Ep. 178 Neil Cole Returns - Journeys of Spiritual Formation, Listening to God, and Finishing Well

In this episode, Neil Cole explores spiritual formation and missionary methods through a discussion of Paul's journeys in the book of Acts. He shares insights from his book "Journeys" about Paul's progression and growth through each journey of his life and ministry, as well as lessons learned during a 13-year period of silence. Neil applies Paul's model to our own spiritual journeys and finishing well. We also talk shifting from institutions to more organic, relational ministry and hearing God's voice to radically obey his commands. So join us as we dive into the book of Acts, look at Paul’s journeys, and see what it has to do with our own life’s journeys and spiritual formation.

Neil Cole is an author, missional thinker, and movement catalyst. His whole work can be summed up in this: listen to Jesus and do what He says. Neil’s latest book and the focus of our conversation today is Journeys: Discovering God’s Paths of Spiritual Formation Building to a Strong Finish.

Neil's Book:
Journeys

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Transcript

Neil Cole: 0:00

So I think in the in the not too distant future, this is my speculation. And like I said, on my team, I'm not the Prophet, I have a prophet. And he's smarter than I am in those ways. But I'll just fit sure guests. I think in the future, people will not be as institutional as their parents or grandparents were. In fact, I think they will be anti institutional. So the moment you put a brand or logo on it, they're going to be turned off by that. So we're going to have to approach ministry. Not as organizational but more organic and more relational than, than we did in the past.

Joshua Johnson: 0:54

Hello, and welcome to the shifting culture podcast in which we have conversations about the culture we create, and the impact we can make. We longed to see the body of Christ looked like Jesus. I'm your host, Joshua Johnson, gotta shift in culture podcast.com to interact and donate. And don't forget to hit the Follow button on your favorite podcast app to be notified when new episodes come out each week, and go leave a rating and review. It's easy, it only takes a second and it helps us find new listeners to the show. Just go to the Show page on the app that you're using right now and hit five stars. It really is that easy. Thank you so much. You know what else would help us out? share this podcast with your friends, your family, your network? Tell them how much you enjoy it. Let them know they should be listening as well. If you're new here, welcome. If you want to dig deeper find us on social media at shifting culture podcast, where I post video clips and quotes and interact with all of you. Previous guests on the show have included Alan Hirsch, Michael frost and Pam Arland. You can go back listen to those amazing episodes and more. But today's guest is Neil Cole. It is so good to have Neil back on the podcast. Neil Cole is an author, missional thinker and movement catalyst. His whole work can be summed up in this LISTEN to Jesus and DO what He says. I say that all the time. Neil's latest book is the focus of our conversation today. Its journeys, discovering God's paths of spiritual formation, building to a strong finish. In this episode, Neil explores spiritual formation and missionary methods through a discussion of Paul's journeys in the book of Acts. He shares insights from his book journeys about Paul's progression, and grow through each journey of his life and ministry, as well as lessons learned during a 13 year period of silence. Neil applies Paul's model to our own spiritual journeys and finishing well. We also talk shifting from institutions to more organic relational ministry and hearing God's voice and radically obey his commands. So join us as we dive into the book of Acts, look at Paul's journeys and see what it has to do with our own life's journeys and spiritual formation. Here is my conversation with Neil Cole. Neil, welcome back to the shifting culture. Really excited to have you on. Thanks for joining me.

Neil Cole: 3:08

Great to be back,

Joshua Johnson: 3:09

Joshua, excited to jump in and talk about your book journeys. I'd love to know where was the impetus for this years ago, before you did this reworking? Where did your fascination with Paul's missionary journeys and the addition into spiritual formation into our own lives take place? Right,

Neil Cole: 3:34

so many years ago, I can. Maybe the early mid 90s I read? Well, the way we do discipleship is we read 20 to 30 chapters in Scripture every week in the life transformation group. And so we're reading X, all the way through every week, repetitively for at least a month, maybe two. And so I was reading a lot of Acts. But I also had other reading, I was reading J. Robert Clinton or Bobby Clinton's book, The Making of a leader. And I had also just read the classic St. Paul missionary methods St. Paul's are hours by Roland Allen. And everything sort of congealed at once in my brain, I saw Clinton's framework of leadership formation, put over Paul's life, and I saw Paul's methodology grow and change whereas most books on Paul, they just summarize a method based on all of his trips, I saw progression and change and growth and learning in both life. And that was a long time ago, but I was nowhere near mature enough to write the book. I wrote an article, but I didn't have enough experience to write the book most almost all my books. I have to do them before I write them. So I live life and then in 2011 or 2010, I wrote the book journeys to significance. And it was published by Josie bass, which is an imprint of Wiley, the minute I held that book in my hand, you know, that's always a special moment for the author that comes in the mail, you pick it up, you hold it actually in your hand, something you've worked for years to get to the finished product. And the moment I held it, I felt God's Spirit whisper in my ear. I'm about to take you into a boundary or a period of transition. It didn't tell me how long or why or what it was about. But it was a 13 year transition. And he, he silenced me in the US. He said, No more gonna go to conferences anymore. No more training in the US. He shut down our offices. You shut down my website. He had me stopped blogging. Apparently, he told everyone to stop blogging. He had me stopped using social media other than just a picture of a cute grandkid or a waterfall, no more content. So he basically silenced me for 13 years. He didn't tell me how long it would be I kept asking what did I do wrong? And he kept saying you didn't do anything wrong. This is not about that. And I kept asking, well, what's the lesson I have to learn to this kind of lesson you can't just learn by reading a book. And so for 13 years, he let me do everything I wanted to overseas. And that was my focus. He changed my writing from writing to church leaders to run into young people unengaged with church. And that is a difference between the two books. He stripped everything away, except Jesus. And and I found that was still enough. And I got through it all, I couldn't get a job, no matter how. Right I was, before I even applied for Walmart and couldn't stock shelves. They wouldn't hire me. So the only job I had during those 13 years was I got to drive Lyft kind of like Uber. And that was a good experience in some respects. But it was a rough 13 years for both me and my wife. But every bill got paid. Every bill got paid on time. My two daughters both got had weddings, and they were beautiful. Spared no expense. God took care of us journey significance went on her print faster than any book I've ever written. And a lot of my dearest and closest friends say it was my best book. So the publisher gave me the rights back, and I was just going to reissue it and republish it. And the Lord said, No, you need to rewrite it for your new audience. So I started trying to just tiny, tweak it. And he says, No, start over rewrite the whole thing. And I did. And so it took me as long to rewrite journeys as writing any book ever did. And when it came out, I think it I think the person that wrote this book is different than the person who wrote the first one. And I guess if the books worth writing twice, it might be worth reading twice.

Joshua Johnson: 8:03

I think so I love this new version of of what you did. And I think that long journey of a formation and in the silent, and that changes that really does change you coming out of that long journey. What are some things that that defined that space for you? What did God do in your life?

Neil Cole: 8:26

Well, there's a number of things. It's not like with God, it's not usually just one lesson or one thing. We can all say, Jesus is my everything, but until everything else is taken away, and and you know, I still have my family and my home is still so I'm very blessed, I'm suffering. But I have come to realize that Jesus is enough for me, and I will, I will not ever lose that. And that is the most important thing in my life. And that gives you a kind of strength that you really can't be threatened. When Jesus is your, your your core, there's nothing the enemy can do to to it can't take anything away. He can't. The thing that you treasure most in life is locked, secure in heaven and can't be taken from you. So that's, that's helpful. It gives you a boldness and a strength that I don't think you'd have otherwise. I was also in school the whole time and there's a subject. And I don't think it's a subject of this podcast, but maybe in the future that God has been addressing in my life with my ministry partner, Desi Baker, who lives in Arizona, I live in California. He is the prophetic gift to my apostolic and we have traveled together and learned a lot of breakthroughs. Because the Bible says that the foundation of the church is the apostles and prophets. So I have been really delving into why is that how does that work? Why don't they get along and how can we make them get along? And it's been helpful and we've walked at the other end of it with a lot of insights that I haven't seen anywhere else. And so that's, that's been a lot of the lesson. And then also, I think I have a better patience and understanding with people, I think I'm less, less upset when people do the wrong thing. I see the spirits behind what's going on. And I get mad at them rather than the people they're using, I think those are some of the quick lessons and he shifted my focus to young people who are unengaged with church. So I'm no longer focusing at trying to change church. Now I'm looking at starting something with people who aren't even in church. So it's that changed a lot.

Joshua Johnson: 10:43

I think let's get you know, Layton Ford always says that, you know, is later life is about mentoring, and, and smaller groups and pouring into leaders so that they can actually continue to move forward. And he talks about descending into greatness, and the which, you know, he had a big platform of let's speak to 1000s and 1000s of people on a stage. And then he actually went into the quiet and descended into greatness. And it seems like a journey to significance is quite of what, what just happened with you. A journey to significance is actually going low and going small. And it's quite the opposite, then what a lot of people think, as they think what is significant. So as you think about what is significant within the kingdom, what what is significant within the kingdom.

Neil Cole: 11:40

Well, I used to be a very task driven, apostolic person, I come up with a vision, it used to be big, then develop objectives and milestones to reach and goals and how quickly they need to be reached. And I'd set out to do it. And God used that many times over. There were actually moments during this time where I felt like well, you know, I've actually accomplished everything I set out to do. So Lord, if you want to take me now I'd be ready. And he said, No, it's about time. I've changed in that I've become far more relational in my approach to things. Everything is about the relationships. I guess, I came to the realization that when we do finally go and meet Jesus, he's not going to ask us what we accomplished. He's going to ask us, who did you love? And how well did you love them? And that's been a more of my focus of late. And I think it's my, my wife's very Shepherd, like, and my closest friend is a shepherd. And so I think it's rubbed off on me. In fact, in the a pest scenario, Apostle, prophet, evangelist, Shepherd and teacher, my profit gift dropped down. It used to be my secondary, and now it's like my, my fourth, and shepherd is bumped up to third and teachers. Second, it's a big shift that happened during this transition

Joshua Johnson: 13:04

time. Take us into the big picture of this and journeys, what are these these journeys towards significance? What are the Paul Paul's journeys? And how does that relate to you to our times of life?

Neil Cole: 13:18

Well, most of the time, we look at Pete pocalypse, or we look at Paul as a teacher. He is an outstanding teacher. But the reason he's such a good teacher is he's first a learner. And so I approached the book of Acts, looking at how Paul is a learner. So we tend to take our saints and put a halo around them, and they can never do anything wrong. And I don't think that that's fair to Paul, one of Paul's greatest strengths is his weaknesses, ability to learn. And so I, I just basically follow his life and how he learns I start at his birth, and how God had already invested in him so many things that prepared him for a future he didn't know have any idea would be in or in, in line for him, that I look at how he came to Christ and the early formation of his life. That's chapter two of the book. And then we just go from journey to journey. Now No, most of us don't get to have clear delineation marks between one phase of maturity and the other like Paul, you're, but for some reason, it matched his first journey, second journey, third journey, and then what I call his fourth journey, which is his Roman imprisonment. Most of us don't think of his Roman imprisonment as a journey, but I assure you, Paul did and even says to the Philippians, this is my greatest, the greatest opportunity for the gospel of all my trips my whole life, and he was incarcerated the whole time. And so I delve into how that happened, how he was most effective and prisoner Rome and how he managed to accomplish that so it follows his life pattern. His first journey was his early journey. And it wasn't as fruitful as his later journeys would be. But I comment in the book that you don't want your first journeys in life to be your most fruitful, because then the rest of your life is downhill. You know, it's sad when we see young starlets are only 25 years old. And they're still there already looking back on their lives and their greatest moments in the past. Or what's worse than that is to see a 70 year old man still dressed in leather pants dancing on the stage singing a song when he was 19. You know, we don't want our greatest success to be young. We want that to be a stage of development and learning. And that's what it was for Paul. God is more interested not in what he gets out of you, but what he puts into your death stage. So I highlight that his second journey is all about training and education. And that training came through painful experiences he he was silenced in Asia, he was blocked in Bithynia, he were propped up, he was beaten with rods and Philippi. He was left little alone in Athens. And then he was afraid in Corinth and God used all of those things, to teach him the character formation give him the internal spiritual authority and strength. So that on his third journey, he can go up against the greatest spiritual forces the world has ever seen and come out the other side victorious. So all of that is spelled out throughout the

Joshua Johnson: 16:37

book. It's pretty fascinating that we could see the delineation between Paul's tourney's that it could match up for us. So as if we want to start to reflect on our own journeys, and what our spiritual formation is. And in regards to Paul's journeys themselves, what are some questions for us set, ask about our early years, the way that God had, you know, put in us the things that he has set apart for us to do on this earth? Like, how do how do we start to think about those early years? Well, I

Neil Cole: 17:09

don't know about you. But in my early years, I was praying and asking God for great success and God, God saved me from me. If I had had all the success I wanted in my earlier journeys, I would not be who I am today, and our ministry would be much more localized and much more about me and less about Jesus. So I think there are things in our mind that need to be it's not just things that need to be put in. But also he needs to remove blockages and pride and ego that you might even mask as spiritual, but is still a problem. When you do see early success. And people it's kind of sad, because they they carry all this success on week on a week platform that doesn't have the character to hold it. And then you end up seeing it all come crashing down. And we're seeing this almost weekly, in the church in the world where leaders that started off so well are ending poorly. And it's because, you know, once you see that early success, then everything in life is telling you to repeat that. Inside, you have yourself saying, Oh, maybe that was just a happenstance that was an accident. And I couldn't repeat it. So I've got to try to do it again, and prove to me in the world that I can do it. And then you'd have everybody around you saying don't change a thing, because what you did work. And so everything in life is telling you don't grow, don't change stay the way you are. And that's the opposite of what spiritual life is supposed to be. So I think success in the earlier days is is is actually a bigger problem than we realize. And it's hard to transition from success to more success. It's easier to transition from failure to success than it is in order for you to go from success to success. You have to kill that early success. And nobody's willing to do that. So we don't see people progressing. So these are the things Paul had to go through. Yeah.

Joshua Johnson: 19:19

So how do you kill that success, that early success for those that were worldly successful? Or, you know, they see in their mind were successful? How do you transition and say, I have to kill that success and continue to grow and mature and have for me what God has for me, so that we could be lifelong learners and we could grow in maturity.

Neil Cole: 20:23

Well, I don't even think you have the ability to come up with a new idea until you let go of the old idea. You know, we think the word repentance is thrown around and usually it just means I'm sorry for my sin and I won't do it again. And that's not what metanoia really means. And Alan Hurst, my good friend has a good book called The metanoia. On that, where it's an actual paradigm shift where your own mind has changed from one thing to the other. In order for that to happen, you have to let go of what made you successful in the first stage. And that's the hardest thing for people to do. And so you're risking all that success on the the wish that maybe this new thing will be as successful. And that's a lot to ask anybody to to risk, and they won't usually do it. But men, if you really do believe that Jesus has risen from the dead, and has given the Holy Spirit to all of us, then I think you you follow Christ to the end, you don't follow success. Success is a shallow, weak goal anyway, it's fickle to begin with, it will leave you anyway, whether you choose to die to it or not. It's not actually as as satisfying to one's heart as you think it is. So I think we should be more willing to die to the success, but it's often oftentimes very hard for people to do that. How

Joshua Johnson: 21:59

do we get into that metanoia process, then? Is it through community those around us? Is it through, like finding our identity in something other than the success that we have is like finding our identity in Christ alone, like, I am now a beloved child of him, instead of I am this great, successful person? Well, how, where do we find those things to enter into metanoia? All

Neil Cole: 22:23

of those things are important. I think, first of all, I think for all of us, and this is this has to be learned through experience. We have to be more in love with Jesus than we are with our success. And if we follow Jesus, step by step, he will lead you into the metanoia. Like for Paul, he made minor tweaks to his strategy from the first journey to the second journey to try and compensate for the mistakes made in the first journey, which were weak left weak churches that were utterly dependent upon leadership, and so they got led astray and the Galatian churches. So instead, he recruited a bigger team on a second journey and dropped leaders off where we went. So he left Luke in Philippi, and Timothy and Thessalonica, and Silas and Bria, and then he got to Athens. He's all by himself. He did the same thing every Christian leaders done. They see the the need, and they recruit the best leaders they can. And for Paul, it was a high standard, he wouldn't let John Mark be part of that team. He said No, to John Mark, and it cost him Barnabas. But he wanted the best team to lead these guys behind so he could keep going. But when he got to Athens, he realized, as we all will do, there is a ceiling to that strategy. It doesn't multiply it, it only goes so far, it's a dead end. And there's always more ministry we have and there is leaders to find. And so through that experience, God then taught him I have a better way. And actually, there's only one sentence that Jesus gives to him in Corinth, he says, Do not be afraid. So he speaks to the fear he felt in court. He said, I will not let anybody harm you. He speaks to the pain that he experienced in Philippi. With the beating of rods, he said, go on speaking you speaks to the his speaking to the silencing you experience and out in Asia. He says, Keep on going, which is speaking to the blockage, he had an Bithynia and then he says I am always with you. He speaks to the loneliness he felt in Korean. And then he finally comes up with a strategy to speak to his weakness in his strategy. He says I have many people in this place. Don't recruit your leaders from other churches, find them in the harvest and release them to the harvest. And now Paul starts to multiply instead of just add a big shift in his life. Jesus led him to that place, but he didn't download that information back in Antioch before he started. He let him feel the bankruptcy of his strategy and the pain that came from it before God spoke to him. Because then he was ready to hear it. And we all need to get to the place where we're pain brings us to the place we're ready to hear what he has to say. And so that's why I say the way to get to metanoia is just to follow Jesus step by step. It will take you to through painful experiences, and then you'll be ready to hear what he has to say So then on your third journey, everything comes together. And it's amazing. It's remarkable. He goes to an emphasis, he stays in one city for three years. And in those three years, every person, man, woman, child, Jew, or Gentile in all of Asia Minor hears the gospel. And Paul doesn't have to carry the gospel everywhere. 4000 square miles is reached in just three years, because of lessons he learned before.

Joshua Johnson: 26:06

Okay, me, I, I want to train my missionaries to do that. And their first journey, but is it possible, they're going to have to walk through their own journeys? How do we do that, then? If we're, as we're training, if we're training missionaries, or we're training people to go and be able to do this type of work, this ministry work. And we know that Paul has learned and so we learn these lessons from Paul, and so we try to enter into it. What are the journeys for us to get to that space? How do we, how do we balance that of like saying, we're gonna go to our final journey, or our third journey before we enter into our first journey?

Neil Cole: 26:55

Yeah, I don't, I don't think you can get to your third journey without going through your first and your second journey. That's just you can't skip these things. And you don't want to. It's the it's the foundation laid in the earlier journeys, that brings that kind of fruitfulness, and that insight into the third journey. So you don't want to skip these classes. They're there. They're really important. Now on Paul's third journey, he had gone through the first journey, the second journey when he got there. Now on the first journey was only one team Paul and Barnabas. On the second journey, there were two teams Barnabas and Mark went one way, and Paul and Silas one another. So now there's twice as many teams on the third journey. He stayed in Ephesus, and there were teams going everywhere. Now those people like Epaphras, going to the Lycus, River Valley, starting the church and Colossus, I hear propolis and Laodicea. This is first journey. Right. And that's his first experience. So he's a brand new believer going out there, doing all that he's got several more journeys to go. And we find out when Paul's in prison in Rome, the path versus also imprisoned. So you know, he had to go through his second journey, just like Paul did. We don't know about his third journey. But you know, there, we do discover that you can be a part of someone's third journey, even if it's only your first if you're if you're being mentored and coached by someone who's been through it. And that can mean you're a part of this great fruitfulness even know, it's not carried on your character, your spiritual formation, you're just a part of it. And I think those of us who go further in in our journeys, you know, it's one thing, it's great to find a leader who trust God, it's even better to find a leader that God trusts. And that's why He tests us so often. It's not because he doesn't know the answer. It's because we don't know the answer. And we have to go through the testing come out the other side, and then God can entrust us with greater things. To him who is faithful with a little I'll give much. And so Paul had been faithful with a few things. So each journey is the scope of his of his ministry increased to a point where on his fourth journey was all the Gentile world heard the gospel. And that's not just then, but even today, we still read his letters to this day, he still hadn't the ministry in our lives, 2000 years later. So the people that were came to Christ on the third journey got to experience the fruitfulness of Paul's third journey, even though it would have been just their early days.

Joshua Johnson: 29:50

So then in your journeys and your spiritual formation, and as God is saying, You you're trying to write to a new audience, a different audience, and you're working with the nuns that don't have church affiliation, or religious affiliation. It looks a little bit like what Paul's journey is where he going to the Gentiles, they don't have that affiliation. Right. So what are the things that you are taking and gleaning from that as you're you transitioned from focusing on church leaders into focusing on on nuns and religiously unaffiliated?

Neil Cole: 30:27

So I think in the in the not too distant future, this is my speculation. And like I said, on my team, I'm not the Prophet. I have a prophet and he's smarter than I am in those ways. But I'll just fit your guests. I think in the future, people will not be as institutional as their parents or grandparents were. In fact, I think they will be anti institutional. So the moment you put a brand or a logo on it, they're going to be turned off by that. So we're gonna have to approach ministry, not as organizational, but more organic and more relational, then than we did in the past. And so that's something God's how to shape in me, I think it'll be something that the love needs to be. I mean, this is true at every generation, love needs to be the core of what we do and why. But I think we've lost that through the years. And we may say, we love. But love is not proven by how you take care of the people closest to you. It's how you take care of the people furthest from you. And I think that that's going to have to be evident if people are going to buy into our message. So if we don't have that kind of love for the marginalized, the weak, the vulnerable, the people who can't speak for themselves, then our message isn't worth listening to. And I would agree with that. So I think that's going to be important. I think this is true, I think there will be a whatever is going to happen, it will be global, it will not be regional, and will not be national will be global. But I also think it will not start in the States. I think we've had our day in the sunshine. And we didn't, we didn't steward Well, what God gave to us. So I think we may benefit from the awakened, but it will come to us from other parts of the world rather than be bored from us. These are some thoughts on how, yeah,

Joshua Johnson: 32:26

I think we're seeing that already. That these things are are happening, the things the awaking even the things that are happening in war, have more Muslims have come to Christ recently than ever, in the history of, of Islam. And it's pretty amazing parts of the world and the places

Neil Cole: 32:44

we at least likely see, we're seeing fruit all over the world. And I think it's already happening. I just think that we're we're going to be the last ones on the bus rather than the first ones.

Joshua Johnson: 32:58

So it's good for us. It's good for us that we get instead of the back of the bus. And I think it's time as well. And so how, how do we move then from institution into all of life, love, discipleship and formation in in all of life,

Neil Cole: 33:17

you know, my experience. And you know, I'm not a young millennial, or even a Gen Z, you know, I'm a holder guide now. So I may not be the right person to be asking. But I think I think we just need to make it about focusing on Jesus, and not the church, focusing on the person, not the organization. So just always make it about Jesus and approach everything relationally because love is not an organizational objective. Love is always something a person has or does, it's not something your organization has or does. And now granted, if the people in your organization are loving, then the organization will have that element to it. But it doesn't start with a mission statement. And core objectives and, and values. It starts with us a person dies to themselves and sees the image of Christ and others and loves them and is willing to die for them. And I think that that has to be come contagious in us so that it isn't really about the name or the logo or the identity of an organization. In fact, I think the new generation will be repelled by all of that. So putting the monkey suit on over something beautiful is not a good idea. Let's just leave the beautiful thing alone and let it multiply and spread and become contagious without putting that brand or logo on it. And that's that's going to be hard for Boomer and Gen X leaders to accept because they've been told all their lives that it's about creating this corporate identity and that's not what it is about. It's about loving this neighbor and loving this person who's my enemy. And, and you you can't really do that as an organization, you have to do that as a as a follower of Jesus and nothing more. So it will be simplified. It will be disciplemaking it'll be mentoring and and learning and it will be alongside one another in families rather than organizations. That's how I see it happening. I've been preparing for this my whole life. You know if you read my earlier books, I was already bringing us to a more organic approach and to movements and disciple making and making it more simple. So I think I'm ready for this. I don't want to have another organization, I don't want to carry another organization. I don't want to lodge a weekly event, those things don't aren't attractive to me in any way whatsoever. And I think there are others like me, that are feeling the same way.

Joshua Johnson: 36:07

Yes, there there are. And there'll be more and more and more as we move forward. You know, so then, let's take some people through this through journey. So if I'm, if I am now I'm going to put myself into a disciple maker mode. How can I help people go through these journeys? What does it look like for me as a disciple maker mentor, to help people walk through their journeys of life information.

Neil Cole: 36:39

So what what's important to know is that of the heroes in the Bible that we read about since we were kids, only 1/3 finished well, and Bobby Clinton later said, 1/3 is far too high a number for today's leaders, were closer to 20 25%, at best that finish well, that's, that's really terrifying, if you think about it, and those are our leaders. So if our leaders aren't finishing well, I'm pretty sure those who are following them are following to the same destination, not finishing well. So you have to have it in your mind that I want to be someone whose last lap is their best lap, I want it to be that that I get better with time. So what I say in the book is that finishing well is not something you do at the end of your life, it's what you choose to do every day of your life, we have to have a framework, a mind a mental shift, where we are always thinking, Okay, I don't want this journey to be my best journey. I want to learn as much as I can during this journey, so that when I get to the next one, I'm even more fruitful. But even there, I want to keep learning. And when I talk with people, they always want to move themselves further along than they really are. And I like to sober them up by saying you don't want to be in a later journey, because you want a long life. If you get through this real quick, that means you're going to have a short life. So don't be in such a hurry to die. But take your time, and take your lessons and go through it at the right pace. So first of all, have it in your mind that you want to finish well. Secondly, be a learner for life, always look to learn more. I don't. It's so sad how many people I find my own age. That stopped learning a long time ago. And it's almost common to talk to Christians who say, you know, if only I had the excitement I had when I first believed? Well, why don't you Jesus hasn't changed? The stakes are the same. Why have you changed because you're the only one the only part of the equation that's changed. You know, I just don't think people have the stamina to keep learning. And so maybe we need to work hard at disciplining ourselves. So that we have that strength so that we do keep learning, always have an objective to learn. And maybe you need to start learning how to play the guitar. You don't. Here's one, I recently decided on my bucket list. I want to do stand up comedy. The people closest to me think that's crazy. But I want to test myself to try something I've never done before. Someday I want to sing karaoke, I've never done it. I've never sung in front of people. I don't have the best voice. But I want to test myself I want to learn I want to become better at something. What is it? You know, maybe it's woodworking or gardening or something. But maybe it's more serious than that. Maybe you want to learn how to make disciples from lost people. So that they are followers of Christ and you're going to keep trying until you succeed at that. I think, you know, we need to be the that a learner for life that wants to finish well, that disciplines themselves. Then, fourthly, we need to mentor others and be mentored ourselves. And if you don't have a mentor, go find one or two or five. And they don't have don't look for one person to have everything you need to be your mentor. Because that person doesn't exist except Jesus. So, see a quality you like in someone and ask them if they can show you how to have that same quality or seek to find someone who opens doors for you. Or, you know, there are several of my mentors I've never met in life. They died before I was born. I look forward to me meeting John Wesley, I look forward to meeting the Apostle Paul because they are mentors to me from their writings and their history. There's, you know, don't limit the mentor to just one person, but find mentors. But don't just be a dead sea that receives become a mentor for others. And all that means is, figure out what you're good at and give it away. These are the kinds of things that will help you get through the journey. So likes

Joshua Johnson: 41:09

Great, yeah. Well, Neil, if you really want to, to learn how to do some karaoke if you want to sing right now? No, I'm not yet ready just yet. I gotta practice it already. Yeah. All right. Maybe next time, maybe next time, you're gonna be able to

Neil Cole: 41:27

sing out. My kids or my grandkids all know how I sing. But I don't think Russell was ready for it yet. Get there, we'll get there. But I do want to test myself. I want to put myself in places where I'm doing something I've never done before. And I think that's important for all of us. To see ourselves as always willing to try new things and learn new things. Maybe learn a new language, maybe, you know, there's, there's things you can learn later in life. I just started up another degree. You know, three useless degrees are not enough. I need a fourth. You know, it's never too late to go back to school, I guess. That's

Joshua Johnson: 42:10

right. So if you have somebody that are thinking about their life, they're they're young, maybe you have a graduate of high school, a high school graduate, now they're thinking about their journeys, think about their lives, where where's a good place for them to start within these, this journey?

Neil Cole: 42:30

Okay, well, first of all, you got to know you've got to learn God's voice. You've got to hear God's voice, be attuned to it. There are people who are in love with scripture, but they don't love God's voice. And that's possible. Paul was like that, before the Damascus Road experience. He was an expert on the Scriptures. He knew everything the Scripture said. But he he was kicking against the goads, which means he was pushing away the actual voice of God. So you have to get to the place where you accept and hear God's voice, and follow it. Whatever he says, you'll do it. So that's the first and foremost thing so you can love the scriptures and not love the voice of God. But you can't love the voice of God and not love the scriptures. Because you'll find that voice that you love, in every syllable that's there. So that's the key find and value the voice of God. In the book of Acts, the the word used by Luke, to describe the movement of, of faith that was spreading was the word Lagace, the word word, and the Word of God spread and the word of God multiplied, and the Word of God grew and strengthened. This is the expression for movement. Basically, it's the voice of God. It's the message and voice of God. So the first thing for you is to become more acquainted with hearing his voice and becoming someone who radically obeys. I think we we don't value radical obedience in our life. And I don't mean just that you. You don't eat and you don't drink in these foods. You don't drink those drinks. You don't do drugs. I mean, that's all good and everything. Don't do sex, all that. But the thing is, is radical obedience is not just what you don't do. It's what you actually do this radical. I love the story. And this is in the newer journeys is brought to life, where Barnabas is sent by the Jerusalem church to Antioch to check out what's going on with this new church. And he does that. His charter is to go see what it's all right, and get word back. But he doesn't do that. He breaks protocol. And he goes walking minimum 300 miles off to Tarsus to find someone no one's ever heard of named Saul, edit the horn to Luke's language. He had to go looking for Saul. He wasn't easy to fly. So it was probably much more than 300 miles. And everybody there was probably saying, Why would you do that? Where are you going? That's not what you were told to do. What but it was what he was told to do by the Holy Spirit. Are you willing to go 300 miles out of your way on a whim just because the Holy Spirit says so we need to get that place. We need to be like, like Barnabas in that regard. And I think when you do you know, in the spirit realm, everything you see touch feels Smell Taste, is only half of what's real. Oh, there's another world. That's this, let's hear that we don't see touch, feel the unseen realm. And in that world, there are beings that are angels, and there are demonic or fallen angels and demons. And in that world, they are accustomed, they're all about us. They're ministering servants to us, or they're our enemy. But they're either way they're focused on us. And when we live predictable patterns, that you know, the angels don't have to pull out their sword very often. And the demons are just sort of orchestrating all the events in our lives, because it's easily predictable, when you suddenly take off in a direction that nobody expects. Suddenly, now the angels are pulling up their swords, and they're getting to work in ways they don't usually get to thrive. And the demons are falling back on their heels, and they're on defense instead of offense. And everything shifts in the spiritual world, because of radical obedience, like Barnabas hat, we have to be willing to listen to Jesus and DO what He says immediately. And I in fact, I think if persecution comes, and I believe it will, it used to be when persecution comes that your neighbor or your loved one or somebody you work with, would turn you in. But today, you're already turned in, they know all about you. They know what you think they know more about you than your spouse, and they know where you are. They they can track you at any moment. So the kind of persecution we're going to have in the future is going to require we'd be much more radical, and live much more supernatural type lives. And I think we should begin practicing that kind of lifestyle now. And so get to hear God's voice and then radically obey it, no matter what he's telling you to do, even if he makes you a fool. You know, I'm sure everyone was saying Barnabas, that's that's not the right thing to do. That's not what you were told to do. by Peter, James and John, both for Barnabas, he had a higher copper, he had a higher authority he was going to listen to and think of it, if he hadn't gone to get Paul, Barnabas would be a small footnote in our bytes. In fact, what would x be without Paul. So because of that simple, radical obedience, everything in history changed.

Joshua Johnson: 48:08

That's so good. And you see that throughout Paul's journeys to that he hears the Holy Spirit hears from God, he moves directions, he goes to different places because of what he hears from the voice of God. And that is, you know, we, we like to talk strategy, we like to talk, you know, this is our mission, this is our mission saving, this is how we're going to go about doing things. If we could get back to that principle of hearing from God doing what he says, interacts with the Spiritual World, and live spiritual lives. And that way, we're gonna see a lot of incredible things. It's gonna be pretty amazing. Let's get to it. Let's get to it.

Neil Cole: 48:50

If you if you need to learn to hear God's voice, then time in the scriptures. I mean, just devour scriptures. I try to read 25 to 30 chapters a week, and I've been doing that for over 30 years. And I read books repetitively, you know, reading the book, the Bible through and a year, you're gonna get Romans once in before you have time to think about it, you're already into First Corinthians. So it just washes over you, which is not bad, that's better than the alternative. But man, if you read Romans eight times in a month, it starts to make sense to you. So I, I suggest that repetitive deep reading of Scripture, and then practice listening to God, I even recommend, go for a drive in the car without a destination and only turn when you have an impression in your heart to turn, turn left turn right, see where it takes you practice hearing that voice and responding to it. When I do hear God's voice, it's a thought coming from another direction. My train of thought is like this, and another thing comes in a different direction. And it's a better idea. It's a holy idea. And it it, it's obviously God, it couldn't be me, I'm not that smart. That's how you start hearing God's voice and then you respond to that with obedience. So I you know, I always say this, you could sum up all my writings and all my teaching in one sentence, listen to Jesus and DO what He says. And if we just did that the world would change real quickly.

Joshua Johnson: 50:32

Amen. I must have gotten it from you because I say that all the time. And that's that's all i i say they end up there. Every time I train or do something, I was like, just listen to Jesus do what he says. And it's so important. Neil, what's, what's a hope that you have for your readers of journeys?

Neil Cole: 50:52

Well, I think journeys, in the initial read, it will bring to light things in the book of Acts that maybe you didn't even bother questioning. Like, why was Paul beat with rods when he's a Roman citizen? He shouldn't have been, there was a reason why, why did the Holy Spirit say don't go to don't speak the word in Asia? I think there's a reason. And in my digging, I've discovered some of those, and I present those. So I think you'll have better insight in X and even the epistles and how they fit by reading the book. But I think it goes beyond that this is not just a roadmap for the scriptures, it's a roadmap for our own spiritual formation. So it may give you ambitions for the future, and a goal to finish well, but at the same time, help put into place, What is God doing with this? Why am I experiencing this illness? Now? Why is my loved one so unhappy? And how does that fit into my own spiritual formation, what God's doing in my life? These are the kinds of things that suddenly they fall into place, and you realize God has a plan. And if I obey Him and follow Him, it will make sense, but it won't beforehand. So that comes from this book. And I also think it there's missional strategies that come out of what Paul had to learn how to do missions better. And he did each time he got better. And it's I bring to light literal practices that he did that made things better. So there's even practical ideas like that. Yeah,

Joshua Johnson: 52:29

it's, it's really, really good. I highly recommend journeys. And to dive into it, I think it's going to it's helpful for all of our spiritual formation to move forward in these journeys and not jump ahead and take were way farther down the line than we actually are. What's your one hope for the body of Christ? At the moment? Is there anything that you would love to say to the body of Christ?

Neil Cole: 52:54

Well, I think God is on the move right now. I travel a lot overseas, and I've been to places I'd never been booked to before. In the last year. I've been to Korea, Azerbaijan, Kaga Stan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, I was in Madagascar and Mauritius. And India, I've never been to India until this year. And everywhere I'm going, I see the same things. I'm seeing young people, teenagers, I did a training, where the oldest person I was training was probably 25. And the youngest was probably 13. And they love Jesus and they want to be used by him. Yeah, I want you to mention certain places I've been to where there's a movement happening right under the noses of the megachurch movement, and they don't even know it's happening. And it's all young people, and they're all coming to Christ. And they're not going to go to that church. They're going to meet in homes as families, and they're, they're so excited about Jesus. And when this gets unleashed on the world, it's it's going to be phenomenal, but it's not going to look like it's not going to look like the Jesus people movement, ending up in a bunch of mega churches. They're going to be mobile, decentralized, relational, that infiltrates rather than gathers. So I think that's, that's going to be a little bit different. And I think the world is going to help us with that there. Once this starts, the spark starts to spread. Persecution will come all those who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. And if we're not suffering persecution that says something about us. Well, this will be Satan will try to stomp this out. And the more he tries, the more decentralized it will be, the more empowered it will be, the more contagious it will be. And I'm, I think our greatest days are ahead of us. But we have to stop celebrating what's behind us.

Joshua Johnson: 55:01

Amen. Amen. Anywhere you want to point people to where can they get their book journeys? Yeah,

Neil Cole: 55:09

it's available, print, audio and ebook on Amazon. That's the easiest place to get it. Our website is Starling initiatives.com Like the bird starlings, I think the reason we call it that as I think in the future, when you see a murmuration of starlings, where they're all moving like one when that happens, there isn't a bird that has a microphone that's saying, Okay, everybody go left now everybody go right. There's no one calling the shots, they're all responding as one. I think in the future, we're gonna have to live that kind of spiritual life. And that's why we call it Starling initiatives. So it's merely connecting with people around the world that are of a light mine still want to listen to Jesus and DO what He says. So you can go to the website and join on their Starling initiatives.com. And on Amazon is where you'll find the book. And I would appreciate it anyone who likes it reads it, write a review, because that's how people find out about it. I think it's worth finding out about his worth writing twice is worth reading twice.

Joshua Johnson: 56:19

That's right. It's fantastic. So Neil, thank you for this conversation. Your book is amazing. And I love to go through these journeys of Paul to think through it, both as missionary methods and strategy. And as a spiritual formation of where I am in life and how I could walk through that be a lifelong learner, continue to move forward. I just pray that everybody will listen to Jesus and DO what He says, to live a life that is really bound by God's voice, that we could follow him and all that we do. You know, talking to you, to me, always gives me hope for the church, even when we see people not finishing well. And you see a lot of leaders falling, right now. We know that Jesus is on the move, and there's some incredible things happening all around the world. And that we're going to see the hope of glory some time, and it's going to be fantastic. So, yeah, institutions may not be in the future, but we do have faith, discipleship community, and the love of God within our lives. So thank you, Neil.

Neil Cole: 57:32

Appreciate thank you for the opportunity to just check it out. Sure. Yeah, yeah.