaches to the Christ. And serve first, right? Before Jesus heals, before Jesus says follow me, Jesus always served. Rich Birch — Right. Love it. Johnny Scott — They never have to come to youth group to be a believer, man. Ever. Rich Birch — Right, right, right, right. Love it. Johnny Scott — It’s it’s revolutionary revolutionary. Rich Birch — Let’s take it I so I love this. Let’s take a step back. One of the things I I love about this. I knew this was going to be a great conversation. For years I’ve said to people, and and you know I’ve been in, you know I think you and I in similar kind of circles in the church world. And for years I’ve said, listen when you read the bible, it is clear that God appears to prefer to work in the marketplace not in the holy places. That’s just scripturally true. He he constantly is reaching people when they’re out in the the real world. Not then it’s not that he doesn’t work in kind of holy places… Johnny Scott — Yeah. Rich Birch — …or set aside places, but he seems to prefer to work… Now I bump into your story. Now you as a church, this this minister’s business as ministry, give us kind of the handles. What does that look like for you? How would you be different than kind of the the typical church, you know, around the corner from you. What does that what does that look like for Generations? Johnny Scott — First of all, this is we’ve not arrived at all. Rich Birch — Sure. Johnny Scott — And we we are we a, man, my goodness, everything that we have started has been harder than I thought. Um and I don’t regret any of it. And ah one of the axioms that we have is we can we will acknowledge that we’ll do less than a year than we want to. But we’ll probably do more in 10 years than we ever imagined. And that’s just given us this exhale, okay. Johnny Scott — And so um there are about 9 business entities right now. We went from 17 church staff to over 100 church staff in the last seven months. Rich Birch — Whoa. Johnny Scott — We think we’ll be at 250 church staff or 250 staff overall businesses in the next eighteen months, but we see about a hundred businesses on a hundred acre property in the next five years. Rich Birch — Wow. Okay, that’s a lot to take in. Johnny Scott — Yeah it it is. I know dude. I’m… Rich Birch — That is a lot. Like there’s so lot lots of churches have a coffee shop that like and they’re like oh my goodness we’ve got a coffee shop. I know what you’re doing is different – pull that apart. Why is it? Johnny Scott — Um, yeah I will well for me God says he’ll do more than more than I can imagine. And I started to think about that. When he says I’ll do more than, I’m like I don’t know. I’m imagining some pretty crazy crap, and you’re telling me more? And I’m one of those guys that you know I’m telling you stuff on a podcast where, you know, people watch this podcast, they’re going to hear stuff that, you know, I don’t I don’t tell all my buddies around the country. Because unless you come here to get your boots on the ground, you’re just not going to get it. Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — I’m having conversations where I’m like okay I’m not going to talk about this to anyone else because this is stupid. But we we are we’re we’re engaging right now with you know, an equity group to buy 49% of a MLS Next Pro Soccer team. The church is going to own 20% and um, we’ve already got a built in fan base. We believe by 2026 World Cup time that that prop, that entity this soccer club could be worth $25,000,000. Johnny Scott — um that’s that’s cra that’s crazy, right? And like we’re getting into it I’m I’m answering your question in a backwards way because we’re getting into a gray space. because people start to say well, what are you gonna do if, you know, MLS Next Pro, which is their minor league team, if they start to say that franchise is going to do gay pride month, and demand that you have that on your Jerseys. Well here’s my first answer: I don’t know. I don’t know. Rich Birch — Sure. Yes. Johnny Scott — And but here but but here’s how this has worked. Grow me, you know, I’m an X’r, you know, son of boomers. I know the greatest generation ever, you know, because they were grandparents. And I I know where we’re at right now is we have this next generation these next generations that we’re trying to pull into ministry. And ah I’ve seen what we’ve done which is, you know, cast people out, tell people that they’ve got to believe before they can belong, and it’s not the model that Jesus had. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — And so all of these entities that we’re doing I’m willing to get into the gray space and say we’re going to make decisions based upon the leading of the Holy Spirit and the facts as they present themselves when we get there. How about that? And we can only move at the speed of trust. And um, we’re God has slowed us down and sped us up, and with the current things that we’re doing and how they’re interacting, our our fear of mission drift you know. Because we’ve got the classic examples. Well did you know that Harvard started out preaching? And how are you going to guarantee not doing mission drift? Well, how are you going to guarantee not doing anything crazy, and and not trying out of the box things are going to do… like seriously? Johnny Scott — So we feel like we’re in the fight. We feel like the Holy Spirit is leading us. And while we’re not sustainable yet, I see within 18 months, you know, we could be to a place where you know there is 0 debt for our church. And we can say every dollar given goes straight to. But here’s what I’ll do it’s that Matthew 25. We we had a high level leader say to us, when when does this stop? And I just I had a like a a very clarifying moment. I said this is, by the way, this is never going to stop. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — This will never stop. Because when Jesus comes back in Matthew chapter 25, he doesn’t say, everyone without church debt stand in line. He says, I want to examine your point of leverage. That’s what he says. Rich Birch — That’s a good question. Johnny Scott — And so for us, um, you know I, man, I’m I’m getting I’m so I’m stepping on some toes, I know. Rich Birch — It’s good. It’s good. Step away. Johnny Scott — But but but here’s the deal, bro. Here’s the deal with this, and because it gets me frustrated. Um, we we’ve changed what, you know, like cleanliness is next to godliness. I’m like where is that exactly. And we’ve put like well debt-free is what God wants. And that’s not what God said. God said use man’s money, that’s man’s currency to get kingdom currency. Kingdom currency is people. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — So we leverage man’s money to get that. And so if you’re a church and you have no debt and you’re worth, you know, $30,000,000, I think that our property in the next ten years could be valued at over $100,000,000. Easily, okay. Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — And if our if our loan to debt is like well we just got all of debt. We do everything cash now. I’m like wait wait a minute, wait a minute. What if we leveraged say 35% of that? And put that into church planting globally, right? Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — What could we do a $35,000,000? Because everyone’s like well you know what the payment on that… Because someone would say to me they’re like, I remember when our payment you know a monthly payment was something like $47,000. And someone said do you know what we could do with $47,000 a month? I was like yeah. A lot less than ten million now. Rich Birch — Yes, yeah, right. Johnny Scott — That’s what that’s what you can do. And and so I think that the biblical principle is never to be a slave to the lender. Well when you’re leveraged at such a point that regardless of an economic downturn, you know I think we’re in two we’re in two quarters of you know like GDP downturn right now. So we’re technically in a recession. There are still banks lending, right? Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — And and we could still go out and get a lender who’s excited to do business with us as we build what’s going to be a ten acre facility with a soccer, a new soccer field, on top of 2 levels of parking. Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — I mean this, it’s crazy architecturally what we’re getting ready to do. We’re not a slave to the lender, right? Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — Because lenders want to be involved. And so changing church’s mindset to say we’re going to appropriately leverage man’s resources/dollars to get influence. I’m after influence. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — Because if we have influence. Um, now we can use that influence to make it all about lifting Jesus up, right? I mean five years ago when I when I got here I wasn’t meeting with people that didn’t know Jesus. And now I’m I’m in a meeting with people and I had a guy who I count as a dear friend. And he looked at me and he just said, hey man, you’re crazy. And I so and I said, no, I said I really want to reframe that for you. Because I want for you and I to start to have a conversation that I’m not crazy at all. I just believe that God is real, and that Jesus wants to be lifted up. Johnny Scott — And so all the things I’m doing, it’s not so that you think, oh that pastor is crazy. Or he’s an entrepreneur. No, no, no. I want you to start to say he’s fully believing that Jesus is going to be lifted up in this. And I’m pushing the conversation to be about Jesus lifted up. He says, if I’m lifted up, men will look to me. Johnny Scott — Then they’ll have to make a decision if he’s the Lord, liar, or lunatic. And he’s where he responds to me and he says, well soccer is my god. And I loved his response because… Rich Birch — Yeah, now you’re having a real conversation. Right. Johnny Scott — Because now we’re yeah, and so I said I said here’s the here’s the deal. I said I I’m gonna I I said I I like soccer, and I want to come and enjoy soccer. And God gave us soccer because soccer is super fun, but soccer makes a bad god. So I’m I want to have a God-off with you. And as as you and I enjoy soccer together, and high five, and grow soccer, I’m going to constantly be comparing my God to your god. And my assertion is that your god is fake, not real, and you’re worshipping something that should just be enjoyed. That’s a gift given to you by my God. And now we’re having a six month conversation about is God real? Rich Birch — Right, now you’re engaged. Yeah, that’s amazing. Johnny Scott — And you know what God’s doing? God’s showing himself that he’s real. Because this is where he gets glory. I don’t have to do it. I write spiritual checks all day and I’m like you better cash that one Lord it’s got your name on it. You’re you’re my you’re my guarantor. Right? Rich Birch — Sure, sure, sure. Johnny Scott — And this this business is ministry. You know as I’ve got ministry teams, because here’s here’s the the rub you get into. I’ve got pastors’ friends that are like oh my goodness, man, I don’t want to do that that sounds like such a headache. Oh yeah, I’ve got 3 schools on my property right now. Rich Birch — Right. It’s a headache. Johnny Scott — I’m I’m launching two more schools, 2000 learners in 5 years. Um curriculum is expensive. Startup costs is expensive. FF and E is expensive. Shared ministry space is horrible, and everyone’s fighting. And you know I’ve got traditional 1.0 ministries people going, well, you know, Johnny sometimes you spend too much time with businesses and stuff. Like well no, that’s what I hired you for you know and and guys it’s not businesses versus traditional ministry. Business is ministry. Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — And to get that we are one, right? And this is why Jesus’ is last word to us, his last prayer and his his final discourse in John was all about unity. He didn’t pray for ideas. He didn’t pray for business performance. He didn’t pray for money. He prayed for unity. So here’s the premise I actually believe: that every resource our church needs to dramatically impact the community around us is embedded in us. My job is to cultivate that. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — I continually fight for unity. Rich Birch — When you so to pull apart a little bit you kind of were heading towards or hinting towards what, you know, there might be some skeptics that are listening in that would say like, isn’t this all just a distraction from church 1.0? Or you know, the preaching of the word? Insert whatever language in there. I understand at a personal level. I love that story because I think that’s a great, you know, soccer is god story – I think that’s at the heart of what you’re trying to do. But how do you do that at scale? I get that you have an opportunity to do that as a leader – you’re engaging with one other leader, but then how does the church do that? How do you kind of do that with the thousands of kids that are on the property and the ten thousands of people that come to watch soccer? Um, what what does that look like for you today? Johnny Scott — Okay, I’m gonna I’m gonna do two things. I’m gonna dodge your question here real quick… Rich Birch — At least you admit it. Johnny Scott — …and I’m all and I am… Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — …but then I’m also gonna give you some very practical things. Okay, my dodge is when I do this on a very personal level um to me that’s that’s stopping mission drift from my heart. Rich Birch — That’s good. Johnny Scott — And speed of leader, speed a team. Rich Birch — Yep yeah, absolutely. Johnny Scott — And I want I want my team to have that ethos about us that, you know, we’re doing this on an individual level and if we do it at the smallest level, it’ll happen on the macro level, okay. And if and if I model that. So that’s how I’m keeping my way pure in all this. I’m keeping my religion undefiled, right? Johnny Scott — Um, the second more practical answer to that is ah there’s profit from these businesses. I mean the fact that a youth pastor would walk into my office and say um, hey we’re going to take kids to camp and you know my budget is $50,000 this year. Like no one in the business world does that at all ever anywhere. Rich Birch — Right, right, right, right, right, right. Johnny Scott — Like and like what I remember, you know, one of my mentors in ministry like we made enough money off summer camp to fund our own intern for $7000. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — We made $7000 profit because we just built it in. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — So that we we’re completely backwards at how we run ministry. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — Like we’re ser… McDonald’s has got a sign that says 50,000 people served. Well we’re serving people. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — But why do they charge and we don’t? Rich Birch — Right, right, right, right. Johnny Scott — Do you not believe in what what you’re giving people? Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — So we need to have a total transformation on how we serve people. We’re offering a value and there’s something valuable to it. Ah, but on a very practical level. These businesses are making profit. Their performers are set up to make profit. And I’m I’m there’s profit that comes back to the elders oversee everything in our corporate structure. You know there’s no, there’s not a lot of boards set up. It just goes straight to the elders um through a very very really good list of, you know, organizations through with our our org lawyer. Um, and so we’re we are reinvesting those dollars with missionaries that are intentional. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — And we don’t pay people have coffee; people drink coffee for free. You know? Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — Like I never want to be that senior pastor that’s like, how big is your discipleship team? It’s like nine people. It’s like what like like that’s everyone to everyone disciples here at church. Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — You know our one of our things is you are God’s plan for your street. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — When people walk up and say you know we should start a program for it like, great. Go do it. God put that on your heart not mine. Rich Birch — Right. Johnny Scott — So we’re we’re going to have metrics and like we’re working on what are metrics right now and deliverables for someone who is assigned to that school as a missionary. Because my ministry staff’s doing ministry 1.0. And there’s a piece of me even when you said it a minute ago a minute ago. You said to me, well you know the the gospel clearly shows us that you know missional effort and always happened in the workplace. I was like man he’s so right on the text. And there’s a part of me that reared up. And I was about came at you, I was like, hey bro, the church is the answer for the world man. Hey bro, you know? And so I have that fight within me, you know? Rich Birch — Sure. Yeah, yeah. Johnny Scott — And ah so you know as a church, we’re extremely churchy. Like if you come we get to be churchy. I’m I’m pastor first with everything I do. Sunday is not for talking about like it’s the gospel gospel gospel; we preach the gospel Christ crucified on Sundays. And if you want to know about what’s happening like book a meeting on Monday, right? Rich Birch — Right, right. Johnny Scott — So practically like we’re just putting embedded missionaries in these entities and giving them deliverables on what they’re really going to do to show that they’re making headway. Rich Birch — That’s fascinating. Johnny Scott — So that’s where we’re at, and it’s messy. We’ve not I’ve said it a few times we’ve not figured it all out, but we feel we feel like we’re not getting. Rich Birch — No, no. Yeah, yeah. I love it. Johnny Scott — We’re not doing something new I’m getting back to Paul’s framework. I’m just selling tents. Not Christian tents. Not tents to christians. Rich Birch — Yes. Johnny Scott — Right? Rich Birch — Yep, yeah. I love it. I love it. Well, let’s kind of as we come to land. Rattle through we did I love this. We did this interview like completely backwards which is good. Johnny Scott — I I know. Rich Birch — Rattle through the 9 the 9 businesses, give us a framework. We talked about soccer. What are some of those other ones that they’re currently, you know, that are are currently running? What are that what do they look like or not all of them just like kind of a flavor of what they look like? Johnny Scott — Yeah, so you know a full on convention center that serves ah the the entire community would be a big one. I mean the the farmers market might sound like a small deal. It really is a massive influence in in our community. Rich Birch — Huge deal. Yep. Johnny Scott — We have ah you know standard christian education on our campus, but the fact that I have non-faith based education franchise on our campus is a really big deal. A sports school, you know, that a parent’s paying $23,000 is a year to send their kid to um, that’s bringing life back to them. Two coffee shops um, that are actually international coffee shops while we’re roasting our own stuff and working with missionaries in 3 different continents around the world to bring single source, fair trade coffee. Rich Birch — Yeah. Johnny Scott — Um putting all that together. That’s great. Rich Birch — Fantastic. Johnny Scott — Um, our sports brand is probably got four or five entities in it. Rich Birch — Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Johnny Scott — I could just do an entire thing with you on the sports brand. It’s I forget stuff like a counseling center I don’t I don’t even know man. Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s so good. Johnny Scott — It’s it’s crazy. It’s crazy. Rich Birch — This is so fantastic fantastic, Johnny. I this has been great. I I do think—just want to encourage you—I really do think you are scratching ah towards, like you say, Church 2.0. I don’t think you’re way off in the deep end on that. I think I think that what you’re doing is pushing towards what I think all of our churches need to do, and you’re asking the questions hey where do we go from here? What does it look like in a particularly in a post-christian culture to reach the culture around us to use the resources God’s given us to make an impact in the world around us. I just think it’s fantastic. Anything else you want to say as we kind of wrap up today’s conversation? Johnny Scott — I you know I would just challenge pastors that you know might be overwhelmed. This was this didn’t happen in a year. This has been a 5-year journey and I’m not the guy, you know, that God is put together. I mean if I were just to talk about the team that God is miraculously assembled and and folks are like well you know, that’s just Johnny’s personality. It’s it’s not, it’s not. I think this is part of who Jesus is in saying I I want to have a church that, you know, is just out there serving. and maybe for guys like for us we started with just a Crossfit gym. That’s it, man. Johnny Scott — And God started to put these other things together. And for you, you know, you got to contextualize all this. We we took this from missionaries overseas actually is where the dream started in Kenya – Nairobi, Kenya. Rich Birch — Very cool. Johnny Scott — And I challenge guys all the time that are like well that’s just you know that’s your personality. No no, it’s not. Like you can do just one of these things. And it will bring so much fun and you will start to have personal evangelism, and reach in your community like never before. Start somewhere. Rich Birch — Love it. So good, Johnny. Appreciate that. Where do we want to send people online if they want to check, you know, check out the church, kind of track with your story. Where’s the best place for us to send them? Johnny Scott — Ah, generations generationscc.com is a church’s address… Rich Birch — Perfect. Johnny Scott — …and then The Commons at Trinity is we renamed the property The Commons at Trinity. Um, and you know that that url is up and Instagram… you can follow the journey of the business develop the CDC cool. Rich Birch — Love it. Thanks so much – appreciate you being here today. Johnny Scott — Thanks, man. Yeah, God bless, bro.

Thanks for tuning in to the unSeminary podcast. This week we’re talking with Patrick Lencioni, one of the founders of The Table Group and an expert in leadership, teamwork, and organizational health. Pat’s also the author of 13 books which have sold millions of copies around the world, and today he’s talking with us about his latest book, The 6 Types of Working Genius: A Better Way to Understand Your Gifts, Your Frustrations, and Your Team. Listen in to learn how to help your team tap into their God-given gifts, identify the type of work that brings them joy and energy, and increase productivity while reducing judgement and burnout. What is a working genius? // When it comes to getting work done, one task can give someone joy and energy while it feels draining to another person, even when they love their job. Pat identifies six types of working genius, spelling out the word WIDGET, which identify a person’s God-given gifts so they can work from a place of increased productivity while reducing frustration and burnout.Understanding WIDGET. // Understanding the six types of working genius gives you a model for understanding yourself, your team members, and why you need all of the working geniuses to be present and working together on your staff. It will also help you to place people in the right roles so that they thrive while helping the church to thrive.Wonder. // People who have the working genius of wonder are naturally fed by asking questions. They are concerned with possibilities and potential. Wonder is always the first step; without it our organizations will keep doing the same thing until they stagnate.Invention. // People with the working genius of invention are attracted to developing a new and better way. They will partner with the person who has the working genius of wonder to turn questions into new solutions and systems.Discernment. // The working genius of discernment is a God-given gift of using your judgement, intuition, instinct, pattern recognition, and integrative thinking. Give the person with this working genius a problem and they can naturally identify the right thing to do.Galvanizing. // The galvanizing working genius belongs to people who wake up every morning and love to inspire other people to act. They exhort, encourage and rally people together to take action.Enablement. // The positive form of enablement is the next working genius and it’s critical for a team. Being gifted with enablement is all about joyfully coming alongside people and helping them with whatever they need in the way they need it.Tenacity. // The last working genius is tenacity and it’s about finishing things and plowing through obstacles. People with tenacity are focused and persistent; they won’t move on to the next thing until the current task is completed.Take the quiz to know your gifts. // Without knowing what gifts God’s given you, you can’t fill in the gaps with the team around you. Take the Working Genius Assessment in about ten minutes to identify your working geniuses, your working competencies, and your working frustrations. Plus, complete the assessment with your team and receive a team map that will reveal any gaps in the organization. Discover your gifts and transform your team at www.workinggenius.com. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Leadership Pathway If you are trying to find, develop and keep young leaders on your team look no further than Leadership Pathway. They have worked with hundreds of churches, and have interviewed thousands of candidates over the past several years. They are offering a new ebook about five of the core competencies that are at the heart of the leadership development process with every church that they partner with…just go to leadershippathway.org/unseminary to pick up this free resource. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Well hey, friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in. You know every week we try to bring you a leader who will both inspire and equip you and today’s no exception. It’s our honor, really our privilege, to have Patrick Lencioni with us. You probably have heard of him before – he’s one of the founders of The Table Group, which is really a pioneering organization around ah, organizational health. They really do a fantastic job – started in 1997. As the president of The Table Group, Pat spends his time speaking, writing about leadership, teamwork, and organizational health as well as consulting with executives and their team. He’s also the author of 13 books, which have sold a crazy number – 6,000,000 copies, translated in 30 languages. His latest book, which we’re going to talk about today, The Six Types of Working Genius. Pat, welcome to the show. Patrick Lencioni — It’s great to be here. I’m so excited – when I saw this on my schedule a few weeks ago and woke up this morning I thought, this is the kind of podcast I love to do. I love to speak to your audience and so I’m a kid in a candy store today. Rich Birch — So honored that you that you’d come on – really appreciate it. What what did I miss there? Kind of fill out your story. What parts of, you know, Patrick do we want to let people know in on. Patrick Lencioni — You know I mean I I I always like when people go: Pat Lencioni – here he is. That’s it. You don’t need to tell. But I think the one thing that your audience might be interested in is 10 years, almost ten years ago, I started an organization with another gentleman called The Amazing Parish. And though I work with like I work with, I know a ton of megachurch pastors and pastors and different denominations and Christian Evangelical all that, I’m Catholic and we started an organization called The Amazing Parish ten years ago that really serves pastors in Catholic Churches… Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — …who went to seminary and didn’t learn how to lead didn’t learn how to develop teams. And and we help them with that in a very spiritual, prayerful way. So I love this audience. Not only from my Evangelical friends but I’m steeped in it in the Catholic Church as well. So this is fun. Rich Birch — Yeah, love it. I I have to confess—I said this before we got on air—I have been following you for a while – did not know about The Amazing Parish until I was doing research for this and I checked it out. It looks amazing. So yeah, friends, you should go and check out that website. It’s really easy to find. amazingparish.org if you want to check that out. It would be a great thing. Patrick Lencioni — And you know what’s an interest. What I love is so many of my Evangelical friends have actually come to our annual conference… Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — …where we bring people there, and and we’re partners with Northpoint and Andy and the and the folks there who you’re friends with. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — …and they’re serving churches and we’re helping them and they’ve come to our conference and so yes, yes, ladies and gentlemen, in this time of persecution and craziness in the world. Evangelicals, Protestants, Catholics are all realizing we’re all brothers in Christ so it’s wonderful. Rich Birch — Oh absolutely. Actually I was just in London… Patrick Lencioni — And sisters. Rich Birch — …and a couple couple weeks ago and spent a bunch of time with with an organization called Alpha. Patrick Lencioni — Oh! Rich Birch — And there’s a yeah lot of the huge Catholic component within that and I dinner with a guy across the table who spent a whole night talking, and it was it was fascinating, you know, sharing across the table about our ministries. How similar, you know, we really are for sure. Patrick Lencioni — Well and let me tell you the evil one hates the idea that we’re talking, and I mean that but… Rich Birch — Yeah, so that’s true. That is very true. Yeah. Patrick Lencioni — …years ago I had the chance to go to London and go to speak at um, um the conference there and meet the Alpha folks, and and be be involved with the with the folks that do that on the Catholic side as well. It’s wonderful to see how we’re cooperating and working together. Rich Birch — It is. Patrick Lencioni — It’s great. Rich Birch — It’s very good. Patrick Lencioni — Nicky Gumbel. That’s what… Rich Birch — Nicky Gumbel. Patrick Lencioni — …Nicky Gumbel. Yup. Rich Birch — Absolutely. Love it. Well I’m really looking forward to diving into your most recent work here Working Genius – The 6 Types of Working Genius. Talk to us about it. What is this model? You know, like give us a sense of what what we’re talking about here today. Patrick Lencioni — Essentially this is this is two things. It’s a model for understanding yourself – the gifts God gives you when it comes to getting real work done. Like to the specifics of which kind of task, activities give you joy and energy and God intended you to do because it’s a gift. And which kind did he not give you, and it drains you of your joy and energy, and feeling guilty about not being good at that is not good. It’s not good. And and that’s how I developed it and I came about I came upon this by accident in trying to address my own frustration at work. I was finding myself grumpy at work… Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Lencioni — …for 20 years off and on even though I worked with wonderful people doing something I loved. But I would often drift into grumpiness and I couldn’t figure it out. And somebody finally said, hey why are you like that? And I and I said I don’t know. And by the grace of God I came up with this model just for myself. And then we found out people were were just were were saying, no this is universal; this helps me. And and so it went crazy. But what what this also is is not just an individual tool, but it is the fastest and most transformational tool for teams to better appreciate one another, readjust how they get things done in an organization… Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — …and certainly in a church… Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Lencioni — …so that they can lean into their geniuses more… Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Lencioni — …and and call other people to work up into their geniuses. It is such a wonderful tool. As it turns out God made us to need one another. We don’t… none of us have everything. Rich Birch — Right. Love it. The—and I want we’re gonna talk about the assessment I had a chance to take it and it was fantastic, but we’ll get a chance to talk to that—one of the things I loved was you’ve got these kind of six different types, and they spell out the word “widget” but Wonder, Invention, Discernment, Galvanizing, Enabling, Tenacity – widget. That seems kind of crazy to me that you use that as a, you know, as that the the word under it all. Patrick Lencioni — Well let me tell you it was mostly by accident. So we got as we were. We were really coming up with like what’s the right word for each of these these geniuses… Rich Birch — Yes, yeah. Patrick Lencioni — …and we got it was W and I and D and G. And I was like okay, I’m not going to make it spell widget. I’m not going to do that. And then we were struggling with a word for the the fifth one, and we were like there’s only one word and it’s it’s enablement. It’s like in the in the good way… Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — …enabling others to. And when I got to that I said, now I’m going to find a darn T word because it’s not going to be widgel or widger. So we and we found a great T word. So we didn’t do it on purpose. In fact, we were kind of worried about doing it that way… Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — …because it sounded like, did you do that on purpose? Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — Most of it was by accident and then we said okay, we’re gonna we’re gonna finish it. So. Rich Birch — Yeah, so why don’t you take us through that a little bit kind of unpack that a little bit. Give us a sense of the model; talk us through what that, you know, what those what those six are. Patrick Lencioni — Great. So I’m going to do it in the order in which they generally occur in getting things done. Although nothing’s that neat and tidy and I’m going to start from the highest altitude – the first thing down to the lowest, like landing the plane. So the first thing, the first genius—which most people who have this don’t think it’s a genius because mostly they’ve been either criticized or kind of looked at funny when they do it, but it’s critical and it’s a first step in anything—is the genius of wonder. The genius of wonder – the W. And and people that have this genius and it’s completely God-given are naturally inclined to, and are fed by, asking questions and thinking about things at a high level – about possibilities and potential. And and and asking questions like, is there a better way? Is this enough? Should we be rethinking this? Why why are things like this? And why do we do it this way? And and it’s it’s it’s how this model came about. Patrick Lencioni — My colleague Amy said to me one day, why are you like that? What goes on? Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — And and that question somebody says—and this is true in any kind of organization—is there a better way to do ministry? Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Lencioni — Is is the way we’re doing youth outreach, is it is this really working? They’re they’re not saying they have the answer… Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Lencioni — …but they’re the ones that look at and go, I’m going to ask the question. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Lencioni — And it’s critical, and there are certain people that are naturally inclined to doing that, and it’s a beautiful genius, and we need to realize that without it our organizations… Rich Birch — Right we don’t move forward. Patrick Lencioni — Yeah, or we keep doing the same thing. Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Lencioni — I I had a group of of executives of a multibillion dollar tech company, who had been behind the curve in innovation for years. They had no new products, and they were just living off of their old products. And when they saw their their their team profile, they realized nobody on their on their leadership team had W. In fact, it was worse than that. Almost everyone had it as one of their working frustrations, their least happy thing. Rich Birch — Oh gosh – they were repelling it. They were pushing it away. Absolutely. Patrick Lencioni — Exactly. Rich Birch — Wow. Patrick Lencioni — And the CFO who certainly was not a Wonder said, if we don’t learn to wonder we’re never going to figure out this market. So… Rich Birch — Wow, wow. That’s great. Patrick Lencioni — So we need people to do that. But that’s not enough somebody has to ask the question, then somebody else says, oh please please. The next genius – the genius of Invention. Please let me try to come up with something new. That’s that person who goes, oh I can think of a better – let me think of a – give me give me a whiteboard with nothing on it and a pen, and I will come up with a new way to do youth outreach. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Patrick Lencioni — You know, this is one of mine and your working geniuses – I’ve seen your results. And you and I are not intimidated by, in fact we’re attracted to the need for a new way. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Patrick Lencioni — And you know what else? Rich, we do this even when it’s not necessary. And that’s how you know it’s a you know it’s a genius… Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Lencioni — …because like I would like to do this all the time. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Lencioni — And it’s okay for people to say, hey Rich, I love your Invention, man. God gave you a great gift, but this is not the right medium for it. You know because you know… Rich Birch — Right. Yes, let’s do that at a different spot. Patrick Lencioni — Right. You’re about to roll something out and I’m in a meeting in my company and and I’m like, ooh I have an idea! And people go, wait a second, wait a second, wait a second! I think we’re done with the idea phase for now – we’re like two days from implementation. We’ve got the plan. We’re doing great. So sometimes, sometimes it’s a genius that we’re not supposed to use and that’s okay. Rich Birch — Right. So I when I read when I read this, took this, you know, your assessment and and rolled through it this particular piece of it really stood out to me as true. For years, probably 20 years, when someone would ask me, hey, what is it that you actually do? Because they try to, you know, sometimes be an executive pastor who’s not on the stage all the time people wonder what is your job, like what do you do around here. And I would always say the shorthand I would say my job is I live at the intersection of vision and execution. I love taking the “where are we headed”—the Wonder in your language, the Wonder, what do we think that God’s calling our church to do—and then actually figuring out how we’re going to go and do that. Like let’s actually… so it is like a little bit of vision casting. It is I have to and I and I can live in that space. But then I love then saying ok, let’s figure out what that looks like let’s go make it happen. Patrick Lencioni — Right. Well and we’re gonna get to let’s go make it happen. I love that that you said that. Um, so so there’s Wonder and Invention, and those two… Rich Birch — Yep, yep. Patrick Lencioni — …the first two—are what’s called idea ideation. That’s where new ideas come from. Rich Birch — Ok, ok, love it. Patrick Lencioni — Okay, by the way I’ve had I had we had a pastor right after this model came out. He took the assessment, and he wrote to us and he said, I thought I was a a fraud, and I should have never been a pastor. He’d been a pastor for over ten years and he goes, I thought I was a failure… Rich Birch — Oh wow. Patrick Lencioni — …and I I picked the wrong profession. And he said, I realize now I just don’t have W or I, and so writing a homily, writing a sermon, was really hard for him. And so I looked at his type and I said, do you like to counsel people? He goes oh I love to. Do you like to come alongside people where they’re at in their discipleship journey? Oh yeah I do. I love that. Yeah, see a pastor is not a pastor is not a pastor. Rich Birch — Right, right. Search. Patrick Lencioni — All you need to do is find somebody on your team or somebody that you know who’s good at W I, and spend a few hours with them every week and they’re going to help you. But don’t feel guilty. Rich Birch — Right, right, right, right, right. Patrick Lencioni — And it was he said it it changed his whole view of his pastorship. Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Patrick Lencioni — Okay, so so those first two – Wonder, Invention. Then we get to the D – discernment. Discernment is a God-given gift of using your judgment, your intuition, your instincts, pattern recognition, and integrative thinking. It’s people that just kind of have a sense. You give them a problem and it’s not about data or expertise, but they have great… they look at things and they just see things and they go, this I think this is the right thing to do. And they’re usually right and they and it is an absolute gift. Some people just think that way. Patrick Lencioni — I love to tell the story of Tracy, a woman in my office who has great discernment. When my wife and I are talking about just about anything, like should we refinance our house, or where should we go on vacation, or or how should we handle this, or does this look good, or what kind of car should we get? Here’s the… Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — Laura will say, ask Tracy. Rich Birch — I I love it. Love it. So good. Patrick Lencioni — I think the last three cars I bought I finally said, Tracy, I don’t know – what do you think? She was you need this. And I’m like then I probably should get that. Rich Birch — Ah love it. Yes, Yes. Patrick Lencioni — And you know what’s funny. She said when she was a kid her friends would ask her for advice because she always had… Rich Birch — Ah, oh that’s amazing. Patrick Lencioni — Yeah. Rich Birch — Yeah, and we all know people like that, right? We all know those people. Patrick Lencioni — Right. Rich Birch — That it’s like they they’re just in our orbit and and we just want to listen to what they have to say, and they’re yeah they’re very discerning. I love that. That’s so good. Patrick Lencioni — Right? And it’s a God given talent. Rich Birch — Yeah, cool, cool. Patrick Lencioni — And it’s real and when you say to them, prove it with data. They’re like oh yeah, yeah, that’s not my thing. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Lencioni — I I don’t know. That’s not how I make decisions. Rich Birch — Yes, love it yet. Patrick Lencioni — So so discernment is great because when people invent something, like you’re an inventor having somebody that can come along and discern it and go, Hey, three of your ideas are pretty good. This one’s fantastic. This one here would never work. This one needs a little bit more work. Rich Birch — Okay. Patrick Lencioni — So we had a guy write to us and say that for years he thought he kind of thought his wife didn’t like him. She was against him. And he said for their anniversary they took the Working Genius Assessment. He goes he goes I’m an inventor and I come up with new ideas all the time. And every time I come up with a new idea, she tells me what the flaws are. Rich Birch — Oh wow. Patrick Lencioni — And he goes I thought she was like trying to crush my enthusiasm. And they took the assessment and her lead genius was discernment. Rich Birch — Okay. Patrick Lencioni — So he would give her new idea and she’d say, the way I love you is to try to give you feedback because I want it to work for you because I love you. And it changed their marriage. Rich Birch — Interesting. Love it. Patrick Lencioni — So it’s one of those things we we often judge people like you’re criticizing me because you don’t like me. And it’s like oh no I’m a discerner and that’s how I love on people is I give them advice. Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. So good. Yes. Patrick Lencioni — So Discernment is the third one. Rich Birch — Okay, great. Patrick Lencioni — And and the next one comes to one of yours, Rich. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — And that is Galvanizing. Rich Birch — Galvanizing. Yeah. Patrick Lencioni — And that’s the G. And that is people that wake up every morning and love to inspire people to act. They love to remind people to exhort people. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — Exhort exhortation is a great word. Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Lencioni — You know they’re like come on! You can do this! We can do this! Rich Birch — Right, right, right. Patrick Lencioni — So your your two geniuses are Invention and Galvanizing. The word we use for that pairing is the evangelizing innovator. They come up with new ideas. Rich Birch — Yeah when I read that… Patrick Lencioni — Yeah. Rich Birch — Yeah when I read that again that did that did resonate. I was um and I posted on social I was like okay so I took took the Working Genius. For those folks that know me, what do you think? And you know it’s that little thing on Instagram where they can pull the bar. And it was 100% of the people said 100% of it. Like they were like, yes, that was that’s very much you. Patrick Lencioni — Yeah. Rich Birch — This idea of somebody who is out you know, evangelizing saying, hey let’s let’s let’s pull this thing together. Let’s make this thing happen. We can do this, you know, whether it’s in lots of different areas of my life. So that’s kind of fun. Patrick Lencioni — Yeah, by the way, a little a little personal feedback I I know a lot of I-Gs, G-Is like you. And one of the things I found about all of them I love them. They’re some of my favorite people. But when I first meet them I always suspect that they’re not authentic because I can’t believe anybody could be so excited so often. Rich Birch — Okay. Patrick Lencioni — And then my third interaction… Rich Birch — So now you’re reading my… but Pat this is the first time we’ve met. Patrick Lencioni — Yeah. Rich Birch — I’ve had that feedback from people in my life in the past where people have said they’re like are you…? Like yeah like they would say like after we’re friends for a little bit, they were like when I first met you I was like, is this guy real? Like you see is he really honest in that way? Which is so funny so that’s great. Love it. So fun. Patrick Lencioni — Yeah, um, and praise God that this actually works. You know I don’t think I invented it. I think I discovered it. I really do believe… Rich Birch — That’s great. Patrick Lencioni — …God like anointed me with like, hey Pat, here’s an insight that can help other people… Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Lencioni — …who are feeling guilty about themselves, or are judging others, without understanding it. St Francis of Assisi said, you know, seek to understand more than to be understood. And the more we can understand other people then the more they can understand us too. Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Patrick Lencioni — So anyway, so you’re a Galvanizer. Now here’s the thing about me, I’m not. Rich Birch — Okay. Patrick Lencioni — But I’ve learned how to do it and I I can do it well. But I don’t like it. Rich Birch — Oh interesting. Okay. Patrick Lencioni — And so that’s how this whole model came about, Rich. I would come to work every day, ready to invent and discern, and people would go well, you’re the best galvanizer we got so galvanize us. Galvanize us. Galvanize us. Rich Birch — Okay, okay, okay. Patrick Lencioni — And it was burning me out. And and… Rich Birch — Interesting. Patrick Lencioni — And so sometimes just because you’re good at something doesn’t mean that’s actually what you’re called to do. You know I love that I love that idea that when you make a decision go where you’re where you find peace. And and and if you don’t have peace and when you’re doing something but people say you’re great at it, maybe there’s that there’s probably something a little bit wrong there. You know when Barry Sanders the football player, if you follow football, retired—like the best running back ever—retired when he was like 28. And… Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s crazy. Patrick Lencioni — …and you know why? I don’t think he loved it. He was just good at it. Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Lencioni — And God really does call us to spend as much time as possible in the things he gave us that give us joy and energy. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — So this isn’t just about talent. It’s about joy and energy… Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — …where we and that’s where usually our talents lie. Rich Birch — Yes I love that. Patrick Lencioni — So you’re a galvanizer; you love doing that. Rich Birch — I do. Actually I’ve I’ve seen that many times. So what what’s that what are your two? You said Wonder is your first – are you W I? Is that what you said? Patrick Lencioni — No – I’m I and D. Rich Birch — Oh okay. Patrick Lencioni — So I’m an inventor and a discerner. And that’s called a discriminating um ideator. Rich Birch — Okay. Patrick Lencioni — Which means like when I come up with new ideas – this is going to sound very immodest but but humility is not being falsely modest. Humility is actually acknowledging what is true. And and since we know we’re not God and it’s a gift, um acknowledging your gifts is not a violation of humility. In fact, to deny your gifts is. Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Lencioni — Because they’re a gift. How can I brag about my gifts? Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yeah. Patrick Lencioni — So when I come up with new ideas a a disproportionately high number of them turn out to work… Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — …because because I I have this loop of invention and discernment, invention and discernment. So by the time I I put it out there, I’ve already kind of evaluated it. Rich Birch — Okay, okay, that makes sense. Patrick Lencioni — And so it’s just kind of how it works. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. Patrick Lencioni — Now I suck at a bunch of other things. That’s also humble. Rich Birch — Nice. Now these last two. Enablement and Tenacity – those are the last two. Talk us through what those are. Patrick Lencioni — Those are both your and my working frustrations. By the way, Rich, do you know what a working frustration is? A working frustration to compare it… Your Working Genius is like pouring coffee into a Yeti mug and putting a lid on it. Rich Birch — Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. Patrick Lencioni — You know it holds the it holds the heat for hours and hours. You’re Working Genius – you could spend ah an entire day in your Working Genius and feel like I’m not really tired. You know? Rich Birch — Right. Yes, yes. Patrick Lencioni — The the next two areas are what we call your working competency. That’s like pouring coffee into a cup and putting a lid on it – a regular plastic coffee cup. It’ll hold it for a while. You can do that. Your working frustration is the coffee cup you pour into and it’s got a hole in the bottom of it. It’s going to drain you of joy and energy. And it’s hard to spend much time certainly over a period of time. We really aren’t designed to spend a lot of time in our areas of working frustration. Patrick Lencioni — And so the next area which is both your and I working frustration. It’s hard to admit this as followers of Jesus, but the next genius is called Enablement. Rich Birch — Okay, yep. Patrick Lencioni — And it’s a beautiful thing. It’s not enabling an alcoholic or a drug addict. It’s enabling people by coming alongside them and helping them with whatever they need. Rich Birch — Okay, yep. Patrick Lencioni — And there are people who have a God-given gift, and you all know it because you see it in your organizations, when somebody says I need help. Their energy, they’re like, oh please I want to help you. What do you need? Rich Birch — Pick me, pick me. Yeah yeah. Patrick Lencioni — Right. Because they love to help on your terms. Now you and I love to help people too. But when somebody asks me for help, I want to invent and discern for them. Rich Birch — Hmm, okay. Patrick Lencioni — I don’t necessarily want to give them what they’re asking for. Um the best explanation I have of this one is when my wife says to me, Pat, I need your help this weekend. Before she even tells me what it is I start to feel a little bit drained. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — And then I said oh okay, what do you need help with? She says I need help cleaning the garage. So now I’m even a little lower. So what I immediately go to my my strengths and I say, are you sure we need to clean the garage? Tell me why you think we need to clean it. That’s my discernment. Rich Birch — Love it. Yes. Patrick Lencioni — And she’ll say, I don’t want your discernment. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — Trust me, we’re gonna I need to clean the garage. Then I go, Okay so what’s your system? Maybe we can come up with a new way to do this. And she says, I don’t want your invention. Rich Birch — Yeah, just… Patrick Lencioni — I just want you to stand in the corner. And when I hand you a box, I want you to put it where I tell you to. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — That is paralyzing to me. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Lencioni — And there are other people that are like no, no, no, no, no. I will get joy out of just watching this person get what they need. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — And that is a God-given genius. Now, I still have to do it sometimes, Rich. Rich Birch — Right. Yes. Patrick Lencioni — But there are certain jobs that would require me to do that every day that would send me into the looney bin. Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Lencioni —And that’s why one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. And God didn’t give anyone everything. And I would be a really bad nurse. Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Lencioni — But I’d be a really good diagnostic doctor. I like… Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Lencioni — I would be the one in the emergency room where people come in and I would like have to use my discernment to quickly evaluate all the variables Rich Birch — Figure out what’s going on. Yeah, I love it. Love it. Patrick Lencioni — Right? Rich Birch — Yeah, totally. Patrick Lencioni — Yeah, but then if somebody said okay just give these people whatever they need, would be really hard for me. Not because I’m a bad person. I thought for for the last fifty five years that meant I was a bad person. It’s like oh that’s just not a gift. Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Lencioni — So it’s not an excuse but it’s an explanation. Rich Birch — Yep makes sense. And then Tenacity. Patrick Lencioni — The last one is Tenacity. This is the genius of finishing things, and plowing through obstacles, and crossing things off the list, and meeting the numbers, and and fulfilling the the standards. And there are people who wake up if in the morning—I call them freaks, no I love them, but I’m not one of them—who say give me something to do that I can finish… Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Lencioni — …and see the results of it, and that gives me joy and energy. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — Rich, I’m the opposite. I get halfway through a project and I think it’s largely solved, and I want to move on to the next thing. Rich Birch — Yeah, what is the next thing? Patrick Lencioni — Yeah, I don’t have angst when things aren’t yet finished… Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Lencioni — …which is why I need people around me. And if I’m a pastor of a church—executive pastor, whatever—one executive pastor is not the same as another one, and another one. Rich Birch — Right, right, right. Patrick Lencioni — So you have to know what gifts God gave you, and then invite people to work with you that fill in your gaps. And so if you’re the pastor, an executive pastor, and the pastor of your church is is really like the the preacher, the preaching pastor, is really strong in certain areas, you’re probably going to have to fill in some gaps. Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yeah. Patrick Lencioni — And and but more importantly than even the two of you can’t do it all. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Lencioni — And then you’re going to build a team around you and say, hey let’s look at our team map. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Lencioni — Because when a team fills this out they get a map with everyone’s type on it. And they look at it and they go, oh we’re totally exposed over here. We don’t have anybody doing enabling. I was I was in a church organization that had no enablers which is rare. Rich Birch — Right. Well and you know… yeah that is interesting… So that’s actually very quickly as when I did the assessment I could see very quickly how this could work so well in a team environment. I like how you’ve laid out even just the widgets. You know it makes sense how kind of ideas flow from just ah, you know an idea all the way through to execution, or tenacity. You know how do we move the the thing all the way through? I love that. Talk me through what it looks like in a team environment. Go a little bit deeper on that because I think there are people who listen in around these assessments and it’s like it’s like they’re just cynical. They’re like oh gosh another one of these you know personality assessments. I don’t blah blah blah. I don’t want to do this. Tell me how this works and how could I roll this out well. Patrick Lencioni — Okay I love this. First of all I like people that are skeptical because that means they’re not going to just take anything. And when you convince them that it has value then they’re on, they’re on board even more. So I like that. Rich Birch — Yep, yep. Patrick Lencioni — And I did not think the world needed another assessment. I like them all. I like Myers Briggs. I like um DISC. I’ve done them all. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Lencioni — But what what I didn’t have is one that translated quickly to how to put people in roles… Rich Birch — Right. Yes, yes. Patrick Lencioni — …that brought them alive. This this assessment takes 10 minutes to fill out. And you look at your results, and like you said and the the face validity is super high, like people like this is me. And then when you look at on a team 15 minutes later everybody in the room is going, oh crap. Yeah now I know why we do that really well, and why when we have to do something like this it doesn’t work well. Now I know why Mary is burning out because she’s the only Tenacity person on the team and she’s landing the plane every day. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Patrick Lencioni — And not why… and you know and it explains so much. So I think the the the immediacy of benefit of this is like nothing we’ve ever experienced. I know my Myers Briggs type. Rich Birch — What does that mean? Patrick Lencioni — I just don’t know what does that mean I should do every day. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Or who I should interact with, or what is you know, when we think about projects and we think about doing things – that was the thing that that struck me as I was like okay I could see how this could work within our organization… Patrick Lencioni — Yeah. Rich Birch — …which I just think is that’s a gift to people for sure. Patrick Lencioni — Here’s another thing. I think, by the way, churches are more important than any other organization in the world. You know, there’s family—the home church—and then there’s churches. Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Lencioni — And the sophomore company down the street or the restaurant or whatever else, the church is more important. It’s people’s souls. So I think that we should have higher standards. Well I think it’s beautiful when a church becomes a source of wisdom for people in their life. And I think that churches should be introducing this not only to their staff and volunteers, but to their congregation. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — And saying let us, as your as your church, let us help you understand what God gifted you with so that you can bring that into your home, and into your workplace, because church is relevant everywhere. So you know I love that Dave Ramsey, who’s a friend of mine, Financial Peace University has brought so many people to Jesus because they’re like… Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Patrick Lencioni — …I’m I’m struggling with my finances. Well here’s a biblical way to understand your finances. Well I think that this is a very God centered way to help people understand what they what they’re meant to do. Rich Birch — Oh I love that. Patrick Lencioni — And it doesn’t only apply to to work like when you’re at work at your church or in your job. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Lencioni — It applies to work at home. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — My wife and I – our marriage changed because we realized the combination of our working geniuses left us exposed into areas that caused a lot of arguments over the years. And now we have grace for one another. And we are outsourcing things that we thought we felt guilty about before, but we’re just bad at. Rich Birch — Okay, makes sense. Patrick Lencioni — So it’s really changed our our marriage and our home life as well as our work life. And our and the parishes that use this. in the Catholic world and the churches that use it in the Evangelical and Protestant world are just finding it to be really um, it allows them to reduce guilt and judgment and increase morale and fulfillment. Rich Birch — Yeah I can see that, I was I was going to ask you if there’s any examples from a church, Catholic or otherwise, who have used this on kind of a wide, you know, kind of a wide margin like you’re saying there a wide part of their church. Because I could see that as a a real gift to a church. Do you have an example of that? Patrick Lencioni — Oh goodness. I mean yeah, I mean the the pastors some pastors are like I know pastors who are W-I’s, right? So which means is they’re they’re the that’s called a creative dreamer. Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Lencioni — And they can just go for a walk in a park and come up with threes homilies or sermons… Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Patrick Lencioni — …and and and they preach. And then they go, and like in the Catholic world—so it’s ah particularly challenging because we don’t have executive pastors. Rich Birch — Right, right, right. Patrick Lencioni — We’re trying to teach them to do that more. Like no, we need to have a team and you need to to give some responsibility to others. But there’s pastors that don’t really like counseling. Rich Birch — Right, right. Yeah. Patrick Lencioni — Like E and D, let’s say are there frustrations, and they feel really guilty. Like I know Catholic pastors who don’t like to do the sacrament of confession. Now they don’t have a… they have to do it. But that’s not the thing that gives them the most energy and joy because that’s a very pastoral role. Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Lencioni — It’s a counseling and and… Rich Birch — Traditionally pastoral. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah. Patrick Lencioni — Exactly. And they’re like oh my gosh. I’m a preacher and I love coming up with new ideas. And I like looking at what’s going on and what people need to hear. And it’s like yeah, you’re not a bad person. That’s a beauty. Now find, build up a counseling ministry. And when you go do your confessions, offer that up to God and say, God I’m going to go do something that’s hard for me, but rather than feel guilty about that I’m going to lean into that and say, I’m going in there to do something that’s hard, and I can do it for two hours a week. Rich Birch — Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Patrick Lencioni — And say, that’s okay. We have a guy in our office named Matt, who you met. He um he does not like tenacity that much. So when he has to do tenacity work, he goes into one of our offices and he goes, I’m going into the T cave. I’m coming out in 2 hours. And and he comes out and he’s like yes! I finished all those things! Rich Birch — Yeah, I did it all! Check the list! Patrick Lencioni — Right. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — Whereas we… you know I’ll tell you a really really quick story is when I was a kid my dad used to try to get me to mow the lawn with him. And I did it out of duty, but I hated it. Rich Birch — Sure, sure. Patrick Lencioni — And I felt like a bad son. Rich Birch — Okay, yeah, yeah. Patrick Lencioni — And and I carried that forever. And I realized he wanted me to do it. He wanted me to be an enablement and tenacity person, follow him around, he’ll tell me what to do. I’ll do it and I have to do it perfectly. And it was exactly my working frustrations. Birch — Right, right. Love it. Patrick Lencioni — And so here I am fifty years later going, oh I wasn’t a bad son. Rich Birch — That’s funny. Patrick Lencioni — Whereas if it he if he had said, hey Pat, I want you to look at the the yard and I want you to envision how you think it should look. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Patrick Lencioni — And come up with a way to do it. I’m not saying he should have done that, but I would have been like YES! Invention, discernment. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, love it. Love it. Patrick Lencioni — But he needed T work. Rich Birch — Well, this seems to me like, yeah I love this. And isn’t that true. That feels like a very true statement. I’m a little bit younger than you – not that many years younger, and I do feel like in this this age is is about figuring out our childhood. It’s like looking back and being like, oh right. That’s what was going on fifty years ago forty years ago. Rich Birch — Um so to be honest, Pat, I don’t know if other people said this you when I read this and looked at this, this feels like in a different category than your other writing. This feels like wow this has got huge—and yeah, and obviously you’ve had huge influence, you’ve helped so many people so many organizations, your writing is is so helpful and you know catalytic in so many ways—but this feels like it’s in a different category. What’s your thought for the future of Working Genius? What are you thinking about? What’s your kind of dream for this? What’s your hope for this as it kind of continues to ripple out? Patrick Lencioni — Well as I’ve gone through my own healing in my life, which is really the essence of our spiritual life is healing, you know, it’s be healed. I’ve come to hold things a little more lightly and realize it’s all a gift. And so when somebody first saw this—one of the guys in our office who has who has discernment and galvanizing, which is called a intuitive activator—he looked at this and he said, right away, this is going to be bigger than The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, which is the the most popular book. Rich Birch — Wow. Yeah, yeah, that’s saying a lot. Yeah. Patrick Lencioni — We’re convinced that that’s true. I’m also convinced that this is a gift, and that we just want to steward it well. Rich Birch — Oh love it. Patrick Lencioni — And so my hope is that nobody ever, you know, I mean that so many so many fewer people feel any sense of guilt or frustration in work because they think that there’s something wrong with them. Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Lencioni — But more that they realize, oh no I’m just meant to do something else. Patrick Lencioni — And that’s true if they’re 16 years old, or 20 years old getting out of college, or if they’re in the midst of their career and they’re and they feel like they’re failing. Or if they’re retiring and they’re saying, God what else do you want me to do? I think it’s like well I’ve given I’ve imprinted this on your heart. Do things like this. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. Patrick Lencioni — So I want the world to be that much more fulfilled in their doing, because they’re aligning that with what God has intended for them. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — So that would be that’s my that’s my dream… Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — …but I’m I’m holding it lightly and letting God take it where it goes. Rich Birch — Yeah, I would echo that. I do it does feel like to me it has that kind of like, oh this has like long burn potential in a lot of different organizations and a lot of places. And I’m hoping frankly the churches that are listening in today that they’ll take steps to do the assessment, pull their team together, have the conversations. Rich Birch — Where where do we want to send them if they’re thinking, yeah I would I want to do that. I want to take some steps. I want to want to learn more. I want to jump in and and kind of get a better sense of this. Patrick Lencioni — You know, and it’s so funny because I I have a company we serve the corporate world. And in the corporate world, we price this very low, because we wanted we don’t want it to just be in the corporate world. But then when I talk to a church like oh but it’s $25 to take this assessment, right? And um. And but if ah if if somebody had a volume, like we want this to go throughout our church, we we do discounts and stuff like that. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, sure. Patrick Lencioni — But take the assessment… Rich Birch — Yep, yep. Patrick Lencioni — …and the report that comes back is usually like super helpful. And and you look at a team map, or you share this with your friends, or your spouse, or your boss. Patrick Lencioni — Um, we had a guy in a church that—here’s a great way to look at this – a story. A guy who worked in a church who was getting ready to do his performance review, and he knew it was going to be bad. He was he was struggling. Rich Birch — Okay. Patrick Lencioni — And he took the Working Genius Assessment. He brought it to his manager. And said I want to go over this with you before, and and the guy looked at it and said well it’s no wonder you’re struggling, we have you in the wrong job. Rich Birch — Oh wow. Patrick Lencioni — And and he he literally said, I got promoted because I because they figured out what to do with me. Rich Birch — Right. Wow. Patrick Lencioni — And so the first thing people can do is go to workinggenius.com. It’s a it’s our website working genius – two Gs in the middle. And and you can take the assessment. It takes 12 minutes to take or 10 minutes. The results are very powerful. This is a better gift to give somebody than a tie, you know. Rich Birch — Yeah, totally. Totally. Patrick Lencioni — And it’s like it’s like what do I give somebody that can change their life? Um so sometimes I think that’s ah, that’s a great thing to do. One day I’ll be glad when we just give it to everybody for free, but we’ve had to put a lot of time and energy into it, and we’re selling it in the corporate world. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah, it’s great. Patrick Lencioni — But in a church this can be a great tool. Rich Birch — Now, and again friends, I would encourage you to do that – workinggenius.com. Go. I think as a bare minimum that’s a great idea even this time of year. Maybe this is what you do instead of Christmas gifts for your staff. This could be a great, you know, conversation starter. A great discussion piece. Listen particularly, you know, I’m thinking particularly on the staff side. You know, you can. You’ll get more than $25 value. It even sounds stupid to say that because of course it’s more than $25 value. Patrick Lencioni — Right. Rich Birch — Repositioning people into their, you know, asking the question of, hey what what is the kind of your seat on the bus, ah, you know, what does that look like? Love it. So I think it could be great. Patrick Lencioni — You know you know, Rich. We just did a podcast that came out yesterday um about Working Genius and the holidays. And we’re we’re encouraging people to actually do this at Thanksgiving… Rich Birch — Oh love it. Patrick Lencioni — …and and or and or just just take a one page sheet of the six Working Geniuses. And say to instead of arguing about politics, or or or playing doing charades, it’s like just say, hey can any be what which of these do, you guys, feeds you? Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. Patrick Lencioni — Which of these gives you joy and energy? Which doesn’t? Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Love it. Patrick Lencioni — And it’s like families are like, oh my gosh, I I never realized that about you. That’s so true! When you were a kid you always were drawn to this. Rich Birch — Right. Love it. Patrick Lencioni — And and and it’s a really wonderful way for a family to celebrate one another’s geniuses. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Lencioni — And so anyway. Rich Birch — Well, Patrick, I just want to say thank you. Thank you for this. Thank you for Working Genius. Thank you for your your work. I got to be honest, just such an honor to get a chance to talk with you a little bit. When your team reached out I was like I’m like, you have the right person? You must have asked the wrong person. You must be looking for someone else. But really, super honored to have you on. And your work has made an impact—I know you know this—has made an impact on lots of leaders lives, and so the fact that you would come on here just really does ah it honors me. And I’m just thankful that you were here today. So thanks for that. Thanks for being on the show today. Patrick Lencioni — As the people at Chick-Fil-A say, it is totally my pleasure. Rich Birch — Yeah thank you so much, sir. Have a great day, and like again, friends, workinggenius.com – pick one of those up. Thanks so much for being with us today, Patrick. Patrick Lencioni — God bless.

Welcome back to the unSeminary podcast. Today I’m excited today to be talking with Chuck Fenwick, lead pastor at New Haven UMC in Indiana. How do we build churches that are both reaching new people, and caring for the people who are with us? It’s a universal tension all church leaders face. Listen in as Chuck shares about how to identify your target audience and allow them to influence the decisions you make. Create a basis for your target. // When it comes to decision-making at New Haven, sometimes people can have an “us” or “them” mentality where “them” refers to people that the church is trying to reach whereas “us” includes the people already at the church. So the New Haven staff focused on defining who their target audience is by creating a fictional family with names and a backstory. Now when faced with decisions, they ask how that fictional family would react to it. Would it interest them? What impact would it have on them?Look at the community around you. // In creating the fictional family, the details about them were chosen based on what the church sees in the broader community around them. The age of the couple—35 years old—was common for those who have walked away from the church, but are considering coming back because of their kids. Identifying this target audience doesn’t mean New Haven doesn’t care about people outside of that age range. But it does mean that every decision made is based on this fictional family because the church wants to gain traction with this age group. It challenged the New Haven congregation about what it meant to really be a Christian; it’s more than just showing up to church.Recognize the influence. // The this fictional family the father was responsible for 51% of the decision-making and the wife 49%. Why? Because the husband may come to church with the wife occasionally, but there is a difference when the husband goes of his own volition because he wants to. Many times if the husband decides to go, the rest of the family will too. But often if the wife decides to go to church, the husband may decide he’s too busy, and so she only goes with the kids. Winning the man over is that slightly bigger part of the process.Help reach them. // Drawing people to church is one thing, but retaining them is another. One of the things Chuck tries to teach his people is that the people outside of the church’s walls need Jesus, but don’t realize it. That means they need you as a Christian to give them hope. The next generation needs Jesus, but they probably won’t come to you asking for Him because they don’t even realize they need Him. It’s up to each of us to reach out to others and care for them, because the pastor can’t do it all. You can learn more about New Haven UMC at www.newhavenumc.com. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: CDF Capital Since 1953, CDF Capital has helped Christians and churches embrace their part in this story by providing the 3 kinds of capital every congregation needs for growth—Financial Capital, Leadership Capital, and Spiritual Capital. At CDF Capital, we care about each of these components. When a church is properly resourced financially, spiritually, and in leadership, lives are transformed. Sign-up to learn more about CDF Capital and how we can help your church grow. Receive a 50% discount on a monthly subscription to the CDF Capital Subscribe & Save Bundle. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Well, hey, everybody. Welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in. You know every week we try to bring you a leader who will both inspire and equip you and this week’s absolutely no exception. Super excited to have Chuck Fenwick with us. He is the lead pastor at New Haven UMC, located in Indiana. Ah, Chuck and I are both a part of Carrey Nieuwhof’s The Art of Leadership Academy, with a kind of team discussion leader type people in there, and Chuck is on there and is so helpful to folks. I wanted to make sure to get them on the podcast, wanted to spread some of that good here on unSeminary. Welcome to the show. So glad you’re here. Chuck Fenwick — Thank you! It’s great to be here and yeah, do whatever I can ah share and also learn… Rich Birch — Nice. Chuck Fenwick — …because you’re the genius not me. Rich Birch — I don’t know about that. Chuck Fenwick — Yeah. Rich Birch — Yeah, fill out the picture – tell us a little bit more about yourself, tell us about the church, that kind of thing. Chuck Fenwick — Ah, well I came into… I’ve been in ministry most of my adult life, some as um, a lay person doing ministry with youth and even campus life youth for youth for Christ. And decided to go to seminary later, kind of as a second career. I worked in some um, kind of marketing things, even for a newspaper so talk about outdated… Rich Birch — That’s funny. Chuck Fenwick — Um which some people could relate that to the church in some ways but ah… Rich Birch — Sure. Chuck Fenwick — Um, and then I’ve been at this particular church—it’s a United Methodist Church—I’ve been here twelve years. And so for those that don’t know anything about the United Methodist Church, that’s odd um, we get we get moved… Rich Birch — Yes, normally a rotator every four or five years, right? Chuck Fenwick — Normally, yeah. We get moved ah we don’t decide where we go. And um so it’s odd that I came here as the associate pastor, and was working with youth and doing some other things, and they decided to make me the lead pastor a few years ago. And I’ve been here now um, a little over twelve years. And um, it’s that is bizarre that that happens. And we’re a church of about I’d say 200, give or take. We probably average a little bit less than that maybe around 160 to 180 on an average Sunday, and and probably about 300 or of 350 or so that call our church home if you will. So you know how that works and but… Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely, absolutely, for sure. So what… Chuck Fenwick — So yeah, that’s that’s me and that’s… Rich Birch — Yeah this the U the UMC… I forget what they call that that the system of moving people around. What’s that called again? Chuck Fenwick — Well, we’re appointed. Rich Birch — Appointed, right. Chuck Fenwick — Um and that’s really about that’s about I’m not sure what else you’d call it. But yeah, we have appointment seasons. Rich Birch — Yes. Chuck Fenwick — So every year in January, February, March the bishop along with the cabinet, which is district superintendents, get together and decide who goes, who stays. And we are we are allowed to tell them what we want. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — Um and for the most part they’ll go with that unless they just say no. Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yes. Chuck Fenwick — Which they can. They say, no, we believe this is where you ought to be. But um… Rich Birch — Yeah. Chuck Fenwick — So I’m in Indiana and I’m my conference is Indiana, so I won’t unless I request it I won’t ever leave the state of Indiana. So. Rich Birch — Right, right. Yeah, that’s an interesting system. I know, you know, there’s been we’ve had some folks on the past we’ve talked about that and and it’s ah you know there’s definitely some strength there and there’s obviously some some interesting weaknesses. And you know, one of the ah, statistically one of the stats of larger impacting churches is lead pastors who have been with those churches for ten, fifteen plus years that just seems, which makes sense, right? You need to build up some leadership momentum. So that’s fun. Rich Birch — Well one of the things I want to talk about today, you and I had a brief conversation pre- ah pre-call around this whole idea around how do we build churches that both are looking to reach new people, and at the same time are caring for the folks that are with us. That’s such a a tension. It’s a universal tension that we we all face. Ah and you guys don’t face that at all. It’s never a problem at New Haven UMC obviously. Chuck Fenwick — Never. Never. Rich Birch — Just kidding. But… Chuck Fenwick — I can’t imagine one time when it’s ever come up. Rich Birch — Yeah, talk to me about that; talk to me about that tension. Why why is that? How does it come up? How have you seen that? What does that look like? What what’s that look like in your church? Chuck Fenwick — Well anytime, and I’d say most UMCs just in general are a little more traditional. Um, our idea is contemporary is playing something that probably the the Bill Gaither band did in ’84 or something… Rich Birch — Sure, sure, sure. Chuck Fenwick — And so um and that’s only a very slight exaggeration. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — And so it comes up sometimes with things like music, or um, one thing is we’re also a tradition that does ah, like a lot of pastors wear robes and stoles, and you’ve probably seen that. I I don’t. I don’t like them. Ah, it’s it’s not be… it’s just because I don’t like it. And so things like that, believe it or not, come up. And ah it’ll It’s a lot of well you know we like that. And usually the we is, you know, we’ve been coming here for a long time. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — And no one ever says, I don’t like new people. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — It’s just… Rich Birch — No, no. People are too smart to say that. Chuck Fenwick — Right? This is what I want to see, and what I like to see, and that kind of thing. Rich Birch — Yep. Chuck Fenwick — And so ah that that kind of thing comes up and um, even at times – are we focusing too much on on reaching others but not taking care of us? And and I wouldn’t say it’s ever a in a mean way. It’s always: no, we know we want to reach other people, but I also want you to do these things for me. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — And which I think is in life. That’s the way we all are, really. Rich Birch — Sure, sure. Chuck Fenwick — Like, oh yeah. I’m all for that. Just don’t neglect me in the meantime. Rich Birch — Yes. Chuck Fenwick — And if I feel neglected—even if I’m not—if I feel that, then I don’t want that. And so, that’s it’s come up a lot, or I would say a lot. But most of the time when it comes to music or any change that we would make, um and when it comes to of course with all that comes budget items and okay, where are we going to spend our money? On “them” or us? Rich Birch — Yes, yeah. I love that. And that you know I think this is like this is one of those things I think all of our churches wrestle with – this is universal. Does not matter, the size of the church doesn’t matter. You know if you’re into into robes or not, ah you know, it it is a you know this is that one of those tensions. So how have you kind of attacked that? What is that what does that look like at New Haven? Chuck Fenwick — Well, we’re – it’s a little new for us. Rich Birch — Yeah that’s great. Chuck Fenwick —Um I wouldn’t say we we’ve mastered it by any means. Rich Birch — No. Chuck Fenwick —We’re still in the trial. Rich Birch — Yeah. Chuck Fenwick — But one of the things we did—and you talked about The Leadership Academy—one of ah one of my staff. She is our Digital—I don’t know—Director. I would call it Goddess, maybe, because she like… Rich Birch — So good at it. Yeah, yeah. Chuck Fenwick — Yeah, but she took one of the ah classes that was offered through that, like a cohort or something, and we really focused on, okay, what’s our target audience? Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — Now one of the things we didn’t… it’s not like we announced this like, hey, here’s our target audience. I put this ah out for our leadership, and our staff, our key leaders, so it wasn’t just for everyone because ah we did we we put pictures to, and made created names, backstory, everything, ages. Um to a point of we we know where these their kids, what grade they are in, how old they are… Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s cool. Chuck Fenwick — Um and so it helped ah because one is they’re about 35 years old. Rich Birch — Yep. Chuck Fenwick — And so it’s not that in there being the target doesn’t mean that if you’re um older than that, which I am… So let’s say you’re 50 or 60, it doesn’t mean we don’t care about you. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — It means that every decision we make we’ve got to make it based on this couple. Rich Birch — Yes. Chuck Fenwick — Um, we call it’s “Drew and Maggie” – we’ve named them. Rich Birch — Yes. Chuck Fenwick — Um so Drew and Maggie, we we say, how is this impacting them? Would they be into this? Would they want to show up? Would we, you know, what are we going to do in the community for them as well? Rich Birch — I’d I’d love to dive into this – I think this is so great. So talk to me about Drew and Maggie. Give me the let’s let’s start there – like tell us a little bit about how to, you know, tell us about this these personalities. And then we’ll jump to how is that actually impacting some of your leadership decisions. Chuck Fenwick — Well um I kind of… it it was key for us that that she helped me a little bit, but that I really drove this as far as who they are. And so one—I’ll give the quick background of Drew—is um, he’s happy with his life. Ah, he wants the best for his two kids. Um, and his parents were divorced and when he was young. Um and they his mom and stepdad forced him to go to church, and he got burned out. He saw hypocrisy, like who doesn’t. He’s not anti-church. Um he’ll bring his kids to some of our big events because of course he fictitiously lives in our community. Um… Rich Birch — Sure. Chuck Fenwick — And ah he just… it’s not a priority. And if he if there’s a reason for him to show up, he will. And he’ll show up even if he’ll bring his kids to VBS, he’ll show up for VBS Sunday. And he doesn’t it’s not that he dislikes it. He just… do I want to spend my time doing this? Um, so his kids are really his his motivation. And ah, and so and he’s about 51% of our target. And Maggie is 49%, if you want to look at that. Rich Birch — Okay, okay, yes. Chuck Fenwick — Which doesn’t mean we don’t care about her. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Chuck Fenwick — It just means because in her mind she would like to come. She doesn’t want to come without him, and she’s not mad at him for not coming. Chuck Fenwick — If she said, “hey let’s go to church today,” he might not agree. But if he said, “hey I’m ready to go,” she’s all on board. So that’s why he’s kind of a little bit more of a priority. Um, she has she’s kind of the same background. She’s okay with church, but obviously it isn’t one of those things she pushes. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — And um would do it, but and so that’s where they are. Their kid their kids are 8 and 4… Rich Birch — Love it. Well the thing I think that… Chuck Fenwick — …and we gave him hobbies. Rich Birch — Oh what are their hobbies? I love it. I love it. Chuck Fenwick — Oh well, he he loves listening to podcasts – all the time listen to pod… he listens your podcast. Rich Birch — Doesn’t listen to this one? Chuck Fenwick — No I don’t… ah he coaches a kid’s sports and he likes disc golf. Rich Birch — Okay, okay. Chuck Fenwick — I didn’t even know where that came… that popped in my head. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah. Chuck Fenwick — So she likes gardening, running and reading because she hosts a monthly book club. This is… Rich Birch — Okay I love that. So the thing I love about this is a great exercise. Obviously a great creative exercise, interesting. You know it’s definitely right-brain, gets us thinking about it. But you know, when it goes beyond just so some some interesting ideas, it can make a great impact on the way we do what we do. Talk to me about why you landed on some of those things about you know Drew and Maggie. What was it kind of in your in your experience at the church or some of your convictions that led you to that? Is this like a amalgamation of the kinds of people you think that have resonated with your ministry, or it’s like your heart drive for the kind of people you’re hoping, you know, that connect or what? Tell me about that. Chuck Fenwick — Well, a couple of… the the age group is one that at least I’ve seen in in our local context that kind of have walked away from church. Rich Birch — Yep. Chuck Fenwick — But they’re about that age when they or if they consider coming back… Rich Birch — Yep. Chuck Fenwick — …that might be it, mostly because of their kids. Um, if if the kids are really into it, fine I’ll sacrifice my hour to take you there. So that was a lot of it, and knowing that okay, that’s an age group that we have lost… Rich Birch — Yep. Chuck Fenwick — …um in general and so what can we do to to gain that to gain traction with that age group. And as far as his attitudes for church, I see that so much. And um I heard ah I heard another pastor tell me one time and this—and if I need to clarify you can tell me as long as doesn’t sound too horrible. So there’s there’s something I love and something I hate, even though hates a strong word. I love Christians, but I hate church people. Rich Birch — Sure, sure. Chuck Fenwick — And I’m like well I don’t know if we should use word hate or not… Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — …but it was kind of the idea of that, especially for Drew, Christianity isn’t the problem. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — Essentially it was church people that was the problem. Rich Birch — Right, right, right. Chuck Fenwick — And I probably don’t even need to define the two the differences obviously but. And so that’s where I thought okay as a church we need to be more more Christian than just church. And um, those things supposed to they’re supposed to go hand in hand… Rich Birch — Totally. Chuck Fenwick — …but they don’t always. Rich Birch — Well and there’s that I think it was Bono that said, I like Jesus, it’s just as friends I’m not sure about. And, you know, it’s that same idea, right? Chuck Fenwick — Yeah. Rich Birch — It’s like I really like Him and I think what He has to say is true and right, but but man the way that’s worked itself out is is ah you know can be pretty negative. I want to underline for listeners the thing that you I think have hit on here, particularly when it comes to people’s motivations for coming I think you’ve you’ve said a few things there that you just skipped over that I think are really critical. I think there’s there is a there’s a key piece around kids ministry. We’ve said this multiple times on unSeminary that leading thriving, growing churches are disproportionately engaged in next generation ministry. They are thinking about kids and youth. It’s not it’s not a secondary thing. It’s not a like we’re babysitting those people. It’s like wow we’re going to we’re going to double down there and we want to do a great job on that stuff. And then the other thing, you know, talk to me about the 51/49% thing there – the male/female. I’m going to push you on that a little bit – tell me about that. Chuck Fenwick — Okay, well good, good. Because I don’t want somebody to hear it and think oh the guy is since you’re a guy, the guy is more important. Rich Birch — Yep. Chuck Fenwick — Um, honestly, this is from what we’ve seen in experience. Rich Birch — Yep. Chuck Fenwick — Um, and I wouldn’t say we and nowhere. Do we have this in writing. Rich Birch — Yep. Chuck Fenwick — Um but it’s the idea and that we have seen and we have couples that um yeah, he might come with her occasionally. But if he says—and and I did some interviews with different I wouldn’t say interviews I asked different people. Rich Birch — Yep. Chuck Fenwick — Um but and it did come down to if if he is in, the male of the couple would say, you know, “I I want to go this week,” almost always families will go. Um, if she says, “I really want to go this week,” there’s a good chance maybe he’ll go, but most likely she’s going to bring the kids and go. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — And not that he’s going to, forget it I’m bailing on it. It’s just, I’ve got other stuff to do. Maybe it’s projects around the house. Whatever. Um and that, even at all generation levels, that that seem to be the thing. And so that’s why it’s not like a 90/10% thing. It’s more like we know if we if we get him, there’s a good chance she’ll: okay, yeah, let’s do this. Um, and so I… Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. Chuck Fenwick — I almost don’t like saying it always because then it all all of a sudden it’s like, wait a minute… Rich Birch — Right. And well and… Chuck Fenwick — So which isn’t true at all. Rich Birch — Yeah and I think you are hitting on a dynamic that we see in a lot of churches, or I would say in all churches, right, that oftentimes when you just look at who is engaging in what we do, you know it skews 60, 70% female. Um, and you know we do have a harder time attracting men. That’s just true. Chuck Fenwick — Yeah, yeah. Rich Birch — Like that’s a you know there’s a ah, there’s just truth to that. That’s like you can’t argue with who’s actually sitting in your in your rooms, and I I appreciate that that you’re even flagging that as like hey there’s something we need to think about. Here’s we we have to think about what can we do to try to um, you know, to try to entice him to to to want to show up to you know… Chuck Fenwick — Right. Rich Birch — And some of this is just practical. Like I, in other contexts, same principle but just apply differently. Um, you know for years I’ve said to student ministry and kids ministry people I’m like we have to program towards the most cynical person in every age group. Like and so like if I’m programming you know grade 1 to five year olds and it’s a mixed group. The the 5 year old guys are like the… or grade five ah, but guys are like the hardest dudes to to connect with in that room. Like they’re they’re, you know, we’ll have like so you know, we can get girls, unfortunately, you know, not unfortunately, but just you can get girls to get up and dance and sing and do like funny, you know, actions and all that. And then you see at the back of the room, here’s a bunch of grade 5 guys who are like totally disinterested. Chuck Fenwick — Yep. Rich Birch —And so we we have to think about those grade 5 guys if we who is that most cynical person? And I think to your, you know, similar kind of way to think about Drew is that you’ve described the most cynical person, right? 35 year old, you know, divorced parents. Um you know is ah disaffected by, you know, stuff that’s happened in the church. How do we, you know, reach them? So talk to me about how Drew and Maggie have have impacted maybe you personally as you’ve thought about leading, and then more broadly as a church. Chuck Fenwick — Well personally, and I guess a lot of it’s internal, just the way I think… Rich Birch — Yep, yeah. Chuck Fenwick — …the way I deliver messages or craft messages. I found this out. I said it by accident I don’t use a lot of notes on Sundays. Um I write down just a couple of key transition words. And so sometimes something pops in my head. Ah, or when we record our online service, because we don’t livestream. That’s a whole nother story and we won’t ever livestream. But um, if it pops in my head sometimes I just say it. And one of the things I said was, here’s a challenge. And so I kind of laid out a number of days and said—this was on a Sunday—if you start this tomorrow, however, many days—I don’t remember the details—but it was basically I’m challenging you to start it tomorrow. And then what popped out of my head was, but I get it. For some of you guys you’re just like me and because I said start tomorrow, you’re waiting until Tuesday. I already know it. And I had multiple and, when I say I don’t mean a lot—4 or 5 guys—come to me and say, you’re right. The moment you said tomorrow I thought, I’ll wait until Tuesday. Rich Birch — Interesting. Interesting. Chuck Fenwick — And and so I just started thinking of this idea that, okay, I need to have him, that guy in mind. Because for her she would say, oh yeah I should start this tomorrow. He’s saying, oh you want me to start tomorrow, then I’m going to wait at least a day. Rich Birch — Sure. Yeah. Chuck Fenwick — And so that some of that’s just for me. As a church we just had a really big decision. We we got a grant. It was very substantial. It was over a quarter million dollars um ah, from our state. Um, and it was for ah basically for our preschool. Um, so I didn’t want you to think, what the state is funding church stuff? It’s for our preschool… Rich Birch — Yeah. Chuck Fenwick — …um and child care and we’re going to redo our our playground, make this thing huge. And because we’re we’re pretty much at capacity. But one of the things came up as, well we could also use some of this money for other stuff. And the other stuff wasn’t bad stuff. It’s all improvements that we could do, and ah fix that air conditioning unit, and and all of it’s great. Do the kids need air conditioning? Yes, they do. And this came up as far as our target audience going, Okay, yeah, they want their kids to be comfortable when they’re here, but I know from my perspective when I see when my kids were younger if I at that age, and luckily we have ah we had 2 people on our board about his age who have kids and said, When I see a fancy playground, you may say, well do we really need to spend this money? I see that you care enough about my kid to make this happen. Rich Birch — So true. Chuck Fenwick — And I would say I wouldn’t say that completely everybody just said, oh you’re right, let’s go ahead and do it. We did decide yep, we’re going to spend it on this playground. We’re going to rock this thing out. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — Um, and a couple other things. But it was one of those that we we say this is our target and let’s let’s make decisions based on our target. Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. Chuck Fenwick — So that was one of the biggest things we’ve done. Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. That’s a great practical example, right, where the rubber meets the road on these things… Chuck Fenwick — Yeah. Rich Birch — …that like yeah, if we’re if if we say we value next-gen ministries then that should reflect in our actual spending, like we you know it… Chuck Fenwick — Yeah. Rich Birch — …it should show up. That’s that’s Interesting. So now I… Chuck Fenwick — I say it I don’t say it a lot but with their last name is “Wellman” – I don’t even know where I came up with that. Rich Birch — That’s funny. I love it. I love it. Chuck Fenwick — But and I every now and then I’ll say well what does this do for the Wellmans? Rich Birch — Right, right. Chuck Fenwick — And um and it’s still new enough that occasionally people go, wait, what? And then our target remember they oh yeah, the Wellmans. So it’s kind of funny that that’s kind of been the mantra whenever we have a kind of bigger thing, and okay, what about the Wellmans. So. Rich Birch — Yeah, okay, cool. I love it. I think that’s great. Again, practical takeaway. I love this idea. I think it’s a great, you know, framework for you to think about. I know for years at at when I was in New Jersey, I would talk internally we didn’t have it as clearly or as succinctly um defined. We had a similar convictions around the male but you know female thing similar age group. And you know there I used to talk about um, you know we’re trying to reach the guy who on Monday morning gets on a train and goes into New York City, has some sort of highfalutin’ job there, and um, has zero time, thinks he’s super important. Um, and you know we we have to speak that person’s language because their own kind of their thinking about the way they their self-perception and the way they think about themselves, if we don’t address that, if we don’t if we’re not thinking through that filter, we’ll miss them consistently. Because in that case and, you know, it’s partly a um, ah, regional issue, it’s like the the folks that are in that kind of target ah they are so kind of self-obsessed, they’re so self-concerned that if we don’t figure out a way to connect with them ah, they’ll they’ll just, you know, we won’t we won’t as a church be able to reach them. It’ll be very difficult for us to to move forward. And so so I love that idea. Now how does this connect with then the reach and keep thing? The okay, so that gives us a clearer sense of the people we’re trying to reach. How do we balance that off with the people who are already here and caring for them? How has this approach helped that those conversations? Chuck Fenwick — Well, we’re and like I said we’re still at the very beginning of it. Rich Birch — Yeah totally. Chuck Fenwick — And so I toward the beginning so we’re still working through that. But one of the things we’ve really tried to push recently is that the the Drews and Maggies, the Wellmans out there, they need Jesus – they just don’t realize it… Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — …which ultimately means they need you as as a Christian and they need you to to act like a Christian. And I think I’ve even said it not a church person act like a christian not a church person. Rich Birch — Yes. I love it. Chuck Fenwick — Um, ah because we’re we’re not trying to necessarily say, come to the church. We’re trying to give them hope, which is through Christ. And so that’s really where that part has come from. As far as the caring for each other, um because okay we know that has to happen. And unfortunately and also fortunately for this church, um I’m horrible at pastoral care. Like I can’t express there’d be no way to describe how horrible I am at it. Rich Birch — Okay, yeah. Chuck Fenwick — And ah everybody knows it around here. Rich Birch — Right, right. Chuck Fenwick — And some are not, you know, it’s not like I make everyone happy with it. But it means that because of that our people have to step up and do that. And so they have done that we have some teams that will visit and take care of each other, but then also for the ones who, Okay, yeah I want this to be about me, they still understand that this we we’ve got to handoff. And it’s always got to be handed off to the next generation. And they need that. They need Jesus. You’ve already got Jesus. That’s awesome. Now they need Jesus. And um, they probably won’t come to you asking for Jesus because they don’t even realize they need him. And that’s kind of where that has come from. And some and that’s been right at the it’s that’s been a broad stroke kind of stuff um. We’ve and I guess really quick one practical thing… Rich Birch — Yeah. Chuck Fenwick — …is we started a big community garden. It’s huge. Way bigger than we thought it was going to be. And we get all the food away. Rich Birch — Wow. Chuck Fenwick — Now we have a meal that we do here every week. And there and one of the ideas, well why don’t we use some of this food for our meal? Basically it will save us money having this meal. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — And my wife who’s in charge of the garden said, you know, that’s that’s a great idea. But we’re not going to do that. We are giving this food away 100% to our three local food banks. We’re not even going to distribute it to people because we’re not going to reinvent the wheel. They know how to do it. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — We’re going to grow it, harvest it, give it to them. They give it away. And that’s been one of those things of of it’s small, but it’s the, and I wouldn’t say the people who said we could use this… So for our our meal because people from the community come to our meal, so it’s not selfish… Rich Birch — Right, right. Chuck Fenwick — …but it’s one little thing in a practical way that said, no, this really isn’t about helping us and our budget. It would help, but we’re not going to do that. We’re giving it away. Rich Birch — Love it. Chuck Fenwick — And so I think it’s going to be a lot of little things like that that make the difference. Rich Birch — Yeah, I love the idea of yeah, um, we ultimately like discipleship or helping people grow closer to Jesus, act more like Jesus, is ultimately the journey of denying ourselves, and saying it’s not about us. It’s about other people. It’s about being other-centered. It’s about how do we reorient all of our decisions around how can I help other people? That’s that’s what discipleship is. And so I love that idea of yeah, in your care systems, in that, you know, even something like the, you know, the community garden, I love that – I think that’s so fantastic. How have you helped motivate, or what does it look like to get people involved on the care side? Maybe drill into that a little bit more. How have you been able to because I think that is a key place where folks, you know, frankly in a church of your size, that the thing gets stuck because of that. Because it’s like okay, we can’t we we can’t get more people involved in… Chuck Fenwick — Yeah. Rich Birch — It’s like if if, you know, if Pastor Chuck doesn’t show up, it’s ah you know, I’m not being cared for. So what does that look like in your context? Chuck Fenwick — Um it hasn’t been easy. Rich Birch — Yes. Chuck Fenwick — Because there are times when I’ve heard people say something similar to, well no one from the church even came by. Rich Birch — Yes. Chuck Fenwick — And I and sometimes I’d say, well I thought—and I’ll even name some people—or I thought we had some people that were visiting, and did I not hear that correctly? And, well yeah… Rich Birch — Yes. Chuck Fenwick — Like the and their our friends from the church. And and so then I, well but they don’t count? Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yes. Chuck Fenwick — And so and I don’t say it that way. I’m like, ok well yeah, so they were visiting you. And I just kind of say it that way going, Ok good then you did have someone that was visiting you. Rich Birch — Yeah, yep. Chuck Fenwick — Um and it it’s really been we’ve just said it. Our leadership has been on board with it right from the beginning. Ah because of course early on when I was the lead pastor and we we said okay just keep in mind every time somebody stubs their toe and goes the the clinic the pastor’s not going to show up. Rich Birch — Right, right. Chuck Fenwick — And so our leadership had to get really on board because they had to have my back. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — Because of course people aren’t going to come to me. They’re going to go to one of them and say hey did you know he didn’t show up? And like that’s good. Did someone show up? Because if not, the system’s broken. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — Um, otherwise if someone came, that’s what we’re after. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — And it’s really been doing that. And I haven’t recruited a lot of people, I’ll admit. My I keep saying my wife, ah she only works part time for us but has about like 19 different jobs… Rich Birch — Sure sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Love it. Love it. Yes. Chuck Fenwick — …in the church that she does. And 1 of them is working with people doing that. Um, connecting with people, and then ah those who visit and that kind of thing. And so the toughest part has been, like I just said, ah what represents the church. Because if you’re my friend and you show up, you’re just my friend showing up. Um is least the way some of them or I think some people see it. You aren’t the church showing up, you’re my friend showing up. And that’s been a little hard even though I say, ok so you did have someone there. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — Um and it’s not like I want to say well see you’re wrong. The church did ah. Rich Birch — Right, right, right, right. Yes. Chuck Fenwick — So but people hearing it and realizing. Okay, we can do this. It’s not a big deal for me to go see a person who’s at home, or recovering, or whatever. And and so it’s taken a while; it’s taken a maybe ah probably the last 3 to 5 years of a shift in our our thinking. And I wouldn’t say we always get it right. I tend to make people mad on ah about daily, no, we’ll say weekly basis. Um, but yeah. Rich Birch — Well and I think that the principle to pull out there is there is something about making the implicit explicit, right? like it’s actually like. It is finding a way that’s not like um, it’s not obnoxious. It’s not like oh, like well you are being cared for, like stop whining. Ah, but it is it is being as clear as, hey at our church this is what care looks like. Care is really important. And my experience has been you have to be as explicit as as exactly what you’re saying, which I’m sure you’re doing this, Chuck, where it’s like yeah like you might be used to a church where you know the pastor is going to come every time there’s you know something going on, but we’ve just found that doesn’t work partly because I’m no good at it. And because that is, you know, if it’s just about me we’re not going to be able to reach more Drew and Maggie’s in this world. It’s not going to happen. Chuck Fenwick — Right. Rich Birch — And so ah so we have it set up like this. And you know, and then explain what that looks like. And then like you say if if the if someone’s not being cared for, that’s the thing we need to flag. Chuck Fenwick — Right. Rich Birch — If if someone’s not being um, you know, loved in the midst of all of that, that’s the problem we have to figure out how to to ensure that. Yes. Chuck Fenwick — And occasionally that happens, you know, you’ll hear someone or literally no one, and no one knew… Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — …and no one got a message. And like okay we got to solve that one. Rich Birch — Yep. Chuck Fenwick — But that isn’t necessarily you weren’t there so it doesn’t count. Um, and I’ll tell you if if seminaries fail us, that’s one of the places right there. Is it’s always about how you as pastor we’re going to train you how to care for people. Rich Birch — Right. Chuck Fenwick — And no one ever talks about or at least my seminary which I think was a great seminary… Rich Birch — Yeah yeah. Chuck Fenwick — …just it was more about you as the pastor. You do the care. As soon as that baby’s born, you better, get there. And I was even told that – you’ve got to get there, especially if ah, it’s say a Methodist and a Lutheran, and they’ve married, and now they have a baby, you better get there before the lutheran pastor. Rich Birch — Yes. Rich, I wish I was kidding. I was told that like. Rich Birch — Wow! Wow. Yeah, that’s crazy. Yeah, yeah, that’s crazy. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Chuck Fenwick — So it was. But and I’m not, you know, I know that’s kind of the education system. Rich Birch — Yep. Chuck Fenwick — But it’s the idea of going wait a minute I mean this is pretty scriptural, right? Even even Jesus walked away. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Chuck Fenwick — And and even the disciples after he left said, No, we can’t do all this. We got to get other people who do this. So. Rich Birch — Right. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it’s interesting. Well this has been a great conversation. I’ve really appreciated this get to know you a little bit better, and get to know the church. Is there anything else, you’d like to share, you know, when you’re thinking about this whole area of how do we create a kind of church that really is transitioning from being kind of insider-focused to outsider-focus, saying hey we want to reach people. We want to really be for New Haven. We want to find a way to to love the people around us. Anything else you’d you’d like to ah kick around today? Chuck Fenwick — Well, we really have pushed for New Haven because we’re about this community and that’s what it really all needs to be. And and I guess the biggest thing, and I hear this often and I don’t want it to be cliché, but the the why far more than the what and the how. Um talking about the the Wellmans, Drew and Maggie, and this is why. We can we can have ah a church that caters to all of us and eventually we won’t have a church. Rich Birch — Yes. Chuck Fenwick — And then that’s if that’s what we want, that’s okay. And no one really wants that. But ultimately it’s why are we doing this? It’s because if we’re following Jesus it’s what we’re supposed to do. That’s bottom line Rich Birch — Yeah, love it. Chuck Fenwick — And that’s where it comes from is we’ve got to focus on why we are for our community and not just for ourselves. Rich Birch — Love it. So good. Well if people want to track with you or with the church, where do we want to send them online? Chuck Fenwick — Ah, the easiest place is our website which is newhavenumc.com. Rich Birch — Love it. Chuck Fenwick — And the .com is important because if you go to dot org you’ll go to New Haven—what is it—somewhere out east. It’s the big Connecticut. Rich Birch — Okay, oh that’s funny. Love it. Chuck Fenwick — Yeah, we we had some ah we had some people watching us online and come to find out they were they thought they were watching the church in Connecticut. Rich Birch — Oh hilarious. Oh that’s hilarious. Chuck Fenwick — And and even talked with us and then was like oh this isn’t the same place. Rich Birch — Oh funny Chuck Fenwick — But newhavenumc.com… Rich Birch — Love it. Great stuff. Chuck Fenwick — …so that’s where you’ll find everything. Rich Birch — Well, Chuck, I really appreciate this I appreciate you being here just you know, thankful thankful for you thankful for your leadership… Chuck Fenwick — Thanks, it was great Rich Birch — …and I appreciate being on today. Chuck Fenwick — Yeah, thank you very much. It was great to be here and great talking to you.

Welcome back to the unSeminary podcast. We’ve got Dr. Warren Bird with us today. He’s the Senior Vice President of Research and Equipping at the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability (ECFA), and an author of over thirty books. Warren is back to talk about the New Faces of Church Planting survey which was performed back in the spring, and some of the results around church multiplication and replication. Vision for multiplication. // In the multiplication part of the study, the first thing surveyed was how much it was a part of a church’s vision, upon the launch of the original church, to create a network of multiplying churches. Was it not at all, a little, or very much? 36% of new churches were already thinking of creating a network when they launched their first location. Also, as churches have established, they increasingly have a vision to plant more churches or launch more campuses. 52% of multisite churches say it’s part of their vision to keep adding campuses.Clarity of vision. // Church leaders always ask what size launch team they should have for a new site, and how that size influences the number of people on opening day. The study showed that the number of attendees on opening day is three times the number of the core group. In addition, churches with big vision grow at a markedly faster rate. Clarity of vision is a core issue in the growth of a church, much more than theology. If your church has an extreme clarity of vision, it always goes hand in hand with growth.Are you making disciples? // Disciples are not people who just show up to church, but people who are being transformed to be like Jesus. The study asked where a church’s focus was on the issue of evangelism and discipleship. Growing churches were found to have a higher focus on reaching the person who isn’t there, rather than helping the person who already is present grow in their faith.Do you have the goals and focus for multiplication? // The study identified the top ten predictors on whether a church would be likely to multiply. Warren tells us the top three: first, in the past year the church leaders have participated in a meeting that focused primarily on church multiplication. Second, the church leader surveyed is personally developing a named apprentice leader. And third, the church has specific goals for future church planting.What describes your way of doing church? // When asked to describe their way of doing church, “missional” is the top response from the church leaders surveyed. Warren says, to him, missional means having a clear focus and being excited about bringing people into a relationship with God. Another question was how often do you give people the opportunity to receive Christ? The top response in that question was weekly, particularly among larger, growing churches. You can access the complete results from the survey for free at www.ecfa.org/surveys. Visit www.ecfa.org/pulse to keep up with everything Warren is doing, and find free resources from ECFA for your church or nonprofit organization. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Chemistry Staffing One of the things that they never teach you in seminary is when to move on from your current church. Over the last couple of years, we have been having a TON of conversations about this with pastors all over the United States. Of all the ministry decisions you make, leaving your position will be the toughest. Download this two-in-one resource that walks you through the decision-making process. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Well hey, friends – welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have tuned in today. You need to buckle up because we’ve got our friend of the show, Dr. Warren Bird – he’s been on multiple times. I think you’re the most guested a person on unSeminary – one of these people whenever he’s got something, I love to get him to come on because he’s got such great insights. If you don’t know Warren he is the Senior Vice President of Research at the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability or more popularly known as the ECFA. He’s an author of over 30 books. Ah but the thing I love about Warren, although that is all true, he really has a heart for churches and for church leaders. This is not just some like academic study. It’s not because he thinks it’s interesting, fascinating from ah a laboratory point of view. He wants to see churches thrive, and so ah, honored to have you on the show, Warren. Ah, welcome back. So glad you’re here. Warren Bird — Rich, thank you and this is really full circle in that you were the very first person, when we came up with the idea of what became the nation’s largest… I’m sorry… North America’s largest… Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — …study on church planting and multisiting, you were the one that said, okay give me a first crack at it. What do you think you’re going to find… Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. Warren Bird — …and what are some of the early stuff… Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Warren Bird — And, Rich, you your enthusiasm for what God is doing ah then and now – to have some actual numbers to go with it ah, remains undiminished, and I love talking with you. Rich Birch — Great. Well, thank you so much and I appreciate that’s a that’s kind words. I yeah we were just before we started I loved how you’re saying you literally just kind of did the last analysis on this. Kind of give us an overview of the study for folks that maybe didn’t listen into that first podcast or two. What what was this most recent study? And then we’re going to dive into some kind of specific findings that I find particularly fascinating, but what what were you setting out to try to do with this? It’s a landmark study – huge study. What were you trying to do with this one? Warren Bird — We really wanted to find the state of church planting and how it parallels to multisite campusing across North America. That hasn’t been done. There are so many angles you can go that what I did is I set it up so everybody got 15 minutes of questions, but not the same 15 minutes, which enabled us to do drill down ah reports. We’ve done one on race and multiracial churches, on funding, you know, how do you finance a new church. Where the snag points on the pandemic, what are implications from the pandemic—on the one we’re going to look at in particular today—on multiplication/replication of what’s happening there. So I I hope that when it puts all together, people will have a realistic picture of of what’s happening right now. And then they can diagnose: Okay, what what do we need more of? Where does God seem to be blessing that we need to put more energy into? And so forth. Rich Birch — Yeah, I love it. One of the things I love about your work, Warren, is like there are people—yeah, even like folks like myself—who will like do a survey and I’ll get 100 people on a survey and then I’ll say like national survey based on 100 people. But, man, you’re over 2700 participants – 2300 church planters and founding pastors, 387 multisite directors or campus pastors, 50 plus denominations including Southern Baptist, ARC, you know, both Canada and… And actually I was impressed by this, as a Canadian, US was 92%, Canada’s 8%. That’s an impressive amount of Canadian representation, I think. You know, the fact that we’re 10% of the population size of of the US, that’s that’s amazing. Um I love this. So, friends, the thing I love about Warren is he he takes the data science side—I think that’s the right word—of this very, you know, seriously like this is, hey we want to actually make a real survey here. It’s not just like, hey let’s pull a few friends on Facebook and see what they’re what they’re saying. Rich Birch — So the the thing I want to dive in on is particularly this multiplication and replication, particularly. So churches who plant churches, Campuses who plant campuses. Um, what are you looking for? You know, the kind of big overarching question, what are the best predictors of a church’s ability to multiply itself? To me that’s like the $10,000,000 question – if we could figure that out, oh my goodness, you know, the kingdom of God could go forward. Rich Birch — There’s a number of things that we um, you know, could start with you. You talk about ah, in the very front end of this kind of this part of the study, you you talk about a finding around kind of what churches talk about their vision for multiplication. Can you pull that apart for us? Warren Bird — Absolutely. And just so you know, Rich got to preview a report that by the time this airs will be just fresh off the press. Rich Birch — Love it. Warren Bird — They are free… Rich Birch — I know it’s amazing. Warren Bird — …at ecfa.org/surveys (plural). Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — ecfa.org/surveys – that’s the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability, as you said so articulately. And Rich and I are going to kind of talk through the report that’s titled multiplication. And yes, let’s go to vision first. Because the first finding that we present in this one is is we ask, Okay so the the desire to create a network of multiplying churches. That’s a mouthful. That’s a big concept. That’s a… I don’t know if twenty years ago I could have we could have rattled that off, and people go, oh yeah I know what you’re talking about. Rich Birch — I know what that means. Yeah, no, that’s true. Warren Bird — But I think today most people get the idea of a network of multiplying churches. So when you launched, how much was that part of your vision? Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s amazing. Warren Bird — Was it not at all? A little? Very much? So we took the extreme part of the scale, which was very much, and and drumroll the percentage was of new churches, 36%. Rich Birch — That’s amazing. Warren Bird — So that’s more than more just over 1 out of 3 said, when we launched we were already thinking, praying, dreaming that there would be more than this one location. Now maybe that was microchurch thinking. Maybe that was megachurch saying. Who knows? But the dream, the vision, and hopefully the calling, was there. That knocks my socks off in and of itself. Rich Birch — Yeah. Warren Bird — When I planted a church, Rich. The first church I plant and my goal was to get to the next Sunday. Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — I I never once stood up and said someday… Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — …God is gonna use this motley group of people and we are gonna impact our county by having multiple churches coming out of it, or impact our world for that matter. Rich Birch — Um, yeah I love that. I thought the same thing when I read this this finding because, similarly, I I self reflected and I’m like, man, the kingdom of God’s in a better place today than it was twenty years ago. I’ve been involved in in the front lines of multisite for years, but when I think back to when we started, we we were celebrating an addition strategy. We were saying, hey we’re… and and we thought it was a big deal. We’re like, wouldn’t it be amazing… and you know, our original thing was what if we did one campus a year for 5 years. But there was no conversation around “and someday those campuses will launch campuses.” That that wasn’t that wasn’t a part of the dialogue. Now in this same part of the study what I did find interesting was there wasn’t, particularly on the multisite campus side, there was an accelerating there seems to be an accelerating factor that people are seeing that. They’re they’re they’re kind of seeing that more now than they did when they began. Talk to us about that. Warren Bird — Yeah, so actually there are two columns in this first chart. The first first column is, okay, when you first launched, was it very much part of your vision, or what percent said very much part of your vision. If that’s not enough, then when we ask, and today is it very much part of your vision? That number or percentage went up both for church plants and for multisite campuses. So the vision—one year, five years later—whatever it is in your experience, it’s going up. It’s increasing. Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — That’s powerful. Rich Birch — It is. Warren Bird — And the multisites actually ah registered a little higher. Today 52% of multisites say, this is part of our vision to keep adding campuses. Rich Birch — Yeah, that intuitively works out. Like I would say the churches that ah that, particularly will call it like in whatever this era is, in this… I had someone recently I heard referred to this as the pandemic era, and I was like I don’t really want to call it that. But this timeframe, like this kind of covid timeframe, churches that are still talking about doing multisite, um they are I would say there’s a high percentage of the conversations I’m having where they’re asking that question. It’s like but you know maybe maybe we’ll work harder on, you know, on granddaughter or even great-granddaughter campuses. Warren Bird — Well yes. Rich Birch — Maybe there’s we need to spend more time there. Warren Bird — Let let me correct myself. I said just a minute ago adding campuses that wasn’t the question. It was multiplying churches. Rich Birch — Right. Yeah, yeah. Love it. Warren Bird — So it’s the it’s the granddaughter, and great granddaughter and grand-nieces and and all of those that come from… Rich Birch — Right. Warren Bird — …one thing starting another. Rich Birch — Love it. One of the questions that comes up, and it it ah like this every time I’m talking to a church, coaching a church on the front end of multisite, and they’re, you know, particularly and that’s been my you know that’s been my background… Rich Birch — It’s it’s literally the like million dollar question that everybody asks, which is what kind of size of launch team should I have? What size, you know, what what should we be doing? It’s like every time we keep asking that question… was did you find in your findings here that there’s a correlation between the size that ah, you know, that that churches are, whether they’re multisites or campuses, or I mean churches that there’s like a correlation between those and then their ability to then ultimately multiply? Did you see a connection between those two? Warren Bird — Well, that’s really two questions. The first is we did find a solid ratio between core group size pre-launch, and launch day. Now again, this is this is the kind of tipping a hat towards a launch large or or launch public, or or at least have a definitive launch day, and not all churches do – I get that. But of those who who could say yes, our church was officially birthed on this day, the ratio was consistently 1 to 3. Warren Bird — So if I had 10 people in the core group, there were 30 on that opening day. If I had a hundred people in the core group, there were 300 on that opening day. Now to your the next part of your… Rich Birch — Can I just stop for a second? Ah so this I this is a part of why I I love—and I said this I’ll be more off air. This is part of why I love your research, and it’s going to sound this’s going to sound really selfish, friends. Like that 1 to 3 ratio, I’ve said so many times to people, I’m like that that it like it works out, anecdotally. We see that in so many different conversations that we, you know, time and again if you’re looking for what does that look like, you know? and the fact that we’re actually seeing that is great. I love it. That’s that’s fantastic. What I love when, you know, those things I also like when we’re proved wrong, but that’s kind of a fun ah, because 1 to 3 literally just yesterday was talking to a church on the 1 to 3 core. So keep going. Sorry about that. Warren Bird — Well and that that really then says, okay so what kind of church do you believe God is calling you to lead? And and their financial, you know, what is your financial model for for eventual sustainability in terms of what what you’re dreaming ah, will happen? But that that 1 to 3 really can be repeated again and again. That that okay, we had our initial launch, we had our our our big Sunday launch, we had our grand opening, we had our… I’ve known churches that have done up to 7 different launches, each time seeing somewhat of that ratio. That whatever we had at that moment um by pulling out the stops and making a big invite and bring event um that that we ah surged ahead. Warren Bird — So now the second part of your question is, and what is the predictability of replication? And I did not find a size—again I have 2700 responses, so I can slice and dice… Rich Birch — Right. Warren Bird — …by when the church started so well, let’s look at 3 year old churches. Let’s look at 5 year old churches. I found more of a correlation with vision. And I actually put a chart in the report on that, where we ask people here’s the question: how many times your church will multiply in the next five years? And we asked this one just to church planters. And they that was a fill in the blank. And you could fill in anything from 0 – you could write in the number 0, to 1, 2, 3, 4, so I picked the two extremes. Those that wrote in 0 – not – I have no vision to multiply over the next five years. And I picked those that said 10 or more times. It’s like whoa! Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah – mind-blowing. Warren Bird — And again, this may be micro-churches, mini-churches ah church across town —who knows—missionary churches overseas that we’re going to send teams to. They didn’t define how. But that is a huge vision difference. And the point I’m making on this, later in the survey we said, so the church that you’re serving, describe the people in terms of are they, you know, what percent would you say are are converts, what percent are renewal (which would be which I defined as kind of the de-church – people who had some kind of relationship with God or church and and dropped out and are now coming back) and we also had transfer growth, and we had biological growth (having children). Warren Bird — And and the churches that had big vision also had… Rich Birch — That’s amazing. Yep. Warren Bird — …at least reported… Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — …very large conversion and renewal… Rich Birch — Right. Warren Bird — …in their congregation. And same thing we ask ah, you know what’s your attendance at your biggest at your big gathering worship attendance this year, last year, year before, and so forth, so that we could chart including pre-pandemic for those that were had been launched several years ago – what your growth rate was. And we found that churches with big vision were also markedly growing… Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — …at a much faster rate. Now I’m not giving causality. I don’t know… Rich Birch — Right. Yes. Warren Bird — …which which came first chicken or egg. Rich Birch — Yep, yep. Warren Bird — I’m just saying that among those churches that are dreaming big, they’re also seeing more significant reporting, more significant conversion, renewal growth, and um bodies, people impacting. Rich Birch — Yeah. So so this one I love that you’re highlighting this. And friends, I want I don’t actually gonna give you the numbers because I want you to go and get this study. I want you to go to ecfa.org/surveys and actually get it. Rich Birch — But to be honest, the the difference between those two I found shocking. The annual growth rate since launching the it’s it’s not like a small difference. It’s a giant difference. Um, you know, the conversion rate versus renewal rate it is it’s bigger. It’s definitely bigger the kind of churches that have bigger vision. But the actual growth rate, man, is is amazing. So I know this is the kind of question you maybe don’t like to to answer. But help us work that out. What is that what do you think is happening there? Is it churches that are they’re articulating vision around multiplication? They’re articulating there’s and then they’re building systems towards that and so that’s generating opportunities to you know they then that ends up kind of driving growth, or what? What do you think is actually happening there? Again that might be an unfair question to a surveyor. Warren Bird — I know from other solid sociological study that clarity of vision is a core issue… Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — …in the growth of a church… Rich Birch — Right. Warren Bird — …more than theology. So I may be a theologically liberal church, but if I have extreme clarity of vision – we are about this One thing, which in a broader theological spectrum you don’t find as much. They’re the ones that are growing. And likewise among evangelical conservative whatever label you use for those that are more focused on on needing that faith in Jesus Christ both to to transform my life and to use me to transform this world while we’re populating heaven. Um, that focus, that clarity, always goes hand in hand with growth. That does not… Rich Birch — Interesting. Warren Bird — …doesn’t necessarily guarantee it… Rich Birch — No, no.. Warren Bird — …but it’s very rare… Rich Birch — Warren Bird — …to find a growing church that’s not marked by unusual clarity of vision compared to other churches. Rich Birch — Interesting. Fascinating. Again that works out even just on the, you know, pedestrian you see that like you see that in churches that that have um, yeah, that have a laser focus on they have core conviction around, you know what does the bible teach and what are kind of imperative around ah, reaching people around us that does translate. You see that, you know, that translates. Where when that goes soft, there does become like a okay so why would we do that? Like why? You know, which is interesting. Now ah later in the study you talked about… I was like, is Warren picking a fight on this one? New churches that grow are more more focused on evangelism, less on helping existing believers. Well first of all I love that you were trying to to tackle this question. This is an interesting question. Um, it’s the kind of reach versus keep question. Are we driving towards trying to reach new people with the gospel of Jesus, or are we trying to help those people who are already? Help me understand what you were saying here. And I know you’re not trying to pick a fight, but help us work through what you found and what does that look like there. Warren Bird — Well sort of I am trying to pick a fight in that… Rich Birch — Love it. Warren Bird — …I spent a good year before we finally framed the survey talking to church leaders and say, okay if there was this state of the church of new churches and… Rich Birch — Yep. Warren Bird — …and all, what do we need to measure? And the immediate response is, well sure, measure attendance, measure numbers, but but get beneath that—people would underscore—and measure discipleship. Are we making disciple-makers, people who reproduce themselves, people who not just show up with their bodies, but but they are being transformed by the power of God in becoming more like Jesus Christ. That is not an easy issue to survey. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Warren Bird — So so in this particular question we simply ask, where is your focus? Ah and and again we used a scale and I took just the “very much”, which was the the high end of the scale… Rich Birch — Okay. Warren Bird — …on the issue of evangelism and discipleship. And then I sliced and diced and said, okay, let’s break that into um, growing churches, not growing churches, ah all kinds of of ways of parsing that out. And I found a real difference that growing churches do have a higher focus on reaching the person who’s not here, than they do on helping the person who’s already there grow in their faith. Again, it’s hopefully there’s a lot of overlap heavy overlap between those categories, but given that you had two different categories, ah, that’s what we found. Rich Birch — Yeah, interesting. Yeah so I found that – that one stood out to me. Um, you know I think we time and again… a part of so ah in my work when I help churches around church growth, the thing I keep coming back to time and again is it’s it’s kind of using similar, it’s driving at the same issue but but coming at it from a slightly different angle. Which is, you know, I’ll say listen, one of the main differences between growing churches and non-growing churches is growing churches, or even fast-growing churches, train, equip, and motivate their people to invite their friends, which I realize is one it’s not all of evangelism. But it’s one piece of evangelism. And there’s ah and I would contest it’s like the starting place of evangelism. We got if I can’t invite somebody to come to my church, the chances of me engaging in a deeper evangelistic conversation is pretty low. Now I know there are those people that do that. But the thing that I found interesting about this is it reinforces that idea that, hey growing churches are that’s not a secondary focus. It’s a primary focus. They’re saying yes, we’ve got to stay focused on that issue. And it also reinforces the the difference between discipleship and scholarship. I think sometimes we we use with the word discipleship, but actually what we’re what we’re doing is we’re encouraging people to just continue to consume information about Jesus. We’re not pushing them to apply that. And I would say the ultimate application is reaching out to your friends. It’s actually saying, hey I want to tell other people about Jesus. That’s the highest form of of discipleship. But but we’ve all seen churches… Warren Bird — I found it a profound discipleship moment for me this morning in the gym… Rich Birch — Love it. Warren Bird — …as I was changing clothes, I had struck up a conversation the day before with someone. he came back in and I prayed so hard, Lord, help me find a bridge to share my faith, to invite, to to talk with him about his faith, to invite him to a church event. And I go to a church that gives me lots of excuses and helps to be able to invite people and that it’s ah it’s a friendly place, and well I’m one of the greeters. I like… Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — …ah of making people feel welcome. Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — Ah, but but it was a discipleship moment for me… Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — …to try to figure out how can I do the evangelism piece this morning? How can I show him God’s love in a practical way? Rich Birch — Yeah, love it. Yes, so good. Warren Bird — I failed, by the way. Rich Birch — Okay. Well… Warren Bird — And I’m praying that that he’ll be back next to be changing clothes the next time I’m there and that God will give me another chance to open my mouth. Rich Birch — It’s a vivid picture. It’s a vivid picture of Warren Bird at the gym changing. That’s great. It’s great. No I appreciate that. And you know it’s funny I we all have those. I I whiffed on a similar experience I was in a there’s ah I’m in this coaching group with ah a number of people who I’m not sure where there it’s it’s around some kind of business stuff. And I’m not sure where they’re at with faith. And we were I was at a retreat this summer and a guy who I did not know, um, kind of where he was at with Jesus and we showed up at the hotel. And opening night I was checking in and he comes up to me and he says, Rich, Rich, Rich! I got to talk to you about it have you I got to talk to you about something. And he pulls out of his his book bag. He’s like have you heard of this guy Erwin Mcmanus? He wrote this book called The Brilliance of Jesus. I heard him speak at this event and I’ve read this book and I’m so fascinated about what Jesus has to say. He knows I’m Christian. And I was like tell me more. And it’s the beginning of a conversation. But again to me I’m like those are that’s the real moment. Am will I lean in as a Christ-follower at that moment to say, yeah let’s talk about that, and continue that conversation’s ongoing. And… Warren Bird — Yeah, and and by the way my pastor… Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Warren Bird — …who who encourages me to do those things would have checked the we do evangelism is a slightly higher priority than discipleship. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Warren Bird — Rich, can I jump to that the the golden nugget table… Rich Birch — Love it. Warren Bird — …that’s the …that’s the multiplication predictor? Rich Birch — Okay, let’s talk about it. Warren Bird — We ask… I talked to Dave Ferguson, and a whole lot of people, I said I’m compiling composing this survey – give me your hunch, something that I can test, of what you think is a predictor of whether a church is going to multiply, or multisite campus, is going to multiply. And I ask—there were 12 of them I came out with from different people—and then I limited the responses to those who said they had multiplied already. Rich Birch — Okay, okay, yep, makes sense.. Warren Bird — Okay so let’s see what characterizes them. And let me just hit the top three. Number one was in the last year have you participated in a meeting that focuses primarily on church multiplication, in your city, regionally, anywhere, yeah national thing, like Exponential. But are you being pushed in that way? Are you finding fellowship, are you are you being encouraged? Are you here being reminded of what the scriptures say about multiplication? That was number one. Warren Bird — Number two close behind. Are you the leader personally developing a named apprentice leader, such as small group level, pastoral level, or board level? In other words do I have a church planting resident as part of our church? Do am I leading a small group that. There’s someone who is sitting beside me who knows that at a certain time period I’m leaving and they’re moving into the driver seat? Do I have ah ah future board members that that I’m cultivating and replicating? Wow that’s number two. Warren Bird — And number three, does your church have specific goals for future church planting? If you aim at nothing you will surely hit it. Rich Birch — Love it. Warren Bird — But if you do A and you do have that that helps with the focus issue. And then on down and I give the top 10 in that list of those who have replicated. To me that’s just gold. Rich Birch — Yeah, I love it. I love that because this is again why I think a part of what you do is so helpful from… or lots of what you do is so helpful. This is one of those things that’s like you you can get very prescriptive on the other side which is, hey if we’re trying to increase the multiplication temperature in our church, if we’re trying to turn up the volume on that, you know, the the parallel to what you’ve done with that chart there is let’s do these things. Like let’s actually how are we ensure that our people, like the three you talked about, how do we make sure that regularly, more than once a year, people are in conversations, in meetings where they’re talking about multiplication? How can we ensure that our core leaders actually can have a named apprenticed leader? And then do we have goals around those things? Let’s actually talk about those and and and get them out. Um, and and you can see in the rest of them and again you’ll have to check it out at ecfa.org/surveys to see the rest of it. But it’s super helpful for a leader who’s looking for, Okay, what can I do to actually push this this you know multiplication forward as a church. I love that. That’s fantastic. Rich Birch — Above that chart on that same page. And again, friends, you’re going to have to get the whole thing. There’s a ton here. We’re not going to be able to pull apart all of it. There’s a ton even just in this this one which is just one slice of a much bigger study. There’s lots of other things that Warren and the team looked at. Ah, interesting about the kind of the way people talk about the current way of doing church. You know, the the top three here were missional, multi… Warren Bird — So let me set let me set it up. Rich Birch — Yeah, set it up. Warren Bird — Of churches that had multiplied… Rich Birch — Multiply. Yes. Warren Bird — …by their own definition. Rich Birch — Yep. Warren Bird — We gave them about 25 words and we said so check as many as you want, but what describes your way of “doing church”? And Rich, you gave the top one there. What did you say? Rich Birch — Yeah, missional. Yeah, missional, multiethnic, or multiracial was number two. And then online church, digital church, phygital… I can’t believe people said phygital but yes… Warren Bird — Okay, so phygital was like 3%… Rich Birch — Right. Warren Bird — …but it was it it meant the same thing. Rich Birch — It’s in that category. Warren Bird — So online was the, of those three choices, online was by far the more popular. Digital was way down the list. And phygital was near the bottom, but it was like 2 or 3%. So it that added to to become part of the 34%. Rich Birch — Yeah, and… you know, it’s interesting again, I was in I was in a conversation literally just yesterday where we were talking about increasing invite culture stuff. And had a pastor who I dearly respect came up to me after and we were talking. And you you know, he didn’t ask it this way but essentially what he was asking is he’s like, hey isn’t the attractional church movement kind of dead? Shouldn’t we just be missional? And um and he didn’t say it like that. Again, he wasn’t that aggressive around it. But you know missional is a… and my pushback was yeah, all missional is saying is like you have a mission for a church. You have a you have a um, you’re you’re clear on what you’re trying to do. You’re outward focused. You’re not about yourself. You’re trying to make a difference in your community. It means a lot of different things in a lot of different contexts. When you think of that missional word there—again, 54% of people self who are in these churches that are growing, multiplying, they’re identifying as missional. How do you pack unpack that? What does that look like? What do you think that means? What do you think that’s saying? Warren Bird — Clear focus. We know what we’re about. We are excited about our relationship with God and about bringing as many others as possible into it. We give opportunities. That was another question. We asked so how often do you give people an opportunity to receive Christ to become a follower of Jesus Christ? And I worded it generically so that it it it wouldn’t ah ah, limit. But the idea is ah… and I I said weekly, monthly, um more often than monthly, or never. And I was delighted by how many people said weekly. And you know, sermon… I’m sorry survey construction, looking back, I probably should have said “almost weekly” but I didn’t I said “weekly.” And ah and growing churches, especially in this case, larger growing churches are the ones that have the most consistent invitation of sorts. Rich Birch — Yeah I love it. I loved too on that that list, I loved personally—which may be a little bit counterintuitive—I love that multisite, as a way people describe themselves, is farther down on the list. One of my things that’s bugged me for almost two decades is when people… like to me multisite is just a way to an end. The end is reaching more people, is seeing people come into relationship with Jesus, and seeing those people reach more people. And you know for years when people are always like described themselves as like we’re one church in three locations. I’m like don’t describe yourself like that. That’s not… that’s ah, such a small vision. It’s it’s, you know, it’s and I’m a huge fan of multisite. Ah but I I love the fact that people are, you know, that even that is like a is a falling descripture even though I’m a huge fan of multisite and and that approach to life. Warren Bird — So, so Rich, let me just jump in and tell you the big finding from the report where we compare multisite and church planting. Rich Birch — Sure. Warren Bird — And the biggest finding, at least in my opinion, is they fuel each other. Rich Birch — Right. Yes. Warren Bird — If you are a church planter, you are more likely to favor and support multisite. If you are multisite… Rich Birch — Yes. Warren Bird — …you are more likely than non-multisites to favor church planting. The two feed each other. There initially when multi-site movement started there always you ask the questions: what are the unintended consequences? What are the toxic pieces? And and oh it’s going to kill church planting. Rich Birch — No, no. Warren Bird — No, it has fueled church planting. Rich Birch — Yeah and for sure like and I’ve seen that just anecdotally and the… Like you the more longer I’m in multisite, the more I realize that is one tool that fits in certain contexts, but it it doesn’t fit all. If we’re if we’re interested in actually multiplication we’re interested in seeing people who reach people who reach people, we have to have multiple approaches. Not just one. So yeah, love that. This has been incredible…oh sorry. Warren Bird — And and let’s not underestimate that that third listed item of online digital, phygital, whatever you call it – that that this is a huge audience. This is a huge way of of doing going back and forth. Ah like my wife and I lead small groups. Sometimes we meet online, sometimes in person and and they they intertwine. It’s just one more way, not only to reach more people but to make church possible for more people. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Warren Bird — And and the the churches that have reproduced involve digital. And maybe some of their outreaches are purely digital. But that’s that’s for another chart. Rich Birch — Love it. So good. Well this has been fantastic. Friends, we’ve just barely scratched the surface trying to get you interested in actually dropping by ecfa.org/surveys to pick up them. And again, they’re free. I’m not sure how Warren does that, but somehow they’re free. And they’re amazing studies and will be super helpful. Warren Bird — Well I’ll I’ll tell you how we do it. That ECFA’s, you know, several thousand members a bunch of them are into church planting. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Warren Bird —And so this is serving our members. And what we do with everything that we do to serve our members, it’s like hey, anybody else? If it helps you, we’d love to share it with you. Rich Birch — Love it. Well, Warren, I appreciate that. This is like I feel like this next question is like asking the the star performer in a play at the end of a very long run, they’ve just finished their their broadway run they’re twelve, fifteen weeks into the run, and they just had their closing night last night. And and someone comes to them and says, hey what’s your next play? Ah, what are you thinking about next? You know, what’s the what is the next Warren Bird study? Do you have anything on that front? And you can, like that that person, say can I just take a break? Like can we get this one out the door? But what is any thoughts for the future on things you may be looking at next? Warren Bird — I do have about five different topics… Rich Birch — Love it. Warren Bird — …that that I’m I’m working on and thinking, praying about… Rich Birch — Yeah, love it. Warren Bird — …and and exploring. And I look forward to unpacking those on another Rich Birch podcast. Rich Birch — Yes, love it. We’d love to have you come back. Warren Bird — But but for now, Rich, you are and we’re recording this the day after I finished the last analysis and study. And ah what I’m having a happy time doing right now is is kind of thinking among to myself, so what was the biggest finding? What was the biggest surprise? What’s the headline? What’s what’s the biggest implication? What’s the biggest challenge? Rich Birch — Right. Warren Bird — What do I wish I had I had asked that but didn’t ask. So so for today I’m still processing that. Rich Birch — Love it. Warren Bird — And then I’ll circle back and and start preparing the next projects. Rich Birch — Love it. Well cheering for you, Warren. You’re a great gift to so many of us – appreciate all your work. If people want to track with you—so we’ve said it a few times but ecfa.org/surveys—is there anywhere else we want to send them online to track with you, or with the great work you’re doing? Warren Bird — Yeah, um, ecfa.org/connect Rich Birch — Okay. Warren Bird — …or better yet ecfa.org/pulse Rich Birch — Okay. Warren Bird — That will that will everything I do will be announced through there. Plus there’s just lots of free resources that help ah churches and Christ-centered nonprofits to do integrity well, which is what ECFA is all about. How do you lead? How do you set up your board so that it’s it’s not an underutilized group? And then it really does partner with the senior pasto,r or CEO, or whatever. How do we how do we do things so that the only stumbling block is the cross of Christ… Rich Birch — So good. Warren Bird — …and not some bad, foolish, or or even unthinking decision that leaders have have allowed their organizations, or or key people to go down. Rich Birch — Yeah, love that. Warren Bird — So we’d love… everybody can benefit from what the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability does. Yes, Canadians too. Although you do have a wonderful counterpart up in Canada. The CCCC. Rich Birch — The four Cs. Yep. Absolutely – they’re they’re good people. We love them. They do a good job. So good stuff. Well, Warren, appreciate that. Thank you so much for your time today, and for all your energy and and enthusiasm for serving the church. Thanks so much, friend. Warren Bird — Always a joy to talk with you, Rich, and I read your unSeminary, um I listen to the podcast and I read all the good stuff you put out. So I’m honored to be among that crowd. Rich Birch — Thanks so much. Thanks, buddy.

Thanks for joining us here at the unSeminary podcast. We’re talking with Dr. Derry Long, from the Yellowstone Theological Institute. He’s served for 45 years in many church leadership roles and is here to share his knowledge with us. At churches, it’s not uncommon for 20% of the people to do 80% of the work, but as church leaders, we need to own how we might contribute to a lack of volunteer involvement and empowerment. Listen to today’s podcast as Dr. Long shares how to create and sustain a culture of empowerment at your church. Our part in the issues. // Church leaders need to own that we primarily produce a telling organization. People come, and we tell – most of it one-way communication in our teaching and leadership. That one-way approach often creates passivity and reduces collaboration. Another problem is that we can create a smorgasbord mentality in ministry, putting too much on the menu in the hope that the many options will entice people to serve.Four things that empower people. // The problem isn’t always the telling in our churches, but the execution. How do you empower people and build an on-ramp to service inside and outside the church? Dr. Long found that there are four things that empower people: choice, competence, meaning, and significance.Ask these questions about the leaders. // When looking at someone who is leading in the church, think about these questions: Where are they giving their volunteers choice? How are they building competence into the volunteers’ life? How do they find out if the people serving have a sense of meaning in their service? Are people serving simply because there’s a need, or because it’s what they feel they’re meant to do?Every role has significance and responsibility. // Create a culture where every role has significance, and communicate that significance. Offer both “entry level” serving options and opportunities for growing in leadership. Not every volunteer role has the same level of responsibility, so look for those volunteers who show a level of skill and responsibility beyond the role they are currently in, and give them the next opportunity.What are the economic engines of your church? // To avoid the smorgasbord mentality at your church, you have to know what the organization is about. There may be people who have skills that are valid but don’t fit within your ministry needs at this time. Leaders have to make this call. Every organization must know its economic engines. What are the four or five things that produce disciples, generate donors, bring people in the doors, or connect people to the community?Four traits to an empowering culture. // Dr. Long started studying what characteristics must be present within a culture in order for a person to function in an empowered way. Four traits needed are voice (treating someone like they are present and valued), support (understand the reality of another and addressing it), modeling (when a leader’s behavior is in line with their rhetoric), and trust (because empowerment brings choice, and choice has risk, people can’t be empowered without trust). If you’d like to learn more about what he talked about today, you can email Dr. Derry Long. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Leadership Pathway If you are trying to find, develop and keep young leaders on your team look no further than Leadership Pathway. They have worked with hundreds of churches, and have interviewed thousands of candidates over the past several years. They are offering a new ebook about five of the core competencies that are at the heart of the leadership development process with every church that they partner with…just go to leadershippathway.org/unseminary to pick up this free resource. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Well hey, everybody, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in. You know every week we try to bring you a leader who will both inspire and equip you and today’s no exception. Super excited to have Dr. Derry Long with us from the Yellowstone Theological Institute. Now I know it’s the unSeminary podcast. But today we have like an actual like academic – someone who has actual bona fide, you know, credentials. I just play an expert on the internet, but Derry actually is one. He has served for over 45 years in many different roles – pastor, church planter, pastoral coach, regional overseer, international teacher. He’s served as a lead pastor in a number of churches, for nearly thirty years, in both metro and rural areas. His PhD is from the University of Birmingham ah in England. He’s and he’s just a great guy. Rich Birch — He’s currently professor of Christian leadership at Yellowstone, like I said, Theological Institute, and he came to us ah by recommendation of our friend, Vern Streeter. Welcome to the show. So glad you’re here, Derry. Derry Long — Thank you, Rich. It’s good to be here. Rich Birch — Yeah, thank you for taking time to be with us. Fill out the picture there. What did I miss on the Derry story? What is it that you want people to make sure they know about you? Derry Long — Well one of the first things I think is that my ah resume, that you have so eloquently expanded on, really ah displays a commitment to the church. Um I’ve actually been frustrated with the church. I grew up in the church. My mom was a Sunday School superintendent, played piano for worship. The church has been part of my life, but at 55, I stopped being a pastor. I resigned. I thought this is not working right. I don’t I don’t like how it functions. Derry Long — And I moved to England, got involved in a PhD ah project where I began to study how to create and sustain empowering social environments. And that renewed my vision, and really for me got me back in touch with how the new testament pictures the church um all along. So um I guess I’d just add that. Yeah. Rich Birch — Hmm, love it. Love it. Well we’re we love the church here at unSeminary. You know I’ve joked in other contexts that like I’m like a church leadership wonk. I’ve we’re 600 episodes in on this thing. I could talk to church leaders all day long. And really want to try to to help them, and so I’m ah you know you’re going to be just such a great addition. I’m so glad you’re here. Rich Birch — You you have an interesting vantage point because not only because of your background because of your work that your engagement in a lot of different contexts, and so I’m going to throw you like a giant open question. When you look at the church today, as you engage with leaders, what would be a couple of those maybe problems or pain points or things that you see coming up time and again with church leaders, with the leaders you maybe that you engage with, or you hear people, that kind of are are common that you you keep hearing, you know, you keep running into or hearing about? Derry Long — Well, there’s a there’s a big complaint among church leaders, and that is that the the people in church are too much spectators and too much consumers. Um, but my view is that they are the product of our system. And yeah… Rich Birch — Ah, you’re putting a mirror back on us. You’re saying hey we we created these people. Derry Long — Exactly. Rich Birch — Yes, yeah, yeah. Derry Long —I I think these these are not people who don’t aspire, but we don’t we have not built on ramps and we live by that 20… 80/20 principle of 20% of the people do 80% of the work. I thought that that cannot be right. Rich Birch — Right. Derry Long — That’s not that’s not how that was meant to be. Well is it that everybody’s just lazy, or they don’t care, or they care about other things? And so when we have lower participation then we we criticize the people and we spiritualize it instead of owning that we are not building the on-ramps… Rich Birch — Love it. Derry Long — …that get them to the way they were created to be. Rich Birch — Love it, love it. Doctor, you’re coming in hot here. This is good. I love it. So ah, you know this whole idea of low participation. So this is you are, you know, this is why I’m excited to have you on. Friends, friends that are listening in, you’re going to be really blessed by today’s conversation. I feel like you’ve tapped into a lot of church leaders. A lot of pastors, conversations, they get together and, you know, ah, once they get beyond how big is your church and once they get beyond some of that initial stuff, you know, when you hear them complaining it’s like, oh my people are just so lazy. They’re so lazy. They don’t they don’t want to engage. Um, and I love that you’re challenged here around maybe the low participation is about us. What would before we get to solutions, before we get to on-ramps—I do want to get there though—let’s talk about what would be some of those signs those things that maybe we’ve done that actually is lowering expectations, that’s creating in our people this idea of like “just show up; you don’t need to participate” that’s that’s that we’re then ultimately reaping as we engage with folks. Derry Long — Well let’s say two things. Number one we we need to own that where we’ve we’ve primarily produced a telling organization. People come and we tell. They come and worship worship in the morning and most of it is one-way communication. Teaching it… often our leadership styles are telling. So there’s this there’s this one way communication that seeps into almost every everything we do. And and that telling, that approach to that that telling approach actually creates passivity. And it it reduces a sense of ah collaboration. Derry Long — The other is um, we we create almost a smorgasborg mentality – come and pick and choose. And we think the stuff we have on the menu is good enough that if you you pick enough stuff, you’ll just get healthy and you’ll you’ll just serve. And in fact, but that simply does not work. Rich Birch — Um, wow this is so good. Derry Long — Um, so for example, people will say we want to be a friendly church. But if you say um, what system do you have for your hospitality ministry? They they don’t have a system. Well we really need leaders. Well, tell me how you’ve designed your leadership pipeline. Well they don’t actually have a leadership pipeline. They’re just hoping that there’s enough good stuff on the menu that if people pick it, they’ll end up getting the outcome they’re hoping for. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s interesting because I you know… so I’ve been in ministry going on three decades and I remember when I started lots of churches would celebrate like we have 112 ministries. Like they literally would say stuff like that. Derry Long — Yeah, yeah. Rich Birch — Like we’ve got and it was it was this idea of the smorgasborg. We’ll come back to that. So Let’s talk about, so I get the telling organization issue. I can see that. So um, and I can even understand how that would create people who frankly, just sit around and listen then. So what’s that what should we, rather than being a telling organization, what should we be doing? What would that look like? How should we modify that? Derry Long — Well I I don’t think the problem is is the telling; the problem is the execution. Rich Birch — Okay. Derry Long — Like where where’s our on-ramp? How do we build a bridge? If we’re if we’re telling them on a Sunday morning, or in the class, and we’re we’re inviting them to serve in some way, what’s the bridge? And I began to study how to create, sustain, and sustain empowering social systems. And to my surprise um one of the people I started studying was John Wesley. Rich Birch — Ok. Derry Long — In the 1700s he began working with the a totally disenfranchised group, which were the working class of England. England was a very much a caste society. You were paralyzed and stuck wherever you were born. That class was uneducated, irreligious. Ah, they had no time because of their work schedules. They were poor. Ah they they had no mobility. And and yet he created a movement that was so powerful that when he died, other than royalty, he was the most famous person in all of England. And he did it with people who had been called by the church of England “rabble”. And he created a very participatory um ministry model. Rich Birch — Okay, let’s talk about that. What is so on-ramps, creating a participatory model. What does that look like? We all would love to have the impact of John Wesley, but when we look at our context, how do we what does that look like for us? Derry Long — Well let’s go back to so when it when I began to study this, what I studied was what empowers people? And empowerment is simply the ability and the opportunity to act to the benefit of something righteous. The ability and the opportunity to act to the benefit of something righteous. God’s purposes, my own well-being, my family. And I found that there are four things that empower people. Two are intrinsic and two are extrinsic. Derry Long — One is choice. Rich Birch — Okay. Derry Long — So God, from the beginning, he tells Adam and Eve, now I want you to name the animals. We don’t have any record of a review system when they did that. I don’t like Zebra. I don’t like Zebra – let’s find something else for that one, you know. Rich Birch — Right. Yeah yeah. Derry Long — And so ah, a new manager for a large shopping mall gathered his janitorial staff together and he asked them, um tell me about your job. Like for example, when you’re shampooing all the rugs and stuff here in the mall, who decides how to buy the the detergents for those shampooers. Well he said it’s always been decided in the office and they they just order it. Well the manager says don’t don’t you know better than anybody else which shampoo which shampoo ingredients clog up the machine, require more maintenance? He says, of course we do but nobody ever asks. Well that seems minuscule but within the sphere of their responsibility, that manager began to give them choice. And choice is an empowering, and you find it all through scripture. Derry Long — The second is competence. And competence is ah, you know, he that’s faithful in a little you’ll become ruler over much. Everybody wants to be good at something, and not not just that, everybody’s actually wired to be good at something. Rich Birch — Mmm-hmm. Derry Long — And so those are extrinsic. But the intrinsic ones are meaning, and meaning means if nobody else saw it, when I’m doing this, I know I was meant to do this. Rich Birch — I love it. Derry Long — There’s an internal sense of connection between what I’m doing. I mean when my wife goes down and works at base camp in the children’s ministry, she was one of eleven children. She was the oldest daughter. She grew up around kids. She understands kids. When she’s doing that, she knows she’s doing something she was meant to do. Derry Long — But the fourth is significance: I need to know what I’m doing matters. It has some impact. Then and everybody plays to an audience. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah. Derry Long — I once visited with an elderly man who is the hardest working man I ever met. And I was a terrific pastor and, but I always wondered at at the level of his work level. And we were driving along one day and he said, you know, my dad told me I’d never amount to anything. And I thought all this all this all this time in his life, he’s still talking to that audience… Rich Birch — Right, right. Derry Long — …that audience of one – his father, showing him that he he and he had amounted to something. And so choice, competence, meaning, and significance. Rich Birch — Love it. Derry Long — If if I’m empowered, I’m I’m experiencing those four things. Rich Birch — Yeah I love that love that. Derry Long — And I’m only empowered if I think I’m empowered. Rich Birch — Love that. That’s so much here. You’ve just like unloaded so much I want to pick apart there and understand. Help us go over again, kind of pull apart meaning and significance again. I I feel like I ah maybe missing the difference between those two, and it’s probably just me. It’s definitely just me I’m I’m being slow, but work through how how would you differentiate that inside, you know, the the mind of people who are in working with. Derry Long — So me meaning is an internal sense that what I’m doing fits how I was designed. Rich Birch — Okay, okay, ok, right. Great. Well said. Derry Long — Significance is what I am doing is making an impact… Rich Birch — Okay. Derry Long — …in my external world. So I get… Rich Birch — Yeah, love that. Yeah I love that. I remember years ago I was at a church, you know, one of these name brand churches that, you know, lots of people look up to and they ah, you know, ah super charismatic ah, not in the like spiritual gifts category, but just in the attractional kind of you know, lead pastor who you know, you know one of those world famous in our little world and church church world. And I got to spend a week there at just hanging out with people like not with leaders just with normal people and the thing that blew me away, I was in a conversation a couple days in with a guy who was a camera operator. So volunteer camera operator on Sundays, and he said to me he said, you know, the the two hours I get to do this every weekend, I come alive. This is like, man, I just love this. I feel like this is the most alive I’ve ever been. Derry Long — Yep yep. Rich Birch — And and we have the opportunity to do that. Now on when we think about the are the churches you run into, when you think about kind of low hanging fruit on these four – the areas that you find that we’re stumbling most on when it comes to engagement, which of these four, or is there a combo of these four, that you feel like we’re that you commonly are seeing where that churches are not doing a great job ah, you know in helping their people be empowered? Derry Long — Well I I think to start with there we’re not looking at people from this angle. Rich Birch — Okay, right. Not even thinking about it. Yeah, yeah. Derry Long — We’re not, we’re not coming to him and thinking, now when I’m relating when I’m trying to recruit for base camp or our our children’s ministry, ah, they’re you know, am I thinking from this angle? If the the person who’s leading base camp when they’re when they’re helping their teachers and their volunteers and where are they giving them choice? How are they building competence into their life? How do they find out if the people that are serving have a sense of meaning? Rich Birch — That’s so good. Derry Long — Those people who are doing it simply because there’s a need, and those people who are doing it because they know they were meant to do it. Um, in what ways does that person, when they’re doing it, know that other people know that they’re not not only know that they’re doing but that it’s making a difference in somebody’s life? Rich Birch — Love it. Derry Long — How, as a leader, do I make sure that they have that sense of significance? Where’s that communication line? Rich Birch — Love it. So help me tackle a problem that I see in so many of our churches – maybe using this framework, or helping us kind of wrestle through this. I feel like sometimes even in my own church um, there’s a giant gap in our ah the way we position volunteer roles. We would have like I would call them shallow end of the pool kind of roles. Like you can you know be a um, an usher you can greet people. You know, we used to hand out programs, we don’t do that anymore because Covid and all that. But you know, like there’s there’s like, you know, and they they’re great roles because I love that’s those roles because they’re they’re they are easy on-ramps for people. They’re like, you know, you can show up basically one week and then next week we can say, hey great, stand here at this door and be nice to people. Rich Birch — But then there seems like there’s a giant gap in, particularly when it comes to meaning and significance, then it’s like either of those—and obviously I’m using hyperbole here—it’s like you either do one of those shallow end of the role. Or it’s like you’re discipling people or you’re like ah, you know, an elder, like you’re like responsible for the entire thing. How do we create roles or opportunities that that are kind of across along the spectrum that kind of ramp up. Do you get the problem I’m I’m describing? Derry Long — Sure. Ah to start with I’d I’d say one of the we have to create a culture where every role has a significance, and we communicate that significance. Rich Birch — Right. Derry Long — Like for example, ah I go to Journey Church here in Bozeman. They run I don’t know they run about 1500, but my volunteer role is ah I so I stand at the Connect Table afterwards and if there are new people and they have questions then, you know, it’s it’s ah it’s it’s it’s down there with the ushers and the hands shakers and… Rich Birch — Sure. Derry Long — …and but but those roles help people who are unfamiliar in an unfamiliar place to to find out information in a non-threatening way. Rich Birch — Right, right. Derry Long — And so you start communicating to the people who work work that every role matters. The second is not every role has the same level of responsibility. But if I’m working with people in hospitality and the Connect Table, I’m also looking for, again he that’s faithful in the little I’ll make ruler over much. Who who seems to exhibit understanding and skill beyond the role they’re presently in. And I look for that. Rich Birch — Love it. Derry Long — You know, do I see someone that more they they seem to go the extra mile? They seem to have more understanding about how we’re functioning than would really be required of them. Um, do I and and but I’ve but I’ve got to be looking for it. I have to have eyes for that. I have to see as a leader if I’m head of that department that part of my responsibility is is finding those people, looking for those people, and giving them the next opportunity. Rich Birch — Mmm, love it. Okay, so one of the earlier one of the things you talked about was this smorgasborg mentality. This idea that one of the things that can hold us back is we is we just have it’s non-connected, a series of things. We basically say, here’s the menu; you figure it out. Um, one one of the things I think can create that or I’ve seen created in the church is um, we say to people like, hey if if you’ve got an interest in an area and you’ve got passion in that area um, we want to empower you to like go and start that ministry. And that’s how I think many of these, one I don’t think, I know that’s how many of these churches ended up with 100 plus ministries because it’s like they people they were they they saw a need, and they just said well let’s start something to to meet that need. How do weh ow do we fit these things together? How do we create an empowering environment where people feel they do feel meaning in what they’re doing because they’re maybe leading in an area that feels like it’s made for them, it has significance and that wow it’s pushing the mission forward, but it doesn’t just add to a, you know, a giant smorgasborg ah buffet of like hey there’s a a gajillion different things to do as a church? How do we how do we reconcile the tension of those, or am I not thinking about that correctly? Derry Long — No yeah, yeah, that’s a good question. Ah, but first, every organization needs to know what it’s about. So there may be people who have skill a skill base or a passion that is valid but it it doesn’t fit here. Or it doesn’t fit here at this time. Rich Birch — Right. Derry Long — And leaders have to make have to make that kind of call of ah… Rich Birch — Right. Derry Long — …you know, does it fit here? Rich Birch — Right, right. Derry Long — The second is the the an organization, if you use Collins Good to Great, he uses this phrase—ah, he he he means it in a secular sense, but I’m going to use it in a sense for the church—he says every organization must know its economic engines. Rich Birch — Yeah, yep, yep. Derry Long — In other words I might do 50 things but there’s only 4 or 5 things that are actually producing disciples. Rich Birch — Right. Derry Long — The other things may be good ministries, but I don’t get to do those if I don’t do these 4 or 5 things well. And and a leadership has to know what are the economic engines of this organization. Rich Birch — Yep. Derry Long — What produces disciples? What generates donors? What what brings people in the door? What connects people to the community? What are what are the economic engines? So I used to when I was going to college I worked at a grocery store. And grocery stores um, there’s permission to play. Like if you go in to a grocery store, they got to sell some things because they’re a grocery store. They they make no profit up off it. They you know they break even, but that’s permission to play. If you’re going to play in that arena you got to have that product. But they have certain departments where their their profit margins are in those departments, which means they have to make sure they make profit in those departments because that that takes care of all the other departments. And so I have to make sure that as people I’m working with people that I have arenas of ministry connected to the economic engine of the church that are meaningful and that I can’t always meet every need… Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. Derry Long — …for ministry that person has. Rich Birch — Yeah I love that. You know I know but for sure you know that resonates with and it just even a personal lesson, the longer I’m in leadership I realize it is more about talking about less things, focusing down, saying no to more things. You know, how do we focus? How do we provide more energy to using, sticking with Collins on the flywheel, how do we get more of our energy onto that? Um, it’s amazing how much that book all these years later still you know has huge impact. I literally was just listening to conversation with senior senior leaders like literally guys that report to Jeff Bezos at ah, Amazon that were were talking about their hedgehog concept, and their flywheel. They’re like, hey we keep thinking about that. We keep coming back to and that’s like you know a giant organization, right, that’s that’s asking that question. How do we pare down? How do we stay focused? How do we, you know, add energy? Rich Birch — When you think about that side of it, kind of the focus side of it, the how do I as a leader um add energy to those areas that are going to ultimately be more empowering, that are going to get more people engaged. Any thoughts on that or things we should be wrestling through as we you know, try to help people define, you know, how they should get engaged? Derry Long — Well, there’s ah, there’s a interesting thing that often happens in academic research. You start researching something and you find ah somebody’s already found it out. So when I went to England I was researching what empowers people only to find out we already knew what empowered people. Derry Long — These four things that I just mentioned, they’d already been discovered. Gretchen Spreitzer from University of Michigan, others, they they had already, so then I began to ask, well if we know what empowers people, then why are so few organizations able to do it? Rich Birch — Right. Derry Long — So I started studying what what characteristics must be present within a culture in order for a person to function in an empowered way. Rich Birch — That’s a good question. Derry Long — And that that research… And my theory was that was based on the Imago Dei, created in the image of God. So that would be true whether it was a church, a nonprofit, or a business because all people are created in God’s image. So I began to actually do case studies on businesses, churches, and nonprofits, and I found that those different arenas used the exact same language… Rich Birch — Interesting. Derry Long — …when they talked about being empowered. And there were four traits that were part that were present in a culture where people could function in an empowered way. And the first was voice. In fact that was the single biggest discovery of all the research I did. And voice isn’t just asking, well Rich, what do you think? Voice is treating someone like they’re present. Like if they weren’t at the table they’d be missed. Rich Birch — Right. Derry Long — Like they are a key component of the structure of who we are. And the the the the sense of an employee that they’re just treated like they don’t even exist is so devastating that almost no employee can stay in an organization where they’re treated as as someone who doesn’t have voice. Rich Birch — Yeah, as a cog. Nobody wants that feeling, right? Derry Long — No, no, no. Rich Birch — Nobody likes feeling of like, you know… yeah. Derry Long — The the second is support. And support is not an attaboy, you know, kind of a slap on the back. Support is where I understand your reality, and I’m ah I’m addressing you through your reality. It was amazing to me how many people that what they’re really dealing with, the both the leaders or others simply don’t don’t don’t know what they’re dealing with in in their day-to-day responsibilities. Derry Long — Um, the third was modeling. And modeling is simply where the leader, the leader’s behavior is in line with the leader’s rhetoric. And I found ah I found an organization that said they had never seen an improvement program work. And and so I I read more about that and here’s what would happen. The leader go to way to some conference, and then they’d come back with a 3-ring binder and hey I got a plan! And then they have a meeting… Rich Birch — Yes. Derry Long — …but the people in the organization knew that that was only going to last as long until the leader went to another conference. Rich Birch — Yes. Derry Long — And so they had this they had this, they developed this pattern. We’ll hear him out, and then we’ll wait them out. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah. Derry Long — Because they know we’re just going to change. They’re waiting for leaders who say I’ll die on this hill. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. I wish that wasn’t I wish I couldn’t think of examples of that. I wish that one was like that one is so common. Derry Long — Yeah, yeah. Rich Birch — Like I and I feel that temptation like ah… Derry Long — Oh yeah. Rich Birch — …you’re you’re like, man, this is the silver bullet. This is the thing. Derry Long – Yeah, yeah, yeah. Rich Birch — And scrap everything else we’ve talked about. Let’s run with this. Yeah, that’s that’s… Derry Long – Yeah and and the and the fourth is trust. Because empowerment brings choice, and choice has risk. And so if there’s not an atmosphere of trust, then people won’t operate in empowered way. But it’s not trust. Derry Long — a trust attitude. It’s trust behavior. And the difference is Jesus was giving the disciples responsibilities well before they were fully capable of executing those responsibilities. He was showing trust behave he was showing a trust behavior before trust attitudes. Rich Birch — Yeah. Derry Long — And as voice, support, modeling, and trust exist, then a person can operate in those first four that we talked about: choice, competence, meaning, and significance. Rich Birch — Love it. This is so good. You know, one of the things you’ve been taught you’ve said multiple times is this idea of create and sustain, so in some ways um like I can see the create side of this maybe easier. That’s probably the not a very precise word. It’s like ah, getting this ball rolling is one thing, sustaining it over the over ah an extended period of time, creating an empowering culture versus sustaining an empowering culture, I could see where there would be some well there’s natural all systems tend to wind down. When when you kind of have thought about that side of it kind of keeping this going, what should we be thinking about on that front, when you think about kind of sustaining an empowering church culture? Derry Long — Well, the first four are are about how I’m empowered. Rich Birch — Yes. Derry Long — But the second four are what sustains it. Rich Birch — Okay, okay, okay, okay, that makes sense. Derry Long — So the you go back to the idea of lag and lead measures. Rich Birch — Yep, yep. Derry Long — So like instead of measuring attendance, I measure what is producing the attendance. And that becomes the primary measure. So attendance is the is the lag measure. The lead measures what’s producing it. These four traits I just mentioned, these are actually the lead measures… Rich Birch — Okay. Derry Long —…and that’s the thing that ah enables me to sustain in the organization. And connected with this are certain are certain um, um, leadership traits that become sustaining issues. For example, ah a leader a leader who wants to have an empowering culture, so he wants to flip the 80/20. Instead of 20% doing 80% of the work, he wants 80% of the people working. Um that leader has got to be a leader with a healthy ego. They can be a fragile, you know… Rich Birch — Right. Derry Long — …temperamental, territorial. There’s nothing that builds trust; that that doesn’t build trust. Rich Birch — Right, right. Derry Long — You got to have so the the leader has to have a healthy ego. They have to have a positive view of people. Rich Birch — Right, right. Derry Long — You know I’m not I’m not trying to hurt a bunch of people who don’t know know anything. These people aspire. My job is to help them in in that aspiration. Derry Long — They have to measure their achievement through relational a relational grid. Are they just task-oriented, or did a little relationships matter? Um, they got to see that micromanagement actually is the enemy of an empowered culture. Um so you know I could go on but… Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. Derry Long — …those those traits in the leader, and then those four traits of the culture, they sustain the the traits within an empowered person. Rich Birch — Yeah, love it. Well this you know listen I feel like we well it’s like one of those we’ve it’s been both scratching the surface in that, gosh, there’s probably so much more we could talk about, but it’s also been a fire hose. I’ve got pages and notes here of like ooh stuff I’ve got to wrestle with so I I really appreciate this, Dr. Derry. Is there anything else – there’s tons we could talk about but is there anything else, you’d like to kind of for us to cover just as we wrap up today’s episode? Derry Long — Yeah, one thing. People often think when they think about empowerment to think about delegation. Hey I’m going to empower Rich. Rich, here’s here’s a project. I’d like you to do it. My door’s open. If you need me, come get me. That’s about as far from empowerment as you could get. One of the reasons people fail at empowerment is they don’t own that it is a highly relational construct. It involves more relational connection, not less. Rich Birch — Right, right. Derry Long — And so the emphasis has to be in relationship. Rich Birch — Yeah, we got to keep working that side of it, right? We have to. It’s not I think that’s a good caution for sure. Well, Derry, this has been fantastic. Super encouraging conversation, and like I say helpful and lots for us to chew on. Um, where if people want to track with you or track with this thinking if there’s you know is there places we want to send them online? How how can we have them kind of continue to track along with this? Derry Long — Um I’m not sure the answer, you like like my my email address you mean? Rich Birch — Sure, yeah, that’s great. If they want to reach out to you, what would that look like. Derry Long — Sure ah DL@YTHI.com (Yellowstone theological incident). Rich Birch — Perfect, great! Well, Dr. Derry, I appreciate you being here. Thank you so much for that for the help – this has been super enlightening lots for us to to chew on, and yeah, appreciate for your your help for today for our leaders. Derry Long — Hey, thank you very much, Rich.

Welcome to the unSeminary podcast – so glad that you have decided to tune in. This week we have with us Aaron Tredway, Lead Pastor of Fellowship City Church in Ohio. As church leaders, we know that when we empower others, we can accomplish more together than we can alone. But it can be hard to “give your job away”. Listen to today’s podcast as Aaron shares how the team mentality at Fellowship City Church has allowed them to turn around from a place of decline to growth. Team philosophy on leadership. // There’s always a temptation to fill the gap yourself rather than bring others in to raise them up and release them. Church leaders wear a lot of different hats and we have limited capacity so we have to get creative about problem solving. Team leadership can be a solution to our limitations, but it requires us to lay down our egos and not build the ministry around our own personalities.Team preaching. // One example of team leadership at Fellowship City Church is the preaching team. Every Thursday this team of more than ten people meets to do a full runthrough of the message, whether Aaron or another person on the team is preaching. The team vets the message together and, as a result, on Sundays it’s really the voice of the team bringing the message even though one person is communicating it.Give your job away. // At Fellowship City Church, the staff is taught to embrace a team mentality where they are working themselves out of their jobs. Everyone needs to hold their position and title loosely, and intentionally think about how they can operate from a place that serves the team best. To combat fears about being replaced, Aaron reminds us that because there is always enough work to go around and enough people that need to be reached, there will always be an important place for people to serve out of their callings. Help them find their place. // To help people at the church get plugged in, a vocational paid staff at Fellowship City Church created a leadership system that raises people up and releases them into ministry. He worked to get the system off the ground, but then handed it off to unpaid staff who are now facilitating it. Rather than shy away from empowering volunteers in these roles, create intentional touch points to help them continue to grow in their leadership while staying aligned with the church’s mission and vision.Aim for significance, not success. // As people start to reach their life goals, they have a sense of accomplishment and fulfillment, but it doesn’t last. Aaron has written the book, Don’t Miss Your Life: The Secret to Significance, which reveals that many of us are dissatisfied with our lives because we are aimed at the target of success rather than the target of significance. Gift this practical guide and read it together with your team to discover how we can find a life of meaning in God’s kingdom. You can learn more about what’s happening at Fellowship City Church by visiting fellowshipcity.org, or find out more about Aaron and his book at aarontredway.com. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Portable Church Industries Doing Church in a Rented Facility can be a Challenge. Questions about Multisiting or Portability?Click here to connect with our Multisite Specialist for a free evaluation. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Well, hey, everybody. Welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in. You know every week we try to bring you a leader who’s going to both inspire and equip you and today’s no exception. Super excited to have Aaron Tredway with us. He is a Lead Pastor at a church called Fellowship City Church. They have 2 locations located in Ohio around the cultural epicenter of the world, Cleveland. Aaron is the the Lead Pastor – he’s been there since 2017. At that point the church had existed for 40 years and was in decline. We’re going to pick up the story from there. But, Aaron, welcome to the show today. Aaron Tredway — Hey, Rich, So great to be with you man. Rich Birch — Yeah, why don’t you fill out the story. Tell us a little bit about your background and kind of how did that connect with Fellowship City, and kind of bring us up to speed on that. Aaron Tredway — Yeah, well first, I love the idea of the cultural epicenter which is Cleveland, Ohio. Rich Birch — It is isn’t – that’s true, isn’t it? Isn’t that true? Aaron Tredway — It’s how everyone introduces me. I just I pastor at church in Cleveland, Ohio. No that’s that’s awesome. I’m not a native Clevelander, but I gotta tell you I’ve grown to love this city. I love the people of this city. I actually originally from California, and had the opportunity to travel a lot in my life. You know, kind of I guess I sometimes call it my former life. I was a professional athlete I was professional soccer player for 13 years. And really ah spent about 25 years in professional soccer altogether. But the Lord always had ah a calling towards vocational ministry on my life. I went to seminary kind of while I was a player – not common thing to do. And not because I thought it was called to be a pastor per se, but I was kind of always like a pastor to professional athletes along the journey. Rich Birch — Okay, yeah, yeah. Aaron Tredway —And found myself at ah at a local church. I’ve always loved the local church whether I was living in Harare, Zimbabwe, Singapore, Sao Paulo, Brazil, or now Cleveland, Ohio – I’ve always loved the local church, had a passion to see people equipped and released to live out the kingdom, and and live for the glory of God. And so so, yeah, I found myself in Cleveland, Ohio 2017 with my South African wife. We had moved here and this church was in decline. It was, you know, it was ah a great church at one point. And this community, in my opinion, needs a great church, and it wasn’t quite that at that time. Rich Birch — And what when you say it was in decline, kind of paint the picture. What does that look like? How did you, you know… So there’s two fascinating pieces of that. One is tell us about that. What did that look like? And then how did you land there? How did those two pieces kind of come together? Aaron Tredway — Yeah. I guess the shortest way to describe it is I was a missionary of this church with an organization called Ambassadors Football. After my career in in soccer, I joined an organization, a ministry – a Gospel Ministry, presenting the gospel, doing discipleship through soccer all around the world. Rich Birch — Very cool. Aaron Tredway — It’s part of how I met my wife in South Africa. And so really ambassadors exist to serve the local church around the world, to help the church harness the power, the vehicle, of soccer to do discipleship and evangelism in their own communities. Aaron Tredway — And so when we moved to Cleveland, Ohio, it was kind of a natural place to land because we were supported by this church, and so we kind of landed here, and I ended up on the board of this church. And so I served as an elder for a few years, and and we we went through a 10 year downturn in terms of leadership, where you know there was was a little bit of moral failure on on the part of one pastor. There was just some, you know, some deficiencies – a gap in leadership over 10 years. And really, what was a 40 year legacy of real impact in this community had quickly diminished to, you know, we were on a lifeline, so to speak. Rich Birch — Interesting. Well I’d love to hear the story of kind of what what has God used in the life of your church over these years between 2017 to now, kind of what would have been a few of those things that have bubbled up as like, hey it seems like God’s using this to help us reach our community to kind of restore the church to where it had been in the past. Aaron Tredway — Yeah, I think there were were probably a lot of questions to answer when I first came in to leading the church. And you know I’ve led a few different organizations. Um from a professional soccer organization franchise here in the United States, to a fairly large nonprofit globally with offices in forty different countries. And you know, so so from a leadership perspective I feel like, you know, not that I’ve figured everything out, but I really have a philosophy on leadership that’s really built around team. It’s really a team-centric model of leadership where I really want to just empower those around me and believe that together we can do more. It’s kind of cliché I realize, but I really believe and we pull our resources and leverage that which God is instilled within us, we can do more than I could personally do on my own as a leader. Rich Birch — Mm-hmm. Now let me poke on that a little bit. I think a lot of people say they’re into team leadership. They are like, yes, they know that because you’re supposed to say that. But then it seems like a lot of local churches are like these pyramids that all bubble up to like a single person at the top. When you say “team”? What do you mean by that? What do you mean by team leadership? Aaron Tredway — Yeah, I can’t speak for for other churches; I’m not… and you know, I’m I’m an unconventional lead pastor. Rich Birch — Sure, sure. Yes, great. Aaron Tredway — I backed my way into this role, but I gotta say as well I really feel I am here for such a time as this, that God equipped me to be in this position. Um, and you know it it might not be that we’re reaching at this point the outer most parts of the universe yet. But but God has me here. And so when I talk about team, I do recognize that, you know, a lot of people say they want to do team and and value team. But for me what it means is is trying my best to not build the ministry around my own personality. Rich Birch — So good. Aaron Tredway — And I think if I would ah to to boil down my philosophy, it’s, you know, from everything from from preaching on a Sunday um, you know, I had ah an itinerant preaching ministry for 20 years. So even though I’m a fairly new pastor I’ve preached in 150 countries. Rich Birch — Right, right. Aaron Tredway — So, you know, I’m not the greatest preacher, but I can preach a bit. Rich Birch — Yes. Aaron Tredway — And and yet I think the the real tension is not to fill that gap myself. Really try to bring in other people and to raise up, and also release, them, to do that that work as well. Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. So that’s a great example of, you know, how do we kind of acquiesce, how do we give to other people—maybe talk about that a little bit particularly on the teaching piece—what has that looked like? How has teamed work itself out in that, because that does seem to be ah, it’s like um, ah, a bottleneck, a capping off point that we can find ourselves in. What what does that look like, how does that work itself out in your church? Aaron Tredway — Yeah, I’m probably like most people; I have I wear different hats. I’m a husband, I’m a father, and I lead ah a nonprofit organization in addition to leading in the local church. So there’s lots of different balls you’re trying to keep in the air all at the same time. And the preaching team is just one example of how I manage that. You know, I think one of the great challenges that I’ve seen in the local church is capacity. You know, unlike big fortune 500s who might have you know maybe deeper pockets or or greater resources, whether it’s kind of paid staff, or you know just the finance to go get the right people in the right position, I think the local church often has to think creatively. And I think team leadership is a potential solution to that. It does take the laying down of ego in some ways – something I’m always trying to work on. But but the example would be with our preaching team. So I’ve got about at this point 12 guys… Rich Birch — Wow. Aaron Tredway — …on a team that meets every Thursday. And we do a full runthrough of the Sunday message, whether it’s me preaching on Sunday or somebody else on the team… Rich Birch — Wow. Aaron Tredway — …the team fully vets the message. The the preacher preaches it, and they have the ability to speak in. So it’s really the voice of the team bringing that message through the communicator on any given Sunday. Rich Birch — I love that. So the thing you’ve hit on that we’ve seen in so many churches is teaching, particularly at and very large churches, is a team sport. That it’s although there may be one person who’s ultimately up communicating, there’s often a group of people behind that. I love that you’ve systematized that even with kind of every week we’re going to pull that group together. I love that one of the other interesting nuances around team, I think in the local church, is oftentimes churches that are struggling with team, they have a very kind of strong line between who’s on staff and who isn’t on staff. And they get really wrapped up in like titles and, you know, that kind of stuff that I think can ultimately undo some of the teamwork stuff that we’re we’re trying to build. Am I wrong on that? What’s what’s your take on that kind of thing when it comes to ah, you know, how do you think about staff, paid and unpaid, all those kinds of things – what does that what does that look like for your church? Aaron Tredway — Yeah, for for us it’s kind of like everybody’s on staff. Rich Birch — Yes. Aaron Tredway — Some some people get paid and and other people don’t. Rich Birch — Right. Aaron Tredway — In fact, other people might pay… Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Aaron Tredway — …to be on staff but we kind of have a mentality that we are one team kind of working together, pooling our resources to the best of our ability. And I think especially with the the volunteer staff, you know, everybody else that kind of sits in the seats on a Sunday, it is a paradigm shift. Rich Birch — Right. Aaron Tredway — You know, this for us at Fellowship City isn’t a spectator sport. Rich Birch — Right. Aaron Tredway —You know this is this is a battleship situation. We’re not on the, you know, the the cruise liner where we’re sipping drinks and everybody… it’s all hands on deck. And it it is easy to say but you’ve got to really be intentional about instilling that within your people, from my perspective, or kind of it’s human nature. You know, if I can kind of just eat along for the ride, sign me up. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Aaron Tredway — You know, I’ll just cruise along. Rich Birch — Interesting. So talk to me about how you’re how you’re getting people onto your teams. What’s that actually look like? So I Iove this. Oftentimes you know I’ve said in other contexts that actually volunteer growth is actually a precursor—we’ve seen this time and again in church growth—it’s actually a precursor of church growth. So if you’re building your volunteer teams, getting more people onto your volunteer teams, that’s actually an indication that overall growth is coming because there’s this whole thing that happens as people change their own life, and they become a part of their team, they talk to their friends about it and and they’re like well I now do this thing at my church, they end up naturally inviting people. It becomes a kind of accelerant for church growth. But talk me through what that looks like – how are you encouraging people like you say, you know, echo what you’re saying, get out of the stands and onto the field, stop being an just an observer, become an active participant. What what does that look like for you? Aaron Tredway — At every level of of our ministry within our church, we’re trying to promote this idea of team. So whether it’s kind of the preaching team to you know the kids ministry team. Every aspect has a team mentality. Aaron Tredway — And I know that there’s, you know, that this whole idea of the leadership pipeline is quite a popular concept, which I like as a leader, but I’m I’m really probably more invested in the idea of a greenhouse, where we’re constantly growing people up. And and really the the perspective and mentality of our paid staff is to be working themselves out of a job. And that’s that’s a mentality, you know. And unless you’re strategically and specifically thinking in that direction, but we’re trying to create a culture where we’re all thinking: how can I replace myself as fast as we can. How can I hold my title and my position loosely because I just want to be in the place that I can serve the team best? Rich Birch — Okay, I love that. Let’s lean in on that a little bit. I think ah, we’ve all run into team members on our staff who have not that hasn’t really fully got into their head, and they feel like, gosh, if I replace myself, then what’s going to happen? Like if I find other people to do what I’m doing, doesn’t that mean I’m just going to be somehow made redundant, which we know that’s not the case, but work work us through that, kind of talk us through what does that look like for your team. Aaron Tredway — Yeah, I’ll try to illustrate that – maybe from outside of church world. Rich Birch — Sure. Aaron Tredway — You know I served a long time in soccer and, you know, soccer, you know, whether Americans want to believe it or not is the most popular game in the world. Rich Birch — Yes, yes, true. Aaron Tredway — And so, you know, the the reality is there are a lot of people doing soccer ministry out there. And and whenever a new soccer ministry has arisen over the the history of Ambassadors Football, we never viewed it as competition. Because we all felt like there’s enough people and enough ministry… Rich Birch — Right. Aaron Tredway — …around the world through soccer to go around. And that’s kind of how I feel like in the local church. No matter how big the church happens to be, there’s enough people and enough work to go around. So whether I’m the lead pastor today, or I’m a campus pastor tomorrow, or I’m an elder you know, or I’m a kids ministry director, or… to me there’s just there’s so much to do… Rich Birch — Right. Aaron Tredway — …that if I’m thinking through the lens of team, there’s always going to be ah, an important place, not just a place, an important place for me to serve out my calling. Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. I and, you know, I think one of the critical pieces of building great teams sticking—and I am like the opposite of the sports guy, so this is I’m way out of my field here at this point—but you know, knowing your kind of place on the team is important, getting a sense of kind of what is my what’s my unique piece that I bring to the table. Um, how are you doing that at you know Fellowship City? What does that look like to kind of help people find their place, to find their spot in how they can serve, how they could be an active part an active participant in what’s going on? Aaron Tredway — Yeah, we’ve got ah a few different kind of of formalized mechanisms, I suppose. We we in-house started like a leadership university, just in our church. It’s not something formalized. We actually launched through a seminary, Ashland University. Rich Birch — Mmm-hmm. Aaron Tredway — And and we found like they they did a great job that first year – it was a nine month thing, but we felt like it wasn’t contextualized enough. And you know so one guy he, on staff, he kind of owned that. And the reason I bring that specifically that example up is because he owned it. He got it off the ground as a vocational paid staff. But now that thing is fully run by unpaid staff, where we are raising up and releasing leaders into ministry. But but it’s actually not being facilitated in any way by somebody being paid by the church. Rich Birch — Oh I love that. That’s so cool. And so how do you then kind of that’s a good example of any of ah you know and an area where you know you’ve been able to hand that over. How do you kind of how does your team interface with that? How do you ensure that that continues to push ah, in the right direction, that it continues to meet the needs that you’re hoping it will meet in the church? Aaron Tredway — Yeah, it’s a good question and I I interpret it as a cultural piece. You know, you want to make sure that the culture of what you’re doing remains consistent across the board, whether you’re you know a single site church, or you’re multisite. Aaron Tredway — You know, especially as you kind of broaden your your reach a bit. But that that happens you know, even within ah a single location, if you’re running programs especially if they’re being led by unpaid staff then you know how do you maintain that. For us it’s its intentionality. Aaron Tredway — You know, it’s It’s not saying, Okay, well we raise them up and now they’re fully released. Fly! Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yeah. Go do it! Yeah, yeah. Aaron Tredway — You know, is to continue to have very intentional touch points along the way continue to walk the journey of leadership out. It just means that I don’t have to handhold quite as much. Rich Birch — Right. Aaron Tredway — It means that I, as a leader, am released to begin to invest my time elsewhere, while I maintain and monitor, you know, other things going on. Rich Birch — Well and that’s as you know as old or as foundational as Ephesians 4, right? That’s our job is to equip the people, to release them, to get them ready for ah, you know, the ministry. I love that. Where are the bounds like have you run into areas where maybe that handoff hasn’t gone as well? Like I, you know, I can imagine areas where, you know, sometimes people just want a paid staff member. It’s like maybe it’s like hospital visits, or maybe it’s funerals, or you know are there things like that where where people have kind of pushed back a little bit on this handing off or or there been kind of, you know, interesting engagements on that level? Aaron Tredway — It’s such a good question and I’m sure you know your listeners especially pastors have dealt with with this question. For me coming in, for our church which was a fairly traditional – we’re a nondenominational church, but fairly traditional sitting in a fairly traditional community here in Cleveland, Ohio. And so the idea of multiple voices on a Sunday morning… Rich Birch — Right. Aaron Tredway — …from the pulpit, not normal. Rich Birch — Right, right, right. Aaron Tredway — Not not readily embraced. The idea of the lead pastor, or more appropriately, the senior pastor… Rich Birch — Oh sure, sure. Aaron Tredway — …not being the one who would go to the hospital, or you know make the call, or etc etc. Not normal here. Aaron Tredway — So was it that like we snapped our finger in 2017 and after 40 years we shifted into this, you know, everybody embraced… No! Rich Birch — Right. Aaron Tredway — It took time. You know it’s interesting too because you know not having been a career pastor, um I talked to a lot of pastors now. And and we talk about, you know, like different emails you might get, or comments that you might get on any given week. And the interesting thing to me is I got a to me an unprecedented amount of feedback in my early days leading Fellowship City. Rich Birch — Sure. Aaron Tredway — It felt like everybody wanted to have a say in what we were doing… Rich Birch — Everybody’s got an opinion. Aaron Tredway — …everybody had an opinion. Rich Birch — Yes. Aaron Tredway — And as a professional athlete I was not unfamiliar with that reality. Rich Birch — Sure. Aaron Tredway — You got the armchair analyst… Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yes. Aaron Tredway — …in sport, right? It kind of feels like the same thing exists in church world. Rich Birch — Oh wow. Oh wow. Aaron Tredway — You got people who are not professionals… Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Aaron Tredway — …sitting out in the seat kind of commenting like they are the coach. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Aaron Tredway — And fair enough; that that makes sense to me. But the interesting thing that happened is the longer we just stayed consistent with what we were doing, and how we were doing it, and unapologetically, for the most part, the more I felt like people got on the bus. Rich Birch — Right. Aaron Tredway — And got on board. And I’m not saying that I never get an email with a negative critique or kind of, you know, input. But it’s very rare for me now. Rich Birch — Interesting. Aaron Tredway — Very rare. Rich Birch — Right. Aaron Tredway — In covid I got two emails the whole of the last two and a half years. Rich Birch — Wow! That’s incredible. Yeah, that’s amazing. Aaron Tredway — And that’s stating a lot to anybody who’s been leading in a local church for the last two and a half years. Rich Birch — Absolutely, absolutely. There’s been lots to comment on, for sure. That’s that’s incredible. Yeah, I love that idea of staying consistent, staying focused. Um, you know, and people will follow leaders long term. It’s normal at the beginning when you start in a location, you know, for there to be questions for sure. But I love that idea of consistency, pushing in the right direction. Rich Birch — I’d love to pivot in a different direction. You have a book that just came out that I want to talk a little bit more about, if if you don’t mind. It’s called, Don’t Miss Your Life: The Secret to Significance. Tell me about this book. This is a lot of time, effort, and energy to pull this kind of thing together. What was it that you that led you to say, now is the time; I want to pull this book together. Aaron Tredway — Yeah, thanks for asking. Ah I’m super-excited, like you just said it. It just launched just came out October 4th and and we’re real excited about this particular book. I’ve been, you know, fortunate enough to write a few books in the past. But really this book specifically is kind of like my life and and my my whole philosophy put into a few hundred pages. Rich Birch — Love it. Aaron Tredway — And really it’s a book on on living out our God-given purpose. You know, I can’t speak for everybody but for me, growing up I wanted to be an athlete. And you already said that’s not what you wanted. Rich Birch — Yes. Sure. Aaron Tredway — So this is not a book about becoming a professional athlete. But for me, growing up, you know, I had this vision of what my life maybe could or should be. This idea in my mind. And and when I got there, it was an amazing thing. I felt you know the sense of accomplishment and fulfillment. Um, but the interesting thing, and I think most people can probably relate with this, is you know when you start to attain some of the things of the world, and some of the the things that you maybe desire most, they do satiate and satisfy, but not long term. Rich Birch — Right. That’s true. Aaron Tredway — And and for me I had an experience standing on ah a dirt soccer field in Harare, Zimbabwe in 1998 where I went on a mission trip and I’d never been on a mission trip. Um I was a 21 year old kid at the time, and I’d only come to know Christ a few years before. And I’m on this mission trip and we’d played in a stadium of 60,000 people the day before… Rich Birch — Wow. Aaron Tredway — …but now I’m standing in the middle of nowhere Africa. And and I don’t know if it was the audible voice of God, but I felt God impressed upon me, do you think I left you on the soccer field all of these years just for you? Or do you think that there’s a bigger purpose, you know? Rich Birch — Right. Aaron Tredway — Is there some reason that you are here that is more important than just the significance of self? Rich Birch — Love it. Aaron Tredway — And for me what I realized in short is that I had aimed the at the target of the the target of my life was the wrong target. So for me, it’s really become about, how do I aim the target of my life at significance instead of aiming at success… Rich Birch — Yes. Aaron Tredway — …which is what I always thought we were supposed to aim at. Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. You know, I’m struck by this because I think this could be a great book as like ah ah, either a team discussion, like with my the people who you know I work with, or even as a gift, you know, maybe to people in our churches, significant donors, that kind of thing. Because I think this whole idea of, you know, we come to the place in our life where we have some level of success but the question is is that of any significance, is that actually making any difference. I really do, I love that idea. Now as you wrote this book, what part of it resonated the most with you, or has resonated as you’ve had it released out there with other people, that it’s like okay this this this kind of core piece of it seems to be the part that’s getting the most traction? Aaron Tredway — Yeah, there’s this idea that I didn’t come up with – those are all but always the best… Rich Birch — Yes, I love it. Aaron Tredway — …called the hedonic treadmill – have you heard of it? Rich Birch — No, tell me about it. Aaron Tredway — It’s this idea that, you know, it’s kind of if you imagine that you’re running on a treadmill, and the the more you run and the more you attain the thing that you want the more you want, that thing. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Aaron Tredway — You know, it’s like it’s like sugar. If I if I feel like I crave sugar and I eat some sugar. I’m satiated for a moment, but the second I eat the sugar, I want more sugar. Rich Birch — Okay, yeah, yeah. Aaron Tredway — So it’s like this treadmill that you can never really get off because the more of it that you get, the more of it that you want. And the more of it want, the more of it you get, et cetera, et cetera, and it just keeps going. Rich Birch — Yeah. Aaron Tredway — And and for me I think that’s something that’s resonated with me. As I started to experience just a little bit of of success, I craved it. Rich Birch — Yes. Aaron Tredway — I wanted more. And I started to experience more. And it’s almost like I could never get enough. And and I think that idea resonates with people. Rich Birch — So true. Aaron Tredway — Um that that, you know, when you experience success really that the success isn’t going to satisfy the deepest longings of your soul. Rich Birch — Right, right. Aaron Tredway — Um, and so the question becomes, what will? Rich Birch — Love it. Well and yeah, you can see where that the hedonic treadmill can be really the part of a ah, really vicious, negative, downward spiral in life. Um, or. You know there could be a part of that that could actually drive to something great, right? That’s like hey you know there’s if if we can get our our desires aligned with things that ultimately pushes towards the Lord that could be a you know that could be fantastic. . Aaron Tredway — Yeah, definitely. Rich Birch — Um, now when so where do where do we want to send people online if they want to pick up a copy of this? So like I said, friends, I was struck by this because I do think this would be actually best in a team, ironically, ah that this would be best for either your team, like here we are in the fall. Maybe you’re thinking about either, you know, at last quarter kind of training stuff, I think could be great. I think it could be great if you’re looking for um, you know, conversation starters with maybe a group of leaders around you, but ah, where do we want to send them online if we want them to pick up a copy? Where do we want to send them for that? Aaron Tredway — Yep, it’s it’s kind of everywhere books are sold type of an idea. You know, Barnes and Noble, Amazon, aarontreadway.com … Rich Birch — Love it. Aaron Tredway — Everywhere books are sold, that’s that’s where it will be. Rich Birch — Love it. Well I appreciate you being on the show today, Aaron. Is there anything else you want to share with us just before we wrap up today’s episode? Aaron Tredway — Yeah, um, you know again, it’s it’s probably a widely known saying, but you know, I’m married to an African so I feel obliged to to share this. Rich Birch — Yes. You know, this idea that if you want to go fast then go alone. But if you want to go far, go together. Rich Birch — Love it. Aaron Tredway — And for me in my my leadership, whether it’s here in the local church, or or a para-church, or on a soccer field, I’m all in with this idea of going together. Rich Birch — Love it. So good. Well, where do we want to send people online if they want to track with you, or with the church? You talked about aarontredway.com – where do we want to send them for more information about the church if if they want that? I want to make sure people are tracking with your story; I think it’s pretty amazing what God’s doing through it. Aaron Tredway — Thanks, Rich. Yep, our church is Fellowship City Church. It’s fellowshipcity.org and again I can be contacted personally: aarontredway.com Rich Birch — Thanks so much – appreciate you being here today. Thank you so much. Aaron Tredway — Thanks, Rich.