Jason & Rob - Successful?

In this episode, Rob and Jason explore what makes a church successful beyond just size and numbers. They discuss biblical principles, cultural influences, and practical strategies for effective ministry and spiritual growth.

Church Health Scorecard

Dwight Smith: Renovation

Church Talk Project

Chapters

00:00 Introduction and Personal Anecdotes
5861:04:27 Failing Forward: Trying New Things in Ministry
12999:58:04 Interpreting Church Metrics and Health
16972:11:32 Characteristics of a Successful Church
18805:31:33 The Impact of Church Size and Leadership Gifts
22749:58:19 Jesus' Teaching on True Discipleship
25861:05:04 Cultural Influences on Church Success Metrics
28333:18:32 Historical Shifts in Church Growth and Success
30722:11:59 Rethinking Success: Moving the Finish Line
34888:52:04 The Evolution of Church Leadership Roles
37055:32:11 The Power of Delegation and Leadership Development
41222:12:17 Biblical Principles of Delegation and Trust
46027:45:42 Kingdom Principles of Faithfulness and Impact
48416:39:07 Focusing on People and Spiritual Growth
533333:19:22 Five Characteristics of a Successful Church
556666:39:28 Measuring Spiritual Maturity and Fruit of the Spirit
616111:06:18 Stories of Life Change and Long-term Impact
671666:39:51 Balancing Growth, Faithfulness, and Sustainability
722222:13:18 The Importance of Developing People Over Numbers

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Hey everybody, welcome back to the Church Talk Podcast with Rob and Jason. We're so glad that you're here. Rob, as always, it's really good to see you. I I do want to confess something. Earlier today, I went to the eye doctor. And, you know, when you do that, they always dilate your eyes. So I don't know if it's because our internet connection isn't the greatest or it's my eyes, but you're a little fuzzy. And you look better now that I can't see you well. No, I'm just kidding. But I did so everything's just a little like if I kind of lean forward or whatever, it's because I'm trying to focus and my eye my and of course today is one of the sunniest days of the year. So like I I go upstairs and it's like I feel like Paul on the road to Damascus.

SPEAKER_01 0:43

Yeah. Well, you know what? He had drops in his eyes. That was all it was. Oh, that's so funny. Hey, you know what? Like, I I I'm of uh when I was 20, 30, maybe I would have been offended, but you know, like when someone says, Hey, it's good to see you, I don't care if you're blind and can't actually see me, you know, like I'll take the I'll take it nowadays. Good enough. Good. Hey, so last week, you know, you kind of ended with this teaser that we were gonna talk about uh, you know, what makes a church successful, you know, and really wrestle through that. And, you know, since then I've kind of been thinking about this because, you know, I just I'm crazy enough to still believe that not everybody, but most people in local churches, most leaders, most pastors, you know, they really, really, really want to like serve God and honor God, and they want to have people encounter Jesus and have their lives changed now and forever. And literally, like all of the stuff, right? And we just kind of joked around about like expensive lights and hazers. I still remember I've done this multiple times. You know, you go to a conference and you see like eight motion lights at the front of the stage doing this and eight at the back, and I and I mean like I'm like, those are kind of cool. So I go like take a picture of like the thing, and then I Google, like, I wonder how much one of these is. And it comes back and it's like eight thousand dollars for one, and they have like, you know, eight of them or ten of them or twenty of them or whatever. And I'm like, you know, that would be a significant portion of like I'd have to fire people and like not pay the electric bill and do all kinds of things just to buy some motion lights. So obviously we're not buying motion lights, right? So we joked around about that. I that's not a sacrifice you're willing to make. Do you get a little bit more? Well, you know what? My staff doesn't really listen to this podcast, so here's what I think. I probably do need to let them go because they're really not living up to what they need to.

SPEAKER_02 2:50

I would say they need to mention this podcast or they're gonna get fired. But they won't be able to get it.

SPEAKER_01 2:54

They got two weeks from the drop of this episode to mention to me face to face the church talk podcast. And if they don't, they're gone. We're getting motion lights. No, but seriously, like I think I think most people, you know, and so like whatever, like you might go, oh, this church did this really dumb thing, or they they tried that, or whatever. And and you might think that's a bad idea, or but I I really think for most people, like they they've thought these things through and they're and they're trying stuff. And I would way rather, you know, a church try to do something to reach people, to reach their community, to engage and fail, than just sort of keep doubling down on things that haven't worked for like 30 years and then just kind of slowly dying off. And and and so like I just felt like you know, that was worth saying because you know, for so many of us, I think we're just so like overwhelmed and worn down by all the week-to-week stuff. I mean, there's there's people who are struggling that just need a listening ear, a hug, a prayer, you know, some advice. So, you know, there's that kind of thing. There's weddings, there's funerals, Sunday comes every single week, whether you want it to or not, right? So there's just all those things. So the idea of really like, you know, praying and seeking God and really like, hey, like what are the gifts that our church has and what it are the needs our community has, and what is like the best way those two things line up? And then how can we strategically engage a number of times a year to really like help line those things up? You know, like I mean, for a lot of people, if I just said those words, they might make sense in the mind, but it's like I don't have the time, the energy, the people to actually pull that stuff off. And so, you know, I just think what a what a cool thing, like if we could hit on some thoughts, some ideas, some themes of things that, man, a little bit more focus here really does help us be successful. Not so that so that, you know, I mean, our budget can explode all of that, that would be nice, or our attendance can increase 400% this next year. But man, how how do we as God's people faithfully execute this thing called ministry in the local church? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:10

Yeah. And you know, uh this conversation kind of started a few weeks back when the regional president for Convergement Atlantic sent the staff an article in Christianity Today that he saw and said, Hey, this was interesting. You know, and and he didn't comment that it was good, bad. He's just like, this was interesting and would be fun to have some conversations around. And uh the the the article itself, and if I can, I'll try to post a link in in the show notes, uh, but it basically just came to the conclusion or it it demonstrated that more than half uh on any given Sunday, more than half of the people attending church are attending a larger church. Right? Like so yeah, the the statistics are still about 70% of all churches in America are under a hundred in weekly attendance, and and eighty percent are under two fifty or somewhere in that range, right? And yet, 15, yeah, so 10% of the churches in America have more than 50% of the regular church attenders coming to them. And that was just an interesting dynamic to acknowledge. And and again, it's not it's not saying it's good or bad, it just that's that's a snapshot of what's going on right now. And you know, if if I'm leading a smaller church, maybe I get discouraged, right? Saying, oh, I guess you know, we really don't matter because we don't represent the majority of church attenders. But also, you know, it it what it did for me, it pushed me to evaluate how are we determining a successful or an unsuccessful church. Right. And and this article it it basically it has this underlying assumption that that if you have more people coming, then you must be doing something right. And and they don't say that overtly, but there's just this underlying, you know, theme of the bigger the better. And and I don't know that that's what they meant by the way it was done. You know, it just you could just tell it was kind of an underlying premise in that. And and so I I kind of pushed back on it just a little, saying, Well, I mean, I'm not saying the stats are wrong. I uh that's fine. The stats are the stats, right? But it's the interpretation of the stats that I think matter. And I, you know, I so I was working with the church and you know, they they've struggled for a decade in in a lot of ways. And I I'm in this meeting with them and and and uh they did the church scorecard, which go to our website, your you and your church can, you know, your leadership team can take it. There's no cost or anything. Uh but it's the church health scorecard. And so they'd done it with their leaders, and I was debriefing with them, you know, around the findings. And you know, just I stopped the meeting midway through and I finally said, Hey, we've got all the data in front of us, and I can give you all the stuff, but I said, I s I don't know why, but the Spirit of God is just telling me there's an underlying issue here that is not gonna show up on these pieces of paper, but there's something going on. And sure enough, you know, I just then I just got quiet and I waited for them to talk. And slowly it came out, yes, there was an issue going on that needed to be and and I and I told them, I said, listen, that this church will never be health any more healthy than the pastor. Like and and I'm not pastor is going to set the the the ceiling, you know, and if the pastor is wounded and hurting, the church is not gonna outgrow him. And and so we we've gotta really dive into that before we can worry about some metrics or some, you know, some new program or whatever. And and I remember thinking through it, because literally I just read this article, you know, not that long ago, and here's a church that's bleeding attendance, right? They're they're not and yet, you know, there was something. If they could turn a few things around, I think there's still a a a chance that they, you know, can be healthy. And so, but then gosh, the fact that they're smaller, does that mean they're no longer a successful ministry? Like, how do you so that that's where this whole conversation came around? So, what is a successful church? And I was doing some reading uh and I found a guy named uh Dwight Smith wrote a book called Renovation, and it's about the church and so forth, and it's uh I'll put a link to that as well. But he he identified some things that I kind of I've adapted them a little, but they're they're they're characteristics of a successful church, or a church is successful win. And so I thought for the next few weeks we would explore some of these and you know, whether you agree, disagree, I don't know. Let's, you know, we'll kind of dive in. I don't know. What are your thoughts on that? Because I mean you you've ministered in large churches, small churches, and we know size isn't the issue, but there's something to be said about if there's people coming, you must be doing something right.

SPEAKER_01 10:16

And how very American of us, right, to think that, to measure based on like our buildings and our budgets and the number of butts in the seats, right? All the B's or whatever, we whatever you want to do, nickels and noses, or you know, and so if as long as those things are good, you know, who cares? I I was reading an article, and I'm not gonna name names, but some megachurch that had like over 3,000 people, and now they're like under all kinds of investigations for all kinds of things, and it was just in the last week or so, and the pastor's now talking about how on a good Sunday they'll have like two to three hundred, and and it's just like the stress is off, and they can really focus on what matters now instead of on on all the production stuff. And I'm like, I don't even disagree with that statement, but I'm also like, you know, I'd be willing to bet a whole lot that he's not super happy about having less than 10% of the whatever, you know. So there's just all those things. So when you were talking, Jason, three thoughts came to my mind. I was thinking of our friend, Josh Soros, and you know, when he was on the podcast and his church is just a few years old, but they've really built a great ministry, a healthy church. Not, I mean, it's not small, but it's not like big yet, because it's, you know, just a few years old. But they literally are like, hey, we're gonna be in community, we're gonna serve our our region together. And if you don't want to sacrifice to do that, this is not the right church for you. And so they have actually built a very healthy and I would say effective, successful, if you will, church with way harder things that maybe cause and are causing them to grow more slowly on the front end than, hey, come get your blessings and unicorns and rainbows. But, you know, I think on the back end, what they're building with, the types of building materials that they're using, are just gonna help them to see, you know, years and decades and generations of potential ministry success where the the other thing wouldn't. So, you know, there's that. I also think of our buddy JD Walt, who when he was on last time and he was talking about this tiny little church that he pastors and you know, him sitting up front every week doing the children's sermon, and and he's like, Man, I always thought bigger was better, and I'm realizing like that this is the most fun and the most fruit that I've ever seen in ministry. And so for somebody who's been a part of and is part of bigger things to say that this is this is it, you know, to me that's huge. And then I I I think of Jesus in John 6, right? Where where people are like coming to him because he he just fed, you know, 5,000 dudes. And so like people think right way over 10,000 when you had the women and children in, and and so now it's like the next day, and Jesus has gone across the the Sea of Galilee and he's on the other side, and they find him because hey, that's the guy that that gave us dinner last night, and we like dinner. So, hey, right, and and so Jesus just starts going after them with this. You don't you're not following me because you want to follow me. You're you're following me because you know I filled your bellies. Oh no, no, right. And so he says, Listen, truly I tell you, unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you will never see the kingdom of heaven. And literally everyone turns and walks away. Actually, this coming month, this is one of the texts that I'm gonna teach from. It's always just been one of my favorite passages. And uh and I and I love you know what uh what Peter says, you know, there at the very end, when Jesus seems very discouraged that everyone's left, just like just like all of us are when people leave our churches, right? It's very discouraging. And and and Jesus kind of what feels like to me as I read this these verses, like is like, hey, are you guys leaving too to two of the twelve? And Peter's like, where are we gonna go? Like you are the only one that has the words of eternal life. And and in my life in ministry, many times I have felt like when I am doing the most Christ-like things, they tend to be very small. And the things that I have done that have seemed like magic and have grown, you know, I mean, not that they were like godless, but like I'm like, yeah, Jesus probably doesn't give a rip whether we do or don't do this. But people really like it and they'll come to it, you know. And I've always felt that tension because I think again, what our culture says success is, and what the what kingdom success and success that Jesus is like, yeah, you're you're really crushing it, you know, are two very different things.

SPEAKER_02 14:44

Yeah, I think that's that's a key thing to to consider in this is the culture in which we live, and by that I mean 21st century American culture. Um, because that's and and by America, I would include Canada and maybe Mexico slightly like North American, but it's a very distinctly American thing that spills over, you know, a little. And and and and that's there, there's a ton of streams that have fed into what is now our culture. And and I think the church has, you know, the church over the last 70 years has grown up into the American culture, and and we've taken on a lot of that. And you know, Carrie Newhoff did a recent interview with uh Todd Wilson about that, and I've I'm reading his book, and it's you know, tracing just the history of that. And those are all good things. Like, I mean, uh, we need to know our history and we need to understand how some of these things came together. And uh, you know, was it God working, the spirit moving? Was it coincidence? Was it actually some bad actors in the you know, I don't know. That's you know, that's the joy of this. But the one thing even Todd Wilson kind of says towards the end of this interview, you know, we're at a stage where we don't know what's next in the evolution of the North American church. Uh we we don't, you know, we we knew the up until the 70s, we had kind of the typical church where honestly majority, and by majority, I mean 95 plus percent of churches were just 200 or smaller, because there were only like 300 megachurches. No, there were a hundred megachurches in the in all of America, you know, and now there's several thousand that are you know above that. And so the way we even did church, thought about church, approached the idea of church, figured out metrics to decide if it's successful, have evolved. And you know, the whole idea of the megachurch, it's a new concept, you know, like and and we've begun to measure our success against the ones who are making the headlines, getting the, you know, are on top 100 of outreach magazines, growing churches, you know, you know, I mean, those are the things that we've been we we compare ourselves to, and when we know that 99% of the churches in America are not gonna be in that category, that means that either means the church is failing miserably across the board, right? Because 99% are not successful apparently, or maybe we're using the wrong metrics to determine what success looks like. And uh, you know, I've been preaching this for a while now, but I think the challenge that I'm putting before churches is we need to move the finish line and then change our scorecard so that we can actually understand whether we're accomplishing, what needs to be done. One quick little thing before we dive in, and and we'll we'll spend the next five weeks with each of these or give or take. Maybe we'll do two or so, Jason.

SPEAKER_01 17:35

What are we doing today? Are we just gonna kind of hit them all just as concepts and then maybe kind of dive in for the next number of weeks?

SPEAKER_02 17:42

Yeah, and but before we even do that, I wanna I wanna this thing has been messing with me uh a little bit, and I want to play it out with you some. In the last 30 to 50 years, you know, the church has we've experienced this this mega church and larger church type thing as normal, right? But the role of pastor is it's evolving quickly as well, right? Because and and here's the thing we've moved from uh you know a little community organization where a pastor can manage and shepherd and care for. Really, we've churches have become an enterprise, right? And and and one of the key indicators in this, and and this is give or take, but you know, rule of thumb, around five staff members, once you hit four to five staff members, you have to be a CEO, right? You you have to be able to function as a CEO. As opposed to under that, you can manage it more like a a you know, a small business, uh a pastor, right? You can manage those things. And and it moves from managing to a leadership executive type you know situation. And and to me, that's a major shift in the way, number one, it requires a different type of training, right, to be able to do that. I mean, I wasn't, I don't know about you, but I wasn't trained in seminary on running an organization, you know. Like I I uh that wasn't part we we learned aspects, but I you know, and granted, I went to seminary in the late 90s, early 2000s because I went back to seminary, you know, had two kids and was trying to do it. But even then, we we didn't have this training on running an organization. We had training on how to preach, how to do this, how to yeah, you know, the those, and it was good. It was I I I loved it. And and yet now I get you know, one of my positions in a church, I I was the in essence the executive pastor. Well, the term executive pastor didn't exist until the 90s. Like that it wasn't a thing. And so I'm just wondering, as we look at the church today, as we really start thinking, is the church making a difference in the world? And and I'm speaking specifically in our context of America, you know, how can we judge that? What are some things you've noticed that would say yes or no to that question? Like, how do you begin thinking about it? And then I'll set up at least my five propositions, you know, and then we'll play with them for the next few weeks.

SPEAKER_01 20:10

Yeah. So I'm I'm just gonna like base my response here on what you just said, because I it got my mind thinking too. And and I'm unique in that probably like like I have I I kind of have one foot in both worlds for a number of reasons, right? I'm I'm an extrovert. You know, a lot of times these CEO pastors are more introverted, they're very good like organizationally and tactically and strategically. I'm good strategically, but I'm also like, I just can't help myself sometimes as an extrovert when people are like, hey, can you come see us or do this? I'm like, yeah, you know, and so I'm like my own worst enemy. I also live in a very small rural area, and so you get some of that sort of uh I want to see, talk to, I want my wedding to be done, you know, or my funeral to be done, or whoever by my pastor, which is me, not the actual other pastors on staff. And so, you know, there's just a number of things that that muddy kind of how that works in in my situation. And there's five of us on staff full time. So when I when I think of this, I don't think like if you can run your church more like a business, because that was big part of the church growth kind of thing, and people have kind of whole hog rejected that to a certain extent, you know, in more recent years, and other people have doubled down on it. I don't think it has anything to do with that. I think you can run your church more like that because it's just where you live or the size of your church or whatever, and it can't just be everybody looks to and relies on one person. I think you can totally, you know, go back to the old school just kind of caring for and shepherding people. I think it has a lot more to do with unleashing the gifts that a person has. And so, like, if that pastor is just better, you know, one-on-one meeting with counseling, caring for people, and that and this other pastor has more gifts to manage and lead a team and and to deploy people for greater and broader effectiveness. Like, I don't think one is right and one is wrong, even though it may feel to certain people and in certain ways like that is true. I just think, man, like do what God has put in you to do. Use the gifts that God has given you and trust that like He He's going to use those in your context to you know to do what he wants to. I think we just get far too concerned with what others think and want, what what current model seems to be in vogue or whatever, instead of going, okay, God, who have you called and created me to be? And how can I be kind of most faithful to that calling?

SPEAKER_02 22:58

Yeah, it it made me, as you're talking there, it it went in Exodus 18, uh, Jethro comes and visits Moses, right? And and we always focus on Jethro helping Moses discover this idea of delegating authority because he watched Moses be the only one who could judge between people that when they had disagreements. And Jethro, his father-in-law, comes in and says, and I mean, kudos to Moses for actually listening to his father-in-law, right? I mean, that that's that's saying something right there. But he uh but he he his father-in-law tells him, Hey, you need to delegate this, you know, some of these decision-making stuff, or you're gonna kill yourself, and people are gonna get frustrated because they'll never get their decisions. And and but I love the way he he sets it up because in in verse 25 he says, So Moses chose capable men from all Israel and made them leaders of the people, officials over thousands, officials over hundreds, officials over fifties, and officials over tens. So, like he could different leaders were capable of leading in different size groups. None of them were unimportant, and none of them were less than. It was just one of those Moses said, Hey, I'm gonna divide this up and I'm gonna delegate you to look over thousands because you can handle that. I'm gonna, you know, and Jesus kind of does tell stories in a similar vein, right? About 10 talents and five. I I think there is, I think you were right, there are people out there, there are pastors out there who are naturally gifted at leading a larger growing organization, church, right, that that is making an impact and and just has a lot more moving hearts because they're just gifted that way. And and and I don't think we should ever disparage them.

SPEAKER_03 24:46

Well, and Jason is equipped.

SPEAKER_01 24:49

Yeah, and as you said that example, I almost wonder, and again, I haven't really I mean, there's just the surfacey kind of stuff too, but I almost wonder, you know, like so like if if if uh if God was here and he was saying to a group of us, and you and I were in that group, it's like, hey, I'm giving you the tens, I'm giving you the 50s, I'm giving you the hundreds, I'm giving you the thousands. I wonder if there isn't though, like some of the people who might get the 50s and the hundreds, you know, some people who might go, ha ha ha ha, I'm way better because I got more people. And and what God is actually doing in that is he's like, no, you actually you're not better. And in fact, you won't develop people and you won't delegate. So I'm giving you like a bigger group of people because I know you're gonna just do it all. You're not gonna get a huge group of people, but you're gonna try to do it all. And so you're gonna like run around like a chicken with your head cut off. It might be cut short, but man, some of the people that I'm giving the tens, I'm giving them 10, just like Jesus had the 12, so that they can focus, develop, and pour into them. And those people are gonna change the world, you know. So, so again, we tend to weight those things even and think about them in our culture, like in a, well, I got the smaller number, so I'm obviously less gifted. And it's like, no, but you might actually be more trustworthy and more faithful and do more with less that actually ends up having a bigger impact, which is, I think, kind of one of those kingdom principles that God really wants more of from all of us.

SPEAKER_02 26:15

Well, and that's interesting because in my conversation with you know, my boss, the regional president, we we were, and again, we were just wow, this is interesting, thinking about larger churches, etc. You know, one of the things that kind of came out, someone said, you know, one thing to think about this is to realize that you know, about 50 to 60 percent of the people who attend a converge mid-Atlantic church probably attend one of seven churches. Like, I'm you know, like we can we can name that pretty so. And and one of the conclusions was, or one of the thoughts to that was maybe we need to put we need to focus on those because there's a higher likelihood that we will find church planters and missionaries and you know, because there's just a higher volume of people there, and you know, just the whole idea of invest in a in a smart investment, right? You know, like it you're just more likely to get something out of that than if you invested the same amount of energy and resources into a church that maybe only had you know a hundred people, and so just the likelihood that one of them and that really caught me because I was like, whoa, that's not how God runs his kingdom. Like you know, and and again, they weren't saying that's what we should do. They were just like, hey, if we logic this out, here's some conclusions. If we're not careful, we could easily come to.

SPEAKER_01 27:40

Well, and I think back my my first ministry assignment out of college, actually, I was my last year college, and then uh for a few years after that, I was uh at a church of less than 200, and I was the associate pastor over youth and Christian education. Basically, it was like I was the youth pastor, and then anything else the senior pastor didn't want to do and got assigned to me, basically, which is you know, that's not like atypical, right? Like that's kind of whatever we all for. Yeah, we all we all sort of started with that. And like I built the youth group from probably like 10 kids to maybe 20 or 30 or whatever. It was never it wasn't a big church and it wasn't like a huge youth ministry. Now, we actually started, this was on Wednesdays, we started a Friday night Bible study that actually over the course of a couple years grew to bigger than the youth ministry. So we just had people like showing up, kind of youth and young adults, and we just were like walking through a book of the Bible, which was super cool. And of you know, of the 20-ish kids who are part of this kind of kid, the consistent core, 10 of them went into full-time Christian service. So, like, you know, and you tell me anything else that has half the people, you know, basically say, hey, you know, not solely, but in part because of these things and experiences, I'm going into full-time Christian service. Like, and again, I I take virtually no credit for any of that, but you know, I just think that a lot of times I uh I've I've planted churches and I've been in situations where people, you know, were at like a megachurch or almost mega church sized church, and uh, and then they were like, oh, hey, like we're gonna help plant this church. So they come. And you know what? Like they were some of our best leaders, but they were like 10 deep at the big church, and um, and they there they never, ever, ever would have gotten utilized at all. And so you get a part of something smaller that actually needs you, and you learn, you grow, you develop, you engage, you deploy, you raise up in ways that you might never get a chance to at the bigger thing. So again, that's not to say big is bad. I'm not I'm not at all a big is bad guy, but uh, you know, I just think God God uses all of it, and uh and and we can't miss that.

SPEAKER_02 29:56

Yeah. Yeah, yes. So let me give the five kind of characteristics and and we can just do a quick overview and then we'll dive into them. It maybe one at a time, maybe two at a time, we'll see, you know, how how it rolls out. But the this and again, to give credit, you know, I read this the foundation of this in Dwight Smith's renovation, a book called Renovation. A church is successful when people and then there's five things, when people are developing intimacy with God, when people are telling their grace story, when people are exercising their spiritual gifts, when people are demonstrating the fruit of the spirit, and when people are stewarding stewarding their lives for God's kingdom. And I know all of those, it's really hard to measure them. Butts and budgets, way easier to measure, right? As as a metric, because I can tell you what attendance was, and I know what the offering was. And so that's obviously that's way more simple to measure. And it still needs to be measured. Like I'm not saying don't measure that. You know, but to really think about a successful church, then I do think it's more about the outcome of the people who are part of that community. That's really when we start to say whether or not the ministry itself is is moving the needle. You know, are they developing intimacy with God? Are they telling their grace story? Uh, you know, are they able to? Are they equipped to? Are they empowered to? Are they encouraged to? You know, are they exercising spiritual gifts? Um, are are they demonstrating the fruit of the spirit? Like that that's one that I'm I've been in big churches and not a lot of fruit of the spirit. Now, people would say there's a lot of fruit because the attendance was up into the right. But man, not a not a lot of fruit of the spirit among the people. And that's that can be a thing.

SPEAKER_01 31:52

Are you more are you more loving is like a great first question. Like, hey, like are are you more of a disciple? Are you have you been discipled? Are you following Jesus? Like that, that might be the first question I would ask. Like compared to six months ago, a year ago, five years ago, are you more loving? Are you less loving? Are you about the same? You know, if you're not growing in love, that's a tough one to Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 32:19

Yes. And and that's where, you know, if my if my theology or my doctrine makes me less loving as a person, I don't think it's orthodox. You know, I don't care how right you think it is, I don't think it's orthodox if it makes me less full of love and demonstrating things like gentleness, patience, patience, peace, etc. Um what's your first impression? Because I didn't I didn't send you these to you ahead of time.

SPEAKER_01 32:44

I really wanted to get your fresh I know you kind of sprung them on me. I did. Thanks. I did. You're welcome. So as I was hearing them, I thought a few things. One, I love the list. Like I was kind of maybe expecting one or some to be like, you know, as as many lists are, but no, like every one of those things I thought those are great. Like, yes, an amen. I also thought, you know, like again, it's part of just the baggage of sort of being in the location we are, right? In North America, at the time we are in history, where we we tend to think about things through more of like a corporate business organizational type lens. And and so, you know what? Like the Bible is so full of mystery. Like, there isn't here's all the steps and answers and sort of neat processes. It's like, trust God, hang on, you know. And so I think a list that feels so put together and followable and executable, you know, makes a lot of cultural sense. I'm just not sure it's the bullseye biblically. Um, so I felt that as well. And then I also think, Jason, like when we think about success, again, like in my context, you know, like I think about the the the guy who it's taken me 15 years of praying for him, of inviting him, of challenging him, you know, personally and even biblically through teaching and preaching and whatever, in all kinds of ways. It's taken 15 years to get him to be like completely like I don't want to engage in community, I'm not gonna be a part of a small group. I, you know, I'll be a part of the big group, but I want people to know my business. I don't want to have to share my life to now 15 years later, he's engaging in community, he's growing spiritually, he's he's practicing daily disciplines, but it took 15 years. And you know, or or or think of like a marriage that was like hanging on by a thread and now is stronger because people cared and people came alongside and people prayed and people helped give some guidance and whatever. Like those kinds of things are literally changing lives and families, potentially for generations, right? And so you could say that is like huge success, but like I guarantee you, like in your role, you know, or your boss's role, like, you know, we can tell those stories and everyone nods their head, you know, vehemently and says, yes, right, yes, that is awesome. Keep doing that. But you know, does does the district, you know, does the denomination see that more as success? Or do do they, you know, when when one of those big churches that has millions and millions of dollars of budget, you know, scratches a check for hundreds of thousands of dollars that help everything continue and function. And I do not minimize that at all. That's like necessary and important, but it'd be real easy, especially if it was just two people and not on a public podcast, to go, you know what, that other stuff could happen without local churches and pastors and whatever's, but you know, without the big old check, we we won't continue to exist. So, you know, that's success. And the other's good, but it just, you know, and and so depending on where you sit, you know, it really has a big impact on how you see success and what you see as success.

SPEAKER_02 36:08

A hundred percent. And and any pastor who will tell you that they don't care whether or not, you know, a person comes and gives or not, they are lying through their teeth because it matters, especially in a smaller church, because if these people aren't coming, uh there's no payroll to manage. There, there's no paycheck to get. And and there is a weird, you know, tying together of those things that it just it's just reality. It's not good, bad, it's just reality. And I do think this is, you know, Andy Stanley talks about the dis deciding if it's a tension, you know, if it's a problem to be solved or a tension to lean into, right? And and I think that's a tension to lean into. It's not a it's not something to fix. Uh and so Yeah, but it's not that either of those are bad.

SPEAKER_01 36:56

Those are both necessary things.

SPEAKER_02 36:58

And I think by leaning in, we actually get better at then deciding, right, how to move forward, how to do this, how to evaluate things when we recognize there are things at play that you know we don't necessarily have control over, uh, or maybe we do and we aren't we aren't being faithful in that area. You know, that's why I do the church health scorecard. One of the things we talk about is, you know, the inputs is the first thing you measure, which are the systems and structures that are in place. And are they healthy? Because obviously, if they're not healthy, then the outputs are not going to be healthy, and we know the impact that you have is not gonna be strong because you're starting from a weak foundation. And I was meeting with the church recently, and and the the pattern was what I called a leaky pipeline, where it goes the inputs are decent, the outputs are okay, the impact is negligible. Like, you know, there's just there's leaking happening at every step. And figuring out why, right? That that's that's important. But realizing too that just because you're bigger doesn't mean you're better in in stuff. And and so one other thing, real quick. I know we gotta we gotta wrap this up, and and it's gonna be hard to get through all five of these.

SPEAKER_01 38:10

Yeah, I got one more thing, too, here.

SPEAKER_02 38:11

So well, go do yours, because I think we'll get we might get to mine multiple times. So go ahead, do yours.

SPEAKER_01 38:17

Well, no, I'm thinking of my buddy Jason, who not you, my other buddy Jason. I got multiple Jasons in my life, hard to manage all of them. But uh, no, he planted a church with United Methodists, and then now he's on my staff as our church planter. And man, this guy is gifted. He actually preached at my church, well, our church now, uh, this whole last month when I've been on vacation, and he did a great job, you know, and it's and it's awesome. And so he planted this church in a really difficult small area and was given lots of money. And man, he saw tons of life change. The denomination didn't really like care, acknowledge anything, all the stories of people's lives completely transformed. What they cared about was that his weekend in-person attendance and his giving were not, after a few years, to the point that were sustainable, right? That was that was the big deal for them. And and and so, like, again, different places see different priorities. Like he was like, we did this work and it changed this family for years or maybe for eternity, right? How cool is that? And so one of but one of the things that I've been talking to Jason about a little bit that I really want before you know he launches a campus for us, is Jason, man, like you have been in so many environments now where you've had to do everything, you know, like, and so you've gotten good at being a doer, whether it's preaching or executing a program or putting something together, but you know, inadvertently, because you've been in environments where you haven't had people to do any of those things, you know, you've had to do it all yourself and you gotten really good at that, but you haven't been good because you haven't had the people to do it with of developing and accomplishing those things through other people. And so, like the one thing I want from him is for him to do less and less and less, to trust God more and to develop people more, you know, because we have a few people who are gonna who are gonna be a part of this and we're gonna help him and whatever. So let's let's sharpen those skills as well. Because yeah, like it matters, like it just it all people's lives being changed matters, but you being able to function in a way that's sustainable and scalable and multipliable so that more kingdom impact can happen, that is way more success than you just being really, really good at a whole bunch of direct ministry functions.

SPEAKER_02 40:38

And and drawing a crowd. Yep. Right. You know, yeah, yeah. Being good at drawing a crowd is fine, but if you can't develop people, and that's why all five of those things, you know, start with the church is successful when people are and people are because it's about you know, it's about how are people developing and growing and becoming more like Jesus out of the ministries and the programs and the you know, the relationships that you are fostering and cultivating within the community called your church, uh, whatever that that is. And so I don't, I think it's gonna be it's gonna be interesting to talk about not only whether or not each of these is a good indicator, but then if it is, how do we really dive into that? And and then what does it look like to work backwards and say, now what are there things we need to change so that we can actually focus on that? Are there things we need to drop? Are there things we need to fan into flame because they're you know a good starting point? Are there things we need to just, you know, uh uh Emily Manders and I are working on that type of evaluation with all of the services that Converge Mid-Atlantic offers, right? We're just evaluating. And she says it way nicer than I do. She she talks about are there services that we need to sunset? And I mean, oh, you mean kill? Yeah, no, no, sunset. But you know, but there's probably things in our churches that we can just let them die. It's okay. Give them a graceful death. Praise God for the things that is done, you know. But what does that look like to actually have those conversations among your leaders? Because, not because you want to make things simpler, you want to, but because you want to focus on actually developing people in a way that that really helps them become more like Jesus, which then of course grows the kingdom, right? Because if you got a bunch of little Jesuses running around, which in the New Testament they called Christians, right? They that that's what changes the world.

SPEAKER_03 42:34

So it's gonna be fun.

SPEAKER_02 42:37

It's gonna be fun. We're we're gonna we'll dive into it and uh put some put some more thoughts and and stuff around it and and we'll try to add some stuff on the website to help uh do it. Um I'm developing a few things to just make it, I don't know, I just want people to engage this question and see where it goes. Uh and so I hope you'll reach out to us, let us know, you know, what you think, and and of course I'll put the link in the show notes to the book uh where I I glean some of this. I don't want to take any credit for you know for coming up with this, but in the same breath, I I want to see what does this look like as we flush it out and as it gets put into practice in the different churches. Yeah, reach out, let us know. We want to hear your story. Uh check us out on YouTube. If you really want to see what we look like, I'm sorry. We'll apologize in advance. If you're watching on YouTube, good on you. And and then we will uh we will definitely see you next week. Have an amazing week. Uh, we're cheering for you. We'll see you soon.

SPEAKER_00 43:33

Thanks for joining us today at the Church Talk Podcast. We hope the conversation encouraged and challenged you. We would love to hear from you. Email your questions or comments to Jason at ChurchtalkProje.com. The Church Talk Podcast with Rob and Jason is brought to you by the Church Talk Project. We work to engage, equip, and encourage pastors and church leaders around the world. Thanks for listening.