unSeminary Podcast

Greg Griffith, Lead Pastor at King of Kings in Omaha, shares his church's remarkable journey of growth, achieving 60% expansion post-COVID. He discusses how taking risks and stepping out of comfort zones can significantly impact community outreach. King of Kings implemented fun, invite-friendly events like 'Jersey Sunday' and 'Super Sweet Sunday' to engage newcomers. Emphasizing a culture of invitation, Greg highlights the importance of fostering inclusivity and connection across all generations, ensuring everyone feels valued in the church community.

Drew Karschner, Lead Pastor at Northridge Church in Rochester, shares insights from his experience leading one of the fastest-growing churches in the U.S. He discusses the vital balance of empathy and authenticity in leadership, especially during difficult times. Drew emphasizes the importance of recognizing struggles while fostering hope, navigating issues like racial injustice and community unrest. He also highlights the role of genuine engagement and personal recognition in building trust and unity among congregants.

Thanks for tuning in for the unSeminary podcast. We’re talking with Kerri-Ann Hayes today. In addition to being a senior consultant at Ministry Architects, Kerri-Ann has worked in children’s and family ministry for over 20 years and has a heart for making churches more inclusive for families with special needs. At our churches we want to create a place where families have a place at the table. Increasingly this looks like supporting children and youth affected by special needs or trauma. Tune in as Kerri-Ann shares practical advice on fostering a welcoming environment at your church. How much focus do you give special needs? // The CDC reports that 1 in 6 children ages 3-17 have a diagnosed disability, 1 in 36 are diagnosed with autism, and 6.1 million have ADHD. Looking at these numbers, if these people are not represented in our churches, the question we need to ask is why? Initiate communication. // Parents may not share the special need when first attending or registering their child at church. It’s up to churches to provide a place where parents not only can identify information such as a child’s allergies, but also note needing additional support for their participation in kids ministry. During a child’s registration, include an area about special needs they may have. Start with the one. // Rather than feeling overwhelmed by the need to create an entire special needs ministry from the outset, start with the one. Who is the one child you have in mind who you can help? How do you create a plan for this child to participate in your church? Create a volunteer position in the children’s ministry that will be this child’s “buddy”. Their entire role is about becoming an expert on what that child will need to successfully participate in church. By creating a supportive environment for one child, churches can gradually expand their efforts to include more families. Seek advice. // Church leaders do not need to be experts in special needs to make a difference. Seek out local experts, such as occupational therapists or speech therapists, who can provide guidance and support on what could be improved in your children’s ministry. What are the physical barriers? Is the size or lighting of the room holding the ministry back? Simple changes. // Signage throughout a church can help visitors navigate the space with ease. Clear signage is particularly important for families or youth affected by special needs, who may already face challenges in social situations. In addition, provide clear directions and what-to-expect in your different environments. This guidance will help the neuro-divergent teenager to feel more independent and comfortable in the church and student ministry. Sensory rooms. // The sensory room Kerri-Ann’s church created was strategically placed in a back section of the children’s ministry. Placement of sensory rooms are important, both to accommodate situations where children might try to run away, and also to provide a quiet space away from noise and activity. Sensory items and dimmable lighting in the room are also key. The Accessible Church. // Kerri-Ann’s book, The Accessible Church: Making the Church a Welcoming Place for Children with Special Needs and from Traumatic Backgrounds, is a great resource for churches that are thinking about these issues. Kerri-Ann provides practical tips and tools that will help your church be more welcoming for families with special needs as well as families fostering or adopting children. In addition you can follow the stories of several children who have found their place within the church through a team that learned to serve them well. Focus on teenagers too. // As churches learn how to serve vulnerable and neurodivergent children, doors will open for them to serve teenagers as well. Rather than buddies, provide a hang-out sensory room for teens with appropriate lighting and cooperative versus competitive activities. Rethink your youth and worship spaces and how you can create awareness in your volunteers that these students are coming to the ministry. You can reach Kerri-Ann to talk more about working with families with special needs by emailing her. Find her book The Accessible Church: Making the Church a Welcoming Place for Children with Special Needs and from Traumatic Backgrounds on Amazon. 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! Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Hey, friends welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you’ve decided to tune in. Really excited to have Kerri-Ann Hayes with us today. She has been in children’s and family ministry leader in central Florida since the late 90’s. She’s led children’s ministry in both a single and multi-site church context. During her years serving family Kerri-Ann has developed a passion for and really an expertise, particularly for those struggling to find their place in a church due to the special needs of their children. She loves supporting and equipping churches to be accessible to families with special needs or from therautic ah therapeutic background. So super excited to have Kerri-Ann with us. She also serves as a senior consultant with an organization called Ministry Architects. Kerri-Ann, so glad that you’re here today. Thanks for being on the show. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Thanks so much for having me, Rich. I’m so excited to be here. Rich Birch — Oh this is going to be great. I’m really looking forward to kind of diving in. I think this is incredibly important topic. But kind of fill out the picture there a little bit tell us a bit of the Kerri-Ann story. tell us a little bit more about your background to kind of fill in the picture for us. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Sure. I live in beautiful Claremont, Florida and I love that ah you mentioned I’ve been in ministry to children and families since the 1990s. I always say for over 20 years because that’s what you say when you don’t want to give the exact years you’ve done something. Rich Birch — Right. Yes, yeah yeah, yeah. Kerri-Ann Hayes — But I I did over that time really develop a specific passion, which is to serve families who struggle to be a part of our churches. Beyond being a ah, children’s and family Ministry Leader, I am also a consultant. I’m a lead consultant with Ministry Architects which allows me to now work with churches all over the country. Rich Birch — Love it. So Good. So glad to have you on. I think this is a critically important area around, you know, our church is becoming more accessible. And I had a friend recently tell me that, and I don’t know if this is true but they said it sounded true, it resonated true, that 1 in 5 kids in the country have what could be deemed as a special need. Um, but only only 15% of churches in the country actually do anything around this. 85% of churches don’t do anything around special needs. And to me that’s just tragic. Like we want to create a place where where families have a place at the table. But what is why don’t we start with kind of talking through the problem. Like what, you know, this is a huge issue for all of us. Why should we even be thinking about this as an issue for us in our churches? Kerri-Ann Hayes — Well I think it comes down to ministry math. If we do understand the statistics, and you know the CDC says that 1 in 6, which is 17% of our children ages 3 to 17 have a diagnosed disability. Rich Birch — Wow. Wow. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Then 1 in 36 are diagnosed with autism and that’s a brand new. That’s a fairly new statistic. Rich Birch — Wow, wow. One in 36. Yeah. Kerri-Ann Hayes — And 6.1 million have ADHD. Rich Birch — Wow. Kerri-Ann Hayes — So if we look at those numbers and then we look at the number of people who are participating in our churches, if these people are not represented in our churches, there’s another question we need to ask, which is why? Why are they not in our churches? Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, what’s happening there? Yeah. Yeah, it seems like you know if if ah, you know if a family showed up with a child in a wheelchair and we didn’t have a ramp. We would notice that. We would be like, oh my goodness. And what I know of the church leaders that are listening in is that tomorrow we would figure out how to get a ramp in. We’d be like okay we got We got to figure this one out… Kerri-Ann Hayes — Definitely. Rich Birch — …because people are loving and caring. But it’s not the same with you know when you talk about autism, ADHD, you know, even like severe anxiety, those sorts of things. Help us understand why you know why that is. Why why is this the kind of thing that is has been difficult or could be difficult for churches to try to think about how do we create space for kids or families that are, you know, that are struggling with these kinds of issues? Kerri-Ann Hayes — Well some families may not share that when they initially register their child to come into children’s ministry, or their teenager. And it can be because we might not be asking the right questions. Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — We may have a space when we’re registering them that asks them, do you have a medical need? Do you have allergies? But just adding, “Will your child or student need additional support to participate in our ministry?” might get parents thinking in the direction of, okay, now I need to share if there’s autism, ADHD. Is there something else that can be put in place so that their child can be successful in the ministry? Because when parents don’t share this, we usually find out when it plays out in a behavior in in our ministry context. Rich Birch — Yeah, I can see that for sure. If we don’t it’s like if we don’t create the space, they don’t communicate and then there’s like a bit of a vicious cycle there. Well you work with churches all across the country and help them in so many different ways. I’m sure, let’s assume, I’m I’m sure there’s leaders that are listening in today who are like, man, we want to create space where I don’t feel like we’re doing enough on this front. What would be some of those first steps that you would in encourage a church to think about. Like they maybe be understand in a broad sense that, hey we should be doing more, but they they haven’t you know they don’t they haven’t set anything up. They haven’t done… What would be some of those first steps that we should be thinking about. Kerri-Ann Hayes — So my favorite thing it seems to be that every time I’m working with a church… Rich Birch — Love it. Kerri-Ann Hayes — …the first thing that they have to say to me is we’ve got this one child. We’ve got this one. Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yes. Kerri-Ann Hayes — There’s this one. And as they start to tell me about the one I’m thinking, I’ve seen that one before. So I think that the first thing to keep in mind is that we start with the one. We don’t necessarily need to create this entire ministry within the church. We need to start with the one. How do we create a plan for this child to participate in our church. Kerri-Ann Hayes — And and that was our story. We started with the one who turned our Sunday morning, my very well crafted message and worship and ah volunteers in place, and the one child came in and turned things upside down, but also changed the face of our church for for the better because we became passionate… Rich Birch — Yeah, tell me more about that. I’d love to hear that story. Tell us tell us more about that. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Yeah. So well this little guy who came in, he was in first grade and didn’t even have a diagnosis yet. Rich Birch — Okay. Kerri-Ann Hayes — But because of his behavior that played out in our children’s ministry environment that started a conversation with mom and dad which helped me to find out that they were in the process of trying to find out what was going on with him. And the church was able to walk with the family through a diagnosis, finding out that he had ADHD and autism, and then we needed to create a plan that was going to help him to be able to be a part of our church. Because it’s just again, it’s ministry math. If we could figure out a way for this little guy to be successful and participate in children’s ministry, then mom and dad were going to be able to be a part of our church as well. Kerri-Ann Hayes — So we started with the one. We created a position in our children’s ministry, which we called a sidekick, who came alongside this little guy and they didn’t have to be an expert on anything besides him. Rich Birch — Oh that’s good. Kerri-Ann Hayes — They needed to become an expert on what did he need to be a part of our church. And it grew from there. Rich Birch — I love that. You know, I this I think this area can be a little bit intimidating for for church leaders. And I think I can imagine um how you know this area could be the kind of thing where we like feel like, gosh, I’ve got to start so many things. I’s like we need you know it’s like we need a bunch of special super-specialized volunteers. We need people with all kinds of background in this. I’m like I’m not I don’t have those people here. We don’t have the space. Talk us through those kinds of concerns. Kerri-Ann Hayes — The first thing I want to say is I’m not that person. Rich Birch — Right. Okay. Love it. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Like I came into children’s ministry with a hospitality management background… Rich Birch — Okay, yeah. Love it. Kerri-Ann Hayes — …when the Lord called me into it. And now I’ve been in it for well over twenty years. So when I started you know this passion started burning inside of not just me, but the people serving in our ministry to be able to open the doors to other families, we didn’t have the experts. So I did go looking for the experts. I looked in my local area. Like who out there could come in and even assess my ministry? What can we do better? Ah, what do I need to look at? Are there physical barriers for our children? Because if a child has autism or sensory processing disorder, just the lighting in the room, or the size of the room and the amount of children that we’re packing into it, bringing in somebody who helped me have fresh eyes to the ministry was very helpful. But an interesting thing happened: the more that our volunteers and families started talking about people with disabilities and special needs, I felt like experts came out of the woodwork in my church. Rich Birch — Oh that’s cool. Yeah. Love that. Kerri-Ann Hayes — And so so many people that were um, occupational therapists physical, physical therapists and speech therapists started coming forward and saying I hear you have a need. How can I help? Rich Birch — Love that. Kerri-Ann Hayes — So I I think what has helped me most when I’m talking with other churches is the fact that I’m not an expert. Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — I I didn’t study this. Rich Birch — Yes. Kerri-Ann Hayes — I learned from the children. I’ve learned from the families and from the people who have come alongside our ministry. Rich Birch — Is there, you know when you talk about low hanging fruit, is there particularly say in the in kids ministry specifically, is there like changes that most or like, you know, you walk into a church and you’re like, here’s change that you see all the time. You’re like, man, if we just did this, it would at so many churches across the country we it would make us more inclusive as an entire movement. Um, what would be a, you know, couple of those things that kind of come to mind, that low hanging fruit? Kerri-Ann Hayes — Okay, so I’m not going to direct this just at children’s ministry. Rich Birch — Sure. I’m going to say all areas of the church. Rich Birch — Yep, for sure. Signage, signage, signage. Rich Birch — Oh okay, good. Tell us about that. Kerri-Ann Hayes — So so um, I’m share I visited a church recently and I was I was speaking there and I wanted to find the restroom before before the message began. And I stepped out into the lobby and I went walking through this cavernous church and could not find it. Okay, no one wants to have to go and ask. Rich Birch — Yes. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Let’s let’s think about the teenager who comes into Youth Ministry who has autism, who already struggles building relationship. They don’t want to come in and have to ask questions to get their needs met. They want to come in and they want to feel independent. The same thing goes for do we post or share what to expect in our service. Kerri-Ann Hayes — So some churches might share in a bulletin or something like that. But when we’re talking about a youth coming into Youth Ministry and they’re going to participate ah in your Wednesday night, maybe. Do they know when they walk in the door that this is a time of fellowship, that we’re moving into a time of worship, that there will be message, and small group, and that we’re eventually going to send them home. Rich Birch — Right. Love it. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Those clear expectations help people feel independent, but also move through transitions because they can anticipate them. Rich Birch — They know where things are going. Man, that’s just great practice in general for for all humans, which is good signage. I’ve said in other contexts you know next time you’re in an airport, you know, dear church leader, look around at the amount of signage that’s there. And that’s the benchmark. That’s like your baseline, starting point of the kind of the amount of signage you should have at your church. Because you think about an airport is designed for people who’ve never been there before to move them along and to try to not slow them down and that’s the same thing that you’re saying. Is like hey we want to make it super obvious. Rich Birch — And I love that what to expect. Again, that’s just a good practice in general. But if we went out of our way to make that, I can see that, particularly if you know if if there’s parents or kids that are coming, you know, to be able to talk through and know, hey, this is what’s coming next. That you know, that makes that makes total sense. Rich Birch — When you think about kind of where, so those would be some kind of low hanging fruits, when you think about um, where this is headed, and you’re like down the road you’re thinking about, Okay, we’ve we’ve gone beyond caring for the one. I love that idea of being like an expert in the one. And we’re thinking, man, we might want to add like a ministry. We might want to actually build some infrastructure there. Where is that headed? Is that headed towards like um, like an inclusion model where we’re trying to have, or what’s your best approach – inclusion where we’re having kids or families or young people or adults included, or is it like we’re going to have a whole separate thing, um where we do kind of ah a separate service a separate experience? What is the best practice from your perspective as the person who’s not an expert but really is, you know? Kerri-Ann Hayes — I’m not an expert in that is not my education. Rich Birch — I get that. Yeah, I understand what you mean. Kerri-Ann Hayes — It has been my on the ground learning, which honestly I think might be the best way to learn is from from the kids, from the families. Rich Birch — Love it. Kerri-Ann Hayes — So…And I forgot your questions. Rich Birch — Oh no, that’s fine. I was saying like, so yeah, let’s say we’ve taken a couple steps, and we’re caring for the one, and then we’re thinking down the road is are we really heading towards inclusion, or like an exclusive ministry. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Yes, so no. I I prefer inclusion, inclusion all all the way. But in saying that there are also people who will be a part of our church that the accommodation that they will need will be something separate. Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — So in in my experience we started with that one. We created a ministry within a ministry. So our church never had a disability ministry. They never had a special needs ministry. We had a way to include families who had special needs or disabilities. That started in the children’s ministry. So just by creating a position that someone could fill, which for us was a sidekick – some churches call them pals or buddies. But creating that position that people can be a part of – got to have a job description, have to have an invitation into being part of this. That ministry within our ministry grew and grew on on its own. So that’s where we started. Kerri-Ann Hayes — In our original church building we did not have space to have a separate room if if a child needed that type of accommodation. And we had to take an approach of that we would never say no but we might say not yet, or not now can we take that child in without having a family member present. Kerri-Ann Hayes — When we moved into a larger church building, we were able to strategically build a room that was for these children. That allowed us to serve children across a spectrum of needs. Rich Birch — Yeah, I’ve found a similar thing as our church years ago 10 while more than ten plus years ago now is we added ah ah you know more and more kind of accommodations for kids with special needs. It’s word spreads, right, in a good way, in a beautiful way where families, these families are very networked and um, which is a wonderful thing. That’s what you’re yeah, that’s what you’re hoping for. We want to serve more families. And so, you know, over time, you know, we um, you know, we found that we had to add more infrastructure, more people, which I loved as a leader an executive leader in our church. It’s it’s a it’s a really fulfilling area to serve in. It’s it’s um, you know, it can be challenging volunteer service but it’s, and there’s kids that you know are to be able to create this kind of experience is just amazing for ah the families and they’re so thankful, and so you know appreciative of it. Rich Birch — When you say that separate space, what what is what what did we typically see that, you know, this would be like a sensory room? You know, a place where they can have a bit of a, you know, a place to kind of distance themselves a little bit? Talk us through what that looks like. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Yep. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Yes, so a sensory room. And what we did when when our new building was being built was strategically placed our sensory room in the farthest area back in the children’s ministry. Rich Birch — Okay, yeah. Kerri-Ann Hayes — And are are thinking in this was we had a few children that we were not able to accommodate. And we wanted to move to a place that we could, but they were elopement risks meaning they were going to run away at any chance they were given. And we wanted to put as many doorways between them and the parking lot as possible. Rich Birch — Nice. Okay, yes, yes. That makes sense. Kerri-Ann Hayes — So just the placement of where this room was. But then also the room was outfitted with things that would be needed in a sensory place. So the ability to turn the lights down. It was was a quiet space just based on its location. And then there were sensory items that were in the room as well. We had very few children who use that room only, because our goal was we wanted them with our typical kids. But that room quickly became the room that everyone wanted to be a part of. Rich Birch — Right. Yeah. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Because sometimes we all need a moment of quiet… Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — …to step away from all of the activity. Rich Birch — Right. Well and I think there’s, particularly I think in in kids ministry, we can, on the programming side, our programming can lead towards you know, loud, energetic you know, ah over the top which can be fun is fun for some folks, but is not universally fun, right? It’s not. It’s not like not everybody loves that. And and particularly as the church grows you get a lot of kids, like you said earlier, in a room. Um, that can be just very overwhelming… Kerri-Ann Hayes — Yeah. Rich Birch — …you know, for some people for sure. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Yeah, and I’ll tell you, Rich, a funny story because we we were in this church that was really known for how they served families so we had tons of kids. We could have 150 children in one room. And that’s a lot of energy and could be a lot of sounds. Rich Birch — Yes. Kerri-Ann Hayes — And we had to train the volunteers who are up on the stage leading everything not to get the kids to cheer, to yell, or to clap. Rich Birch — Sure. Yeah. Kerri-Ann Hayes — We had to come up with other ways for them to show their enthusiasm. Otherwise that room was not a welcoming place for a lot of our kids, not even those who are neurodiverse, but for some of our typical kids as well. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, totally. Yeah, that’s a good, yeah I would agree. I think that is a that’s a shift for sure over the time I’ve been in ministry where it like that we didn’t even think of that when I was in student industry or kids ministry. But now it’s like a real thing. You’re thinking about it and you’re thinking about, Okay, how do we what’s the best way for us to do that. That’s, you know, that’s fantastic. Rich Birch — I know for me one of my journeys in this area has been even just the terms we use. Um, you know, I remember years ago so, you know, I I talked about special needs kids and I had a loving friend ah you know and I thought I was using a term that was like appropriate and I and I was saying it in an endearing way. And they’re like, oh that’s actually not a great way to use that term. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Yeah. Rich Birch — It’s it’s kids with special needs. And I was like, oh of course. Like that’s a way better way to talk about this. And it’s a fairly that’s a nuanced switch. Kerri-Ann Hayes — It is. Rich Birch — But how do how does someone who maybe isn’t in this space all the time even just keep up with the the language changes, and even the words you use there neuro-typical or, you know, neuro-divergent neuro-divergent. Um help us understand how how do we keep there? Kerri-Ann Hayes — Yeah, oh so they call it disability etiquette. And it is not an easy thing to keep up with. I I remind ah, church leaders often that in Luke 14 Jesus referred to people with disabilities as the lame, crippled, and blind. Rich Birch — Yes. Kerri-Ann Hayes — We would never use those terms today. Rich Birch — No. Yeah, yeah yeah. Kerri-Ann Hayes — And then we used handicapped, and then it became disabled, then special needs came in. And now the the buzz word, which has been around for a long time, ah is neurodiverse. It’s just not been used in everyday language… Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — …by by families, by teenagers, by ministry leaders. So I think the important thing for us to is to not get too caught up… Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — …in the wording. The best thing that we can do is ask our people what are they comfortable with. Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — I I sat in a ah conference setting recently where somebody was sharing that as ministry leaders we get very caught up in all of the terms. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Ah, but families who have special needs don’t get caught up in those terms as much as we do. Rich Birch — Sure. Kerri-Ann Hayes — One thing to keep in mind is that an adult with a disability doesn’t like to be referred to as special needs. Yet families who have children with special needs often don’t like their child with autism to be referred to as disability. That’s where the nuance comes in that we need to know our people and and ask some questions. Kerri-Ann Hayes — I had a young woman who served in our 2-year-old classroom who was deaf. And I actually asked her one day how did she like people to refer to her? Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes —And I was thinking is it hearing impaired, is it deaf? And she was so quick to respond to me and say, I am deaf and nothing about me is impaired. And I went, Wow. Rich Birch — Oh that’s good. Kerri-Ann Hayes — But she wasn’t offended by my question. Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — And I think that’s an important thing for us to keep in mind that. Rich Birch — Yeah, I I have found similarly around this issue, I think that’s a good that’s a good insight there around, I think sometimes maybe we we might get more um, worked up about this than than than the folks that we’re interacting with. And just having an open heart and open spirit to be like, hey, like and being willing to learn and be like, hey, we it’s okay, like I need to learn, is ah goes a long way as you interact with people and even if you stumble on the wrong term. Ah you know, not not there’s no need to get defensive, or no need to, you know, it’s okay, like it’s fine. You can just change and be different. It’s really okay, It’s not a big deal at all. That’s good. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Yeah, exactly. Rich Birch — Well you’ve actually written a book about this that I want to make sure people check out. It’s called “The Accessible Church: Making the Church a Welcoming Place for Children with Special Needs and from Traumatic Backgrounds”. Rich Birch — This is I think a fantastic resource for so many churches as they’re thinking about these issues, wrestling with what a great kind of resource for them to pick up. But talk to me about you know what led you to this a huge project to pull a book together, and you know think about these things in an area that is constantly changing. That’s a that’s a struggle. So yeah, what what brought you to the point of saying, yeah, this is this is what I should be doing next. This is a good step here. Kerri-Ann Hayes — So as as our church began to grow, as more and more of these families started coming in, and the reason why the book refers to traumatic backgrounds as well is because we started off in special needs and then all of a sudden saw this huge influx of families from foster care and adoption. And we realized that some of the trauma that they had experienced caused them to struggle to be a part of our church. But, what we were doing for our families with special needs… Rich Birch — Is similar. Yeah. Kerri-Ann Hayes — …worked for them as well. So as as I was learning, as I was walking alongside these families I was journaling as well and through this process, I had a local church reach out to me and say, I have a family with autism. We’re sending them your way because we know that you can serve this family well. And immediately my thought was, but this family didn’t choose our church. They they chose your church… Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yes. Kerri-Ann Hayes — …and I want them in your church. So how do I take what we saw work in our church and package it in a way that I can hand it to you and say, you could do this too. It’s part of there not being a PhD behind my name to say, here ministry leaders, you you too can do this. And in the book we actually, ah you know, someone recently referred to it as case studies. And I said, I didn’t think about that. But there’s actual stories of kids that if you read their story you might say, oh, I’ve seen this child in in my church. And hopefully the tips and the tools that that are shared there will help that child in your church as well. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. Well I’d love for people to pick, ah you know, pick up there’s ah there’s so much in here. You know we’ve got The Beauty of an Accessibility Ministry, Rethinking Ministry, Redefining Effective Ministry, The Power of Story, Special Needs, Trauma in the Church – there’s so much here. Um, yeah, that’s interesting the connection on trauma. Literally just this week I was talking to a parent of who they identified their child as um, struggling with PTSD. And I was like, oh that’s interesting. Like and had a fascinating conversation with them around those and was struck by the same, you know, the same kind of stuff that they, you know, here’s a kid that’s been through some really tough stuff, but, you know, we were able to help them and have tried to create some space, you know, for them. Rich Birch — When when you think about, um, you know, churches out there who’ve maybe taken the first couple steps or, you know, they’re thinking about this area, they’ve they’ve tried to serve a few people and now they’re starting to get more and more families, you know, come on board, is there a tipping point here where it goes from we’re just helping a few families to like, okay, I think I think we have declared we actually do have a ministry to, you know, kids with special needs. What is that, you know, what’s that line look like or is it fuzzy in different churches? What’s that look like? Kerri-Ann Hayes — Well I would say it’s definitely fuzzy in different churches. Rich Birch — Yeah. Kerri-Ann Hayes — But I will say for from my experience what happened in our church was we started out with the one. And we started to develop some practices in our ministry that we didn’t just focus on the one, we started saying, well what if we did this for the whole ministry? Like if this child can’t sit still through our teaching time, maybe we need to rethink our teaching time. Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Maybe we need to break it up into segments that are are easier for the child to consume and to be a part of. As we did that, more and more came in. So I would say when we reached a place of 5 to 10 was when we started saying, okay, this is an actual ministry within our ministry. And it really did grow from it really grew from there. And it was word of mouth. Kerri-Ann Hayes — And we all know that when a pastor stands in the front of the church and says we need volunteers that that tends to fall on deaf ears. But I will say that as this story played out in our church, our pastor on one Sunday shared a story of a boy with autism who was going to be baptized. Rich Birch — So sweet. Kerri-Ann Hayes — He had brought his whole family to church and now he’s going to be baptized. And he shared this story. And I’m standing in another wing of the church. And 26 people come up to me to sign up to be part of the special needs ministry. Rich Birch — Wow, Right. Wow. That’s amazing. Kerri-Ann Hayes — You know, that’s the that’s the power of story. And I would say it’s it’s word of mouth that helped us to organically create this team that allowed us to welcome more and more children in. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. I love that. Now what happens, so as obviously as kids grow, they become adults. You know that one year after another. And then in a beautiful way I’ve seen churches as a whole start to say hey we need our entire ministries need to become more accessible. What are we seeing as now churches like yours in Florida, and others across the country who’ve been you know, really pioneering this, seeing this journey over decades, what impact is it is it having on the broader really beyond children’s ministry and looking at the entire you know entire ministry? What’s that look like? Kerri-Ann Hayes — So it’s interesting because I think that children’s ministry got the largest focus in the beginning because, like I said, if the child can’t participate in the church then the entire family can’t participate in the church. Rich Birch — Right, right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — But what has happened is once some churches have figured out how to serve those families, those kids are now moving into youth ministry as well. What I’m seeing across the country right now is more of a focus on how do we welcome youth who are neuro-diverse, who are coming in with those invisible challenges. Ah putting a buddy with a thirteen year old in a middle school youth group is not attractive. So there’s a different way that we have to serve them so how how do we walk that out? I’m also seeing churches, I worked with a church in Indianapolis that put in a sensory room for their teenagers. It’s probably one of the coolest places. They called it… Rich Birch — Oh that’s cool. Kerri-Ann Hayes — The Chill Out Spot. And it was an inexpensive endeavor for them to take on. They hung Christmas lights from the ceiling. They put in ah puzzles and you know more cooperative activities versus competitive. There has been this theme in youth ministry, and I think we kind of get away from it then we come right back into it. Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — And it’s that big game competitive, but that doesn’t work for our kids… Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — …who have autism. But you give them something that’s collaborative and they soar. Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — And it’s great for them. So I think what we’re seeing is the rethinking of youth ministry now as well as how do we create spaces? How do we create awareness in our volunteers that these students are coming in? Kerri-Ann Hayes — Here’s the interesting thing. Our teenagers know the term neurodiverse. Rich Birch — Yeah, hundred percent. Kerri-Ann Hayes — I have had I’ve had teenagers introduce themselves to me as, I am neuro-divergent. They’re okay with this. Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — We need to make sure that our volunteers who are serving them know the best practices for getting to know them. Ah, who said it, was it Ted Lasso or was it Walt Whitman, nobody knows. But we need to be curious, not judgmental. Rich Birch — Right. Kerri-Ann Hayes — So finding out by working with teenagers to ask what is going to be the best way for us to incorporate them into our worship environments. Rich Birch — Um, yeah, that’s so good. I love that. And that’s true. You know about about young people and and, man, we want. Um I think that’s amazing. Like you think I think I think it’s great that we live in a world where. You know a young person can can introduce himself as neuro-divergent, and then we can be, roll with it and say, hey, let’s – great! We’re so glad you’re here. Come on in, you know, we’re happy for you to be a part of our ministry. And and um, yeah, that’s just beautiful. That’s a beautiful picture for sure. I hope the church can get this right as we continue to move forward in this area. Rich Birch — Well, I would love people to pick up, if people want to get copies of your book, where… To me, what I was struck about this was this seems like the kind of book that we should read as a team. Like maybe if I’m if I’m you know on the next gen team at our church, like hey maybe 3 or 4 or 5 or 6 of us we should all buy this and and read through it together. That really struck me as a way to kind of use this. But where where do we want to send people to pick up copies of the book? Kerri-Ann Hayes — Yeah, the book is available on Amazon. Rich Birch — Nice. That’s where people get books these days, apparently. Kerri-Ann Hayes — That is where they get them. Rich Birch — That’s great. Well this has been fantastic. As we wrap up today’s episode, anything else you’d like to share? Kerri-Ann Hayes — Yeah I just I want to encourage churches and church leaders to not feel like they have to do everything. Rich Birch — That’s good. Kerri-Ann Hayes — I work with churches that say, you know we do respite events and we do it really well and we’re working to include families on Sundays. There are some churches that do big events like Night to Shine and that’s really they there that’s where their position when it comes to disability. I think that every church can do something. Rich Birch — That’s good. Kerri-Ann Hayes — But I will so and I and I want to end with this. I shared that 1 in 36 children has autism. I worked with a church recently with 100 children and fifteen of them have autism. We as the church need to ask the question why? Why is there a larger ah population of children and teens in our churches? I think, as I’m researching, I think the answer is because they need community and they want to find it in our church. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. Well this has been a fantastic conversation. I really appreciate you being here today Kerri-Ann. If people want to get in touch with you reach out, maybe they’re you know wrestling through these questions. They’d love to get, I know you’ll you’ll definitely help them, even with some one-on-one support. What’s the best way for for them to reach out to you? Kerri-Ann Hayes — So the best way would probably be by email and now I can give it to you now. Rich Birch — Yeah. Kerri-Ann Hayes — It’s super long but it’s ah ah K-E-R-R-I kerri-ann.hayes@ministryarchitects.com. Rich Birch — Love it. Kerri-Ann Hayes — I’m also on Instagram and Facebook. Rich Birch — Love it. So good. And that’s Hayes with an “e” so H-A-Y-E-S. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Y-E-S, yes. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s great. Kerri-Ann, I really appreciate you being here today. Thank you so much for what you’re doing and for, you know, just pointing us to I think a better future in so many of our churches. So thanks for being here today. Kerri-Ann Hayes — Thanks, Rich! Thanks for the opportunity to talk about something that I think is so important to our churches today.

Welcome to this week’s unSeminary podcast. This week we’re sitting down with Brian Tome, the founder and senior pastor at Crossroads Church in Cincinnati – one of the fastest growing and most innovative churches in the country. Whether we realize it or not, the systems in our churches are often set up to cater to women more than men. Many Christian men are dissatisfied with their faith and the current state of men’s ministry. How do we attract and engage more men in our churches? Tune in as Brian talks about men’s ministry, Man Camp, and spiritual awakening. Understand your church’s systems. // Many churches aren’t naturally set up to to attract men. The current demographic makeup of a church is not accidental; it reflects the underlying systems in place. Church leaders need to examine the structures at their churches consider how they might be unintentionally excluding men. Even the programming or worship songs we choose can appeal more to women while alienating men. Challenges men face. // If we want to reach our culture, Brian believes that we need to acknowledge that men are a vulnerable demographic that we need to focus on. Men face significant challenges in society, including higher rates of suicide and substance abuse, a declining life expectancy, and gradually being locked out of opportunities. Churches need to recognize and address these issues to effectively reach men. Engaging men. // To address the challenge of attracting men, Crossroads Church chose colors and messaging that resonated with a male audience from the beginning. Over time, the church has continued to evolve its approach, focusing on creating environments where men feel comfortable and engaged. One of the standout initiatives at Crossroads is “Man Camp,” which Brian describes as a transformative experience for men. Man Camp. // Inspired by a motorcycle trip where he witnessed the power of vulnerability and connection among men, Brian envisioned an event that would facilitate similar experiences in a camp setting. Man Camp provides an opportunity for men to bond over shared activities, engage in meaningful conversations, and step out of their comfort zone in the great outdoors. The weekend includes a variety of activities, from competitive events to more relaxed gatherings around a campfire. Participants are required to bring their own food and supplies, creating a primitive camping experience that challenges men to take ownership of their time together. Spiritual awakening. // Looking ahead, Brian’s desire is for Man Camp to contribute to a broader awakening among men, and women, in the church. He believes that the church is overdue for a significant spiritual revival and that initiatives like Man Camp can play a crucial role in facilitating this change. Church leaders need to think outside traditional church growth strategies and explore new avenues for outreach and engagement to continue to reach our culture with the gospel. Challenge your faith. // Man Camp isn’t just for members of Crossroads Church, or even just believers – it’s open worldwide to men who are ready to be challenged physically, mentally and spiritually. If you’re ready to move beyond your spiritual comfort zone, this year Man Camp will be held from September 27-29 in Ohio. Register before September 1st at mancamp.us. Authenticity in ministry. // Many men, both believers and non-believers, are dissatisfied with their lives, faith, and the current state of men’s ministry. Church leaders need to create environments that are genuine and relatable, rather than overly polished or traditional, when trying to engage the men in their communities. Authenticity in ministry can help men feel more comfortable and open to exploring their faith. Visit www.mancamp.us to register for Man Camp on September 27-29, 2024. You can also learn more about Crossroads Church at www.crossroads.net and Brian Tome at www.briantome.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! Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in. I’m really looking forward to today’s conversation. We’ve got Brian Tome with us. He’s the founding and senior pastor at Crossroads Church in the cultural epicenter of the world, Cincinnati, Ohio. Crossroads has started in 1995 under Brian’s leadership. Crossroad has since expanded to becoming one of the largest churches in the country. But these guys are super innovative. Everything that Crossroads does, every time I interact with anybody from Crossroads, I’m leaned in, I’ve got my notepad open, and I’m learning. So honored to have Brian with us. He’s an author of a number of books, including The Aggressive Life, The Aggressive Life, which is a podcast that he hosts. And he leads a movement called Man Camp. Welcome to the show, Brian. So glad you’re here.Brian Tome — Great to be with you, Rich. I actually don’t have a book called Aggressive Life. That’s the podcast. Five Marks of a Man – not that I’m trying to hawk my wares right now. But no, it’s good. No. It’s good. It’s good to be with you, man. Thanks for having me on. I’m honored.Rich Birch — I appreciate you correcting that. That’s good stuff. Talk to us about Crossroads. Kind of give us the story there. If people were to arrive this weekend, what would they experience? Give us a sense of the church.Brian Tome — Oh, gosh. Well, if they arrived here this weekend, they probably would be very similar to any mega-church, really. I mean, we all look the same, you know. You know, a lot of people, a lot of loud music, you know, some half decent teaching and a lot of video. And you know, free coffee and away you go. Brian Tome — Now that was that was not the way it was way back when. You know, when we when we started Crossroads, there were a lot of things that we were doing that no one was doing before. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — But those things are very common. Like we were giving away coffee before I think any anybody was. They would have to have a little, you know, coffee cup that was there. When people were selling tapes, literally selling tapes, we were giving it away with with stickers on the tapes that said, please reproduce. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — When we were making sure we had 100 DB in our worship music because we knew people needed a concert environment. When believers would come to our midst, it was, you know, that was not what they expected. Rich Birch — Right. Yeah. Brian Tome — So but right now it looks pretty much like any other church. A lot of people, a lot of people don’t, wouldn’t be willing to say that or admit it, but there’s differences. There certainly is. But but they’re very similar… Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — …which is kind of what I’m most excited about, Rich, if you just want me to babble for a little bit here. Rich Birch — Sure, yeah. Brian Tome — I love unSeminary. You know, when I was, when I was in seminary, cemetery, seminary, I was when I was in seminary… Rich Birch — Yeah. Brian Tome — …I chose the seminary I went to because I was in a local church that I knew was undergoing a lot of changes, and I would get a lot of leadership lessons there. So I went to a small seminary in Pittsburgh, knowing that I would also get a practical education from North Park Church… Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — …in how to transition to church from traditional hymn singing pews into something contemporary and all that stuff, you know? Rich Birch — Right. Yeah. Brian Tome — That’s why I stayed there. I knew that seminary was not going to be preparing me practically for ministry. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — That’s why I thought I needed theologically. But second, prepare me, prepare me, practically. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — And then from there, it was about innovating and thinking through, okay, what is it that I’m supposed to do? How does God want to use me? Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — And a lot of the moves you make when you first start a church or first start leadership, they’re copy and paste moves. Rich Birch — Right, right. Brian Tome — You find out what works and you copy and paste, but then eventually, you start innovating and branching out.Rich Birch — Yeah, I love it. One of the things that for me as an outsider looking in at Crossroads that has, I think, been a hallmark of, of your ministry… So many of our churches, we talk about what we’re trying to create, a place for guys to come. You know, we’re trying to create a place where, you know, whatever it is, 35 year old male, 28 year old male, what we all talk about in different ways, we would love for those guys to come. But when we look at the actual people attending our church, it’s 60/70% women, which is not a that’s not a not degradation of the women that are attending our churches… Brian Tome — Right. Rich Birch — …but our churches don’t seem to be naturally set up to want to attract guys. Why is that? What what what’s happening there. Diagnose that problem for us.Brian Tome — Yeah. Well, you you to build a large church or a large organization, you have to understand the basic rule. Your systems are set up to give you exactly what you’re currently getting. You’re not getting what you’re getting by accident.Rich Birch — Yep.Brian Tome — Your systems are set up for it. And so when and you may not even know you have a system. Rich Birch — Yes. Brian Tome — You may have never planned it, but you have a system that’s producing the results that you have right now. Excuse me, excuse me. So you’re right. When we look at churches, we’re clearly we have a system, clearly, that works for women and clearly not for men. I mean, can we just start there and admit that? Rich Birch — Admit that. Yeah. Brian Tome — And there’s a bunch of signs, a bunch of reasons for that. I could go into the normal litany, of course, that a lot of people know, but we just got to just say, hey, if we want to reach a culture and we actually want to reach right now, believe it or not, the most vulnerable part of our culture, which is men. Men.Rich Birch — Unpack that, unpack that, talk about that a little bit more.Brian Tome — Men are four times more likely to commit suicide than women.Rich Birch — Right.Brian Tome — Men are decreasing in life expectancy, unlike women. Men are two times more likely to have an alcohol abuse related or chemical dependency issue than women are. Grad schools right now are 70% female. We know from our history he or she were the best education that has the most money. So we’re men are being locked out of opportunities, or at least will be very very soon. We have an ongoing discussion about toxic masculinity. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — It’s it’s I when I get asked I get to ask that all the time. And my, my first response is, have you ever heard the phrase toxic femininity?Rich Birch — Right.Brian Tome — Of course you haven’t, because you would get stoned if you did. Rich Birch — Right, right, right. Brian Tome — But yet we talk about toxic. Like if someone has a gun and a pickup truck, then is that toxic masculinity? We say if someone drives a pink car and wears eyeshadow, is that toxic femininity? Rich Birch — Right, right. Brian Tome — Not everybody has to have those things. But I’m just going, like, even how we talk about it with men. We we belittle men. If a man is having a friendship, we don’t know how to categorize it. So we call it a bromance. We call it a man crush. Because we we… Rich Birch — Yeah, we don’t know what to do with it.Brian Tome — And our churches are structured to have women. They just are. Our worship songs or love songs to Jesus. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — They’re not the kind of songs that men connect with from of old. Things like Our Mighty Fortress is Our God. My gosh, Onward Christian Soldiers! You couldn’t even do that today. I don’t know what you’re saying about Christian Soldiers. Are you saying we’re pro gun? Are we are we saying we’re going to… Just freaking relax?Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. Take a take a breath. Yeah, yeah. Brian Tome — Take a song. You know what a beautiful name it is. Wait, no, no, no. What a beautiful name it is, the name of Jesus. You know that that that that thing. Rich Birch — Yeah, yah.Brian Tome — That’s weird. I love that song. It’s weird. Rich Birch — Right, right. Brian Tome — What a beautiful name, Rich, is the name of Rich. What a beautiful name.Rich Birch — Right, right. You would never say that.Brian Tome — You’ll be okay hearing wonderful name, powerful name, but it’s just. And we don’t think much about it because it’s in the water. It’s our system to reach and communicate women to, not men.Rich Birch — Right, right. Okay, so so I know churches will do they’ll be like, okay, we’ve got to fix this problem. And so then we end up with, like I would say, real milquetoast solutions. We end up with like, Saturday morning, you know… Brian Tome — Pancake breakfast. Rich Birch — …pancake breakfast, which is not what Crossroads is doing by any means. Compare and contrast why is that? Like so that is like so, you know, repulsive to me. I’m like, I don’t want to be a part of that. I don’t want to sit around in a, you know, a pancake breakfast. But yeah, talk to us about what is it that that Crossroads has done to try to tap into guys to connect with them?Brian Tome — I so we started, at the very beginning, even before we started to have a focus on men, and God started to refine some things in me, from the beginning, this came from our marketing team. We used to have a mailer – all of our people were all volunteers… Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — …a lot of them from Proctor and Gamble, which at that point still arguably today is still the the king marketer in the world. Right? Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — I mean, they’re making money convincing people that soapy solutions, they should buy theirs versus somebody else’s.Rich Birch — Right, right. Yeah.Brian Tome — I hate the target is men. We have to reach men. There they were saying. And a woman led that up, Vivienne Bechtold. We got women, if if we reach men, then we can get women. And men are decision makers and all that. That’s what we believed in 1995. So we chose the colors we had, and we chose the copy we had, thinking about men. So that was the that was the beginning of thinking that. Right?Brian Tome — And then as and then as time went on, you start to say, all right, well, who is God uniquely made me? He’s made me a man. And what would I like to do as a man? Well, let’s start doing that at Crossroads. And so we just kept building from there, really. Brian Tome — And I don’t think I don’t think our church can do that, Rich. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — I think, I think, nor do I think all churches should do that. I’m really big right now on 2 Timothy 4:5 where Paul’s talking to Timothy and he tells them things. Three of them everybody should do. One of them, no. One, he says be sober minded. Great. Let’s be sober minded. Let’s think clearly. Two, two is endure affliction. We’re all going to have crappy times. And the reason we have so many people deconstructing, leaving the faith, not giving people a proper doctrine of difficulty, that life is just hard. Sometimes you just have to suck it up and embrace the suck. Brian Tome — Third thing he says is do the work of evangelism. Doesn’t say have the gift of evangelism. All of us, no matter what our gifting are, we’ve got to be sharing our faith. And the fourth thing and this is the thing that’s unique to everybody. He says, fulfill your ministry. Emphasis YOUR – fulfill your ministry. Timothy never wrote any books that went in the New Testament. Timothy never went to other countries on ships to share the gospel, at least not that I know of. Timothy never, as far as I know, you know, went and started a bunch of other churches. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — Maybe maybe on that. But he didn’t. What I’m saying is he didn’t have the Apostle Paul’s ministry. Fulfill his ministry. Rich Birch — Right, right, right. Brian Tome — And we’ve got to get more people in the kingdom of God that know uniquely what they can do in fulfilling your ministry. Not Steven Furtick’s ministry… Yeah, it’s true. Brian Tome — …not Brian Tome’s ministry, not anybody. Your ministry.Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s great. I love that. I’ve said in other environments that one of my impressions of being around, you know, multiplicity of lead pastors who have led churches that have grown, you know, they’ve gone beyond a thousand, 2000, 3000, they’re growing 4- or 5000 people, is it does seem like over time those ministries become, you know, it’s like the lead pastors and the leadership of the church. They become more of themselves. They become more of like they take on a unique personality. That’s a part of what I think God uses. So I love that. That’s a great a great reminder from Scripture. Rich Birch — Well, let’s talk about a specific outworking of this kind of approach to trying to connect with guys. Man Camp. What is Man Camp? Explain this to me.Brian Tome — Okay, so I was on a motorcycle trip once where we camp off of our motorcycles. And it was a tough day before. It rained at night. We got up in the morning, we were having coffee around a fire, and somebody opened up and shared something real vulnerable about their life. And I realized this happens all the time. We’re pushed. We’re in an uncomfortable place. We’re standing in the fire. We’re having some beverages at night or in the morning or whatever it is. And someone and someone opens up and stimulates a great conversation. Brian Tome — And I said, yo, we should do this, but not expect people to have a motorcycle. What could you do? You know… Rich Birch — Love it. Brian Tome — …what could we do that would give people a sense of adventure, a sense of mystery, of unknown, where they sit around a fire and talk? And that’s when man camp was born. And all those people around that, around that campfire, were the leadership became the leadership core for Man Camp and are still serving at Man Camp, to this day on everything. And we we did a we found a guy with a farm in Indiana, and we sold out tickets. Like, people put credit cards in to open up at 6 a.m. Sold out 90 seconds. 500 tickets sold out in 90 seconds. Rich Birch — That’s crazy. Brian Tome — We said, okay, let’s do that again. So we did another one. A make up in two weeks. Same thing. 500, 500 gone like in minutes, you know. Done. And then we went to an abandoned ATV park and then did. And then we bought our own land, and then we just bought more land to add on to our land. So, and, and we’re seeing, yeah, we’re seeing, quite breakthrough in men’s lives and people coming to Christ like crazy supernatural stuff like, tongues… Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — …tongues, breaking out in the prayer tent where people are hearing Portuguese that they have never spoken or heard. Rich Birch — Wow, wow. Brian Tome — And we had four countries come to the last one.Rich Birch — Yeah. Amazing.Brian Tome — 41 states and four countries. And we had the situation with, people came from Portugal. Rich Birch — Right. Wow. Brian Tome — And one of the guys speaks the gift of tongues inside of the personal prayer language thing. And he said, I’m, I’m just gonna try this and see what it goes with this thing. And he did it. And they all there was one of them spoke English, and the guy who spoke English said, we don’t know what you’re speaking. But we all understand, stood every word you heard you said, and we understood it exactly. Here’s what you said.Rich Birch — Wow. Brian Tome — It’s interesting when you read Acts 2, you’re not sure if there’s a supernatural ability for people to speak ah speak Portuguese who haven’t heard it, or if the people in Portugal are hearing it the way they can understand.Rich Birch — Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.Brian Tome — It’s uncertain. So, and we got right beside that is that crazy stuff is happening. We’ve got a beer a beer truck right beside. We went through 100 kegs of beer last time. And, and that’s kind of the magic of Man Camp. It’s all the things that men normally do, all wedged together. And you think it shouldn’t work, but it does. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — When you have guys together camping, someone’s going to be drinking. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — And when you have guys who are together and they, a good percentage of them know Jesus, they’re going to be talking about Jesus. Let’s put it all together. And that’s really where the power is.Rich Birch — How does the programming work? Is it is it overly programmed, or is it just kind of like a menu? Here’s a whole bunch of stuff to do. How what are you finding is working on that front from a like how you know what’s actually happening during the few days that you’re away?Brian Tome — Yeah. All I mean, all men are different, you know, some drive minivans, some drive trucks, some like to shoot guns. Some people hate guns. Some are married. Some… But there’s no prototypical man. I don’t think. So Man Camp has to be, meets different men where they are. If you want to do a machismo arm wrestling competition, if you got muscle mass, great, we got it for you. RIch Birch — Sure. Brian Tome — If you want to, you know, have some, have some beers. Great. If you don’t, we make a big thing like a lot of people shouldn’t drink. And some of the most manly men are in recovery and some people here should be in recovery. Great. We, you know, we we do that sort of thing. But we do the common thing is we try to meet men where they are and let them be off. Let them be themselves. Let them have a different environment with other men who understand them, quite frankly, more than any other woman.Rich Birch — Right. Interesting. Now our so people are bringing all their own stuff. It sounds like they’re bringing their own food. It’s like, you know, it’s pretty primitive. Is that by design… Brian Tome — Yes. Rich Birch — …or are you hoping long term, like, talk us through that part?Brian Tome — No, it’s very it’s primitive by design. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — We are we are not looking to give you another thing you can buy, we entertain you with. You got to figure it the freak out. You got to figure it out. That’s that’s a major problem. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — So we’re not going to build, like, retreat facilities because it would be a financial and maintenance nightmare. No, you got to bring something to the thing. We’re going to give you one lunch, and we’re going to give you a program and structure. But no, your group have to figure out who’s doing breakfasts, who’s doing dinners, how all that stuff’s happen. No, that that that’s very intentional.Rich Birch — Yeah. Interesting. Now what is when you think about the future, you know, as you’re obviously this has grown. It started you know, with a couple of weekends and you know now you’ve got a lot of folks showing up. What’s your heart for this for the long term? Obviously this doesn’t seem like the kind of thing, this isn’t a passing fad. You guys are committed to this. You bought land. You’re trying to you know, this is like a significant deal you’re thinking about here. But talk to us where do you think this is going?Brian Tome — I think where it’s going and where I’m praying for is a is an awakening. An awakening on a mass scale in our country for men and women. That’s where I think it’s going. I think we’re way overdue for an awakening. And I’m tired of just incrementally growing the church on pastoring. I’m tired of just adding another campus that needs to happen, and I knighted somebody else here to do that work while I’m still engaged with it.Brian Tome — But like, you know, if an if a church growing by 20% was going to change America would, if another campus was, it would… Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — We got to start trying some new things. Where where are the future Jim Rayburns, who started Young Life and ship people from all over the country and got his bus company to take kids out? Where where’s the Bill Brights that had a vision put Campus Crusade on every single campus and four spiritual laws and people raise money. Where are those ideas? All we’re doing is trying to replicate somebody else’s success. And I think this may be the thing that maybe God is asking us to do. And it may be the thing that unlocks the masses of people. We’re way overdue, Rich, for an awakening on a mass scale. Rich Birch — Yeah, amen. Absolutely. Brian Tome — And they all happen outside, by the way.Rich Birch — Well talk to you about that. That’s an interesting idea. Talk talk to me about about your conviction about a revival is happening outside.Brian Tome — Yeah. Well okay. So revivals if you’re going to revivals, like Christians having their faith revived, that can happen inside. Rich Birch — Sure.Brian Tome — But if you’re talking about awakenings, which is where the Spirit of God descends in a region and there is conversions on a large scale and the structures are changed and shifted, we have a bunch of those that we can study. George Whitfield, George Whitfield, gosh, Wesley, all that stuff. Well, the most recent revival that took place, which was amazing down in Asbury. I’m so bummed I didn’t go to that because it’s an hour away, and I found out about it. I could have gone the next day after it happened. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — And I just waited too long. Too late. But, you know, Francis Asbury was named for Francis Asbury. Francis Asbury wrote 300,000 miles on horseback… Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — …going outside, preaching in the settlements, 300,000 miles, you know. Rich Birch — Right, right. Brian Tome — And so these things, is it outside because it’s cheaper? Is it outside because people aren’t boxed in? Outside you feel closer to God. Outside because the walls are blown out and you can see. Outside because the most palpable presence of God seems to be in the tabernacle versus the temple.Brian Tome — You know? You ever notice that? Like the description in the Pentateuch is very clear – pillar of fire, cloud. It’s, and then when it goes inside the temple, it’s like, waa-waa. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. Brian Tome — Like there’s some stuff going in there, but it’s just. So there’s something, I think, in the history of the Spirit of God, there’s something about the sanctuary of outside. We’re ready for another one of those things. We’re ready for a Woodstock of spiritual proportions.Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s a great insight. You know, I think, like, even in even you look in the book of Acts, right? Like Paul is going from place to place to place. He goes somewhere, a riot breaks out, then he’s got to go somewhere else, like, that, you know, that’s a fascinating insight. I can see where, you know, I wonder if a part of it is when the church kind of settles down and finally gets reasonable and has a, you know, a building and all that, the risk goes out of it. Brian Tome — Right.Rich Birch — The, you know, the our faith isn’t stretched as much. And so we’re not, you know, we’re not leaning out there where, you know, by definition, if you’re if you’re taking people out into the middle of nowhere, there’s a ton of risk in this.Brian Tome — I’m pro-buildings. Rich Birch — Yes. Brian Tome — We’re building a very expensive building in Dayton, Ohio right now. Very, very, very, very. The construction costs are ridiculous. So I’m pro-buildings. Brian Tome — I just also know that if you look at the history of Christendom, there’s big jumps that happen spiritually outdoors. And if I look at some of the things I’m really excited about, it’s, It’s what’s happening in our camps. Are you familiar with that that study that came out of, came out of Gordon Cromwell, what was it? Four years ago, about how much it cost to baptize a person?Rich Birch — Oh, I remember that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.Brian Tome — Yeah, yeah. I’m gonna look up the up the things right now. They they they basically looked at all of all the money given to Christian causes, churches, non-profits and the number of people who were baptized.Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — And they divided it, which that’s a pretty big deal, right? It’s like…Rich Birch — Right.Brian Tome — …great commission. And and in 2017, the number, the number per baptism, what it costs, excuse me, 2014, is $753,000. So to get someone saved and baptized cost $753,000. They’re projecting that 2025, it would be $1.4 Million dollars… Rich Birch — Right, it’s unscalable.Brian Tome — …per baptism. Wow. Now so I just looked at Crossroads and I said, okay, I’m curious, where are we? Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — At 70 million bucks given last year, we baptized 2000 people, it was came out to be like, I don’t know, 30,000 bucks or what is that, the person in my room, whatever it is. So not bad. But I tell you what was really crazy when I looked at, when I looked at what it meant for camps, you know what camps was? Rich Birch — How much?Brian Tome — Camps was it was, oh, where is it I’m giving $769 a baptism. When we factored in all the land, all the staff, all the all the, the program 769. So that is like the most…Rich Birch — Super compelling.Brian Tome — Oh my gosh.Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah..Brian Tome — I don’t know. Is that what it is? I don’t know. I just think we’ve got to get back to our roots, and our roots as human beings is spending more, more time outside.Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. Now, is is Man Camp open? Like, is this just a Crossroads thing or is it open to guys outside of Crossroads? Talk us through that. How does that work?Brian Tome — Well, we have 41 states and four countries. So Crossroads is not in 41 states and four countries. Rich Birch — Yes. Yeah, yeah. Brian Tome — No. This is a this is a movement of men. In fact, what we have is we have some churches bring some of their men. Like, well, pastor, come and bring some folks. Or another guy one guy comes, just he saw it on social media, and then he’ll come the next year with three people, and it builds that way. So it certainly is a Crossroads, Crossroads is the financial engine behind that where the creative driver of it, but no, this is this is a man thing. This isn’t this isn’t a Crossroads thing.Rich Birch — Yeah that’s great.Rich Birch — So if I’m if I’m listening in today, I’m, you know, I’m a church leader, you’d encourage people to say, hey, like, maybe load up a maybe there’s even a small group of guys, a van load. Hey, let’s let’s jump in the car and go check this out. This year’s Man Camp is at the end of September. September 27th to the 29th. If people want information, they go to mancamp.us. What else we want to say to that kind of leader that’s listening in? I’m hoping they’ll be inspired to think outside the box, but is there anything else around, you know, Man Camp specifically that we want them to be thinking about?Brian Tome — I think it’s like with the rest of life, Rich. If you want something different, you got to try something different. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — This is something very different. I don’t meet many people who are satisfied with what’s happening with men. I don’t meet many people who are satisfied with the ministry endeavors that are gone towards men.Brian Tome — In fact, I meet very few Christian men who are satisfied with their faith. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s true. Brian Tome — I and this is we’re talking unbelievers. We’re talking believers. This this is not like a Christianese event. If it was a Christianese event, we wouldn’t be wouldn’t be going through 100, 100 kegs of beer last time. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — We had to make another beer run. You know, this is like… Rich Birch — Right, right. Brian Tome — It’s not Kumbaya or trying to impress all the churchy people. You’re going to hear language here that you might not like. We’re it’s men. It’s a it’s a men’s event. So I would say, why don’t you push yourself? Why don’t you try something. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — God’s using something here. Give yourself a different experience. There’s something that happens to us where we stop trying new things and exposing ourselves to new ministry methods.Rich Birch — Love that.Brian Tome — I push people to try it. Give it a try.Rich Birch — Well, so let’s talk about, so this is working. This is in the category of working. I think oftentimes we talk as church leaders. Hey you should try something new when we are referencing the things that are working. What’s something that you guys have tried at Crossroads that was like a giant wet fart that just did not go anywhere. That was like, oh, that didn’t work out. Like that was, you know, not a great.Brian Tome — A wet fart. I love that.Rich Birch — Sticking with the Man Camp theme.Brian Tome — Right. Well, we’re pretty, we’re pretty, we’re pretty, we’re pretty well, we’re pretty well known in church circles for our digital strategy, and our app, and how we engage people. We actually don’t count attendance anymore. Well, we do count physical attendance, but we count engagement. And we track a bunch of different things to tell people where they’re engaged. But the failure thing. We wasted millions of dollars. Millions. We’re having huge success right now. But we were a bit too, too rambunctious, too whatever, too high ourselves just to having rooms full of coders who were coding stuff that shouldn’t have been coded. That was a, that was a, a really, really huge, huge failure. Brian Tome — Our first our first Christmas show. We thought, man, Cincinnatians love Christmas things. They go to the same right Ebenezer Scrooge thing again and again and again. We should we should try to do a Christmas show that’s that’s spiritual in nature that has the Christian message in it. First one was just horrible. It was horrible. I mean, we wrote it; it was awful. It was called Imagine. You can’t imagine how bad it was. Seriously. I was getting I was getting emails like, what are you?!? I mean, it was so bad, like we didn’t have Christmas music. It didn’t even mention Jesus. It was really weird. Rich Birch — Right, right. Brian Tome — I’m serious. It was weird. We had light bulb guy that sort of looked like Christmas tree. That was it. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — It was it was horrible. Like people left the church over it. It was like, this is what we give you a Christmas. Boom. Well, but that was the beginning of, Awaited, Christmas show that we did that reached when we, before we shut down, it was last year. There was 125,000 people… Rich Birch — Right, right. Brian Tome — …at that thing. And, we’re actually working to bring it back. But that was a massive wet fart… Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — …That that that led to that. We’ve, our student ministry. Oh my gosh. Our student ministry has struggled since day one. Rich Birch — Right. Brian Tome — And it’s only been we’ve had a lot of people doing some good work there, but never been happy with where it’s been until the last two years. And like, we’ve got the right guy and it’s going it’s going good. But it’s been horrible. So we’ve had a lot of duds.Rich Birch — Right. Well this has been great. That on the innovation side, I think that’s one of those things, churches that have or organizations that have innovated do you have a long list of things that have not gone well and I appreciate you just even, you know, tapping into that. Rich Birch — Well, Man Camp, I really do want to encourage church leaders to check out mancamp.us for more information. I would, you know, I think this is fantastic. I love what you guys are doing. I just want to honor you for your leadership, for the good things that have happened at Crossroads over all these years. And in this kind of current iteration, I think it’s inspiring for sure. Going to give you the last word. What’s the last thing you’d love to say just as we wrap up today’s episode?Brian Tome — Jesus is Lord.Rich Birch — Love it. Nice. Brian Tome — Okay. That is that is the most important thing. But… Rich Birch — Yes. Brian Tome — …I would encourage I would encourage people, look, hey, fulfill your ministry. Your ministry. Rich Birch — Love it. Brian Tome — Cover bands don’t change the world. Rich Birch — Love it. Brian Tome — You’ve got you’ve got to learn your instrument by playing cover man cover band tunes, but if you want to change the world, you got to start writing your own stuff and doing something and it hasn’t been seen before. We need more people doing that. And seminaries aren’t preparing people for that. And the megachurch culture isn’t even encouraging people to do that. But we need more people who are doing their ministry, fulfilling it and finding it.Rich Birch — Love it. Well, thanks so much, Brian. Again, I would want to get people to check out mancamp.us. Is there anywhere else online we want to send people as we wrap up today’s episode?Brian Tome — If you want to do a deeper dive, you can go to briantome.com. And, if you want to see my day job, it’s Crossroads.net.Rich Birch — That’s great. Thanks so much. Thanks for being here today, Brian.Brian Tome — My pleasure Rich. Thanks for having me. A huge fan of what you’ve done and how you’re serving people. Really, really great, man. So I’m honored to be able to spend some time with you.

Nick Blevins, the Children and Student Team Leader at Community Christian Church and cofounder of Ministry Boost, dives into the crucial art of volunteer recruitment. He shares a five-part framework designed to help churches consistently attract and empower volunteers. Blevins emphasizes the importance of proactive outreach, suggesting that leaders should aim to connect with ten prospects for each needed volunteer. He also discusses practical strategies for onboarding and retaining volunteers, ensuring robust team dynamics that can sustain church growth.

Kristin Flynn, the Outreach Director at Liquid Church in New Jersey, discusses practical strategies for effective community and global outreach. She emphasizes focusing on three core initiatives: serving the hungry, homeless, and special needs community. Kristin shares the importance of collaboration and flexibility among campus leaders to manage diverse needs while staying aligned with the larger mission. The conversation highlights creative fundraising and the power of community partnerships to amplify impact and foster spiritual growth.

Thanks for joining us at the unSeminary podcast. Today we’re talking with Bryan Smith, the lead pastor of Summit Christian Church in Sparks, Nevada. We are increasingly living in a culture where many are completely unchurched, having no preconceived notion of what church looks like. Yet this can provide just the opportunity where people are open to learning about Jesus. Tune in as Bryan talks about the power of invitation, vulnerability, and embracing people with messy lives. The power of vulnerability. // Summit Christian Church has a unique story, having been founded in response to the area’s status as one of the most unchurched regions in the United States. Bryan highlights the importance of creating a comfortable and welcoming environment for newcomers, emphasizing that vulnerability and authenticity are key to connecting with unchurched individuals. At Summit the pastors will share personal struggles and life experiences, countering the stereotype of judgmental Christians. Rather than telling unchurched folks what they need to do, invite them into community and a journey with Jesus. Make time for pastoral care. // One of the telltale signs of a church that’s reaching unchurched people is that you have messy, complex, pastoral care. Summit Christian Church is dedicated to creating a welcoming environment where individuals who have faced challenges in their lives can find hope and healing. Pastors and elders have a rotating schedule so each day someone is available to meet with people seeking counsel or help. Use events to reach out. // Summit also works to create a noticeable presence in the community to ensure that if the church were to disappear, the community would notice its absence. From teacher appreciation initiatives and community service projects to outreach events such as RC car races and dodgeball tournaments, get creative about drawing people in who might not think about attending church. Surprise unchurched people with fun outreach events to show them church isn’t what they may have expected. Four team values. // To keep the staff moving in a positive direction, Summit has four team values they embrace: health, focus, whole life generosity, and achievable excellence. Bryan emphasizes that achievable excellence is particularly pertinent to staff health. The church wants to set the bar at a place where they can achieve without feeling defeated or putting in too little effort. The goal is to create sustainability in their staff, encourage healthy relationships and practices, and have them committed for the long haul while still pursuing excellence. Build relational health. // Health is a huge priority among the leadership and staff team, especially because Summit is a fast-growing church. Weekly staff meetings incorporate elements of fun and celebration, such as recognizing birthdays and engaging in team-building activities, like an optional, 30-minute 9-Square tournament each Tuesday. Have fun together, but don’t force these activities. Enjoy each other’s company in order to have a greater impact in the church and community. Building a strong relational foundation among the staff team makes it easier to tackle challenging issues. Setting realistic expectations, encouraging a sustainable work-life balance, and offering free counseling to the staff also helps prevent burnout. Trust what He’s doing. // Bryan wraps up by encouraging church leaders to stay humble and hungry for that one more person to come to Christ. Rather than worrying about the outcomes, continue to look at what God is doing and where He’s leading you. Surrender to His plan and He will help you lead your people well. You can learn more about Summit Christian Church at www.summitnv.org. 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: Risepointe Do you feel like your church’s facility could be preventing growth, and are you frustrated or maybe even overwhelmed at the thought of a complicated or costly building project? Are the limitations of your church building becoming obstacles in the path of expanding your ministry? Have you ever felt that your church could reach more people if only the facility was better suited to the community’s needs? Well, the team over at Risepointe has been there. As former ministry staff and church leaders, they understand how to prioritize and help lead your church to a place where the building is a ministry multiplier. Licensed all over North America, their team of architects, interior designers and project managers have the professional experience to help move YOUR mission forward. Check them out at Risepointe.com/unseminary and while you’re there get their FREE resource “10 Things to Get Right Before You Build”. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Well hey, friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you’ve gotta that you’ve tuned in. You’ve really tuned in for a great conversation today. You know every week we try to bring you a leader who will both inspire and equip you, and I’m real excited for today’s conversation – get a chance to meet a new friend, ah, Bryan Smith. He is the lead pastor at a church called Summit Christian Church, a nondenominational church located in Sparks, Nevada. They’re one of the fastest growing churches in the country and they’re launching a campus this fall, and somehow Bryan found his time in the middle of all that to sit down with us. Bryan, so glad you’re here. Thanks for being on the show today. Bryan Smith — Awesome. It’s great to be with you. And I appreciate that you pronounced our state’s name correctly. “Nevadda” not “Nevahda” -that is painful. Yeah. Rich Birch — Oh ok, that didn’t even know I was doing that right. Bryan Smith — You crushed it right out of the gates. Way to go. Rich Birch — Ah okay, that’s good. Well, that’s good. Well, tell me a little bit about Summit, kind of give me this story. Tell us a little bit about, you know, if I was to come this weekend, tell us give us a bit of the flavor of the church, that sort of thing. Bryan Smith — Yeah, Summit’s been around for 25 years, since Sparks; it’s a right I mean adjacent to Reno, Nevada, which is for people listening about 7 hours north of Vegas. Most people think we’re real close. We’re not. So it’s light years away from sort of what people think of in terms of Las Vegas. Bryan Smith — But Summit launched, our our founding pastor and his wife, Steve and Pam [inaudible], they launched because at the time Reno was the number one unchurched place in the nation. And so they said we’re going to launch a church there. Um, and so Summit has been in two different locations. We started you know at a YMCA, bought property kinda what felt like, at the time, out in the middle of nowhere. But right now it’s in the middle of everywhere… Rich Birch — That’s great. Bryan Smith — …as our community is expanding. Yeah, we’re on a sort of a highway, but it’s it’s got stop lights on it. And the the city put in a stoplight right in front of our church… Rich Birch — Wow. Okay. Bryan Smith — …that is the dumbest stoplight in the community. So lots of people get stuck and we joke about why’d you come to Summit? Was it our stoplight? So that’s kind of been kind of cool. So that’s worked out really well for us. Bryan Smith — But um Summit is from from day one just been about introducing people to Christ, seeing them grow the Lord, experience life change. We welcome in. We’re kind of messy. We don’t celebrate the mess, but we’re definitely messy as folks come in in our community they they are extremely unchurched, usually have blown up their lives, and show up and want to know, you know, what do I do at this blanken church? All right. We can work with that. You’re not churched. I like it. Rich Birch — I love it. Yeah yeah, yeah. Bryan Smith — I have one time—this a fun story—I had a guy come down the risers, our stadium seating, and and say, “hey pastor;” he’s kind of a bigger dude. And I’m like ah yeah? He goes I just want to tell you, and he starts crying. He’s like this church has f-ing changed my life. Rich Birch — Oh love it. Love it. Bryan Smith — And I’m like, you’re not from around here. Okay. And and you could tell the church people because they all kind of, you know, their head popped and around their neck jerked and they looked at me, and and I just gave a hug. And about a year after that got to do his wedding. Rich Birch — So good. A year after that just a couple months ago we got baptized. So. Rich Birch — So good. Bryan Smith — Yeah, so we’re and we’re known in our community as a church that serves, which is great. We we wanted to be that church if we disappear the community would notice. And man, we’re just humbly serving downtown. We’re serving in the schools this week. Teacher appreciation we’re serving meals breakfast or lunch to a bunch of different schools and caring for the teachers. Rich Birch — So good. Yes, we work really hard in welcoming people in and serving in our community, introducing them to Christ, and just seeing life change… Rich Birch — So good. Bryan Smith — …which is fantastic. Yeah. Rich Birch — Yeah, Bryan, I love that. And I you know people already are hearing why we’re so excited to have you on the on the podcast. I love the focus of reaching unchurched people and actually seeing that happen. I think lots of churches talk about that, but then when you have evidence like that, it’s just such a good thing to see. Rich Birch — But why don’t you give us a bit of context fill up fill out the picture a little bit more. To me if I was thinking of places in the country where churches would grow, Reno would not be on the list, and the fact that you’re growing there seems amazing, by God’s grace. Kind of tell us about that story. What’s what’s happening there? What’s God using at Summit to see that that happen? Bryan Smith — Yeah, it’s it’s fun. The the northern Nevada no one ever says I want to move to northern Nevada, but once they get heren once they get here… Like I’m a So. Cal. guy, came up in ’05 from Orange County, and and once once you get to northern Nevada, it’s a beautiful spot. And so we’ve got lots of like the community is growing. We’ve got lots of political refugees, they call themselves, from from California. But we’re we’re growing as a church because we make the place comfortable. Every church wants to be welcoming and and we work hard at that. We’ve we’ve got folks that come in and say, I felt welcome from day one. Bryan Smith — Um and and then we’re pretty vulnerable, whether that’s teaching from the stage or in our kids ministry, student ministry. And and I think we need that in an unchurched environment the the vulnerability where people have this preconceived notion of what Christians are – the judgmental, the kind of putting up a facade, and we work hard to push back against that and be just vulnerable and open and honest and present and show lots of grace. Um I do wish that everyone in our church sinned just like I did so I wouldn’t have to show as much grace, but they sin differently… Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good; I like that. Bryan Smith — …and and so yeah, so I’ve got to extend grace to them. They extend grace to me. Our our staff is, you know, we we hire people that we have to pump the brakes on, not light a fire under. So they’re going to get after it regardless of what we’re putting in front of them. And so that that filters down into our volunteers, and and then into the congregation of people that are like, man, this is a place where I feel loved, and I meet Jesus, my life has been changed where, you know, that that old thing a bunch of beggars telling other beggars where the food is. Rich Birch — Yeah, love it. Bryan Smith — So we’re not. We’re not pretentious. We’re not showy. I think probably we work hard at just being understated… Rich Birch — Yeah. Bryan Smith — …because that’s who we are. Rich Birch — Love it. Bryan Smith — And and that’s our community too. Our community is not flashy. Um, we’re not terribly showy. But um, yeah, so I don’t… Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. Bryan Smith — …there’s some shooting from the hip things. Rich Birch — Yeah, I’d love to talk a little bit more about that. Even you know, pulling back the curtain a little bit, I love before our our interview today you’re like, I’m not sure why you why you called us. And I’m like well, which I which are you’re living that out here. You know that you’re living out your you know, kind of not flashy, just kind of norma, which I love, I think is great. Let’s talk about the vulnerability thing a little bit. From your perspective, how do you cultivate that as a leader? There was a time—I think you and I are a similar generation—there was a time I think when we first started that there were it was like people wanted religious leaders to be like something different and like they’re like we want them to be like a totally different person, but that’s just not true anymore people are looking for people that are like them that are vulnerable. Talk to us about how do you cultivate that kind of culture where people can come as they are um, and you know it’s it’s not doesn’t matter why you came but obviously it’s because of Jesus that we stay. And and but so talk us through that. What’s that look like for you as a community? Bryan Smith — Yeah, I think the vulnerability part is we we don’t tell people, “and you need to do this.” We’re inviting them into something that that… Rich Birch — That’s good. Bryan Smith — …and hey if if your life you’ve blown up your life, I can tell you what you need to do. Like I know I should probably eat less fast food, but I’m going, to I love Del Taco it’s like Taco Bell but way worse. And… Rich Birch — Yes. Or better, depending, you know. Bryan Smith — Yeah, it’s all about perspective. But but if you tell someone what they need to do, ah, you know there’s that backfire effect and and they’re just going to dig their heels in. So we go, Okay, here’s here’s where you’re at; here’s where you could be. Let’s let’s invite you into that life change. Rich Birch — That’s good. Bryan Smith — Let’s invite you into interacting with with Jesus, interacting with the community. And that the things that are um, destroying your life, let’s get rid of those. I think so the invitation the the inviting culture. Bryan Smith — I think too um, we’re we’re pretty open about our past. And and not celebrating our past. Like I hate to say it, but my past um, in in high school convinced mom to get cable, and found Cinemax, became Skinemax late at night at the age of 16 without a dad in the house, and so porn was part of my story for 10 years until I came clean and I thought I’ll get married and and that’ll solve all the problems. No, it didn’t. And and so like I’ll share that from stage. And I always have dudes come up afterwards in hushed tones, “How’d you do it?” And and so you know and every time I share, I’m I’m trying not to cry right now. But when I share it, I I cry because that that part of my story sucks. And I wish it weren’t the case. Bryan Smith — And so we can be vulnerable with that, own it, and say, but God’s got something better. And and our other teaching pastor, he’s just really open and honest, wisdom and and how we share what we share. But when people see that from the stage, when people see that in the lobby when they’re talking to our staff, where we’re like, hey I remind our staff God’s got a deep depth chart and he could choose from the 8 billion other people to do what we’re doing today. We’re pretty lucky that he chose us. Rich Birch — It’s true. Bryan Smith — And and and so we just kind of, you know, we’re not going around crying in our beer kind of thing. But we just know man we’re blessed be doing what we’re doing. Rich Birch — Yep. Bryan Smith — And we’re we’re nothing special. God us breathed life into us on purpose, and we got a story and we’re hungry to see other people experience the the um life to the full that Jesus promises us in John 10:10. Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. Bryan Smith — Yeah. Rich Birch — I love the, you know, the focus on, you know, how are we going to kind of create a community where people can be just truthful and honest and open. I’ve said in other contexts that one of the telltale signs of a church that’s reaching unchurched people is that you have messy, complex, pastoral care. That’s just normal. Like it’s normative that okay we’re wrestling, if you’re just reaching church people, it’s not that they’re not messy. They’re messy. They just hide it. They just don’t know… Bryan Smith — They know better. Rich Birch — Um, so how do you how do you kind of build a staff team that is able to um, you know, kind of accept people and, you know, pastor them and lead them when people are coming with, you know, that kind of messiness? Ah talk us through what that that’s looked like for you and your team. Bryan Smith — I think, yeah, half of our I don’t know, don’t quote me on this… Rich Birch — Yeah. Bryan Smith — …but a lot of our staff will say that comes… Rich Birch — Yeah. Bryan Smith — …from didn’t come from a bible school or seminary background. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. Bryan Smith — My degree is an aquatic biology from U. C. Santa Barbara. Rich Birch — Okay, nice. Bryan Smith — And in in God’s humor, I’m pastoring in a desert. So thank you, Jesus. Rich Birch — Ah, that’s true! That’s funny. Bryan Smith — Um, so I came into student ministry, I mean I was involved with Intervarsity on the college campus when I was a student and then in lay ministry after that. And so I kind of came in through the back door. And then we’ve got a lot of our staff that we’ve hired from within. And and so they don’t have that bible college background, which Ilove bible college, seminary. I went back to seminary. Um, but but I think having folks that that didn’t grow up in the church… Rich Birch — Right. Bryan Smith — …didn’t grow up with a ministry mindset, had been invited into it, there’s they have a different perspective. And then we get the wisdom and the knowledge from the bible college or seminary background folks, and and that really kind of helps create this this kind of cool mix of people. Bryan Smith — I think the the other thing um that that has helped is we we schedule we’ve had to schedule a pastor each day to be available to counsel and meet with people. Because what would happen is… Rich Birch — Oh that’s good. Bryan Smith — Yeah, we have lots of people that are coming in and they’re they’re looking for help. And then it’s the secretary’s responsibility, and suddenly it’s like whack-a-mole, and all the staff disappeared. Ah yeah, and and she’s like, hold on – let me find a pastor… is there anyone? You know? Rich Birch — Yes. Bryan Smith — Um, and so we scheduled that and just said, hey we’re going to be available. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. Bryan Smith — And and and so we make sure that we’re available when people come in, when people have a need. They’re going to meet with a pastor, or an elder. Our elders are part of that as well. Um, does that answer some of your question? Rich Birch — That’s great. Absolutely. I love that even practicality of like scheduling people. I can see that, have been in exactly the scenario you’re talking about where it’s like, I got stuff to do. Um, yeah, that’s good. So kind of sticking with this this theme, um, you know, a church of 25 years, you know, quarter of a century, over time churches become more insider-focused. That’s just true. Like unless you push against that they become actually older and more insider- focused. But but your church hasn’t. You you’ve been able to keep a focus on reaching unchurched people. How are you doing that as ah as a senior leader? What does that look like for you? How are you keeping your people focused on that mission? Bryan Smith — That’s so your your premise is interesting to me that the older churches get the more internally-focused they become. And that’s never been my experience in ministry. So that’s part of it’s kind of like, hey you know ask the fish, how’s the water? Rich Birch — Yes. Bryan Smith — I don’t know because that’s water I’ve swam in. Rich Birch — Yeah. Bryan Smith — So with Intervarsity at the college campus, we were always hungry for for one more student. Rich Birch — Love it. Bryan Smith — Ah in the dorms I moved into the freshman doors my sophomore and junior year which was like social suicide. Um, and but it was just what we did… Rich Birch — Right. Bryan Smith — …because we want to lead kids to Christ. Um, and then Eastside Christian Church where I came from in in Fullerton, California at the time, man, it was the same way. And and so then when I moved up here, took over as the student pastor, um at it Summit, man, ah that was our our whole thought process is, you know, we were giving invitations all the time. We were baptizing like crazy. So this has been something that that has been part of the church. And this is why um during covid we—yeah, that was a fun season to lead through said no one ever—um during covid we said, hey, we’re going to build a building and we’re we’re and we didn’t let off on that… Rich Birch — Wow. Bryan Smith — …and finished the building and moved in in ’21. Rich Birch — Wow. Bryan Smith — Um and yeah 1200 seat worship center. And it it was kind of empty at first. We had a lot of online folks. But they’ve been coming back, and now we’re we’re seeing record attendance, record baptisms, and looking at launching a campus east of us by about 45 minutes. And and this is all we, like our from our kids ministry, we’re creating events. Where can we bring, how can we get these kids who invite their friends, student ministries having events that are um, you know, not terribly church-focused. So that… and that sounds bad but ah, you know, like a dodgeball tournament. Rich Birch — Yeah. Bryan Smith — There’s nothing Christian about that. Rich Birch — Right. Bryan Smith — But it’s super fun. Rich Birch — Yeah. Bryan Smith — And so kids come… Rich Birch — Yeah.. Bryan Smith — …and then they go church isn’t what I thought. This this place doesn’t suck; I want to come back. And with adults you know, like for Father’s Day, they don’t know this yet, but we’re going to we’re doing like all these activities in our plaza, and doing an RC car race. Like… Rich Birch — So fun. Bryan Smith — …this is not rocket science kind of stuff, but it’s like how can we create space where people want to be there, and they go, wait a minute, this isn’t what I expected. And so we’re we’re just staying hungry like crazy – that’s hungry for one more that we we talk about at Summit a lot. In fact, we put plexiglass boards, lit up boards, in our in our entry into our worship center and, said who’s your one? Write their name on that. Rich Birch — Love it. Bryan Smith — And I had this few weeks ago I had a lady come and say, hey I want introduce you to my one. She got baptized a couple weeks ago. Rich Birch — So good. Bryan Smith — And and that lady said, I want to introduce you to my one that I invited. Rich Birch — Wow. Praise God. That’s great. Bryan Smith — And I’m like oh this is working. Yeah, yeah. Rich Birch — Yes, that’s good. I love that. I love the practicality of like, hey we got to operationalize this. We got to come up with things that will, you know, keep that in front of people and just even the plexiglass stuff. That’s, you know, that’s fantastic. Rich Birch — Pivoting in a slightly different direction, so you like you lead a staff team, fairly large staff team. Um, you know keeping people as hard. This is one of those times where, and and you know I’ve led within fast-growing churches. And it sounds great. Everyone’s like, oh that sounds like a fun place to work. But it’s just a lot of work. It’s it’s ton of you know, to keep the thing running is a lot. Talk to me about what you’re doing on the staff health front to kind of keep your team focused on, you know, and on their own well-being and kind of keeping them positive and serving. What’s that look like for for you guys? Bryan Smith — Yeah, um, that we have four team values, and they’re health, focus, whole life generosity, and achievable excellence. And two, two of those are really pertinent I think to staff health, obviously health and then the achievable excellence. The achievable excellence – I’ll start there. Um, we we want to we want to do things that are excellent, but we we only have ah so many dollars, and so many people, and so much time… Rich Birch — Right. Bryan Smith — …and so let’s set the bar reasonably high. But not so high that we’re gonna be defeated, or so low that we’re just going to sandbag it. And and so I’ll push on our staff and and like I said earlier, oftentimes so we hire folks we got to pump the brakes on rather than light of fire. Um, yeah, and so oftentimes I’ll say, hey, with this achievable excellence idea, you’re you’re burning the cantle at both ends. And we want sustainability. We want you in it for the long haul. I want your marriage healthy. I want you to have joy. And you got it now, but you’re not sowing seeds in that direction for the future. Rich Birch — Right. Bryan Smith — So let’s let’s pump the brakes a little bit. Then health, health is a huge priority for me. Um, and and this isn’t like ah a circle to wagon, so we got to kumbayas, fours no mores. No if we’re going to be if we’re going to reach others, then I have to be healthy. Our elder team has to be healthy. Our ah staff team has to be healthy, because somehow in God’s economy what happens in in the the elder team filters into the staff filters into the… Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s true. Bryan Smith — …the church. And and so as an elder team, we’re we’re meeting with our wives for dinner for an hour. Then my wife takes the elder wives and they talk and pray. And then us elders, we get down to business. And our elders are a bunch of guys, number one, I always tell our in our our—we call it the trailhead lunch—but newcomers lunch, you probably wouldn’t ever know an elder is an elder at our church. Because they’re already serving and they’re not wearing it as a badge. Rich Birch — Right. Bryan Smith — Bunch of humble dudes that love the Lord and want what’s best for the church. And they’re critical thinkers and they get after me at times, and and encourage me, and we laugh together and we cry and we pray, and so there’s that health aspect. Then um at the staff level, um, man we want to keep our people around who are creating an environment that is fun, that is welcoming. Um, and and so I have an open door policy. If my door is open, it doesn’t matter who you are on staff, you can walk in and we can sit down and talk. I like that most of the time except when I’m about to close the door cause I got to get something done. But I’m I’m an extrovert and so I would rather be hanging out with people than doing something on my computer. Rich Birch — Right. Bryan Smith — Um, we have month… or weekly staff meetings, rather. I know a lot of folks have ah, monthly. But we have weekly staff meetings and there’s ah, a regiment, not a regiment that sounds not fun. There’s a routine that we go through monthly whether it’s celebrating birthdays or worship or a fun game, and then some kind of huddle or teaching. We have I talk about crucial conversations and part of health is you got to talk about the hard stuff. Rich Birch — Right. Bryan Smith — We celebrate the wins like crazy. Um, we cast vision of why we’re doing what we’re doing and lead with the why (thank you Simon Sinek) um and and lead with that so that people know this is what I’m about and then we help define the win so that they know they’re winning. Rich Birch — Right. Bryan Smith — But and then we also we provide counseling for our staff. So we have a counselor that we have two sessions a month and it’s a use it or lose it, kind of like a gym membership. And those are never empty. People have been very grateful for that. And then… Rich Birch — Um, two for your per staff, or two… Bryan Smith — No, two just two standing meetings a month. Rich Birch — That are open slots. Okay, great. Bryan Smith — Yeah, and so they work through my assistant to get signed up, and and they always come in to say, hey thank you. Um, but here this is the lowest hanging fruit that we fell into… Rich Birch — Okay, love it. We love the low hanging fruit here. Bryan Smith — I know. Nine Square. We play… Rich Birch — Nice. Bryan Smith — We have. Ah yeah, our our it it just happened like in 2021 our our middle school director, now pastor, she said, hey um, can we play Nine Square for half an hour today ah, with the staff? And I’m like, yeah I guess. I mean it’s always set up. Let’s do it. So what ended up from that conversation was we play there’s a weekly standing Nine Square tournament on Tuesdays for half an hour from 1 to 1:30. Rich Birch — Love it. Bryan Smith — Yeah, and and then it’s morphed into we had to buy more so it’s now 18 square because we’ve got like facilities showing up. We’ve we’ve got the preschool director showing up. Um, if there’s a volunteer in the office they’re like, can I play? And I said how good are you? No. In fact in it we we have we have a trophy. And so the last ten minutes is is single elimination, and we have two trophies – one for the winner that week. And if you win you get to write your name on the trophy, kind of like Stanley Cup. Rich Birch — Yeah. But you have to then play opposite-handed for eight weeks after that just to even it and… Rich Birch — Oh ah, you’re punished! Bryan Smith — This is great. We have we have a little um like ah we serve in Cambodia and someone brought home this little miniature kind of version of Angkor Wat, and we call it immunity idol. And if you’re the first person to lose, you get back in the next week after single elimination is down to 8 people. Rich Birch — Oh nice. Bryan Smith — So we’ve created all these rules. And and what happens is we’re goofing around. People love it when they spike on me or or block me. Um, and and we’re we’re just having a ton of fun. So we work hard at playing together, enjoying each other’s company, and then being reminded that that we’re we’re a crucial piece of the mission of what God is doing. And and this is where so it it sounds internally-focused but then we’re like, no wait a minute. What we’re doing in the health of this team has an impact in our church, has an impact in in Sparks High, or out in Fernley, where we’re going to launch, or that marriage that is struggling that that we’re seeing in the community group is getting healthier. And so people are just stoked. Our team is excited about… now that not to say we don’t have our tough days and we go to have our tough conversations. Rich Birch — Sure. It’s It’s not all you know, whistling, skipping down a yellow brick road there. There’s some hard parts to it as well. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, I love that. Well and I think the rhythm of I love the encouragement around you know the Nine Square, kind of fun weekly thing, you know, for you as an organization you as a leader to say, hey there might be something here. That’s kind of fun that a a team member came to you and then we, hey let’s put some energy on that. There’s probably churches that are listening in they’re like, oh we we do something similar around ping pong, and I never thought of it as being something we should really try to build into. I also love the thing there too around, it being it sounds like it’s like an optional thing. It’s like, hey show up if you want to. It’s between this time. If you’ve got time, we’d love for you to come. Because there is sometimes when you do fun stuff like that, mandatory fun never feels fun. You know, like if it’s… Bryan Smith — forced fun isn’t fun. Rich Birch — Yeah. The like, you know, and sometimes you have to do that as a team. Sometimes you have to um, you know, find ah like we’re going to see a movie or we’re going to go do some activity together. Like that that that has its place, but I love to kind of like hey if you’re available Tuesdays at whatever you said twelve thirty one o’clock, come by and have fun. That’s I think that’s fantastic. That’s so cool. Bryan Smith — Yeah, we had best Christian workplaces come in and assess the health of our team. We’ve done that 3 times with them, and then they did a 360 assessment of me. I still have yet to read that – it’s too painful probably. No, I was actually it was, it was insanely helpful. But… Rich Birch — Yep. Bryan Smith — …one of the things in the open-ended responses. There were so many mentions of the the half an hour of Nine Square… Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good insight. Bryan Smith — …in terms of the joy factor on our team. And it helps I have the play drive of a golden retriever. And and so wanting to make things fun and light is really important so that then if we’re enjoying each other’s company and having fun together, then we can really get down to the the ministry stuff, and it doesn’t feel like we’re carrying ah this heavy load. It’s like man we’re carrying a load… Rich Birch — Yep. Bryan Smith — …but we’re doing it together, and there’s this fun atmosphere. And when one person wins, we all win. We’re all going to celebrate… Rich Birch — Yeah. Bryan Smith — …and and that really helps with the the team dynamics. And then the retention that you’re asking about it and keeping people here, keeping them hungry was proven very beneficial. Rich Birch — Yeah, and I think there’s something to, you know when there’s a connection there on even like the crucial conversation side of day of having a you know a high performing team where if there’s strong relational connection, it does make it easier to have a more pointed conversation with someone because they see, oh this person is for me, like they’re in my corner. They you know their total view of me isn’t just this one issue that we got to get traction on. They you know they and and as goofy as Nine Square sounds, it’s like hey I I played Nine Square with them, I see I see that they like interacting with me. And then I’m I’m willing to take the feedback or the, you know, hey we got to work harder on this, or we got to stay focused on this when it’s in the context of, I know for me, that’s for sure the case. Rich Birch — Um, one of the things you talked about kind of as we were preparing was you were in um Virginia, you served there and then you came to Reno. Um two different contexts two, you know, you got the beach you got like you say the desert, um talk to us about what that’s been like to kind of serve in you know, two different contexts. Any learnings from for you as a leader you know, serving in those different environments? Bryan Smith — Yeah, I think um so I came to to Reno in ’05 at Summit Christian Church. Then I moved out to Virginia Beach in a lead role from 2014 to ’17. And then I was invited back to Summit in a co- like a shared leadership position with our founding pastor. And so I’ve worked I’ve worked at ah, two physical location churches, but very much three churches. Because the the church I I left to go to Virginia to pastor, the Summit of ah the first part of my career, is different than the Summit now. So that’s why I say it’s kind of… Rich Birch — Right. Yep. Bryan Smith — …two locations, three churches. Rich Birch — Yep. Bryan Smith — Um, but in in Virginia, you know, it’s it’s very much in kind of in the bible belt of sorts even though it’s way east. And I remember talking to my neighbor when we moved in and and I said, oh yeah I pastor ah, Real Life Christian Church down down the road here, and love to have you come. He goes, ah nah, me and the big man upstairs are okay, right? And we hear that. Rich Birch — Yes. Bryan Smith — And then I realized… and this isn’t a critique of the church, it’s just the cultural differences. Rich Birch — Yep. Bryan Smith — In where I was in Virginia, people were comfortable with God, comfortable with their sort of faith that they decided that faith level they’ve decided to walk in, which is really no faith at all. And it was hard because ah, you’d have to deconstruct that… Rich Birch — Yeah, for sure. Bryan Smith — …to have them see their need for God, their need for grace, what relationship with God looks like on his terms not dictated by our terms, and then supported by popular culture kind of thing. And and so there was always a struggle when when folks would come in I’m like, man, if if we could just break down this idea of, you know, me and the big man upstairs are okay. And you would really see your need. You would really jump into it, embrace the grace that God has for us, and and live as the church name said that real life that Jesus offers us. And again not a critique of the church, but just the culture. Bryan Smith — Well here in Reno, like I said earlier, and people come in and they’ve blown up their life. They’ve never gone to church. And and I realize in our post-Christian ah, context kind of thing we’re we’re really going to see more and more of this. Rich Birch — Yeah, absolutely. Bryan Smith — But it’s especially seems more prevalent here in in the community that I serve and where people they’ve never been to church. Rich Birch — Right. Bryan Smith — They they don’t know what it looks like and and they have these these notions, and I’ll say it from stage and I’m glad that you’re here. I don’t know what brought you here, but maybe you wanted to prove that Christians are weird. And you’re going to discover we are but not the weird you kind of thought of, you know. Rich Birch — Yes. Bryan Smith — And and and so it’s just been in some ways I would rather take someone that that has zero idea of what it looks like to walk with God and say let me introduce you to Jesus. Let’s disciple you. Let let’s you know see see what God has for you. Versus having that kind of you you built your life on a lousy foundation. We got to tear the whole thing down and start from scratch. Yeah, and and so this is I think this is why God has me in in Reno because I love that kind of challenge and I I love… Rich Birch — That’s so good. Bryan Smith — …I just I like messy people. Um I like people that don’t have it all together that um I love teaching with um to that kind of mindset and and topic, and really introducing Christ and the the the aha moments where people go… And I been doing like I think this is why we’re we’re seeing this this resurgence of Church attendance and baptism. Buddies and I’m talking to across the US are like, man, God is on the move. Because people had decided I’m going to build my life on this, Covid destroyed that, and they said that I’m going to try these other things. And they’re realizing, wait a minute, this feels just as empty. Maybe there’s something to be said for church. And and so in our community we got lots of folks that are coming in saying, you know, the world sold me a bad bill of goods. I don’t like where I’m at. And so what what does Jesus have to offer me? Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. I know, you know, I think it’s really important for us as the kind of broader church to continue to learn from places like Reno, or like I’ve served in the northeast and Canada. Um in these kind of for years I used to say post-Christian context, where it was… But but I really feel like that’s shifted and I’ve increasingly heard people using the language of pre-Christian context, which I which resonates is true. That I feel like in the first half of my career, we spent a lot of time deconstructing people’s ideas of church. You know there was the joke of like we ain’t your mama’s church kind of thing. Well the reality of it is most of the people that we see in these contexts, and sounds like this is true in Reno, that are coming in that are unchurched, their their mom didn’t go to church, their grandma didn’t go to church. They’re a couple generations away from this. They don’t have any preconceived notion of what this thing looks like. Bryan Smith — Yeah. Rich Birch — And so it’s not like we’re trying to deconstruct from there. We’re trying to start from the ground up, like you say, hey, let’s start from the very beginning, which I just think is an exciting time so that, you know, this would be a great church. You would be your church would be great church for us to be learning from as we think about the future. So this has been a great conversation today. Bryan Smith — Awesome. Rich Birch — Just as we kind of come to to land land the plane, is there anything else you’d like to say to to leaders that are listening in today that are thinking about, hey how do we make our church, you know be the kind of place that’s always looking to reach one more, that’s kind of got that, you know, you know, in their mission, or anything that we’ve talked about today you want to reemphasize? Bryan Smith — Yeah, it’s not easy if I if we were just if we did circle the wagons and just preach to the echo chamber of us. It’d be a lot easier. Rich Birch — So true. Bryan Smith — But it’s not as fun. Rich Birch — Yeah yeah. Bryan Smith — And you know, I think um it’s incredible, like so there’s there was ah a guy that he he kind of blew up his life. And he had a good life from from outside looking in. And then he got connected to the church. His son had a medical issue. He joined our Rooted group. We we were in Rooted through our church, which is awesome, a great discipleship tool. And and he gave his life to christ in my living room and then I got to baptize him. And to see where he’s at now and helping facilitate another group is just incredible Rich Birch — So good. Bryan Smith — And I think, man, had we just circled the wagons and said, Bro, you’re a little too messy for us. We miss out on all that joy. And I don’t think that that I “us four, no more” is definitely not in line with the great commissioner or Acts 1:8. In in all of this too, I have a friend and in um the Baltimore area Ben Cachiaras. He talked about staying hungry and humble, and that has resonated with me. We’re going to stay hungry for that one more, and we’re going to stay humble, like you know God’s got a deep depth chart. He chose us. This is great. Bryan Smith — Um, and then Psalm 181 it says “the Lord has done this and it’s marvelous in our eyes.” And and so we just continue to look at what God is doing, whether it’s our vision for one more ,vision to launch a campus and and help out in Kenya. We’re we’re going to be building ah an office building on our current site because and then pull all of our offices out of our other buildings so that we can have more ministry space for kids because… Rich Birch — That’s great. Bryan Smith — …we got a lot of young families coming and we got a lot of young families that like to reproduce. And and so we got to make space. And and we’re just going, man, this is awesome – like look what God is up to. Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s so good. Bryan Smith — And I feel like my biggest role right now is to continue ah to shepherd our people well, and and to die to self, my own concerns of is this thing ever going to spin so fast that it gets out of control? I hope not. But in the meantime God help me raise my lid, help me lead well. Help me be available to your people. Rich Birch — So good. Bryan Smith — And and we’ll, you know, kind of trust God with with the outcome. Rich Birch — So good. Well, Bryan, this has been such an encouraging conversation today. Thank you so much for your time. Where do we want to send people online if they want to track with you or with the church? Bryan Smith — Well, it would be to the church. I’m not on social media at all. I I got off of that just a few months ago. And but you can check us out summitnv – our states initials – summit and then nevada.org summitnv… wait a minute… Rich Birch — It is summitnv.org. Bryan Smith — I I don’t know why I blanked; you’re gonna have to edit that, bro, or just allow it in there. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s all good. It’s all good. Bryan Smith — So you can check us out at summininv.org and see what we’re up to, see what we’re doing and check our church out. Rich Birch — That’s great. Thanks so much, Bryan. Appreciate you being here today, sir.

Welcome back to the unSeminary podcast. We’re talking with Patrick Quinn, the lead pastor at Century Church in Alabama. Century has a vision to plant one hundred churches across America in order to see more people brought into a life-saving communion with Jesus Christ. Can you imagine a church so ingrained in a local community that the core values of that local congregation become the core values of the entire town? This is precisely the goal for Century Church. Tune in as Patrick unpacks this innovative approach where a church transforms its community through loving service. Build the town. // Churches are no longer seen as the hub of activity for their communities as they were in American history. But Patrick believes the church is always at its best when it’s solving problems for its local community and loving it in very specific, tangible ways. Rather than building the church, early on Century Church made a decision to prioritize building the town they were in and then let the town build the church. Community first. // The community-first mindset of Century Church is reflected in everything they do, from staffing to budgeting and programming. A lot of church budgets are focused primarily on church programming. Century decided to flip that, prioritizing community initiatives and their programs, which are designed to serve the entire community rather than only church members. The church then works off of a smaller portion of the budget. Similarly, the staff members are all very involved in the community, even having bi-vocational roles, such as serving as chaplain of the local football team. Partner with the community. // What it would look like for us to lose the church in order to find the true essence of the church? Where is the church supposed to serve? Previously Century Church used pole barns on their 23-acre property to host outdoor church services. As they grew, they took a unique approach to property development by inviting the community to design the church’s space based on the town’s needs. They hosted a five-day charrette involving architects, town planners, and engineers from eighteen states and two countries to create a mixed-use space that prioritized community needs. The church would then use some of that space for weekend services. Adapt your plans. // Initially the church was going to build a performing arts center, but they tabled the plans in favor of constructing a gym and recreational space, which better met the needs of the town. Listen to the community and families around you and be willing to adapt your plans based on the evolving needs of the community. This builds momentum and demonstrates your commitment to making a difference. People not looking for Jesus will realize Jesus has been looking for them as they make use of these spaces and programs. Expand your reach. // Century Church operates its 23-acre space as a separate entity called “The Well.” The church has a voice on the board and has put guardrails in place that outline how the space can be used within the community. They also seek like-minded partners who are committed to excellence and want to bring opportunities to the town. With lease agreements and contracts, these partnerships fall under the umbrella of The Well rather than falling other the umbrella of Century Church. Partnerships can amplify your impact and reach. Look for organizations and groups that share your values and commitment to excellence. You can discover more about Century Church’s ministry model at www.centuryproject.org. 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 church leaders and individuals bring light to the world through the thoughtful stewardship of their capital. The Church, including your church, requires more than just financial capital, it also needs spiritual and leadership capital. While separate in purpose, these three forms of capital are intertwined and inseparable for the cause of kingdom growth. Together, when we partner with the Lord to bring spiritual, leadership, and financial capital to a church, the results are transformational. At CDF Capital our ministry is simple: we lend money to churches. CDF Capital, in partnership with Barna Group, conducted a research study to better understand what happens in churches after a new leader comes in. Barna Group interviewed 111 pastors online who have experienced a leadership transition within the last 12 years. Click here to get your free download of the study. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Hey, friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. Super excited for today’s conversation with Patrick Quinn. He is the lead pastor at Century Church. This a church plant that was established in 2017 in Alabama. It’s an independent Methodist Church and this church, man, they, Patrick and I got a chance to interact a little bit at Exponential earlier this year I was inspired by what was going on. Ah but this church really has a vision to plant 100 churches, which is amazing, in communities all across America in order so to to see more people brought into a life-saving communion with Jesus Christ. Patrick, we are so glad you’re here today. Thanks for being here. Patrick Quinn — Rich, thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to be a part of the conversation today. Rich Birch — Well, fill out the picture. Kind of tell us a little bit about Century. You know, if people were to come this weekend, what would they experience? That kind of thing. Patrick Quinn — Yeah, so what they would experience currently is probably something that’s not happening in many other places in America. Rich Birch — I love it. Patrick Quinn — You and had talked about that at Exponential. But during covid we were meeting in a public elementary school in a fast-growing small town ah, that doesn’t have a lot of other facilities. And so when covid hit we needed to get out of the public elementary school for obvious reasons. If everybody goes back to thinking about what was going on there and how you had to have everything clean for five days and all of those things. And so we did not want to be a church that all of a sudden shut down our public elementary school for the next week due to ah worshipping. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Quinn — So we moved out of there. A lot of people went virtual. We certainly did that but we had purchased ah a 23-acre piece of property. It’s completely raw land, and we ultimately ended up ah building an outdoor venue. And we thought that this was going to be somewhat… Rich Birch — That sounds real fancy. That sounds fancy. Outdoor venue sounds very fancy. That’s not necessarily what I picture. Patrick Quinn — Yeah, okay, I’ll bring it down for you because we’re in Alabama. We we have two pole barns. Rich Birch — Yeah, love it. Love it. Patrick Quinn — Pole barns, now they’re large, they are large pole barns. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — Fifty feet wide by eighty-four feet long… Rich Birch — Wow. Patrick Quinn — …and 9 shipping containers which I’m sitting in one right now while we’re doing this recording that we built… Rich Birch — Really, this is in one of those? But if you see the video it’s that I wouldn’t even know you’re in a shipping container. Patrick Quinn — Yeah. Rich Birch — That’s amazing. Patrick Quinn — Yeah, yeah, I’m in a shipping container right now. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Quinn — So not headed to China. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Quinn — But but we are we are here on the property. So we have 9 shipping containers, 2 pole barns, lot of raw land, and we are currently building our first building. But we went outside and our people did not want to go back to the elementary school when it was all said and done. They wanted to stay where we were on this property. They felt called to it to then begin the process. Well we have been an outdoor venue every Sunday for the last almost four years now. Rich Birch — Wow, that’s incredible. Patrick Quinn — No matter if it’s snowing, raining, hot Alabama summer. Rich Birch — Gosh. Patrick Quinn — No matter what it is and somehow, Rich, people keep showing up, like it looks like the field of dreams out here every Sunday. Rich Birch — Yeah, I there’s so much of this story. I I we just before the episode I was like, I’m not entirely sure how we’re gonna tell this whole thing because there’s so much here. Tell tell us about when you put up the tents. This is a to me this talks about resilience. I think there’s a lot of leaders that when you put up the tents and then what happened, you tell us that story… Patrick Quinn — Yeah, so… Rich Birch — …I think would be like, okay I’m not sure the Lord’s called us to this, you know. Patrick Quinn — Yeah, so we’re outside and we’re and we’re literally on a raw piece of property, nothing on it. No utilities, nothing. And we are outside and we have fire pits for the winter. We’re trying to like figure out what to do next. And I was like okay, we’re going to build this outdoor venue. What could we do that would be ah, you know, enticing for the community to want to come check it out? So we we purchased two huge tents – Barnum and Bailey style tents. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Quinn — I mean big massive tents. And you know, one we were going to put the children’s ministry in, the other we were going to do worship in. And Rich, we got one worship service in before Hurricane Zeta came up through the Gulf of Mexico… Rich Birch — Oh no. Patrick Quinn — …went went across the beach, you know, down in the panhandle of Florida, and we are about 2 hours north by driving distance and we still had a Cat 1 hurricane come through and it wiped our tents out. Rich Birch — Oh gosh. Patrick Quinn — We literally only worshipped for one Sunday with the tents. Rich Birch — Oh my goodness. Patrick Quinn — So yeah, we were standing out there on the field after the hurricane came through and we had worked so hard to try to, you know, we don’t have any facilities. Our people have been worshipping completely outside. It’s cold, rainy, all of that. We put up these tents. We finally are excited. And there’s no doubt my team and a lot of lay leaders, we just stood there on that property pretty dejected at first, you know, like what are we doing? Rich Birch — Yes, understandable. Patrick Quinn — Like this doesn’t seem to be some something maybe we should be doing. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Quinn — And but the community showed up and cleaned it all up. And then the town helped us with some zoning… Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Quinn — …to allow us to get these really nice pole barns constructed on the property, and for us to continue the mission and we’ve been growing ever since. We started with 100 people at Century Church – that’s part of Century. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — Psalm 100 is another part of that in scripture. But um, we started with about 100 and now we we shrunk back like everybody did in covid and we grew it back to we’re we’re approaching 600 people out here on a raw piece of property. Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s amazing. That’s amazing. Well you know you might be listening in, friends, and think, oh we’re going to talk about the zaniness of being meeting outdoors for 4 years, but that’s not actually the part of the story. That’s a part of it. But that’s not the part that caught my attention. This was it. You know when I hear ah, Patrick and his leadership team talk, um I really hear a church that is trying to be for the community in a very real way, and has done all kinds of things to try to engage and serve and love the community they’re in. And frankly to be honest I found a little bit convicting. Because I feel like we try to be that in our church, but and sometimes I feel like maybe it’s just a marketing thing as opposed to you know the actual acting it out. I said that; Patrick didn’t say that. Don’t worry, friends. Ah but tell us about, you know, how is it that Century Church has been for your community. What’s that actually look like? Give us kind of a picture of what that is and then I’d love to unpack that for us as we think about our churches. Patrick Quinn — Yeah, so when I I have a lot of my experience was in the megachurch previously. And I ended up in a small town. I’m a military kid, originally, so I didn’t have a lot of small town experience. But I end up in a small town that is fast-growing with a brand new school system. Patrick Quinn — And you see all of the needs in in a small town, sometimes more clearly than in a large metropolitan area that that ah you know I’ve obviously had the opportunity to pastor in. And so as you start looking at it, we had a choice early on. Do we build the church, or do we build the town? Rich Birch — Oh that’s good. Patrick Quinn — And I think that’s where we made some decisions early on to say, you know what? I feel like God’s called us to build the town, to really embed the gospel of Jesus in this community is to build the town, and let the town help build the church. And so that’s where we started leaning into this idea of putting our community first. Patrick Quinn — And I started thinking through it a lot and a lot of research – I’m ah I’m a researcher by nature. I stay up all night, read too much, do all sorts of things, all kinds of conversations. A lot of things I’ve I’ve followed you and a host of other people. And so ah, along the way we just started thinking through, how how can we, in a small medium-sized, growing town have influence with the current generation. Rich Birch — Um, so let’s talk about that. Like so I think there’s lots of us that talk about putting our community first. We say that. Like we’re like we’re like… but what does that actually look like for you? What what are some examples of where you’ve said, hey we’ve we’ve actually tried to, whether it’s been strategic or whether it’s just been by positional opportunity, like hey, we see an opportunity. What have been some of those examples of that? Patrick Quinn — Yeah, so for the beginning of this we we just started talking about the fact that a lot of ah churches in general that I’ve even pastored are not seen as the hub of activity for their communities, like they were in American history and even in the history of the church where where people can come and dream big dreams, reach ambitious goals, get loved through hard and sticky situations. But mostly this: solve community problems, be an incubator for new growth, help build the community around some excellence based on, you know, Jesus’s teachings. So in short I would say that the church is always at its best when we’re loving on the community in very specific, tangible ways. And so I’ll tell you about a few of those. Patrick Quinn — So so for instance for us all of our staffing, um, we we expect our staff to actually be involved in our community and not just at our church. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Quinn — And that works out in some very tangible ways. Like for me, I am the mental coach chaplain for the local football team. I I am constantly in meetings with the town council, mayor, school board. I I am very much engaged in the community as a whole. And we are one of the places that when there’s a problem in the community, they call us to help be a part of the solution. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Quinn — And and I mean in a very not like come paint a fence or we have like a little local mission project. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — I mean like we have issues in our community, how do we solve them? But that’s because we have positioned ourself early on that we really care about the direction of the community. Another thing that happens with our staffing is like, for instance, we have one of our staff members is a bus driver. And um, you know he drives the bus every morning and every afternoon, and he’s our youth minister and our director of operations, and he’s a bus drive full time bus driver. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Quinn — And that is part of the mission of the church is that every single one of us find a, if you will, a bi-vocational role. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — And so so our staff is geared out into the community. Our budgeting, so a lot of times in church world, our budgets are—I mean if we’re honest with ourselves and we really reflect, and I and I’ve had 21 years to do this now,—a lot of our church budgets are focused on church programming. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — And I mean to to a large extent that’s okay. But what we’ve endeavored to do is to flip the model a little bit and look at our budgeting as how can we take the dollars that God has given us and truly put them into community efforts, and and initiatives, and ways that we can help build the community. And then let the church function off of, you know, a smaller portion, if you will. nd so we look at that from a budgeting standpoint. Rich Birch — That’s cool. Patrick Quinn — Um, so so in in staffing, and budgeting, and then also our programs. Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Quinn — So our programs are not… We have very few. And I mean very few internal programs. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — Like it’s it’s it’s almost a rarity for Century to have ah a program that would be centered primarily on church folks. So much so that sometimes, Rich, one of the challenges is actually getting church people to to our church folks to come to the event because they almost feel like the event is actually for the whole community, and maybe they’re they’re not as an… I mean we’ve had some challenges on trying to figure that out because we’re like, oh this isn’t the church potluck. It’s the community, you know, huge festival. Rich Birch — Right. And so whether it’s an easter egg hunt, a trunk-or-treat, or we’re hosting fundraisers on our property. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — You know, here’s one ah one story that I would say was ah was a catalyst for putting our community first. Rich Birch — Okay. Patrick Quinn — We’re meeting in the elementary school early on and this seven year old little girl, her name was Zana, and I still see her face and I still think about her family. And um, she she passed away in a in just, you know, a shocking way through the flu. Rich Birch — Oh. Patrick Quinn — And the school called me and said, hey can you come help us with this family. And I’m like, sure no problem. I’ll be glad. Rich Birch — Yeah. Right. Patrick Quinn — But there was a there was a wrinkle to this. The the little girl’s family was Muslim. Rich Birch — Wow. Patrick Quinn — An active Muslim family. And so I come up there to meet and I had no idea what I was exactly getting into. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — And through the course of the next hour this mother who has lost her 7-year-old little girl looks at me, a Christian pastor in deep south Alabama… Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — …and says, ah, will you do my little girl’s funeral? Rich Birch — Wow. Wow, that’s so cool. Patrick Quinn — And I’m like what? Um and then and then I said yes. I said yes, we’ll absolutely do it. Well here’s the problem, Rich. We didn’t have a building… Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — …to do a funeral in. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — So we had to unroll our box portable church… Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — …into the school, do this whole funeral. Well I leave there and I’m thinking to myself, I have not consulted my leadership team. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — I have not asked my staff. We are about to have to unroll all of this portable equipment on a day that we normally wouldn’t have to do it. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — People are gonna have to take off of work. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — I mean there’s all of these things that are going to have to happen. And by the way I’m gonna tell them it’s not a church member. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Quinn — It’s not even an unchurched person. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — This is a Muslim family in deep south Alabama. Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Quinn — And we gave ah and I say that the way that I’m saying it because this was a this was a moment early on in our church to say, are we gonna put our community first… Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Quinn — …and love people right where they are? I love that. Patrick Quinn — And our community was shocked. I had so many people coming up to me and saying, I’m pretty sure our church wouldn’t have done that. Rich Birch — Right. Well, that’s what I was thinking as you as you were saying that. I think there’s a lot of leaders who who would have made even the reasonable, you know, like I don’t know, I’m not sure. Ah you know, but I love that your knee-jerk reaction was like, hey we want to serve. And then my assumption is that that then has opened up other opportunities to partner in town. And you know that must have kind of ended up, you know, creating those kind of discussions where then as a church you’re trying to come up with how do we decide, how do we figure out who to partner with? How do we figure out who to align with? Rich Birch — I know a lot of churches have pretty, you know, really clear boundaries on that kind of thing, which does which we think of as boundaries, but really sometimes just create um you know obstacles to folks in our community. Talk us through what does that look like for when you’re trying to, you know, forge partnerships with with organizations, or the you know government all that kind of stuff. How how how are you doing that with your town? Patrick Quinn — Yeah, so two things that guided us in our development of this church in in our town was really two statements early on. One of them was I wanted to create a place where people not looking for Jesus come to realize that Jesus has always been looking for them. Rich Birch — Oh that’s good. Patrick Quinn — And if and if I could do that then I have the opportunity to reach new people. Because when you plant a church, obviously you’re you’re not wanting to just steal everybody else’s sheep, you want to reach new people with the gospel. The other thing was ultimately, if we’re going to put our community first, what would it look like when Jesus says lose your life for my sake and you will find it? What would it look like—I would tell our leaders this early on—what would it look like for us to lose the church in order to maybe find the true essence of the church? Rich Birch — Oh wow. Patrick Quinn — Like where are the churches supposed to serve? Rich Birch — Wow. Patrick Quinn — Where the church is supposed to grow and go? And so like when we did that little girl’s funeral, you’re right, Rich. I mean what happened next was the whole like several people in the community were like, whoa. Why? How? Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Quinn — And so all these questions and unchurched people started looking at us differently. And I’ve baptized probably half our church members now, and I mean unchurched people coming to this church and being a part of what we’re doing. And I think it’s because, you know, you always grow up you you grow up in churches and people say oh you, you know, people should be curious about your faith. They should, you should be contagious. Patrick Quinn — But I mean really and truly a lot of times I look around—I’m not being, I don’t want to be judgmental about this, but I want to challenge everybody—like are people today really curious? Like are they? Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — Um and I think when you do some stuff like what we’ve done. And some of it has just been put on our doorstep. I mean that that situation got put on our doorstep, you know? Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Quinn — But it was an opportunity to say, all right, I think Jesus would do this. Rich Birch — Yes, yes. Patrick Quinn — I think Jesus would walk with this family. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — And it made a whole bunch of other people curious. And so yeah, we ended up with visitors. We ended up with people having theological conversations with me. People that had that walked had walked away from the church for 20 years or more going, wait – why did you just do that? What’s going on? And it messed with people theologically. It messed with their constructs of what a church looks like and should behave like. And so before you knew it I’m in conversations that I would have never had… Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Quinn — …had I just played the normal role of a pastor in a small town. Rich Birch — Well, I love it. I think this is such a great, powerful example to me. It feels very Jesus. It feels like that feels, smells very much like when I you know the kind of thing that Jesus would do. He had the reputation of being, you know, he was surrounded by people that the religious people in town were like I’m not sure I want those people hanging around with me. And you know doing a a funeral for a Muslim family, um, you know you were leaning in and trying to care for people. Your heart obviously open to them and were like man, what a terrible, tragic, like we can get on the same page here. We know that it’s a tragedy that your kid. It’s no parent should ever you know bury their child. That’s just unnatural. That’s not how life is supposed to go. And the fact that you stepped in there. But to me I look at that and I’m like, man, that feels like Jesus talking to the Samaritan woman, right? People, you know, same kind of like oh are we really supposed to talk with them, are we, you know, are you when you’re doing a funeral, what does that mean? Are you questioning, you know? Are you saying you know? Are you agreeing with everything? Like no, no, we’re we’re trying to love a family and who’s going through a tragic moment which does very much feel like ah, that feels like Jesus. Has that spilled out you know that are there other examples of that where where when you think, oh this may be a bad idea, but it feels like Jesus is leading us in that direction? Patrick Quinn — Oh yeah. Rich Birch — Um, you know there’ve been other of those that have have kind of come across your path over the years? Patrick Quinn — Yeah, so then I would say another primary example is, so this church with no facilities on a raw piece of property hosts today the largest fundraiser in our community for our schools. Rich Birch — Okay, that’s cool. Patrick Quinn — We will and we do it in the next couple of weeks. It is called the Crawfish Boil. It’s by the Patriot Fund. Our mascot for the local schools – the patriots. Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Quinn — And so the Patriot Fund puts on this ah, crawfish boil. And they outgrew their space next down the road from us in a local neighborhood. And when they outgrew it, they were looking for a place, they couldn’t find one, couldn’t find one, and it looked like it was actually gonna die off. And these are seriously needed funds for our for our schools. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — Um, and and so we we said we would host it. But here’s the problem. Um, once again I’m in deep south Alabama, Rich. Rich Birch — Yes. And and they they allow you, for years, when it was in this local neighborhood, they allow you to bring your own alcohol to the event. Rich Birch — Okay. Yes. Patrick Quinn — And so, you know you’re allowed to bring your own, they don’t serve it. They don’t they don’t, you know, provide it but you can bring whatever you’d like to bring in your coolers or whatever. And so we had another decision to make. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — We had a piece of property. We have the facility to to be able to pull it off. Um do we let this thing go by the wayside and let $100,000 go out of our schools… Rich Birch — Wow. Patrick Quinn — …or do we try to figure out how to make it work and our leadership team looked at it again and said this is the type of thing that we feel like Jesus would figure out. Um and so we started figuring it out. And we didn’t we didn’t become teetotalers um, in in Alabama. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — Um, we we still allow it. But we also put some guardrails… Rich Birch — Sure. Patrick Quinn — …and turned it a little more family friendly. Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Quinn — But we still got people asking, you know, obviously some folks that are a little more hard line. Why are you allowing this? What are you doing? Is this really what a church should be, you know, about? Rich Birch — Yeah, engaged in or whatever. Yeah, yeah. Patrick Quinn — Yes, all of those things, and and yet today we’re 4 years into providing this event, and I cannot tell you the amount of conversations that I have on our own property with people who yeah, maybe even have had a few drinks. Or people who haven’t but are looking around going, wait a second. This is a church? Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, this different kind of thing. Patrick Quinn — And you all are having this huge festival. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — And it’s it’s pretty incredible. Ah so we are we are known as that kind of place that we’re we are going to support our community. We are going to love people where they are. And if we can even get them on our property and you know people not looking for Jesus that come to realize Jesus has been looking for them. And so we’ll we’ll wade into the messy and into the gray areas of life in order that we might earn the right to have a conversation. Rich Birch — Now that’s this this kind of there’s so much here. Like we could talk that we could have 5 episodes here, friends. There’s like so many things I want to talk about. But this kind of intention um to like serve the community has ultimately led you to think about how you develop that property. Um, it’s led you to a place where you’ve made a bunch of decisions and kind of pulled together, you know, I think a different kind of approach to land development. Tell me about that part of the story. This is fascinating, friends, lean in. Patrick Quinn — Yeah, so I I started out a long time ago in management at Sandestine Golf and Beach Resort… Rich Birch — Okay. Patrick Quinn — …in the panhandle of Florida. And so I learned a lot in hospitality management, resort management, learned a lot in in just how spaces and places matter to people – those kind of things. So you take that as the backdrop and then I end up in theology school and on as a pastor. And so as we started to look at the property and what we could do and helping to build the town and what the town needs. How could we put our community first? and a lot of times we design things in the church for the church first—what does the church need—and then we’ll let the community come use it. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Quinn — What if we could create a different model where we actually invite our community onto our property and into an incubator, if you will—we called it a charrette—and we let the community design our own space. Rich Birch — Oh wow. Patrick Quinn — Like what are the needs of this community that the church could uniquely try to meet, and then the church will figure it out on the backend. So what that looks like today is we we ended up with a five day charrette that we, through a, through a lot of different relationships, we were able to host 23 architects, town planners, engineers from all over America – from 18 states and 2 countries. Rich Birch — Wow. Patrick Quinn — We have them even from Canada. And so so we had some from Canada, Rich, that was good. Rich Birch — Nice. Patrick Quinn — And and they came here for five days. And I mean they had resumes that would blow your mind. Rich Birch — Amazing. Patrick Quinn — And they were mostly from the Christian Caucus of the Congress for New Urbanism. Rich Birch — Okay. Patrick Quinn — So you could look them up. Rich Birch — Yeah, love it. Patrick Quinn — And and they came and they helped us map this out, invite our whole community, and what we have now today is is really a mixed use 23-acre space that is designed for profit for for-profit entities, nonprofit entities, incubator-type opportunities, mission and ministry, but it’s all been leaning out toward the community, and then the church would figure out ways that we’ll use it. So every space is intended to be dual use, but dual use in the way that the community wins first, and then the church. And I’ll explain just here’s a here’s a anecdotal piece of how that works. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — So a lot of churches will have, let’s just use coffee shops for example. A lot of churches will have coffee shops. But if we’re honest with ourselves, most of the coffee shops that I’ve ever been around in in all of our churches, they are um, well, they’re not sustainable, one. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — And they they just we’re not coffee people. Rich Birch — Sure. Patrick Quinn — Like we’re just not. We’re we’re church. We know how to run churches. Rich Birch — Yes. Patrick Quinn — We we don’t know how to run coffee shops. Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Quinn — And so what I endeavor to do on this property and what our leadership has has said Okay, let’s do this is. There’s somebody in this community that can run an amazing coffee shop, and wants the opportunity to do it. And and and will and we’ll also give glory to God in doing it. So let’s let them come run a coffee shop… Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Quinn — …and do it with excellence. And then we will support it. We’re not going to make our own coffee on top of you. Um, we’ll we’ll support it and let you be a part of our overall master plan. So if you could take that example and extrapolate it out over every other type of business opportunity… Rich Birch — That’s incredible. Patrick Quinn — …mission opportunity, all of that. So what will ultimately happen on these twenty-three acres will be we’ll have dozens of partners… Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — …with dual use spaces that the church will figure out how to utilize as well as as the community. Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s it’s literally turning upside down, I feel like there’s a lot of churches that and and in one way this is like a noble thing. It’s like we’ve got 100,000 square feet and but it sits empty for most of the week – let’s figure out some use of that. You’re you’re literally looking at it the other way around which is, hey let’s design a space—if that’s what I understand—design is that’s designed spaces—it’s not just a space, a number of spaces—that will get used all week long. And then we’ll figure out how to shoehorn into it on the weekend or when we need it. Um, I just love that. And you’re in the process of building a first space. Talk talk about that space. What is that? What’s that going to be used for and then how how does that fit together with this whole vision? Patrick Quinn — Yeah, so um, well one thing about the coffee shop by the way that I’ll parlay into the building is that um, you know, then the coffee shop can become a place on Wednesday nights where youth meet for a small group Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — Or where on Sunday mornings um, we use it for what you’d maybe even think of as a traditional Sunday school class. So that’s what I mean by the church figures out what to do with it. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — We’re not going to dictate the space on the front end. We’ll figure out how to utilize it through some dual use lease agreements, bringing down the cost, share it across these different platforms, and then ultimately the church gets to figure out how to… And let’s be creative about it and that looks more interesting to people than you just build your children’s wing and then say, all right, y’all can come use some of the space if you want to during the week, right? Rich Birch — Right, right. Yeah, yeah. Patrick Quinn — So like it’s a lot better approach and more fresh for a community. And unchurched people to go, geez you really care. So get to the building. We are building a gym. And in our community, we don’t have anything like this. Like we’re building a we’re building for our first building is ah is a large gym, high school basketball-size basketball court that’ll also be able to turn two volleyball courts and or basketball or two smaller basketball courts… Rich Birch — And hopefully some pickleball courts, You gotta be pickleball. Patrick Quinn — Yeah, actually there are pickleball lines. Rich Birch — You know there better be. Patrick Quinn — And and we have positioned a couple of large soccer fields next to it. Rich Birch — Okay. Patrick Quinn — Because in our community there’s not a lot of recreational space yet. Rich Birch — Right. Patrick Quinn — And so we have found that I mean, once again, and this was not the original plan. The original plan was to build more of a performing arts type center where we had a worship space. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — But as, and and and this is an important point, Rich. As we started to finish up the construction documents of that, inflation was a part of the decision um to move away from it. We moved away from our initial building, but we also realized that wasn’t the biggest need in our community right now. And so we literally are putting on the shelf… Rich Birch — Wow. Patrick Quinn — …completed construction documents that we will have paid, you know, a large sum of money for. Rich Birch — Yes, yep. Patrick Quinn — And we’re putting it on the shelf in order to build another building that we actually feel will benefit our community even more. Rich Birch — Wow. Patrick Quinn — And so we’ve listened to families. We’ve listened to the community. We’ve we’ve we’ve heard how um, so many of them are looking for things that are more recreational… Rich Birch — That’s so cool. Patrick Quinn — …and so, okay, well if that’s what our community wants, then we’ll build that. And so now we’re gonna worship in a gym instead of worshiping in the space that we thought we were gonna worship in because our community throughout the week will be able to utilize it so much more. Patrick Quinn — And people not looking for Jesus will come to realize Jesus has been looking for them. Because they’ll be here with their kids doing all those kinds of things. And by the way this isn’t upward. This isn’t like for us I’m not saying anything bad about any other program. Rich Birch — Oh no, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Patrick Quinn — But what I’m saying for us, we’ve decided that we want everything that we do out here to be done with absolute excellence. And so we want developmental athletic programs to come that will raise up kids to even become D1 athletes. Rich Birch — Cool. Patrick Quinn — Um, now that doesn’t have to be for every child and other children will find ways into these programs that they can still have fun and develop. But our partners – you get back to who’s partnering with us. We want partners that want excellence in everything that we do. So we would so we have already partnered with a soccer/football club. Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Quinn — They call him a football club… Rich Birch — Yep, yep. Patrick Quinn — …you know, because if you’re really serious, you’re a football club. You’re not a soccer. Rich Birch — Yes, yeah, yeah, love it. Love it. Patrick Quinn — So we have a football club. They’re called the Yellow Hammer Football Club. Rich Birch — Yeah. Patrick Quinn — And they have started out here and they are a developmental soccer program. And so when we say that we’re doing things for the community, it’s not your typical um least common denominator type of activity. Rich Birch — Right, right. Patrick Quinn — It is we want we want people being wowed by the… The church historically has been able to solve problems. I feel like when I read church history, the church when we are at our best, we are solving problems for our local community. Rich Birch — Yeah, so true. Yep. Patrick Quinn — And somewhere along the way, and I don’t know if it’s our fault or just, you know, natural vision leaks if we’re not careful, I don’t know, but somewhere along the way, we are not, if we’re honest if we look at ourselves in the mirror as leaders, we are not the first stop where people think to solve problems in our communities anymore. Rich Birch — Right, right, right. Patrick Quinn — And I just wanted to do something where hopefully we can position ourselves every step of the way, whether it’s a soccer program, or a coffee shop, or something with the town council that they look at the church of Jesus Christ as a place. It doesn’t have to be the only place. But but we sure should be in the in the conversation if we’re doing our job well. Where we are helping to solve the community the community’s issues. And if we’re doing that then a whole new generation of unchurched type people, I feel like, start looking at the church differently. Rich Birch — Yeah it’s so true. I love that. And that’s great historical context. It’s true. Like universities and hospitals and so many kind of public good institutions that now have either been taken over by the government, or are just you know there are independent nonprofits, that sort of thing, when you trace back their history they were you know Jesus-loving leaders who saw a need and said, hey we can help with this. We can pull this together. And I love that I love that you’re kind of standing in that stead in that history to try to see something great happen in your ah community. Rich Birch — Well there’s so much more we could talk about, but I know there’s like executive pastor type people that are listening in that want to get into some of the details around how are you structuring those those relationships, or or how do you think you’ll structure those relationships? There’s a lot we could talk about there, but like take the football club you’re working with. So like did you are did you build the building, like you you raised the money to raise it, and then you’re leasing it back? How does all that work, just to give us just give a sense of that. And if people can reach out to you and talk to you if they got questions about that, I’m sure. Patrick Quinn — Absolutely. I would love to talk to anybody who wants to look at the model more. But I would say the the way that we’re trying to structure it is we call the twenty three acres The Well. Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Quinn — So century church meets at The Well. Rich Birch — Okay. Patrick Quinn — And what we endeavor to do is to make The Well a 501c3. We’ll put a board in place. Church governance will have a big voice in that, obviously. Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Quinn — We create partnerships that fall up underneath The Well. And then what happens next is we have these dual use relationships that some people smarter than me, obviously, XPs that are listening know already, right, that the lead pastor is not the one that’s going to be doing all of this, right? Rich Birch — It’s good vision. It’s good vision. It’s good… Yeah, yeah. Patrick Quinn — Right. Yeah, like I’ve run out of my bandwidth pretty quickly on this. So so we we will create these partnerships through these lease agreements and contracts that will that will help our church, you know, we’ll have some guardrails. Rich Birch — Yep. Patrick Quinn — But you can already see the type of church we are where we’re willing to you know flex into some gray. Rich Birch — Yeah flex on that stuff. Yep. Patrick Quinn — But but we will create some guardrails, and then ultimately these contracts will will fall up underneath The Well. They will operate not not under Century Church’s umbrella. Century Church will be another entity that meets at The Well. And then and then as what we look for in partners are obviously some like-minded people. But we look for people who want to do things with excellence. And we want to bring opportunity to ah both the people that want to do something, but also to the town. Patrick Quinn — So in other words, another way to look at this is that I heard someone once say that I loved is that we want to create a canvas where other people can come paint their dreams. Rich Birch — That’s good. Patrick Quinn — So if we can figure out how to do that, and we’re still in the beginning stages of this, but the football club is our first you know example of that that I could that I could share with you, is they’ve come out and they have a contract with us. We will share the space, the fields, and things of that nature. But we give them priority to set their schedules, and we will work with our calendars. But ultimately we want them to be very successful. We want to root them on. We want them to be very successful in all that they do. Um, but communication is obviously going to be key. Patrick Quinn — And look some people listening to this are going to say that’s way too messy, like I don’t want to get into all of that. But for me, the brain damage of figuring that out means that we get to sit at the table in our wider community. And the brain damage is worth it to me. Also what I hope will be um something that the Lord uses even through this podcast is that the brain damage of us figuring it out means that the next small/medium-sized town that has a pastor that may be listening to this that wants to figure it out, maybe we’ve paid some of the stupid tax. You know? Yeah. Rich Birch — Yeah, love it. Love it. Patrick Quinn — Maybe we’ve gone through some of the brain damage and we can help be a catalyst. That ultimately gets us, when you said we want to launch a hundred churches, um I’m just fine with if Century ever is called into a hundred churches that that are that are absolutely part of Century I’m I’m fine to go to more small towns and be a part of that. I’m also fine in resourcing other pastors and helping other church leaders figure out how to launch something very similar with similar principles. And I feel like that’s every bit as much a part of what the Lord might be doing through our church family. Rich Birch — Yeah, that is so good. Well I just want to honor you, Patrick. I just love what you’re up to here. To me this just smells so much like Jesus. It just it smells like him. You know it’s it’s very, you know, Jeremiah 29 – seek the prosperity and peace of our community. It feels like Luke 10, hey find a man of peace and, you know, work with them. There’s like it’s it is messy. Like it’s not you know, but but I think it’s the kind of work that God’s calling us to. And I think you’re, you know, you’re kind of projecting for us a new way to think about these things. There’s a ton we could have talked about here, but I want to encourage people to connect with you. So where do we want to send them online if they want to connect with the church, kind of hear more of the story, where where do we want to send them? Patrick Quinn — The the best place, I mean we have our church website, but the best place to go if you want to learn more about the model of what we’re doing is centuryproject.org – centuryproject.org. And I actually have put my cell phone number literally on that website, so they could text me if they want to, reach out to me via email. But I love to talk about this. And I love to be a part of brainstorming and dreaming with other pastors. I literally was doing it in Huntsville, Alabama just a few days ago, standing on a 40-acre piece of property… Rich Birch — Love it. Patrick Quinn — …and having an opportunity to have a conversation with another pastor about what they are looking to do to bring a similar type concept of what we’re doing here. There’s about probably 10 to 12 other pastors that have reached out to me in the last even couple of years that we’ve engaged in conversation all over America about what this looks like in their small/medium-sized town context and how to actually implement some of these core principles. So, I enjoy doing that work and look forward to hearing from some people. Rich Birch — Yeah it’s so good. I would love, friends, obviously a part of what we’re talking about is like the development of land and pictures and you know obviously you can’t do that in audio format. But I would encourage you to drop by centuryproject.org ah, to even get a sense of when you talk about the development of the property and that there’s some images on there that give you a better sense of what we’re talking about here. Um, it’s pretty inspiring stuff. So I really appreciate you being on today, Patrick. Thank you so much for taking time to be with us, and you know and just Godspeed as you take steps here towards you know, just the next things that God has for you and your ministry. Thanks for being here today. Patrick Quinn — Thank you so much much, Rich, for having me. I appreciate it. It’s been a great conversation.

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