July 19, 2026

Why are churches drifting away from their main purpose of discipleship? What is the cure for purpose drift? New Segment: Pastor Disaster - The (ALMOST) Missing Finger and MORE: with Chris Reinolds, the Strategic Outsider of Jacksonville, Fl

Why are churches drifting away from their main purpose of discipleship? What is the cure for purpose drift? New Segment: Pastor Disaster - The (ALMOST) Missing Finger and MORE: with Chris Reinolds, the Strategic Outsider of Jacksonville, Fl
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Today we talk to the Strategic Outsider, Chris Reinolds, a missions strategist from Northeast Florida. Chris is a great writer and thinker about the mission of the church, and he encourages us today to focus on those practices and programs that align with the church's primary mission, and to cut those things we don't which don't line up with our primary purpose. In addition, we also discuss:

The aspects of pastoring that seminary doesn’t prepare you for.

Why church bylaws are probably more important than most pastors and church leaders realize. A church that isn’t abiding by its bylaws opens itself up to big trouble in legal and lawsuit terms, even for unrelated issues.

Chris Reinolds, host of the Kingdom over Turf Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrpOtpnXQsUo-YdeiiL-3TVSUi-R-os8B

Chris Reinolds Strategic Outsider Substack: https://associationmissionstrategist.substack.com/

The benefits of having somebody come in to your church and see it from an outsider’s perspective

Clarity House: https://clarityhouse.us/clarity-assessment/

Why are churches drifting away from their main purpose of discipleship? What is the cure for purpose drift?

The most valuable insights lie in the most difficult things to measure.

Florida Man/Aligators/Shark Attacks

Four questions to bring YOUR church to clarity in its mission and purpose:

1. Whose church is this? Christ’s Church!

2. If this is Christ’s church, what has He called us to do? Answer: The Great Commission by the means of the Great Commandment.

3. What are we currently doing in light of the Great Commission and the Great Commandment?

4. What are we going to do about the things we are doing that are NOT helping us to accomplish the Great Commission and the Great Commandment?

Asking these questions, answering them, and then making changes based on the answers will sometimes bring about battles and battle scars for pastors and leaders, because change is often difficult and painful for everybody concerned.

The dangers of seminary-trained pastors talking over the heads of church members about important biblical truths.

WEBVTT

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Today, we've got Chris Reynolds, a mission strategist from the Jacksonville,

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Florida area, and he's going to talk to us about the danger of drifting from

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a church's primary purpose of discipleship and what the

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solution to that problem is, which begins with...

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What's the solution? I think the solution is clarity. Let's become clear on

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what God has really called us to do and have some honest conversations about

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that and evaluate, are we doing it?

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Helping churches, leaders, and pastors find health, encouragement,

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practical advice, soul care, and resources that work together to build up your

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local fellowship and the broader kingdom of God.

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Join hosts, Pastor Chris Cole and Dr. Chase Thompson from the Great Commission

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Association, led by Dr. Mike Stewart, as they explore the frontiers of ministry

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and aim for the goal of making every church flourish.

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Hello, everybody, and welcome into episode number 27 of the Every Church Flourishing podcast.

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Today, Pastor Chris Cole and I interview Chris Reynolds, who is the Director of Missions, the

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Mission Strategist, the Strategic Outsider in Jacksonville, Florida,

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and one of the best thinkers on church ministry that we've encountered.

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Some of the things we're going to talk about include why are churches drifting

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away from their main purpose of discipleship? What's the cure for purpose drift?

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And some of the aspects of pastoring that seminary doesn't really prepare you for.

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It was a great discussion. It was a lot of fun meeting with Chris,

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and I think you're going to enjoy it.

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And we talk about several different things. So I think at least one of the topics

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we're going to address today is going to be important for you and edifying for

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you and thought-provoking for you.

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In the beginning of the interview, we're going to tell you all about Chris and

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how to get in touch with him, his podcast, his sub stack. So I'm going to go

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ahead and kick it over to that.

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All right. Today, we welcome in Chris Reynolds, the mission strategist for the

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Northeast Florida Family of Churches, which is kind of located around the Jacksonville

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area there in Nassau County, Duval.

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And it's 100 miles north of the shark attack capital of the world in New Smyrna

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Beach, which is something that I just personally keep up with.

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Chris, I hope you are safe from sharks for the duration of this recording. at least

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Yes, indeed we are. We have to worry about alligators more than sharks here in Florida.

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Yeah, you guys have been in the news big time lately, like three alligator attacks

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in the last week. That's crazy.

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Yeah, I think there just is a running, like something gets picked up once and

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then they have to report every single one.

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They're probably not counting the rednecks that are playing around in their

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pond because that happens probably at least once a week.

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Nice. These are people who are saying things like, hey, hold my beer and watch

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this. Is that what you're saying? I mean, if they're not Southern Baptists,

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right? Because they're saying, hold my Diet Coke and watch this.

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That's pretty accurate. You know, if you search Florida man and then whatever

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date on the calendar year, there is a story behind it.

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We have a mutual friend in Dr. Jimbo Stewart.

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And Jimbo, I've asked him before, I said, Jimbo, are the Florida man stories

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true? He said, every single one. Has that been your experience as well?

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Yes. And I have some family members

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that are Florida men. It's just the nature of having grown up here.

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Well, Chris, we are so glad that you are here with us today.

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We're excited that you're coming to share a bit of your story with us.

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Tell us briefly maybe about your history as a pastor, how you got called into

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ministry, and how you transitioned from being a pastor to becoming the mission

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strategist for the Northeast Florida family of churches.

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So I actually grew up here in Northeast Florida whenever I received the call to ministry.

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And I knew early on in life that I was going to be engaged in ministry in some capacity.

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And so I started serving in my local church and was a children's pastor,

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came on staff at a church here in this region.

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And it wasn't very long before I got a phone call from a megachurch in Tennessee,

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and they wanted me to come and serve as children's pastor there because apparently

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a male children's pastor is a rarity.

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And so I thought this is going to be a great opportunity. And it was.

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It was a great learning opportunity for me.

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The experience gained there being a part of a megachurch running 2,500 every single Sunday.

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We had a 9,000 square foot children's wing and 2,500, like I said,

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running every single week, 350 to 400 kids, two services.

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There was so much happening that I learned a lot, but it was like drinking water

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out of a fire hydrant. Mm-hmm.

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After about two years, it became abundantly clear that God was moving in me

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to move towards pastoral ministry. And I remember praying specifically,

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God, if you want this to happen, you're going to have to be the one that does it.

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Because I don't jump rungs from children's pastor to senior pastor.

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That's just that's not what typically happens. So if this is what you want me

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to do, even though I think it's probably a bad idea, you're going to have to be the one that does it.

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And sure enough, a church in Boone, North Carolina called me to be their senior

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pastor. I was 27 and a half years old, and I stepped into a role that you really

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don't understand the pressures of until you're really there.

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And was there for about four years, arrived and did not realize the environment

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that I was stepping into. It was really a revitalization of sorts.

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And after being there for four years, helping them navigate some significant

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changes and challenges, as well as growing in my own understanding of what that

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role was, I then transitioned to Columbia, South Carolina, where I was for about seven years.

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And that's when I was introduced to a healthy model of associational leadership.

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My mentor, George Bullard, he really showed me what associations could do when

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it came to strengthening the missional movement that could exist in a local church.

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And so while I was serving as a pastor there, helping the church that was in

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transition begin moving in a new direction.

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I really got plugged into the local association. After a couple of years of

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prayerfully seeking God's face on where it was He had wanted me to go next,

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I ended up working for a national consulting agency.

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Working with churches associations, state conventions all across the country.

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And after a little while, my wife and I were like, why are we still here in

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South Carolina when pastoring was no longer my primary role in the local church?

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And I was doing consulting work and I said, well, let's go home.

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And my local association, the one I grew up in, was without an associational

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leader and I'd been working with associations across the country.

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So I said, hey, this is the type of work that I do.

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And at this point, I was doing it on my own. I'd be happy to help in whatever

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capacity that I can assist. I'm not looking for a role, simply saying,

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I want to help because this is my home association.

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And they said, well, we had three interviews today for our next associational

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missionary and none of those three were it. So why don't you send in your resume? And I said,

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I'm really busy. They said, well, will you pray about it? Absolutely.

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So that following Monday, I sent them my resume.

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Come to find out, they said that before they started those interviews,

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they prayed as a group, as a search team, dear Lord, before the end of the day,

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please make it abundantly clear who you want here in this role for this next

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season for our association.

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And they had those interviews and they were like, man, none of them are it.

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And then I called. And so it was just a total God thing.

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And so I get to do what it is that I love doing, working with churches,

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working with pastors, but I get to do it here in the place that I grew up.

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That is way cool. That's such a great intro to your story, Chris,

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and to how God's been at work in your life.

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For just the context here, most of our churches spread out all across California, Central Coast.

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Like when you gave some of those numbers for the church you served in in Tennessee,

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We have no church that would meet that reality.

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Like, I don't know. Chase, do you know of a church that's got a 9,000 square

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foot children's facility?

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I mean, most of our churches don't have more than, you know,

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3,500, 4,000 square feet is a big facility for a lot of our churches and our association.

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So it's definitely not a reality that a lot of our pastors in our churches hang

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out in and live in. So it's quite remarkable to hear that story of how God's

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been at work there with you in that way.

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It's an anomaly, I think, anywhere

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because that group is really only about 8%, if that, 8% of the total.

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And so what it allowed me to do, though, was gain experience in an environment

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in which a lot of people don't have experience in and to understand the dynamics

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that take place there. Because here's the reality.

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I served in that church. That's the largest church I've ever served in.

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After that, I went to 150-member church. And then I went to a church that was

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running 60 in regular worship attendance.

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And then even in that transition, that church ended up merging in with another

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church just because of transitions and changes that had to happen because they

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had adopted the Field of Dreams mentality

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of when it came to building a building, if you build it, they will come and people never showed up.

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And so they had this monstrous deferred maintenance debt hanging over their head.

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So it's not the reality of any most other places, but it has given me that experience

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to where I can actually connect with pastors and church leaders and other staff

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members and understand what it is that they're going through.

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Yeah, well, tell us about your podcast and your sub stack and the kind of things

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you talk about and write about, Chris.

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So the podcast is really trying to reveal resources that exist here in our contextual environment.

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So it's Kingdom Over Turf, and our hope is really to get pastors on there or

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church leaders or ministry leaders or those that are serving in some way

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that can be an asset to the local church.

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That can be a benefit to a pastor in that context.

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Because what I have found is that most of the time, it's not so much the.

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Centralized associational office that is the harbinger of all of the necessary

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information for a pastor or a church leader. Rather, it's somebody down the street.

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It's that local church leader that is experiencing the same thing that that

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pastor that is in a struggle mode, that somebody else down the street has already

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experienced it. They know what it looks like to walk through it.

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And so really, I see my role from an associational standpoint.

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And then this is the podcast is really just an opportunity for,

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but as a connector where if I have a conversation with a pastor and they say,

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man, I'm really going through this or I don't know what to do about the staffing

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issue or, hey, we're struggling to with clarity and where it is that God is leading us next.

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Or we're really hitting this barrier whenever it comes to our education ministry.

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Well, I've had enough conversations with enough people to be able to say,

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hey, I know a pastor just down the road from you.

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Let me connect you to him. And so my hope is through the podcast, it's to

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have those conversations in that form, not to say, hey, come and listen to my

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podcast, but so that somebody that goes and listen to it, they will say,

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hey, that's somebody I could reach out to because I'm feeling the same thing

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or I'm experiencing that same thing or I am going through that as well.

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And so that's a resource that they can connect with. The substack for me is

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a desire to share from a strategic outsider standpoint.

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For those that don't know,

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Back in, I guess, 2015, maybe it was a little bit earlier than that,

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Rick Wheeler headed a task force that was put together through SB Cal,

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which is Southern Baptist Conference of Associational Leadership.

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And Rick Wheeler at the time was part of the JBA, the Jacksonville Baptist Association.

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Jacksonville Baptist Association is now First Coast Churches,

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and that's just my neighbor.

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Rick is now a part of Stewardship Simplified there in Jacksonville, heading that up.

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But while while he was there at JBA, he.

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Led a task force to change the name and to create a name that really reflected

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the role of an associational missionary or a director of missions that it's

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sometimes still called.

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And what they came up with was a mission strategist, associational mission strategist.

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And the definition that they used is they really came as a strategic outsider.

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And so I like the definition of things because I find them so much simpler than

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the complicated of, well, what is a mission strategist?

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So I'd just rather call it the definition. So as a strategic outsider,

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I can walk into an environment, a church, a place, I can walk into an experience

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and I can see it from a different perspective because I don't live there.

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And so that's the objective with the Substack is to say, hey,

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pastor, church, church leader, this is what I'm observing.

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This is what I'm seeing. This is an outsider's perspective that it's really

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hard for you to see when you're in the inside, you're in the day-to-day,

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you're experiencing it over and over again.

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And so that's kind of the focus of both of those.

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Well, that's awesome. Resourcing pastors is a very needed thing. I went to seminary,

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I know Christopher went to seminary and I had a good experience in seminary.

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I worked for New Orleans Baptist for almost 10 years.

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I'm a fan of seminary, but I would say probably 90 to 95%. I don't know.

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That might be a little high. 90% of my seminary experience was all about Greek,

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Hebrew, learning the Bible, theology.

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And it's great stuff. And I'm still into that stuff. But a very small percentage

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of it is about how to pastor a church and how to run a church.

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And all of these nitty gritty things. And a lot of that stuff you're covering

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on your podcast, Kingdom Over Turf. And look, I know bylaws are not the most

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fascinating and glorious topic to talk about.

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But earlier this year, you had an attorney, Gary Eldale on that was talking about bylaws.

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And I think probably this is an incredibly important thing that pastors and

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church leaders don't think about, don't talk about a lot, But probably we should

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be a whole lot more aware of what our bylaws say.

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In fact, our church is kind of going through this process right now.

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We just recently discovered, I discovered going through our bylaws looking for

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something else that we're supposed to be meeting for our quarterly business

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meetings on a particular Wednesday night.

00:15:24.516 --> 00:15:28.452
And we're actually doing those quarterly business meetings on a Sunday morning,

00:15:28.737 --> 00:15:33.487
which you know, probably we're not going to go to jail or be locked up by the

00:15:33.487 --> 00:15:37.821
FBI for that. But if we say we're going to do something, we should do something. So

00:15:38.158 --> 00:15:42.813
Tell us a little bit about what you learned from Gary and what pastors and church

00:15:42.813 --> 00:15:47.593
leaders should be thinking about their bylaws as kind of a warm-up question

00:15:47.593 --> 00:15:49.367
before we get into deeper waters.

00:15:49.507 --> 00:15:52.603
Yeah, and that's one of the benefits is there are a lot of things from a,

00:15:53.163 --> 00:15:55.923
if you're an associational missionary or mission strategist,

00:15:55.923 --> 00:16:00.943
you become a generalist to where you know a lot of things, a little bit about a lot of things.

00:16:01.763 --> 00:16:07.003
And that's where you can tap into experts and say, hey, we need you to really explore this deeply.

00:16:07.403 --> 00:16:11.963
And the benefit of the conversation with Gary is that he shared those necessary

00:16:11.963 --> 00:16:15.204
realities that your bylaws, and I love the way that he puts it,

00:16:15.518 --> 00:16:17.343
it's kind of like a safety blanket.

00:16:17.343 --> 00:16:22.663
It is this warm blanket that it goes around you from a protection standpoint.

00:16:22.963 --> 00:16:30.783
If you don't have accurate bylaws that reflect what you're actually doing and

00:16:30.783 --> 00:16:36.630
your governance procedures and expectations, that is a recipe for disaster.

00:16:36.868 --> 00:16:40.613
Because those bylaws are a protection for the church.

00:16:40.613 --> 00:16:44.914
Because if anything is ever brought to the court system, anything,

00:16:45.053 --> 00:16:51.173
the first thing that a judge is gonna do is say, what do the bylaws of that

00:16:51.173 --> 00:16:53.488
church say pertaining to this matter?

00:16:53.813 --> 00:16:58.678
Because the bylaws are what dictate what's happening and what is supposed to happen.

00:16:58.678 --> 00:17:02.183
And if you haven't been abiding by your bylaws, well, then

00:17:02.380 --> 00:17:08.783
any claim that somebody makes may be in question and put the church at risk

00:17:08.905 --> 00:17:12.558
because the judge says, well, you haven't been abiding by your bylaws in any

00:17:12.558 --> 00:17:14.358
other place, in any other way.

00:17:14.358 --> 00:17:17.598
You've not been upholding them. You can't even uphold them for some churches

00:17:17.598 --> 00:17:21.606
because they don't have the necessary requirement of members in some situations.

00:17:21.769 --> 00:17:26.628
And therefore, why should we adhere to this when you've not been following anywhere else?

00:17:26.784 --> 00:17:31.498
And then they can go by another standard and it may not be ruled in your favor.

00:17:31.498 --> 00:17:36.438
So those bylaws really become a pivotal, pivotal resource for churches from

00:17:36.438 --> 00:17:37.938
a protectionary standpoint.

00:17:37.938 --> 00:17:44.588
Yeah. And I think we resonate so much on so many similar ministry philosophies and values.

00:17:44.588 --> 00:17:48.168
And here at GCA, you know, that's one of the big things that we spend time working

00:17:48.168 --> 00:17:52.748
with churches on, too, is helping them say, hey, where are you not implementing

00:17:52.748 --> 00:17:57.828
and living out of those bylaws and operating really out of your design?

00:17:57.828 --> 00:18:00.238
You know, it's one of the areas that we try to talk to churches about,

00:18:00.238 --> 00:18:04.324
say, listen, this is you functioning within the design that you have,

00:18:04.434 --> 00:18:10.778
and that's a core component of just living with integrity, operating within your design.

00:18:10.778 --> 00:18:17.678
I want to jump back for a second into the term strategic outsider and relate

00:18:17.678 --> 00:18:21.628
that to the idea of living out of our design.

00:18:21.628 --> 00:18:25.138
You wrote a piece recently that I just thought was phenomenal,

00:18:25.138 --> 00:18:31.248
Chris, on how God has shaped you personally as a strategic outsider.

00:18:31.248 --> 00:18:35.958
It's just a phenomenal piece there because I think I find that as I'm coaching

00:18:35.958 --> 00:18:40.958
and encouraging and trying to work with pastors, a lot of them don't actually

00:18:40.958 --> 00:18:44.358
know how they have been designed in order to

00:18:44.898 --> 00:18:49.156
Live and minister with really a sense of wholeness and integrity.

00:18:49.475 --> 00:18:54.139
So, Chris, reflecting on that article, you wrote your observations about how

00:18:54.139 --> 00:18:59.324
God has shaped you and prepared you and formed you to be this strategic outsider

00:18:59.533 --> 00:19:01.199
and why that resonates with you.

00:19:01.199 --> 00:19:06.049
What would you say to pastors about learning and exploring how they've been

00:19:06.049 --> 00:19:12.629
formed and discerning how that impacts them in discerning where and how they

00:19:12.629 --> 00:19:14.559
should be serving within the kingdom of God?

00:19:14.559 --> 00:19:18.714
No, I think that's great. So, one, I don't think that was an actual article.

00:19:18.818 --> 00:19:21.969
I think it was something that I had posted on Facebook. Oh, there you go.

00:19:21.969 --> 00:19:25.889
It was one of my stories on Facebook. So if Chase goes looking for it,

00:19:25.889 --> 00:19:28.319
that's the place to find it. There you go. All right.

00:19:29.099 --> 00:19:32.989
The experience that I had in ministry was incredibly difficult because I've

00:19:32.989 --> 00:19:35.909
never been wired like the typical pastor.

00:19:35.909 --> 00:19:40.569
And I always felt like I was less than or that I was messing it up.

00:19:40.569 --> 00:19:44.799
Because, yeah, I went to Bible college. I went to seminary. I've got three degrees.

00:19:44.799 --> 00:19:49.239
I've got bachelor's degree in biblical studies. So I've done all of the things

00:19:49.239 --> 00:19:52.029
that were required of me to do. But whenever I got into the role,

00:19:52.029 --> 00:19:54.685
like Chase said, it was like, what is this?

00:19:54.818 --> 00:19:59.539
This is not preaching Greek and Hebrew and hermeneutics. And this is not open

00:19:59.539 --> 00:20:02.189
the Bible and say, thus saith the Lord. And all the people go,

00:20:02.189 --> 00:20:04.060
oh, wow, thank goodness.

00:20:04.414 --> 00:20:07.664
You're the most intelligent person I've ever heard of. I can't believe nobody

00:20:07.664 --> 00:20:09.882
ever told me that. Let's go and do that thing.

00:20:10.178 --> 00:20:14.264
It's not that. Anybody in seminary that thinks it is that, I'm sorry.

00:20:14.264 --> 00:20:16.012
That's just not how it works.

00:20:16.152 --> 00:20:20.790
There is leadership that is required. There are tactical steps that are required.

00:20:20.970 --> 00:20:26.684
There's the very real reality that there are lost people that believe themselves

00:20:26.684 --> 00:20:32.249
to be saved, that are members of your church, that are on your deacon board, that,

00:20:32.754 --> 00:20:38.153
God forbid that they are on your elder board and they are lost.

00:20:38.431 --> 00:20:44.104
There are sweet little old ladies that sit on the right side of the sanctuary

00:20:44.104 --> 00:20:48.834
in the very back who believe themselves to be saved that will straight up tell

00:20:48.834 --> 00:20:51.735
you, I just hope I've done enough to get into heaven.

00:20:52.974 --> 00:20:57.470
And they had been there in that church for over 50 years. That's the reality.

00:20:57.592 --> 00:21:03.037
And so for me, coming out of seminary, beginning to pastor, beginning to lead,

00:21:03.183 --> 00:21:08.714
I struggled because the hand holding at somebody's bedside didn't fuel me.

00:21:09.054 --> 00:21:13.274
And I felt like, is something wrong with me? That's not what fueled my soul.

00:21:13.274 --> 00:21:16.271
That's not, did I do it? Absolutely, 100%.

00:21:16.590 --> 00:21:21.314
But it just didn't energize me. Now, standing in front of.

00:21:21.934 --> 00:21:25.194
A room of people who are seeking clarity on

00:21:25.594 --> 00:21:29.204
what God is calling them to do in the places they live, work,

00:21:29.204 --> 00:21:35.064
and play, and how they can execute it well under the umbrella of what God is

00:21:35.064 --> 00:21:38.164
doing at the church, that is something that's energizing.

00:21:38.164 --> 00:21:42.274
That's encouraging. Helping a staff team navigate what the future looks like,

00:21:42.274 --> 00:21:44.245
that's encouraging. That's energizing.

00:21:44.390 --> 00:21:48.174
And so for the longest time, I didn't realize that that's just how God had wired

00:21:48.174 --> 00:21:49.666
me. That's how he put me together.

00:21:49.805 --> 00:21:55.157
In about 2020 or so, I went through a process that my friends have really fine-tuned

00:21:55.285 --> 00:21:59.014
this process, and it's around personal calling and clarity.

00:21:59.334 --> 00:22:02.789
It's my friends Shane Stacy and Dave Rhodes at Clarity House.

00:22:03.155 --> 00:22:06.429
It's a process called handcrafted calling, incredible resource.

00:22:06.585 --> 00:22:09.952
I would encourage any pastor or church leader to consider it,

00:22:10.063 --> 00:22:15.067
or even lay member that really wants to discover what's their Ephesians 2.10 calling in life.

00:22:15.212 --> 00:22:19.574
Because I went through this journey and I realized that's just not how God has wired me.

00:22:19.894 --> 00:22:25.094
I had spent so much of my life trying to help people walk in greater intimacy

00:22:25.094 --> 00:22:28.534
and relationship with Christ that they didn't want to. And yeah,

00:22:28.534 --> 00:22:29.492
they were church members.

00:22:29.776 --> 00:22:33.294
They just didn't want to go any further than they had gone. and it was eating

00:22:33.294 --> 00:22:37.084
me alive. And so when I went through that process and I realized that's not

00:22:37.084 --> 00:22:40.005
what I was made, some people are made to do that and they do it very well.

00:22:40.179 --> 00:22:43.764
That's just not what he had made me to do. When I realized that and I began

00:22:43.764 --> 00:22:48.084
to reframe my actions and started investing in those that did wanna move forward

00:22:48.084 --> 00:22:51.294
with positive progress and greater intimacy in their relationship with Christ

00:22:51.631 --> 00:22:54.429
and helped them move forward, it helped the health of the whole.

00:22:54.539 --> 00:22:59.594
All of a sudden we started seeing dramatic shifts and movement and I felt better

00:22:59.594 --> 00:23:01.604
about what it was that I was doing.

00:23:01.720 --> 00:23:07.544
And so that really helped fuel me as I began to step into the associational

00:23:07.544 --> 00:23:11.914
role and that strategic outsider standpoint, because my tagline for the strategic

00:23:11.914 --> 00:23:13.654
outsider is see what's next.

00:23:13.974 --> 00:23:18.084
I want to help somebody see what's next, whatever it is, and however it is that

00:23:18.084 --> 00:23:20.035
God is leading. I want to help you see what's next.

00:23:20.192 --> 00:23:22.254
Man, that is so good. So rich.

00:23:22.254 --> 00:23:25.434
Well, tell us a little bit, as long as we're calling audibles,

00:23:25.434 --> 00:23:30.554
tell us a little bit about this handcrafted calling process from Clarity House.

00:23:30.554 --> 00:23:32.394
I'm looking at their website right now.

00:23:32.914 --> 00:23:38.274
I just did in a 10 second glance, I'm thinking this is a way for a pastor or

00:23:38.274 --> 00:23:43.834
church leader, something that goes beyond like a spiritual gift assessment that

00:23:43.834 --> 00:23:46.934
goes beyond the personality types or whatever

00:23:47.314 --> 00:23:52.264
and helps you dig deeper into knowing who you are and to understanding your calling.

00:23:52.264 --> 00:23:55.754
Am I barking up the right tree there? Is that what this process is about?

00:23:55.754 --> 00:24:01.164
It is. It is well beyond a spiritual gifts assessment. It is about helping people

00:24:01.164 --> 00:24:06.304
discover their God-unique calling in life. And how do they reframe that?

00:24:06.304 --> 00:24:07.795
So one of the struggles...

00:24:08.154 --> 00:24:11.359
Oftentimes whenever it comes to the church world is people say,

00:24:11.359 --> 00:24:13.692
I want to serve, I want to engage in some way.

00:24:13.820 --> 00:24:19.389
And we can take, you know, fortune 500 CEOs, or we can take chief marketing

00:24:19.389 --> 00:24:23.889
officers, or we can take the plumber next door. And we say to all of them,

00:24:23.889 --> 00:24:28.419
okay, yeah, I need you to hold this door and say hello to people as they come in.

00:24:28.657 --> 00:24:32.587
Now, don't get me wrong, that's absolutely essential. And I think that that's a great resource

00:24:32.942 --> 00:24:36.223
for somebody that wants to serve. However, if somebody's wanting to go deeper

00:24:36.223 --> 00:24:41.103
in understanding God's unique calling on their life and how they become,

00:24:41.883 --> 00:24:47.274
more obedient to the great commission and by means of the great commandment,

00:24:47.425 --> 00:24:50.420
it's probably not gonna be through just hold this door.

00:24:51.783 --> 00:24:55.633
So it's not a spiritual inventory. It's not a gifts test. It's really a,

00:24:55.766 --> 00:25:01.142
how do I begin to look at the world through the lens of how God has wired me

00:25:01.293 --> 00:25:05.823
so that I can carry out the work that God has called me to do every single day.

00:25:05.823 --> 00:25:10.373
I haven't done this in a while, so it's a struggle for me to remember the math.

00:25:10.373 --> 00:25:15.027
But I used to talk about Malcolm Gladwell's 10,000-hour rule.

00:25:15.161 --> 00:25:20.118
In his book, Outliers, I listened to that book in 2018, 2019,

00:25:20.264 --> 00:25:22.301
and that's when I began to do the math.

00:25:22.446 --> 00:25:25.569
So the disciples, they were with Jesus for three years.

00:25:25.709 --> 00:25:30.413
If they spent intentionally 10 hours a day, which according to what we can see

00:25:30.413 --> 00:25:33.843
with scripture, They were pretty much with him for three years nonstop.

00:25:33.843 --> 00:25:38.743
But if they spent 10 hours a day for three years and concentrated trying to

00:25:38.743 --> 00:25:41.863
grow in greater intimacy and relationship with Christ and understanding what

00:25:41.863 --> 00:25:45.343
it is he had called them to do, do you know how many hours they reach at the

00:25:45.343 --> 00:25:46.274
end of those three years?

00:25:46.420 --> 00:25:47.552
Right at 10,000.

00:25:47.656 --> 00:25:48.811
Just over 10,000.

00:25:49.096 --> 00:25:53.711
Just over 10,000. And then I began to do the math on the average churchgoer.

00:25:53.833 --> 00:25:59.383
How much is the average churchgoer investing in growing a greater intimacy and

00:25:59.383 --> 00:26:00.648
relationship with Christ?

00:26:00.932 --> 00:26:06.087
On a weekly basis. And I said, well, if I said three hours a week intentionally,

00:26:06.249 --> 00:26:10.853
so this is including Sunday morning service, intentionally doing it three hours

00:26:10.853 --> 00:26:14.040
a week, how long would it take them to get

00:26:14.352 --> 00:26:18.143
to 10 000 hours i want to think it was something along the line i can't do the

00:26:18.143 --> 00:26:20.773
math maybe you've got a computer in front of you could do the math it was something

00:26:20.773 --> 00:26:25.603
along the lines it was over 70 years oh yeah on average i would probably put

00:26:25.603 --> 00:26:27.613
it close to an hour which you're looking at about.

00:26:28.133 --> 00:26:31.063
192 years for them to reach that 10 000 hour rule

00:26:31.179 --> 00:26:36.013
and we wonder why we have such a problem whenever it comes to spiritual growth

00:26:36.013 --> 00:26:40.123
and development in the local church and so the purpose of the handcrafted calling

00:26:40.123 --> 00:26:43.773
what i really see the sweet spot being is that when people understand their

00:26:43.773 --> 00:26:44.930
Ephesians 2.10 calling.

00:26:45.040 --> 00:26:47.339
Now it's not about what they do at church.

00:26:47.635 --> 00:26:51.323
It's about how they're living their life and how they're carrying out the great

00:26:51.323 --> 00:26:54.775
commission by means of the great commandment in their everyday life.

00:26:54.920 --> 00:27:00.568
And now they're framing everything through the lens of this is how I glorify God and make disciples.

00:27:00.713 --> 00:27:04.313
So for me, simplified to two words, it's discovering next.

00:27:04.633 --> 00:27:08.913
I want to help you discover what's next in God's and how God is working in your

00:27:08.913 --> 00:27:12.161
life. Now, for some cases, it may just be a profession of faith.

00:27:12.306 --> 00:27:14.773
In others, it may be an active faith.

00:27:15.110 --> 00:27:20.218
It may be taking a next step in some venture or some opportunity,

00:27:20.218 --> 00:27:23.788
but I want to help somebody discover next. If I'm helping them discover next,

00:27:23.788 --> 00:27:27.544
then I'm living into that calling and I'm framing everything that to lens.

00:27:27.683 --> 00:27:31.428
And so as people discover their unique calling and they begin to live it out,

00:27:31.579 --> 00:27:35.338
it changes how they interact with the world. And especially if they see it as,

00:27:35.338 --> 00:27:39.758
hey, this is how God has called and equipped me to make disciples and glorify

00:27:39.758 --> 00:27:40.698
him in everything that I do.

00:27:40.998 --> 00:27:46.397
That's a long answer to a short question, but I feel like it's helpful to kind of illustrate that out.

00:27:46.543 --> 00:27:50.348
No, I think that's, yeah, I was just going to say, I think that's so good, Chris.

00:27:50.348 --> 00:27:55.618
I think that this, you know, ties into some of the questions we wanted to talk

00:27:55.918 --> 00:28:00.518
with you about today, specifically as we think about the idea

00:28:01.018 --> 00:28:06.908
of understanding how we are designed, God's work of calling us to be and become

00:28:06.908 --> 00:28:10.384
disciples and then to make disciples, right?

00:28:10.598 --> 00:28:14.169
Right. Which I know is a great passion of yours as well.

00:28:14.309 --> 00:28:19.438
So maybe we could talk today a little bit about the drift in a lot of our churches

00:28:19.438 --> 00:28:25.971
away from the core function of making disciples and how that happens.

00:28:26.578 --> 00:28:30.698
How do churches end up unintentionally? I've never met a church yet that's told

00:28:30.698 --> 00:28:36.218
me, hey, we intentionally drifted away from making disciples as our primary calling.

00:28:36.218 --> 00:28:40.618
Now, maybe they're out there, but I haven't found that church yet that's at

00:28:40.618 --> 00:28:45.961
least vocalized that that way to say, hey, we just decided we gave up on disciple making, right?

00:28:46.141 --> 00:28:49.718
They would all tell you, you know, in good Southern Baptist churches way,

00:28:49.718 --> 00:28:53.455
you know, I can find most of them can recite the Great Commission.

00:28:53.600 --> 00:29:00.578
But living it out and understanding how do churches drift away from their purpose?

00:29:01.278 --> 00:29:07.033
And what are some of the key things that maybe take the place of those churches' purpose?

00:29:07.271 --> 00:29:11.956
Is it just an activity-first mindset, prioritizing programming?

00:29:12.118 --> 00:29:18.243
How do we shift into that mentality? And then maybe what is the cure for that?

00:29:18.629 --> 00:29:22.898
So let me answer the first thing. How does it happen or how did it happen?

00:29:23.478 --> 00:29:26.924
There's a quote by Peter Drucker that I really like, and I had to look it up

00:29:27.064 --> 00:29:30.118
earlier because I wanted to make sure that I got it right. But he said that

00:29:30.118 --> 00:29:35.098
the most valuable insights lie in the hardest things to measure.

00:29:35.918 --> 00:29:39.998
And I feel like in the church world, specifically for us as Southern Baptists,

00:29:39.998 --> 00:29:47.438
but also just churches in general, we have set the metric of success really,

00:29:47.438 --> 00:29:50.503
really about the easy things to count. Yeah.

00:29:50.648 --> 00:29:55.141
It's about the budgets. It's about the butts in the seats. And it's about the buildings.

00:29:55.286 --> 00:30:00.215
Those three elements have really defined the measures of success.

00:30:00.319 --> 00:30:03.895
What's your operating budget at your church? How many people attend your church?

00:30:04.040 --> 00:30:06.380
And what type of building do you have? How large is that?

00:30:07.358 --> 00:30:10.495
If you go to, we just had the Southern Baptist Convention.

00:30:10.623 --> 00:30:14.938
If you were attending there and you were to be a fly on the wall or to be a

00:30:14.958 --> 00:30:20.010
creep standing in the hallway, just overhearing conversations,

00:30:20.558 --> 00:30:24.858
I have no doubt at some point, hundreds, if not thousands of times,

00:30:24.858 --> 00:30:27.104
someone said, how many people attend your church?

00:30:27.417 --> 00:30:30.894
What's attendance like? Because it's an easy metric.

00:30:31.810 --> 00:30:35.328
But you multiply that over time, And that becomes the standard.

00:30:35.328 --> 00:30:41.608
Even our own reporting, the ACP, the annual church profile, the metrics are

00:30:41.608 --> 00:30:45.948
around all of those things. Let's count how many baptisms, how many are in Sunday

00:30:45.948 --> 00:30:49.846
school, how many are in worship, how many were in vacation Bible school.

00:30:49.991 --> 00:30:52.075
It's all around those numbers.

00:30:52.406 --> 00:30:56.055
And don't get me wrong, numbers are not a bad thing. Numbers are good things.

00:30:56.055 --> 00:30:59.675
It's indicative of, hey, we should be measuring these things.

00:30:59.675 --> 00:31:01.683
These are metrics that are important.

00:31:01.810 --> 00:31:06.414
But when those become the standard, those become the expectation of success,

00:31:06.658 --> 00:31:08.620
that's when we're going to start running into a problem.

00:31:08.736 --> 00:31:14.095
The point of Peter Drucker's statement that the most valuable insights lie in

00:31:14.095 --> 00:31:18.475
the things that are hardest to measure is that we should be measuring those

00:31:18.475 --> 00:31:21.083
hard things and trying to measure those hard things.

00:31:21.216 --> 00:31:23.927
Where are we seeing life transformation at?

00:31:24.061 --> 00:31:29.599
Marriages being restored, fathers leading their families, caring well.

00:31:29.727 --> 00:31:34.975
Where do we see people that are engaging in their workplaces and they're creating

00:31:34.975 --> 00:31:38.044
space for disciple making in their everyday life?

00:31:38.189 --> 00:31:41.475
Where do we see those things happening? Let's begin to measure those things.

00:31:41.475 --> 00:31:46.345
And that can't be done on a wide level a lot of the times, but it should be

00:31:46.345 --> 00:31:52.417
thought about and thought about hard on a local level and thought about in individual context and

00:31:52.614 --> 00:31:56.445
be brought into the conversation that's happening around the tables when pastors

00:31:56.445 --> 00:31:58.878
meet together and when church leaders are gathering.

00:31:59.023 --> 00:32:03.485
What are the things that we are measuring as a church? And I think that that

00:32:03.485 --> 00:32:06.773
will begin to shift the conversation significantly.

00:32:07.180 --> 00:32:11.093
Along those lines, how can churches and pastors

00:32:11.255 --> 00:32:18.318
kind of slide into or drift into that machine kind of mentality that you talked

00:32:18.318 --> 00:32:22.958
about, where the whole purpose is to recruit people,

00:32:23.289 --> 00:32:27.458
no matter who they are, no matter what their giftings are, no matter what their

00:32:27.458 --> 00:32:32.348
abilities are, into positions that kind of keep the machine of the church running?

00:32:32.575 --> 00:32:39.919
How can we drift into that mentality and keep drifting over and over away from

00:32:40.070 --> 00:32:45.212
a Great Commission disciple-making mentality when

00:32:45.708 --> 00:32:48.448
it just seems like that's all Southern Baptists talk about?

00:32:48.448 --> 00:32:52.138
We almost want to change the name of our convention to Great Commission Baptist.

00:32:52.138 --> 00:32:57.995
So what is it about church leadership that causes that drift away from

00:32:58.308 --> 00:33:03.504
these primary things that we're called to? Why do we keep sliding down the same

00:33:03.626 --> 00:33:05.205
hill over and over again?

00:33:05.338 --> 00:33:08.621
I don't think it's any one specific thing. And that's where the problem comes

00:33:08.621 --> 00:33:11.621
in. It would be nice to be able to find a switch to be able to go click.

00:33:11.621 --> 00:33:15.251
We turn that off. It's taken care of. But it's not one specific thing.

00:33:15.251 --> 00:33:18.690
And it happens at a grassroots level. It happens on an individual level.

00:33:18.840 --> 00:33:21.296
So let me take just for my own experience.

00:33:21.453 --> 00:33:25.711
I come into a church. There is a level of expectation when you walk into that

00:33:25.711 --> 00:33:28.150
church of this is how we do church.

00:33:28.296 --> 00:33:32.161
This is what church is supposed to look like. And that expectation level is

00:33:32.161 --> 00:33:34.466
built upon what's been done in the past.

00:33:34.600 --> 00:33:37.375
It's built upon what they're seeing at other places.

00:33:37.525 --> 00:33:42.518
It's based on what has worked at other places. It's based on what works here

00:33:42.651 --> 00:33:44.805
and based on the community context.

00:33:44.962 --> 00:33:49.801
So it's based on all of those factors. But you come in and there's that expectation

00:33:49.801 --> 00:33:53.081
level of this is what we do, or this is what we should be doing.

00:33:53.081 --> 00:34:00.966
And it's also been pushed down. In the late 80s, early 90s, we became very programmatic heavy.

00:34:01.094 --> 00:34:05.721
We had Lifeway and Lifeway was pushing out materials and everybody was doing

00:34:05.721 --> 00:34:09.381
the same vacation Bible school and everybody was doing the same discipleship,

00:34:09.381 --> 00:34:10.893
making material, let me clarify.

00:34:11.131 --> 00:34:15.902
They were doing the same programmatic disciple training material.

00:34:16.140 --> 00:34:19.931
It wasn't necessarily that they were making disciples, but they were just educating

00:34:19.931 --> 00:34:22.874
people were using the same material and calling it discipleship.

00:34:23.019 --> 00:34:24.221
Were disciples made in it?

00:34:24.401 --> 00:34:29.471
I have no doubt. But what was the emphasis? The emphasis was more towards here,

00:34:29.471 --> 00:34:33.231
we have a training center instead of it being a, we have a teaching center instead

00:34:33.231 --> 00:34:34.361
of it being a training center.

00:34:35.221 --> 00:34:39.162
And so it's not one specific set of circumstances.

00:34:39.289 --> 00:34:41.901
I think it's a combination of all those things. And so as a pastor,

00:34:41.901 --> 00:34:44.746
you come in and you have all these expectations laid on you.

00:34:45.065 --> 00:34:49.413
Also, you're the professional. You're the one that's called to execute.

00:34:49.535 --> 00:34:51.520
You're the one that's called to do it.

00:34:51.654 --> 00:34:54.963
You don't do those things. What's the consequence in some cases?

00:34:55.149 --> 00:34:58.701
The consequence is people leave the church. That's best case scenario.

00:34:58.875 --> 00:35:03.659
Worst case scenario is they say, you know what? We don't like you anymore. It's time for you to go.

00:35:04.019 --> 00:35:07.188
We need to find a new one who will do things the way that we want to do them.

00:35:07.316 --> 00:35:11.983
So there is a pressure that exists there, And that's hard to contend with.

00:35:12.140 --> 00:35:16.128
And because that's hard to contend with, there is this justification,

00:35:16.279 --> 00:35:18.258
and then it just becomes, this is what we do.

00:35:18.380 --> 00:35:21.828
This is what I have to do for a little while. This is what I have to do in this season.

00:35:21.985 --> 00:35:24.859
This is what we're having to do right now. And eventually it becomes,

00:35:24.859 --> 00:35:31.156
this is just what we do, because any desire to try to change things is met with sort of resistance.

00:35:31.295 --> 00:35:35.129
And when we meet that resistance, there are consequences. And so we have a tendency

00:35:35.129 --> 00:35:39.069
to avoid it. And then we don't have the energy to be able to contribute towards

00:35:39.069 --> 00:35:41.396
the lasting change, towards the small things.

00:35:41.518 --> 00:35:45.789
If you're running so many programs as a pastor and a church leader that you

00:35:45.789 --> 00:35:50.889
don't have the capacity in your schedule or in your own energy level to make

00:35:50.889 --> 00:35:53.638
disciples, then it's just never gonna change.

00:35:53.853 --> 00:35:57.769
You can say you wanna make disciples, but you're so exhausted that you don't

00:35:57.769 --> 00:36:01.239
have the capacity to be able to do it. And so I think it's a combination of

00:36:01.239 --> 00:36:03.518
all of those factors. What's the solution?

00:36:03.762 --> 00:36:08.309
I think the solution is clarity. Let's become clear on what God has really called

00:36:08.309 --> 00:36:13.039
us to do and have some honest conversations about that and evaluate, are we doing it?

00:36:13.039 --> 00:36:16.629
I used to ask a church four questions. Now I've got to try to remember the four

00:36:16.629 --> 00:36:20.049
questions. This wasn't on our list of things. And now let me try to remember

00:36:20.049 --> 00:36:21.576
those four questions. It's been a couple of years.

00:36:21.732 --> 00:36:25.539
Four questions were, whose church is this? That was the first question.

00:36:25.859 --> 00:36:26.539
Good question.

00:36:26.539 --> 00:36:29.239
Whose church is this? And we can go to Scripture because of that.

00:36:29.239 --> 00:36:31.190
And we see in Scripture that this is Christ's church.

00:36:31.899 --> 00:36:34.529
And we point that out in Scripture. If this is Christ's church,

00:36:34.529 --> 00:36:35.979
then what is it that he has called us to do?

00:36:36.319 --> 00:36:38.339
Then we go to the Great Commission by means of the Great Commandment.

00:36:38.659 --> 00:36:40.797
Now, let's begin to evaluate what?

00:36:41.115 --> 00:36:45.185
What it is that we're currently doing in light of the Great Commission and the Great Commandment.

00:36:45.342 --> 00:36:49.187
Let's list all of the things that we are presently doing and say,

00:36:49.187 --> 00:36:53.957
how is this helping us glorify Christ in the local church and accomplish the

00:36:53.957 --> 00:36:55.716
Great Commission by means of the Great Commandment?

00:36:55.849 --> 00:36:59.831
And if it's not, now let's begin to the last question, what are we going to do about it?

00:37:01.027 --> 00:37:04.387
Because if there are certain things that are helping us accomplish the mission

00:37:04.387 --> 00:37:09.131
that God has given us, then we need to either adjust those things or we need to stop doing them.

00:37:09.252 --> 00:37:11.767
We need to adjust them to where they help us accomplish that,

00:37:11.928 --> 00:37:15.717
or we need to stop doing them entirely so that we can create space to actually

00:37:15.717 --> 00:37:16.840
start making disciples.

00:37:16.990 --> 00:37:21.117
But let me tell you, that's a very, very uncomfortable situation because we

00:37:21.117 --> 00:37:25.007
have sacred cows that exist in churches and programs that this is what we've

00:37:25.007 --> 00:37:26.799
always done. And so it's hard.

00:37:26.939 --> 00:37:32.457
And for some pastors and church leaders, they want to avoid that sort of confrontation.

00:37:32.457 --> 00:37:37.881
And I'm not bashing those that do avoid that conversation. It comes with scars

00:37:38.032 --> 00:37:39.512
when you begin to face it head on.

00:37:40.040 --> 00:37:42.676
Especially if you're just trying to keep your head above water,

00:37:42.676 --> 00:37:46.768
it's really, really hard to step in realizing that's what you're going to face.

00:37:46.913 --> 00:37:52.166
Yeah, absolutely. Well, stories are really powerful. And I'm going to ask both

00:37:52.166 --> 00:37:55.197
of you guys kind of a story along these lines.

00:37:55.389 --> 00:37:58.767
Anonymize the story sort of as much as you want to.

00:37:58.872 --> 00:38:04.183
And we can use negative examples or positive examples because both of those can be very powerful.

00:38:04.433 --> 00:38:10.906
Are either of you aware of churches who either A, recognize this kind of drift

00:38:10.906 --> 00:38:17.596
away from great commandment informed, great commission disciple making and turned around or B,

00:38:18.399 --> 00:38:24.846
failed to recognize that they had gotten so into the machine mentality that

00:38:24.846 --> 00:38:31.986
basically it just grinded the church to a utter halt and ceasing.

00:38:31.986 --> 00:38:39.796
So do you guys have negative examples or positive examples of churches that face this issue?

00:38:40.276 --> 00:38:43.976
I'll tell you what, a story that came to mind just while you were asking the

00:38:43.976 --> 00:38:52.735
question that ties so well, I think, into what Chris was just talking about is in one of our

00:38:52.932 --> 00:39:00.601
GCA Renew churches, I remember well this morning when I was teaching a church about

00:39:01.556 --> 00:39:03.794
having a missional mindset to prayer.

00:39:04.055 --> 00:39:09.016
It was the focus, right? And sitting in the back of the room was one of the

00:39:09.016 --> 00:39:13.563
great old saints, the old lady that really does know Jesus and has known him.

00:39:13.761 --> 00:39:18.686
And she's 84 years old, right? And but while I'm teaching, I could tell she's

00:39:18.686 --> 00:39:19.802
getting uncomfortable.

00:39:19.942 --> 00:39:23.696
And then I see a look cross her face. And I've been pastoring,

00:39:23.696 --> 00:39:27.395
you know, so long now I can tell, oh, I've crossed a line.

00:39:27.581 --> 00:39:29.636
I've made someone upset.

00:39:30.076 --> 00:39:34.420
In some way. And I could tell this look on her face. She is not happy.

00:39:34.420 --> 00:39:39.230
She is not happy about something. So I finished my my little teaching time and

00:39:39.230 --> 00:39:41.379
I ask, of course, you know, do you have questions?

00:39:41.535 --> 00:39:45.220
Her hand goes up and I'm like, all right, you know, I'm waiting for it.

00:39:45.220 --> 00:39:49.200
I'm waiting for the blast because that's what I'm used to a lot of times is,

00:39:49.200 --> 00:39:52.440
you know, when you try to bring people to the clarity that Chris is talking

00:39:52.440 --> 00:39:58.350
about, that's a deeply disconcerting moment for a lot of people and a lot of churches, right?

00:39:58.350 --> 00:40:02.880
It's very altering to their mentality and their perspective.

00:40:03.206 --> 00:40:07.319
And I do think guys working in church renewal in particular need to be sympathetic

00:40:07.319 --> 00:40:12.619
to that because we're asking people to examine realities that they hold precious

00:40:12.619 --> 00:40:14.899
and a lot of times for good reason, right?

00:40:14.899 --> 00:40:18.559
It's not just that they're just defending this program. They're defending the

00:40:18.559 --> 00:40:23.058
fact that that program 40 years ago really did help fulfill the Great Commission.

00:40:23.366 --> 00:40:28.359
It really did help them do some of those things. They just failed to see the

00:40:28.359 --> 00:40:32.489
shifts sometimes. Sometimes that's true. So this sweet older saint sitting in

00:40:32.489 --> 00:40:35.835
the back of the room, she raises her hand. I call on her.

00:40:35.968 --> 00:40:41.419
And I thought I was doing this very simple teaching on just how do you pray

00:40:41.669 --> 00:40:44.090
for lost people to come to church?

00:40:44.229 --> 00:40:49.249
And I'd given them six categories of lost people to pray for specifically for

00:40:49.249 --> 00:40:51.079
God to bring into their church.

00:40:51.195 --> 00:40:53.919
And she starts off and she's from Alabama.

00:40:54.239 --> 00:40:59.029
So both of you guys can maybe resonate. She's got that soft Alabama accent.

00:40:59.029 --> 00:41:01.799
And she's been out here in California though. And she's like,

00:41:01.799 --> 00:41:06.819
I've been a member of this church since 1963. And she said, and I have been

00:41:06.819 --> 00:41:09.974
in Southern Baptist churches my entire life. She's 84.

00:41:10.096 --> 00:41:15.922
And she said, I want to know why no one taught me to pray like this.

00:41:16.497 --> 00:41:21.749
She wasn't disputing the need for it. It was It was one of those moments that

00:41:21.749 --> 00:41:24.259
just was heartbreaking to me.

00:41:24.709 --> 00:41:28.679
Not that someone needed to follow the model I was advocating for that morning,

00:41:28.679 --> 00:41:30.919
but just simply that a saint could

00:41:30.919 --> 00:41:35.525
get to 84 years old, attend a Southern Baptist church her entire life,

00:41:35.856 --> 00:41:42.089
be a part of a particular church within our association since 1963, and have not

00:41:42.449 --> 00:41:48.889
one pastor teach her how to actively pray for lost people to come into their church.

00:41:49.463 --> 00:41:53.933
And it was heartbreaking and heart-wrenching. And that moment of clarity that

00:41:53.933 --> 00:41:59.213
came to her and to the others in the room, there was just like this silence after that question.

00:41:59.213 --> 00:42:02.893
And it was both encouraging and, like I said, heartbreaking to me because I

00:42:02.893 --> 00:42:07.903
realize, once again, so often our leadership is not aimed towards what Chris

00:42:07.903 --> 00:42:13.973
has been talking about, bringing people that clarity and bringing them in alignment to the mission of God.

00:42:13.973 --> 00:42:17.036
So that's a story that came to my mind when you were asking that question,

00:42:17.309 --> 00:42:22.417
Pastor Chase. Chris, you've got a million stories, I am sure, along these lines.

00:42:22.539 --> 00:42:25.573
I've got stories on both sides. The only thing that I would say,

00:42:25.873 --> 00:42:29.853
and I love that illustration that you use of that sweet lady, is

00:42:30.293 --> 00:42:36.213
I think that our seminaries and Bible colleges have done very well at educating

00:42:36.213 --> 00:42:39.533
us to the point that we can talk over people's heads.

00:42:39.893 --> 00:42:45.834
And that education is not a bad thing. It only becomes a bad thing when we use

00:42:45.991 --> 00:42:50.183
the big words and that people just, Donald Miller, there's a phrase that I've

00:42:50.183 --> 00:42:54.133
started using over and over, and I like the phrase. I'm sure you're familiar with Donald Miller.

00:42:54.982 --> 00:42:58.604
He wrote Blue Like Jazz. It got some negative reviews.

00:42:59.272 --> 00:43:03.613
From a theological standpoint, some people may not be in very good alignment

00:43:03.613 --> 00:43:08.523
with him. And my quoting him on this is because of the movement,

00:43:08.523 --> 00:43:11.113
the direction that he's gone now with his career.

00:43:11.264 --> 00:43:16.523
But he talks about, with StoryBrand, zero cognitive load whenever it comes to

00:43:16.523 --> 00:43:19.933
having conversations with people, when it comes to marketing.

00:43:19.933 --> 00:43:22.839
Now, he's marketing to the business world, not to the church world.

00:43:22.996 --> 00:43:27.390
But I think zero cognitive load is a great, great phrase.

00:43:27.535 --> 00:43:31.823
When you're having a conversation with a church member and you're talking about

00:43:31.823 --> 00:43:36.504
biblical matters, you really need to talk in terms of zero cognitive load.

00:43:36.707 --> 00:43:41.363
Otherwise, they're going to hear it and then they're going to move on because

00:43:41.363 --> 00:43:45.343
it just takes too much mental energy to figure out what you're talking about

00:43:45.343 --> 00:43:46.683
for the majority of people.

00:43:46.683 --> 00:43:50.653
Now, do I mean we need to lower things as a base common denominator to where

00:43:50.653 --> 00:43:52.317
we're not helping to educate?

00:43:52.659 --> 00:43:57.466
Absolutely not. But there does come a point where if people just don't know,

00:43:57.594 --> 00:43:59.637
let's not talk all over their heads.

00:43:59.788 --> 00:44:03.299
Let's make it to where it's relatable so they can hear the gospel.

00:44:03.299 --> 00:44:07.929
And then you give them, this is how you apply it in your life as a teacher.

00:44:08.429 --> 00:44:12.267
This is how it shows up as a plumber, as an electrician.

00:44:12.424 --> 00:44:18.020
This is how it shows up, you know, on the job site. This is how it shows up in your office.

00:44:18.171 --> 00:44:22.499
And this is how you carry this board. Or here's one way that you can carry this board.

00:44:22.499 --> 00:44:26.729
You have to make it super easy for them because we're in a day and age where

00:44:26.729 --> 00:44:28.869
everything has become super easy for them.

00:44:28.869 --> 00:44:33.199
It's the reason why the Christian Standard Bible has become so popular.

00:44:33.199 --> 00:44:37.099
It's because it's written in a fifth grade reading level because they know we

00:44:37.099 --> 00:44:41.437
have to simplify this down because people aren't taking the time to process through it.

00:44:41.559 --> 00:44:45.402
For those that want to take the time to process through it, take them deep,

00:44:45.623 --> 00:44:49.699
do it. But that's not the majority of people. And it's probably not the majority

00:44:49.699 --> 00:44:52.496
of people sitting in your pews as much as you want it to be.

00:44:53.262 --> 00:44:53.808
So good.

00:44:54.052 --> 00:44:58.299
Okay. Well, I think that's a good midway point to break up the interview.

00:44:58.299 --> 00:45:02.289
We are going to have part two with Chris Reynolds next week.

00:45:02.289 --> 00:45:07.109
And it actually gets even deeper and more interesting. So I really think the

00:45:07.109 --> 00:45:10.449
first half of the interview was great. He did a great job. Second half is even

00:45:10.449 --> 00:45:11.957
better. It's going to be awesome.

00:45:12.118 --> 00:45:15.719
So stay tuned for that. And if you're not subscribed now, you really should

00:45:15.719 --> 00:45:19.827
be at our website, everychurchflourishing.com.

00:45:20.181 --> 00:45:25.209
In the next couple of weeks, we're going to launch a brand new feature of the

00:45:25.529 --> 00:45:29.696
Every Church Flourishing podcast, and we're calling it Pastor Disaster.

00:45:30.015 --> 00:45:36.429
What is a pastor disaster? Well, this is stories from listeners who are pastors

00:45:36.429 --> 00:45:43.109
of any stripes, even church leaders, about disastrous things that have happened in your church.

00:45:43.109 --> 00:45:49.339
Now, we will protect your anonymity, should you so desire, and the anonymity

00:45:49.339 --> 00:45:51.958
of your church, should you so desire.

00:45:52.202 --> 00:45:56.709
But what we want from you is funny, scary,

00:45:57.089 --> 00:46:03.889
Cautionary tales, interesting things of ministry that have happened to you that

00:46:04.229 --> 00:46:08.054
at least temporarily ended up in disaster.

00:46:08.286 --> 00:46:14.770
So if you've got a pastor disaster, I'm going to ask you to reach out and send us an email and

00:46:15.107 --> 00:46:18.050
and then we'll schedule an interview with you.

00:46:18.294 --> 00:46:23.002
You can also just kind of record it on our website, everychurchflourishing.com.

00:46:23.002 --> 00:46:27.443
There is a way to leave a voicemail if it's a short and sweet pastor disaster,

00:46:27.663 --> 00:46:31.452
but if it's got a little bit more bulk to it, we'll spend two,

00:46:31.452 --> 00:46:35.924
three, four, five minutes talking to you and set up an interview time soon.

00:46:36.080 --> 00:46:41.712
All you got to do is contact us through the contact page on everychurchflourishing.com.

00:46:41.712 --> 00:46:47.197
Let me give you a couple of mild, low-level examples of pastor disasters,

00:46:47.423 --> 00:46:52.512
and I experienced one today. Today, our church, Valley Baptist in Salinas,

00:46:52.512 --> 00:46:54.172
California, had Dr. C.J.

00:46:54.512 --> 00:47:00.042
Wan of the Great Commission Association, who was just on the ECF podcast a few

00:47:00.042 --> 00:47:03.542
episodes ago talking about prayer, and I thought it was so good.

00:47:03.542 --> 00:47:07.513
I asked him to come preach to our church, and he did today, and it was awesome.

00:47:07.809 --> 00:47:12.012
And today is Sunday as I'm recording this. Last night, Saturday night,

00:47:12.012 --> 00:47:16.562
my wife, Janet, was sad as she was going to sleep that she was going to have

00:47:16.562 --> 00:47:20.963
to be in children's church today and miss Dr. CJ's sermon.

00:47:21.103 --> 00:47:26.692
So overnight, I kind of made a plan with my son that we would take over children's

00:47:26.692 --> 00:47:30.932
church for tomorrow so that Janet and my daughter Phoebe didn't have to.

00:47:30.932 --> 00:47:33.642
And I will tell you, I used to be a children's minister way,

00:47:33.642 --> 00:47:38.262
way back in the day, but it's been a long time. In fact, in the eight-plus years

00:47:38.262 --> 00:47:43.984
I've been in California, today was the first day I've been in Children's Church and

00:47:44.326 --> 00:47:47.705
In eight years. So that was really interesting.

00:47:47.978 --> 00:47:54.503
And within about 10 minutes of being there, I was teaching on today's passage,

00:47:54.503 --> 00:47:57.213
which was all about Jesus being Lord of the Sabbath.

00:47:57.213 --> 00:48:03.113
And a visitor, a young lady raised her hand in our children's church room.

00:48:03.113 --> 00:48:08.763
And she said, sir, my finger's stuck. I was like, your finger's stuck?

00:48:08.763 --> 00:48:13.856
What do you mean? So her hand was under the table, and as I began to look,

00:48:14.065 --> 00:48:17.850
it indeed was wrapped around the table leg and

00:48:18.216 --> 00:48:25.526
And it appeared to be stuck in the braces of the table, between the braces and the table leg.

00:48:25.526 --> 00:48:35.486
So I gallantly began to try to gently tug her finger out, but I misunderstood the situation.

00:48:35.486 --> 00:48:41.738
As it happens, her finger was not stuck in between the braces and the pole.

00:48:42.016 --> 00:48:49.087
Her finger was stuck in a hole in the table leg, And I didn't realize it.

00:48:49.249 --> 00:48:55.176
And it was my instinct to pull hard to get her out of the predicament she was in.

00:48:55.345 --> 00:49:01.736
But praise God, I did not do that. We almost were in the kind of do we need

00:49:01.736 --> 00:49:05.836
to call the fire department situation because my son and I worked with her for

00:49:05.836 --> 00:49:08.280
several minutes, one of us getting under the table.

00:49:08.536 --> 00:49:13.685
And, praise God, we were eventually able to pull her finger out of the hole

00:49:13.923 --> 00:49:20.296
that for some reason was in a children's church table that was made for children

00:49:20.296 --> 00:49:22.686
and is children finger-sized.

00:49:22.686 --> 00:49:27.826
So I would totally, when I was a kid, stick my finger in those kind of places

00:49:27.826 --> 00:49:30.920
and probably get them trapped just like she did.

00:49:31.180 --> 00:49:34.612
That was a narrowly averted pastor disaster.

00:49:34.908 --> 00:49:39.956
One of the pastor disasters we're going to tell you about in an upcoming episode

00:49:40.276 --> 00:49:47.255
was not averted so well. We're going to call it a mass poisoning incident.

00:49:47.679 --> 00:49:52.900
And although everybody turned out to be okay, it was almost not that way.

00:49:52.900 --> 00:49:58.230
That'll be upcoming on a future episode when we discuss that mass poisoning

00:49:58.230 --> 00:50:01.960
incident at a church in Alabama that I pastored.

00:50:01.960 --> 00:50:07.610
Let me close out real quick with our weekly look at what's going on in the Great

00:50:07.610 --> 00:50:13.520
Commission Association Fellowship of Churches, which is the sponsor of this podcast.

00:50:13.520 --> 00:50:22.310
You can get in touch with us at our website, which is gcasbc.org. That's gcasbc.org.

00:50:22.310 --> 00:50:27.260
We are a family of churches in Central California, and we would love to partner

00:50:27.260 --> 00:50:32.680
with you, especially if you are a church leader or represent a church or a pastor

00:50:32.680 --> 00:50:36.561
and you are doing ministry alone. We could be your team.

00:50:36.863 --> 00:50:41.800
Coming up at the beginning of August, August 1st at First Baptist Gilroy,

00:50:42.120 --> 00:50:47.660
we have partnered with the California Southern Baptist Convention Evangelism Workshop.

00:50:47.660 --> 00:50:52.430
And if you are a Southern Baptist church, you can get a $1,000 grant pretty

00:50:52.430 --> 00:50:56.450
much automatically for outreach. If you come to that, that's Saturday,

00:50:56.450 --> 00:50:59.297
August the 1st at First Baptist Gilroy.

00:50:59.820 --> 00:51:07.630
More details at GCASBC.org. And September 19th, 2026, which is my dear wife

00:51:07.630 --> 00:51:14.390
Janet's birthday, There is a Flourish equipping conference for women in ministry.

00:51:14.390 --> 00:51:19.570
The price is great. The location is Journey Christian Fellowship,

00:51:19.570 --> 00:51:23.700
which is on Foothill Boulevard in San Luis Obispo, California.

00:51:23.700 --> 00:51:27.160
You're going to want to check that out and you can register through our website,

00:51:27.160 --> 00:51:30.958
gcasbc.org slash flourish.

00:51:31.178 --> 00:51:36.280
We would love to hear from you. We would love to have you recommend our podcast

00:51:36.280 --> 00:51:39.480
to other listeners. So please share the show. Thanks for listening.

00:51:39.480 --> 00:51:43.105
Back next week, Lord willing, good day to you and God's