Welcome to the For the Gospel podcast where we're all about sound doctrine for everyday people. I'm your host, Costi Hinn, and on this episode, it is bittersweet. It's bitter because this is the end of the Biblical Manhood series. We've kicked the year off with Travis Allen pouring out a ton of wisdom for you. And it's sweet because this episode is what is the role of men in the local church? Now, at for the gospel, we use media to put out resources. It's sound doctrine for everyday people, but who are we kidding? I'm a local pastor. I love the local church. So does Travis. So does everyone else who supports the ministry. The local church is plan A. The local church is what God uses to reach the lost, and he's building that. That's what he promised to build. So what good are we to do a series on manhood and not talk about how men should be involved in the church? Travis, thanks for coming back, man.
SPEAKER_01Thanks for having me, Costi. Looking forward to this particular one because you and I both love the church. This is always a great conversation to have.
SPEAKER_00Amen. Well, you are the pastor of Grace Church in Greeley, Colorado. You've been through seminary. You were an elder at Grace Community Church for years. You actually, when I met you, were an elder and you were the managing director of Grace to You. Um you have seen a healthy culture of training men. At the same time, uh, I would imagine pastorally, you're fully aware of how many men today might not be sure where they fit in the body. And the questions that a lot of men ask, and and the men that I interact with and even who uh interact with our ministry, you know, want to know what if I'm not on the pastoral track? Like there's guys that want to be like the pastors or want to be an elder, so I'm not really sure. Or what if I'm a new believer? Uh what if I'm I'm not sure what to do or where to plug in? And then also, if men are spiritual leaders in the home, does that mean that they all need to be spiritual leaders in the church? There's a lot of questions, a lot of insecurity or lack of awareness on this. I think you can help a ton of men in the body of Christ. So here's the deal. First, how active should men be in their local church? Assuming roles will vary, how active should men be?
SPEAKER_01Well, um, I think that men, their their instinct should always be, I love the church. Jesus Christ loved the church so much that he died for the church. He died, he shed his blood to forgive their sins, bring them to God, and he continually, actively intercedes for the church, uh, intercedes for individual members in the church. His he's overseeing the sanctification of each and every member of his church, he he gave the Holy Spirit to drive them to sanctification, to empower their sanctification, has given them a new nature, uh, you know, the gift of a relationship with the Father that is never going to end, um, his love is for the church. So if our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, being the most blessed human being who's ever lived, the one who is happiest, most joyful, most filled with gratitude and purpose and significance, completely fulfilled in every way, if that human being, Jesus, um, is the second Adam, the last Adam, and he is the progenitor of a new race, maybe we should look to the head of the church, maybe look to our archetype and say, what is it that made him tick, and why isn't that making me tick? Um, if we do get into his thinking and get in, get the word into us, which will give us his thinking, the more word saturated we are, the more we're going to love the local church, the more we're going to want to be involved in it and actually carry out the great commission to make disciples. We see then everything in our life as an avenue for making disciples. So when we meet somebody, we're asking a question, yeah, where does this person stand with Christ? We're trying to discern the Christian, non-Christian. If they're a non-Christian, then we teach them the gospel. You know, we're trying to have gospel-oriented conversations because we want to see them be Christians. If that's a person's really a Christian, then we're teaching them in order to disciple them further. Sometimes we meet a Christian and they're more mature than we are. So we're like, hey, download to me things I need to learn. So every relationship in our life, every every uh um experience we have, every job we take, every you know, outing we go on, every traveling, every everything that we do is an opportunity for us to think about our stewardship of seeking first his kingdom and his righteousness. So I would say that the that you know a Christian man, his his compass needle always pointing north means he's always pointing toward involvement in the local church. Obviously, it's as his other duties allow. So there, you know, if if if a Christian man is not married, 1 Corinthians 7, Paul says, Hey, I'd prefer that you don't get married. You know, just be like me, because you can secure, I want to secure for you undistracted devotion to the Lord. If you get married, you have now natural interests to care for your wife, and your interests are divided, so your cons your time's divided, your energy is divided. So he prefers. Um, he's not against marriage, obviously. You know, for Ephesians chapter 5, Colossians chapter 3, he taught on marriage, excellent stuff, but but he would say, Listen, I know that you're gonna be so filled with joy just focusing on undistracted devotion to Christ. And so, young, young men, young women, if you're not married, give yourself to the local church, be involved as much as you can be. You've got a job, you've got to eat, you gotta provide for yourself, take care of uh take care of those natural necessities in life. But beyond that, man, get involved in the church. That's where it's at. If um, if you're a husband, all of a sudden you have other interests, you have other things to concern yourself with. God gives you children. Your um responsibilities start to broaden, and you have more responsibilities to tend to. So when you have young, a young family, young children in the home, your wife is obviously she's got those little ones to tend to, and you know how it is, Costy. It seems like every other week, one or more of those kids are sick, especially when they're young. There's just different challenges all the time. So seasons in life are gonna compromise your ability to be involved, but your heart's ache should be to get back into the flow of church life, even if seasons of life take you out, or some extended illness takes you out, or care for uh someone who's got a disability or a challenge or something like that, you need to get them through. You need to tend to that. But you your your desires, your compass needle should be pointing north, pointing toward that church and get involved.
SPEAKER_00Well said. Uh, another question for you why is it not healthy for a man who's been attending a church for a number of years, uh but not involved in the church somehow? Whether that be through serving, that could be in any role. I would also add giving, faithfully supporting the church, but then not to just say, well, you should serve, you know, in some ministry or give money, and you know, that's enough. But really, like discipling and making disciples, shouldn't uh men be growing spiritually. It doesn't mean that a new believer needs to be put in charge of a small group here, but like to some degree, if you've been attending a church, a good, a strong church, let's assume, a strong church, a Bible teaching church for a number of years, but you're not getting involved, you're not doing what Christ calls you to by way of the Great Commission. Is that not healthy? And if so, why isn't it healthy?
SPEAKER_01When we think about the analogy in scripture that's often commonly made about the the church being like a body, having many members, and you know, each of the members being a body part, having a function. If you had, let's say you wake up tomorrow, Cossi, and your left arm is just dead, it's not moving, it's not working, you don't have any feeling in it. You're not gonna say, Oh well, I'll just start using my right arm and just kind of get used to life with my right arm. You're not gonna go through days and weeks and months and years of a limp left arm. Um, you're gonna say, there's something wrong here when this body part is not functioning, it's not actually contributing to the good of the rest of the body. That's what that member is for, to contribute to the good of my body. Um, you know, and I so I think that if you see any men or women in the body of Christ who they're fringe people, they're sitting on the sidelines, they attend, but don't do anything else besides that. There's a problem there. You know, they're that sometimes it's because they've come out of a consumer culture, they're just there for the buffet. Hey, give me what I want to eat, and then I'm gonna go home and just sit and watch TV. Um you know, that there some people need to be trained out of the consumer mentality. Um I think that there's a when people sit for too long though, especially, man, especially if they are in a good, sound teaching church, they're in a dangerous, dangerous spot because they're treating with they're kind of they've kind of trained themselves and habituated this this indifference toward the rest of their brothers and sisters there. There's no love driving them. Love is is trying to sacrifice oneself for the spiritual good of somebody else. If if if you look around and you don't see any needs or any way that you can help somebody, you're blind. If you if you have no impulse or instinct to want to want to do for somebody else, give up yourself to help and do good for others. I gotta wonder if the love of God is in you at all, because that's the kind of love that He's shown toward us in Christ. How Christ continues to love us, how the Spirit continues to love us. Gotta wonder if there's any spiritual life there flowing at all. So I'd say, man, those people who are just sitting there and not doing anything, I want to go to them and challenge them with some of these things. Assume the best, assume they're Christians, and they just come from a very weak uh environment, a weak culture. But if they don't respond to the challenge and see that their life is not their own, that God's love really does energize them, the spirit's power does lift them up, cause them to grow, cause them to reach out, stretch out, love other people. If they don't see those one another commands in scripture and see that they're not involved in them, um if they don't see that uh uh that they need to be um part of this, you know, koinonia, a fellowship of the local church, a koinonia meaning not just we sit around and talk, koinonia meaning partnership. What's the partnership for? The partnership is well, it's the title of your program for the gospel. It's a partnership for doing the great commission for making disciples. So, what's your role in that partnership? How are you how are you supporting it? How are you uh contributing to its success? If if if people just have no interest in that message, I gotta wonder if they really do know the Lord.
SPEAKER_00It's convicting and strong, and I think it's as clear as day. Uh, you read through first John, and there's so much about an active, lively, loving faith. I think John cycles through, I think I preached through it once, and it was like there's three separate sermons I preached on love because John keeps going back to that, and love produces action. What would you say to a man who says, Look, Travis, appreciate it, agree, but I got a lot going on. Uh we pay the pastors to to work on the church and and do all that stuff. Uh to that statement, would you say, is there a short-sighted perspective in that mentality, or it, you know, maybe there's something there. The man is is right. I mean, there is a lot, he has a lot going on. Maybe he should um you know look at other angles here. What would you say to that kind of statement?
SPEAKER_01I uh yeah, I've heard those things before, and in and I have I want to get in and get involved. I want to I want to see what his life, his flow is like, and if he'll allow me to get close and see some of that. Sometimes I can see he's just in a hard spot in his job. I mean, a lot of jobs out there, especially these days, they want twice to work for half the pay. And the guys are just working hard, you know, they're working long hours, and you know, especially when you're just getting into your career, this is often the case for a young guy with a young family. Um, you know, you're you're at the low end of the totem pole. And so you're you're having to pay your dues, and it requires hours and effort out of you. I want to be really kind. Um, I've I've I've been through that myself, and I I want to be kind with guys who are going through that, to not uh to not put pressure on their conscience, uh, create a burden on their conscience that I myself could not bear. That's what the Pharisees did. The scribes and the Pharisees just lay burdens on people that they themselves could not bear, and they didn't even help people with their burdens, try to even lift them with a little finger. I've seen that kind of pastoral pressure coming on people that I think is um also a different kind of unloving. On the other side of it, though, I've also seen men who justify their desire for a certain status and a certain paycheck and a certain they've got a certain ambition that is really a worldly ambition. Um and I I I gotta I gotta guard against assuming that to be true when I see that kind of thing happening. Sometimes you get in, you find guys are just going through the thick of it right now. You just really need to be there to support them and pray for them and and try to help them through that season because you want them to think of it as a season so that they can free themselves up for the instinct of every Christian to be as involved as possible in the local church. So try to help them to get to that point. But I'd want to say to a guy who says, Hey, it's the pastor's job to do all that stuff, it'd say, Oh uh, oh contraire, let's go to Ephesians chapter 4, 11 to 12, 11 and 12, and just see. Here's my job. My job is in Ephesians 4.11. Your job is in Ephesians 4.12, it's to do the work of the ministry. Um, what do you think that means? You know, and so start to have a conversation and press them to understand um doing the work of the ministry. That's your job. And actually, it's not just your job, it's your privilege, it's your gift. It's that's the good stuff, you know, to see yourself as really building the church. Your job is to build the church. I'm just teaching you how to be a good builder. You're the one who's actually laying it out there, you're you're laying down bricks and mortar, you're you're framing in windows and doors, and you're putting roofs up. You're that's your project. And I want to help you to be the best builder possible. And so I'm here to make you make you really good at your job. But man, they've got to have that mentality that their life is a stewardship, they're gonna give an account for the stewardship of their life. When I say stewardship, people all be all of a sudden think about Dave Ramsey and how how they budget. It's it's not your it's not your money, it's it is your money, but it's your life, it's everything that you've been given by God. And believe me, everything you have has been given by God. None of it did you come up with on your own. You didn't come up with your the family you were born into, the educational privileges you've been granted, you didn't come up with your gifts and your talents, you didn't come up with your intellect, you didn't come up with your energy level or whatever it is. God gave all of it to you, yeah, and he gave it to you um on loan. He's gonna he's he's given you this so that you can to see what you're gonna do with it. And so you got to take that, invest it, be a good investor, good steward of his resources so that you can build with it. You know, you want to leave, you know, take those resources and do as much as you can so that you can render a good account to him one day. That's how Christians think. Now, I know I know not all Christians are mature, they don't all think that way. But when you appeal to them and explain that to them, Jesus said, My sheep hear my voice and they follow me. So I expect that Christ's sheep, when they hear that kind of message that's biblical, you can explain it from scripture, they're gonna respond well to that. The spirit within them is gonna drive them to that thinking as well. When they pull away from it and say, Hey, that's not for me, you know. Again, I gotta wonder, where are you with the Lord? Yep, you know, ask other questions.
SPEAKER_00So still good, so balanced. I appreciate the kindness and the understanding and then the pastoral temperance, too, to not just jump to conclusions. I think that's a great example for people. Uh, another question for you. Speak to the human element here. The in strong churches, doctrinal, uh, Bible churches, churches like yours, like mine, uh, this kind of thinking comes up often where people will view the teaching roles as the be all kind of end-all role. And personally, nothing drives me more crazy, I would say, than when people think, man, like this, even when they call it like Costi's church, or like, or they'll say, Man, the pastors are this, or or like that. I I'm I always want to reiterate.
SPEAKER_01You should probably you should probably take that off of your sign then and all your business cards. It says Costies Church.
SPEAKER_00I don't know why you do Costa's Bible church. Costies Bible church. It's like the worst. And and I I get what people are saying, they're like, that's a pastor there, that's the teaching guy there. I understand. But here's what drives me crazy is I wish more Christians would see that we are all in the ministry, all of us together, and that while I have a role, like the body of Christ, I I'm not the head of the church, Christ is, and pastors and elders, we are trigger men, and we have we play a significantly important role by way of protection and guidance. You don't want like anyone doing the teaching. I understand that. But in in sound doctrine-driven churches, I think there could be some tendency to view every kind of role as sort of second rate, even if we don't say it outright, and and let's watch the pastoral pride too. Like, if it's not, you know, teaching, like, yeah, whatever, everything's menial, as important as teaching is for sure. How can we be balanced and how can how would you encourage people? How do you even do this in your own church to see uh yes, the pastoral and teaching roles are are vital in the church, and we don't want to disrespect those or disregard them, but also what would you say to help people and men especially not overlook that their role matters, and you can't look at the teaching role and think, well, that's all you know. If you're not in that, nothing's important, and see this thing I'm doing that no one can see. Like it matters to God, He sees it, and this is doing something. How would you convince someone they're moving the needle, they're helping the first down, they're moving the ball.
SPEAKER_01You know, I I think I think a good way to help people think about the question that you're asking is to take them to 1 Corinthians 12 to see that the Spirit has given gifts as he wills for the purpose of building a body there. And and we're talking about a local church, a local church body that is a part of a larger body of Christ, a universal body of Christ that um you know the spirit is still building through the elect people of God as they come to faith in Christ. So understanding that metaphor of the body, that there is, I mean, just as our own human body, there's no part I would I want to do without. I I like all the parts God's given me, I want to keep them, you know. And people who kind of don't have parts of a body, we call that a defect. They would call that a defect. They say, I'm I'm disabled, I'm handicapped, I've got a handicap here, and they have to work through life and navigate through life with uh with a challenge. We want every single part, we want every single part to be doing its function, and we realize that it's the Holy Spirit who's determined that. And so we can't elevate one part over another part. I think, I think it is the case, and this is again a fleshly impulse for all of us, to uh to take our own, you know, for the man who's good with a hammer, every problem looks like a nail, you know. For for someone who's uh someone who's really good at teaching, that's that's all that's how he sees the world. We need all everybody needs to be teachers, everybody needs to be like me. I I think I think when we look at 1 Corinthians 12 and Paul, I mean, can you think of a better preacher, teacher, someone you want to sit under? He's a great the great apostle, but he's the one who told us in 1 Corinthians 12, one body, many parts, all are essential, all are important. So you can't have a guy who says, you know, I'm a mouth or I'm an eye, and and because you're not me, you're not a part of the body. On the other hand, we can't have anybody who says, Well, because I'm not an eye, or because I'm not an ear, I'm not a part of the body. So we can't have we can't have the sense of pride trying to make everybody like me, the the member that I am. We can't have the other side too, jealousy or envy or Or a sense of insecurity or whatever about our part. We just have to play our position and realize what is the position God's given me and how do I play it? So I think when we go back to, you know, again, 1 Corinthians, or uh, I'm sorry, Ephesians 4 11, you see the apostles and the prophets, those offices have passed, those are done, those are the effect of that ministry, the apostolic and prophetic ministry is recorded for us in scripture. So we have that ministry still with us, but not in actual people who are living and abiding with us. What we do have is the evangelists, the pastors, and the teachers, and those are local church positions. The evangelists, those who are are good at not only good at articulating the gospel, but good at seeing false gospels, understanding them, and then training Christians on how to be discerning about gospel theology matters. So they're you we might call them today apologists, have apologetic ministries. I think it's actually a detriment in our time that all those guys get kind of like online or parachurch kind of organizations. I think they ought to be in the local church as a part of the part of a staff trying to teach Christians in their own area how to be discerning about the gospel. But then you have the pastors and the teachers. You have the pastors who are shepherds, and those, as you know, in the Greek there, they're kind of joined together in and uh in this Granville Sharp construction where you got pastors and teachers that are governed by one article. They are different, I do believe they're different offices, but but the the pastor is going to be a teaching is gonna be a major part of his pastoring role. And a teacher, major part of his teaching is to be thinking like a shepherd, the shepherding implications of his teaching. So you join those together in the church. You need to see those three offices as the training department in the church. They're not the guys that are out there on the front lines, they're the training department. You might say, and we use this in the military, they're in the rear with the gear. They're not the those are the guys who've been, they've been there, done that, they've been seasoned, they've become competent, and now they're gonna use their skill to go and train everybody else who's out doing the action-oriented work. So they are equipping the saints really to do the cool stuff. The saints get to go out and do the cool stuff of the work of the ministry, they're out on the front lines of ministry. So saints get to do the upfront evangelism in their workplace or in their school or in the neighborhood, or you know, moms doing play dates and stuff like that. They're talking to other moms, they get to take part in one-on-one or small group discipleship. They got to use uh wisdom, cleverness, ingenuity uh to the means to extend the say the preaching-teaching ministries of their churches and send that out further. We've got you've got some really competent people working for you to put on this podcast. I know you don't do you don't push every button and send everything out and upload things. You've got people who are doing much more skill than you at doing those things, and they're extending your ministry. I've got the same thing in our church too. It's uh those those people are awesome. So we we understand and agree with Moses' sentiment, you know, would that all the Lord's people were prophets. Um, we understand his, you know, again, he's speaking that to people who are jealous of his position. Look, I wish you all had this gift. You don't, um, but um we acknowledge that everybody has a different place, and so there's there's that saying that those who can do, do those who can't do teach. So um, and I'm not saying I can't do, I'm just saying that God has put me into a role now where it's my turn, my job is to instruct and inform them and let them go out and get it done. So I'm the training department, you know, I'm in the rear of the gear, I'm in the I'm in the shop, in the head shed. It's vital, it's important. Uh, you're never gonna go beyond your training. But man, get those saints out there, let them go mix it up, let them go do the cool stuff of ministry. I'll just say one more thing for like uh illustration purposes.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01I I've uh you know, in some of my past life, and whether it's law enforcement or um or um military, you have the opportunity and occasion to train with different people from different forces, um, maybe in different countries or things like that. You see some really good people in other places, and and you know, you can mark the difference between maybe a high level of training in something, or or maybe a high level of performance of one force as compared with another force. Really good men, solid men, but they're performing at a lower level. When you start to step back and analyze the differences, you can see, especially here in the US, there's a lot of money. There's a lot of training, there's a lot of opportunity. I mean, money buys bullets, bullets, sending bullets down range and being able to pepper a target and do that over and over because builds proficiency. Um, proficiency allows you to be better on the battlefield and have better performance. Guys in other countries don't have a lot of money, can't buy a lot of bullets, can't get a lot of range time, they're not going to be as competent or proficient on target. So that you know, the differences in training, and what I'm trying to illustrate is training is vital. So let's let's make every local church just high level. Let's let's as pastors, teachers, elders, evangelists, pastors, teachers, let's pour into those people, give them the best training possible so that when they're out on target, they can perform at a very high level. Um, that that really makes a difference. But man, honestly, they get to do the cool stuff. I'm I'm sitting behind computer screens a lot of times, had my head in books, and like, man, I've turned into a total geek. What happened to me? I used to be cool. Um but uh I I really rejoice though in my role and what God, the privilege God's given me to do. But I don't say everybody should be exactly what I am. I just want them to be what God has designed them to be, what the Spirit's gifted them to be, and I want them to be the best version possible.
SPEAKER_00So good, so good. All right, I have two more questions for you on the topic of men in the local church. The first is what would you say to a young man who aspires to be a pastor? And then the second question, just so everyone listening, even kind of knows where we're going to land the plane, what would you say to a man who desires to be a lay elder? So the first one, talk to those who want to be vocal in vocational ministry, they want to be a pastor, younger man, could be an older man as well. Weren't you um weren't you an aged one? A little older, weren't you? You weren't like 23, right? When you decided to leave the military, like go into seminary. So any minute.
SPEAKER_01Would you say I I came to I came to the master seminary when I was 30. Would you call that aged one?
SPEAKER_00Or so well, now at my age, 39, I still think I still think I'm young. I still think I'm young. I'm like, man, I got to know what's up. Yeah, now I'm now I'm like, I'm still young. But yeah, the the the younger man or any man who says, I want to be a pastor, what would you say to that man?
SPEAKER_01I I'd say I'd say the same, same advice to either one, um, starting off. So the same advice is get yourself into a good, sound, mature, deep preaching, confrontive preaching church that is going to, it's overseen by biblically qualified elders uh and put yourself underneath that ministry. Get yourself strive to be a good church member, go through the membership process, step into church membership, make that covenant, covenant yourself to love um other people in the church, submit to those elders. You know, Hebrews 13, 17, obey your leaders and submit to them for their keeping watch over your souls as those who have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that's no benefit to you. You practice that. You know, the best leaders are those who have had to follow before. The guys who the guys who I find to be miserable leaders are guys who from a very young age got into leadership and they've never stopped being in leadership. Sometimes those guys are thinking irritating because they don't they don't they don't know what it's like to have to obey commands and submit themselves to anything, and they don't even know what they're asking of people. So, man, you know, be a good church member, be humble, teachable, submissive, volunteer for everything, get yourself into stuff and pursue. I'd say also pursue, especially godly character. Go to 1 Timothy 3, Titus 1, 2 Peter 1, you know, add your faith, virtue, your virtue knowledge, that whole list, that chain of virtues there. And just be a godly man. I remember before I had any desire, ask you know, knowing aspiration for uh church leadership or vocational ministry. I looked at 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1 and said, Man, Lord, make me that kind of a man. I not thinking I want to be an elder, just thinking I am not a godly man, and I've got serious like sin issues and stuff like I want to be that. Lord, please make me that. That's a commendable, and so pursue that, really work on your character, your heart, your discipline, your self-control, but then be a good church member, volunteer for things, and then come near to the elders. You know, you know, the guys that I can I know are really um, you know, they're kind of chomping at the bit to get into leadership and get into eldership. They're the ones who are peppering you with questions. They're coming near, they want to be near to you, seek to learn. Um, so do that. If that's if it's on your heart and you see that more and more you have that desire, come near to your elders, come near to your pastors and and ask questions. Understand on any given elder board in any context, there's going to be a variety of gifts and strengths and weaknesses. You can learn from all of those by positive example, negative example too. Sometimes that could be a really good instructor, too. But uh come near to those guys, learn from them, be teachable, and don't don't uh don't make immediate snap judgments, but try to understand. And then as you're doing all that in the flow of that life, make your desires known to those elders, make your desires known to your pastor, and let them guide and shape you and instruct you, challenge you, test you. Um, you you're you may have an internal desire, but you can't teach your way out of a wet paper bag. So if you've got an internal desire, but you're not able to teach, you're not apt to teach, and your elders are telling you that, and um, you know, it's only the the the sweet grandmas in your congregation that are saying, Hey, good job, Sonny. You know, it you know, you need to listen to the confirmation of the church around you who also confirms your gifts as an elder or a pastor. But let your elders especially shape you. If they determine indeed that you are called and you are gifted that way, then let them tell you how to see that desire fulfilled. And some sometimes that they're gonna say, you know what, we really think you're gonna be most effective, most useful by continuing on in the job that God's given you and serving this church in a lay capacity, and and you submit to that and go with that. Some some guys are gonna say, you know what, I really think that your gifts, your skills, your ability, your articulation with the word, your ability to get into the word, maybe it's a teaching gift, maybe it's an evangelist gift, but whatever it is, you know, you're it would really be a neglect of of uh or a bad stewardship of your time and life if you stayed in this vocation here. I we really think we want to free you up, get you more training, and and take those skills to another level, hone them in and make them really effective for a vocation, a lifetime, a vocation of service to the Lord and His church. So just let the I think you got to put yourself under other people. And again, if you're in a weak squish church, you you're gonna get misguided. They're gonna they're gonna send you off and you're not ready. They're not gonna be concerned as much about your character, they're not gonna be concerned as much about your competency. I don't know about what it's like in your area, but in our area, we've got some of these churches that they have their own little thing going and they kind of like they're franchising themselves all over the place and they're trying to you know do their own training program. Yeah, but honestly, it's just it's just so thin. And the guys who go through it become so proud thinking they've gotten the best stuff, they've gotten pure gold, but all it is is false gold, fool's gold, and but they can't be taught anything after they've gone through that. So man, you got to get people under really competent in a really competent church, sound, deep, mature, healthy, theologically driven, and let those kind of elders shape you and man, follow their counsel.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, Travis, this has been on a personal note, my favorite series. I'm not just saying that, my favorite series of interviews to sit on the other side of on the podcast. And I obviously I'm biased, I'm a man and I'm a pastor, and I pastor men, and I know personally, uh, there's guys in my small group and the small groups at our church, on our staff, and in kind of the orbit of our friendships that that are loving this. And some of even my questions were things that guys in my own church said, Hey, could you ask them this? And so, brother, thank you so much for for your wisdom.
SPEAKER_01Man, uh, I praise God for any wisdom that's come through this uh this time we've had together. But um, man, so good to spend time with you again, Cossi. Your your friendship is is a a real blessing and benediction in my life, and it's just a joy to see what God's doing in your life and ministry through your church. Um, couldn't be couldn't be more gratified to see all of the Lord's doing.
SPEAKER_00Oh, grateful for you, my friend. If you are watching this or listening to this, and you uh don't have a faithful church, you are new to that area, or you need a church, or maybe throughout this series, uh you came to the realization that you're at kind of one of those squishy churches and you are anywhere within uh an hour or less, maybe more if you need to, of Greeley, Colorado, and you need a church, I would certainly recommend uh getting yourself over to Grace Church Greeley and enjoying the faithfulness of Travis's ministry and the elders and the team there. Uh if you're one of our regulars and you've benefited from this episode and the series that we've just done, I would encourage you to share it. Pass it along to your church, to the men in your church, to the elders, of course. And if it can be an encouragement to them, I would most certainly uh recommend doing that. Thank you as always for watching, for supporting. Thank you for sharing these resources, and we're grateful that God has allowed us the privilege of getting to do this. We'll be back next Monday with another episode. For now, keep on living for the gospel.