Pastor Seth here, joining forces with Pastor Jason Watson, to reveal how we're fostering authentic celebrations that resonate with our church's true spirit. We're peeling back the layers of Easter festivities at Reliant Church and Cross Pointe, sharing our approach to blending tradition with transformation, steering clear of superficiality, and how we're embedding community engagement, family day activities, and water baptisms into our ultimate mission of leading hearts to Christ.
Tune in and discover how we navigate the interplay between labor and rest, rooted in theology. If you've ever felt the tug-of-war between action and repose or wondered how to honor God's provision through rest, Pastor to Pastor dissects these challenges, especially for those in ministry, and even shares their thoughts on what rest really is and when it should be taken. We're not just talking about taking a day off; we're sharing our insights into creating a life where work springs from a state of rest in God. Young ministers, we've got a special segment for you on preaching with purpose and the power of leaning on the wisdom of the experienced.
Finally, let's confront the truth about rest and its pivotal role in leadership. It's not indulgence; it's essential. This episode isn't just about catching our breath; it's a clarion call for fostering a culture of rest within our faith communities. Together Pastor Jason and Pastor Seth delve into practical strategies that safeguard our well-being and, by extension, that of our congregations. From the "bus test" to budgeting for rejuvenation, we're making the case that to lead effectively, to nurture creativity, and to sustain health in church leadership, rest isn't optional—it's foundational. Join us in affirming that the strength of our ministries lies as much in our capacity to work as in our courage to rest.
Pastor Seth here, joining forces with Pastor Jason Watson, to reveal how we're fostering authentic celebrations that resonate with our church's true spirit. We're peeling back the layers of Easter festivities at Reliant Church and Cross Pointe, sharing our approach to blending tradition with transformation, steering clear of superficiality, and how we're embedding community engagement, family day activities, and water baptisms into our ultimate mission of leading hearts to Christ.
Tune in and discover how we navigate the interplay between labor and rest, rooted in theology. If you've ever felt the tug-of-war between action and repose or wondered how to honor God's provision through rest, Pastor to Pastor dissects these challenges, especially for those in ministry, and even shares their thoughts on what rest really is and when it should be taken. We're not just talking about taking a day off; we're sharing our insights into creating a life where work springs from a state of rest in God. Young ministers, we've got a special segment for you on preaching with purpose and the power of leaning on the wisdom of the experienced.
Finally, let's confront the truth about rest and its pivotal role in leadership. It's not indulgence; it's essential. This episode isn't just about catching our breath; it's a clarion call for fostering a culture of rest within our faith communities. Together Pastor Jason and Pastor Seth delve into practical strategies that safeguard our well-being and, by extension, that of our congregations. From the "bus test" to budgeting for rejuvenation, we're making the case that to lead effectively, to nurture creativity, and to sustain health in church leadership, rest isn't optional—it's foundational. Join us in affirming that the strength of our ministries lies as much in our capacity to work as in our courage to rest.
Hey, what's up, family. Welcome back to another episode of Pastor to Pastor. I'm Pastor Seth. Across. From me is the one and only Pastor Jason Watson.
Speaker 2:Hey everybody, how you doing sir?
Speaker 1:I'm doing alright. I'm excited. It's been a little bit since we've been together, but I'm excited about this episode.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's been a little while. It's a topic, man, look I don't want to dive right into it. I want to take a moment. So tell me how things are going at Reliant Church. Tell me it's Holy Week. We're recording this on Holy Week, so tell me about Holy Week at Reliant Church. Hey, come on now. We at Reliant Church Turning the cross point. It's cool.
Speaker 1:You're so used to staying cross-cut.
Speaker 2:That's all right, go ahead, it's in your heart ain't it. It is.
Speaker 1:Hey, man, we just celebrated Palm Sunday. Man and I talked about the crowd, puppy love and having real love and fake love with the Lord and man. It was just a beautiful, beautiful thing. And this Sunday I'm excited about Resurrection Sunday. Yes, sir, it is the biggest celebration in the history of humanity yeah, in the history of humanity and I hate it for those who don't see it as a celebration, those who have not received Christ, and I'm hoping, pastor Jason, I don't know about you, but I'm hoping to get some souls saved this Sunday.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:People come to the knowledge of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 2:Yes, sir.
Speaker 1:I'm excited about what this week does for the church overall. Typically, this gives the church a lot of momentum and a lot of creative abilities to reach the lost. I'm in a different place. For most churches, though, we haven't talked about this. This is going to be a fresh conversation.
Speaker 2:Go ahead.
Speaker 1:You know I usually feel pressure to make Easter this big ordeal for the church big ordeal for the church. But what I've figured out is if on Easter Sunday you have a bunch of guests come in and your church does things it doesn't normally do, you've set the expectation for the next Sunday. That's right, and I don't want to pretend to be something on Easter that we're not every other day of the week. So I don't know how you guys are doing it, because we really haven't talked about it.
Speaker 1:But, our Sunday is no different. I mean, we're going to let you take some free photos and stuff like that, and we're going to do a little small things. But it doesn't change who we are as a culture, and I've been in places where we went above and beyond, and next Sunday it's like back to normal.
Speaker 2:Yeah, jesus, flying in on the cable breaks and the cable breaks Dropping down.
Speaker 1:Oh man.
Speaker 2:Hey, no, at Crosspoint, man, we really we keep things. You know, I do think that there's a little bit of added pressure now. I can tell you that today I don't really feel it. I mean, we're doing some extra things. So, as a leader, I'm making sure that we're following through.
Speaker 2:We're right on detail because, anything we do, we want to do in excellence. We don't want to just, but this is any Sunday, this isn't just just Easter Sunday. We just happen to be doing a few extra things Now for us. You know, every fifth Sunday for us is a family day. Yeah Well, this year Easter falls in on family day, so we're excited to celebrate with our families, and it's just something we do every fifth Sunday. We'll have food. Um, we typically have games during the summer. We have water slides for the kids and the adults. Sometimes the adults are taking over the water slide. It's just a good time, man. We enjoy fellowship together on family day. So for this being Easter, look, it may change a few little events that we're having Now. We do water baptisms every family day, so we'll be doing that on Easter.
Speaker 1:Come on somebody.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're going to be having Easter egg hunts, and we got a few little things going and some community involvement things, but overall, yeah, personally, I don't feel any more pressure on Easter than I do any other Sunday, just for the simple fact that it really is for us any other Sunday. Yeah, I will say this. You know, this morning, I'm praying over my message for tonight. It's Wednesday, we're recording, but I'm also praying over ahead, which is my prayer often, though, is Lord. Let me say what people need to hear to bring them to the knowledge of you.
Speaker 2:That is my goal, man, and we are in this season of really making followers of Jesus. That is our goal. At the end of the day, you can have lights, smoke and mirrors, whatever you want, but is Jesus the main focus? Is that what we're doing and that's what our focus is here at CrossPoint. So, yeah, I mean I'm with you. It's a few extra events that we're having, but no different than any other.
Speaker 1:Sunday for us and those family days you guys do, man they're so much fun. We've had a privilege of being a part of a couple of them when we were kind of in transition and preparing for Reliance. So, yeah, y'all are going to have a great Sunday, man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're excited, man, we're expecting it, and my prayer is really for all our churches in the area, man, for them to be thriving and full, and I mean I hope to get on Facebook at some point or on social at some point after Monday, tuesday, and just hear the uh, the salvations that have taken place, man, because I believe, not know what you've experienced, but we've, we've seen an uptick in people search, searching for God. It's like God's calling people home, and so that that's our focus, man is look, bring the particles home, bring them home, them home and, and man, put them back on the right path with jesus and so that's our focus, that's our goal come on, I love, I love.
Speaker 1:I was scrolling, uh, a couple of times this week. I was scrolling on facebook reels and stuff and almost every day I saw your face pop up that's right hey, it's almost easter yeah, welcome to crosspoint.
Speaker 2:Hey, I want, I want you know. At the end of the day, it's not about whether it's cross-pointed, like go somewhere.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's it.
Speaker 2:Actually, if you listen to this podcast, it's after Easter, but it doesn't change. Don't stop, Don't stop yeah yeah, and statistically we talked about this pre-show. Statistically, the Sunday after Easter is a huge drop off.
Speaker 1:You go from largest to lowest.
Speaker 2:Right from largest to lowest. And so my encouragement is get planted, go somewhere, go with your family, go somewhere, but don't stop going, keep going, keep going, keep growing, get planted, produce fruit. Anyway, I'm preaching to the choir.
Speaker 1:Amen of God, amen, I'm excited. Let's jump right into this. It's something I don't think we've ever talked through or talked about, and I'm interested to see how the conversation goes with it. And we're going to talk about rest.
Speaker 2:Yeah, rest the big old four-letter word.
Speaker 1:Jason said we just lazy, we don't need no rest. We don't need no rest, we don't need no rest, man.
Speaker 2:Look, and this is what I love about our podcast, man is the fact that we can show that you can have difference in opinions and it's okay. It's okay to disagree, that's right, and so no, while I'm on the rest boat, I don't think we should be on a cruise ship. But go ahead, I'm going to let you go ahead and start Now. I do agree with that.
Speaker 1:Come. We're going to talk about four essentials of rest, why you need rest, why it's important. Quote a couple of scriptures on why you need it. And, just to be clear, there are different avenues of rest that people need in different seasons. Some need rest just to rest in the presence of the Lord.
Speaker 2:You need to take moments where you can be sharpened and just be loved on by the Father.
Speaker 1:There are times where you need to really just break away and get some rest with your family, some time with your family, and just let the troubles of the world fade away, and so what we're talking about involves all those things. It's not like a cookie-cutter style of rest that we're going to talk about. Yeah, I want to kick off just the first one out of the four. It is that we must have proper theology about rest. I think sometimes when we think about rest, we think, you know, like the word laziness, and I believe there is a reality to that, especially in the generations you've talked about previously, generations coming up where we want everything given to us. We don't want to work for nothing.
Speaker 1:But I think there is a proper theology to where rest is a blessing if it's in the right context, with the right heart, and it's not this abused concept. And so one thing I want us to know this, pastor Jay, is that we don't work for rest, we work from rest, one of the scriptures. We all know it lay aside every weight, every burden, and when you're heavy laden, give it to God and he'll give you rest. Rest is something God wants to provide for you. When you think about the cares of the world and the things you struggle with. You can find rest in that and you don't have to work for it, you don't have to try to find it, it's right there for you In Exodus.
Speaker 2:Sorry, go ahead. I was just going to say I think when you are in God, he provides a rest, because you're relying on him to perform and not for you to perform. Yeah, anyway, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1:I just thought that's a great thought, because this week someone posted about the video that was going viral this kid who was preaching and he was shucking corn. And then he was like take it down to B-Flat, go to B-Flat, wait a minute, wait a minute.
Speaker 2:You said he was doing what.
Speaker 1:Shucking corn.
Speaker 2:He was shucking corn. If you ain't from this, area and you don't know what shucking corn is let me tell you, go ahead and tell us, pastor, what is shucking corn he was laying it down, said he so loved the world he gave and then he stops, bro, and he's like, uh, I need to be flat.
Speaker 1:He's the dude's on the organ.
Speaker 2:He's oh, he don't want to preach in, okay, so he stops uh-huh he gets from all excited about the lord to no.
Speaker 1:No, take it up half a note half a note and then I guess the pastor or his elder, whoever, looks at him and says, don't care about the organ.
Speaker 2:Yeah, preach, yeah, preach the gospel. That is good. If we had some elders in our lives today telling us that man and so what you said made me think about this.
Speaker 1:When you talk about, it's not about the work we put, the work on us when we find rest in being who God's called us to be. There's such a joy in that. But a friend of mine made a post and he was, like you know, as we're talking about this young man who got rebuked openly what are some of the areas where you failed? And, thank God, grace, right, and so it was this really positive thing. Well, one of the guys commented and said well, you know, my pastor leader told me that the result of a healthy sermon is based off of the response of men.
Speaker 2:And I said, I commented, I result of a healthy sermon is based off of the response of man and I said I come and I said, man, that's not good advice, like don't, it's a fleshly thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that the if the result of a sermon being good or not is determined by a, a, um a response, a person's response, then we've put it on ourselves.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. There's no rest in that. It then you become how do I become a better preacher? How do I say it better? Now there's a good, proper way to do that. How do I be a better communicator? But when you think you put it about you and the Lord not leading you, you really find this it becomes a work and you don't rest in your calling, you don't rest in the anointing that God gives you. So I'm glad you said that, because there's a lot of young ministers that I know listen to this, young people in ministry who get it all wrong because we put our works based off of responses rather than just resting in the anointing, resting in the presence of god and what he's called us to do and then trying, and then other people trying, trying to be people they are not yeah trying to keep up with the, with the.
Speaker 1:Joneses.
Speaker 2:Trying to you know that terminology, but anyway, yeah, yeah, and I'm for altar services, bro, because I've been a symptom of power for altar services.
Speaker 1:But you know what I don't know about you? Actually, I do know Me, and you have talked about this because you think we've preached the worst sermon of our lives.
Speaker 2:Right, and then we get more.
Speaker 1:From people that's like I didn't move in worship or nothing, but I was just soaking in. That word was so powerful and it's like okay, we don't dictate.
Speaker 2:But that's knowledge that you need an elder to give you, though, because we're not preaching for a response, we're preaching for them to change.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2:And look, I've had my dad and my elders and stuff like that, tell me straight up and tell me straightforward. And I might not have been shouting in the moment, but it produced a change and so just because they're backing you up, don't mean they're changing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's the truth.
Speaker 2:And we're preaching for changing people, not for them to back us up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and even Scripture says that if you'll rest in the Lord, he will give you the wisdom. That's right, and there's rest in getting wisdom from the Lord too, because you don't have to strive to be anything other than who he's called you to be. And so the first thing is let's get our thought theology right on this rest. It's not about all your working and all your doing and all this kind of stuff. It's not stuff you work for rest. Jesus worked six days and it was good, but what solidified all the work?
Speaker 2:is the last day he rested and he enjoyed it. It's about god and creation god and creation.
Speaker 1:He rested and he enjoyed it, even in exodus uh 23, I believe it is. It says that we will work six days, but on the seventh we will rest, the oxen will rest, the servants will rest and we will be refreshed.
Speaker 2:And there's that thing every seven years. There's a year of jubilee too, where they let the land rest.
Speaker 1:Yep, that's right, that's beautiful. You ready to move to number two?
Speaker 1:All right, let's jump to number two. Rest is not something you have time for, it's something you make time for. Now I'm really big on this. I think me and you are a little different on this, because I will petition for rest. I will petition to step away. Like, for example, my church knows there's four or five Sundays, I won't be there. There's four or five Sundays I won't preach, because one I want to just rest in the seat with my wife and just worship. You're doing this in a couple weeks.
Speaker 2:Actually, yeah, yep.
Speaker 1:And then there's times where I need to rest and get away. Oh yeah right, and so you are like fireball. Hey, I'll rest when rest shows up.
Speaker 2:Right. When the job is up, when rest walks in, we'll rest right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this is where we're a little different.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a little different, a little different man. Look my whole life, bro. I have been raised work, work, work, work, and if you're resting you ain't working right. And so I totally agree with the whole rest theory, with the whole resting, and I know God rested. But I also look at the work that Christ put in and the work that the disciples put in.
Speaker 1:They were going nonstop, consistently laboring.
Speaker 2:I think, if I'm not mistaken, Scripture says that if we were to write down everything that Jesus did, there's not enough parchment, there's not enough ink to write down all the things that Christ did. And so when I look at what I've done in my life and when I look at the things that Paul, Come on, Goodness man.
Speaker 1:Well, hold on a minute, I'll get it right.
Speaker 2:When I look at the things that they did, bro, we don't compare.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:We don't come close. And so when I think of resting, when I put it like this, when I think of resting, I think what do I have to rest from? Like I put my trust in God, like I'm grateful for my family, and I think that's kind of where maybe some of it changes. I don't know, bro, I just don't think we have much to rest from. When I look at the work that Christ did, some say, well, he worked three years. Yeah, true, you're right, but I mean, he still got his time and he still got his rest. And I believe there has to be something to rest from.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I agree, and we do, we, and I believe there has to be something to rest from. Yeah, I agree, and we do. We plan our trips Now. You're coming up this weekend, not this weekend, easter weekend but week after we, absolutely we're going away. Colby's going to Liberty University. We're going to go visit there and check it out and be with him. Man, it got me toe up what you doing.
Speaker 1:You're trying to make me feel bad about wanting to take a nap every night.
Speaker 2:I see what you're doing. No, no, no, no, no. It's not about that man Trying to pull my heart astray. It's not about that.
Speaker 1:I'll put my stones away. I'll put my stones away, Jay.
Speaker 2:No, we're coming back right and that Sunday we are resting that Sunday and, believe me, bro, after a Sunday service I've poured out so much, I need a break. Like Sunday afternoon. We don't have Sunday evening services and, to be honest, I'm bivocational. I just don't know that, with everything that I pour into Sunday morning, with being a vessel, with allowing the Holy Spirit to use me, with preaching the way we preach, I mean you and I both know neither one of us are real. I don't sit on a stool and preach.
Speaker 1:Right, we animated, and you and I both know neither one of us are real.
Speaker 2:I don't sit on a stool and preach, I mean, when God shows up, man, yeah, anyway, we preach, we put it out there, right, we're, as Pastor TC talked about, poured out like a drink offering. I mean, we are, we give a lot of ourselves and I think I heard a statistic this past week that talked about, in a 50 minute sermon, the effort and the amount of effort and energy that a pastor puts into a 50-minute sermon is equivalent to a 40-hour work week. Now, I don't know, I can't tell you quantifiably how that happens. I just tell you that that's what somebody had shared.
Speaker 2:And I feel it because Sunday afternoon, when I have pushed it all out, when I've gotten it all out, man, I am exhausted, I am drained and it's a beautiful thing to be able to go home, eat dinner with the family, relax and just soak that time up together. But on Monday sometimes it carries over into Monday. But, man, monday afternoon to Sunday afternoon, it is nonstop for me, and I think a lot of that has to do with the way I was raised, because it was one. And look man, I've got 20 years in law enforcement, five years in military and it is nonstop. It is mission to mission, what you could say glory to glory, right, you hanging out in the two. I'm trying to get to the next level, oh God.
Speaker 1:Here we go, cut it, cut it, that's it. We stop right there.
Speaker 2:But no man, I'm task-oriented and even in our Next Step class man, I have to tell people look, I know I've got to slow down and I know that people are the most important. I know that, but I find myself fighting at times, that I have to remind myself of that, because I go from task to task to task to task. How's the lights, how's this audio sound Like? It is this constant thing that never stops. And so, even when I'm resting, I find my mind constantly working, never stopping. And so I feel like when I'm not producing something, when I'm not getting the gospel out, when I'm not doing something, I have to be intentional in every moment, because even when I'm resting, I'm not really resting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think too is there's a grace in neither function is wrong.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I think that we're all created with different drives and different convictions with this kind of stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I personally think that you put a huge priority on staying busy and very productive and jumping to the next thing without even considering the in-between the two. Me, I put a priority into rest, my calendar. I don't work for my calendar, my calendar works for me. So I think through, like me and Taylor, we plan our calendar first, and then we plan the church calendar. We implement times that we're going to break away and then we build the ministry, not around ourselves, but just making sure that we're considering our rest as well, because we know in the future we want our leaders to have rest, we want our body to have rest, we want our body to have rest that kind of stuff too I agree there's got to be healthy boundaries.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you've got to set some healthy boundaries. We plan vacations out, little mini vacations every quarter. We we take a weekend and I do that really for my family. I do that, um, I do that so that we we make we're intentional in getting away and spending time together yeah um, and there are times where we have to take breaks in between, when I feel like, hey, we, we, we just got to take a break, yeah, but anyway, yeah, I'm slowing you down, go ahead, yeah.
Speaker 1:I'd say put rest on your calendar.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I want to encourage you to do that and don't leave a lot of people. That's a terrible place, because if your foundation of your ministry is built on you, it will crumble every time. Yeah, that's good advice. Let's look at rest has a rhythm. Rest has a rhythm and I want to share something that a pastor uh gave me in a breakout group, uh, about how they structure, um, the rhythm of rest and even how they plan from monday to sunday and so, uh, it'd be cool if you had some way to take notes so you can implement this in their ministry in your life somehow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. Just because it's a schedule you listen to doesn't mean a schedule you can't create for your own ministry or for your own home, because our situations are different. I'm bivocational and I think where you're getting ready to share is a full-time pastor, so you just have to kind of augment it or tailor it for your own calendar. Yeah, it's a full-time pastor.
Speaker 1:He's got staff and everything and he says rest, has frequency and to that rhythm. So he has meeting Mondays. After Sunday they meet, talk about the things that's coming this week. Tuesday it's called Tackle. Tuesday they tackle all the tasks that they have, wrap it up. Wednesdays they finalize all the tasks and Thursday they're thinking ahead. This I share with you. This is where I feel like I live. I always think I'm thinking ahead. Thinking ahead, and that's what they do on Thursday is think it. Thursday. Friday is free free Friday.
Speaker 1:Friday is their rest day. It's the day that okay, my, my team knows that this is a day that I break away and, unless it's emergency, don't reach out yeah like you can handle it, you can take care of it, and then saturday is called semi-slow.
Speaker 1:It's like sermon finalization going over it, just doing the last minute preps, and then sunday is super bowl sunday. I just think it's very important in in my my concept context of my life is that I take time to just to just pause and just rest. And uh, we ain't got there yet to where everybody knows like this is a day I don't think we're there where I could just completely break away because I don't have the leadership yet that can just run it and everything, but I think your team cannot honor what they don't know.
Speaker 1:So if you're not talking about rest and making rest a priority and implementing it into your culture, then you can't expect people to honor you resting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, the interesting thing is I've tried to send couples away who are deep in ministry and they're here when I'm here. They're here when I'm not here. I mean, they're always here and I'm like, hey, I want you to take this weekend and I want you to go Go here to this church and relax. Just go enjoy a service somewhere else. Now you won't find many pastors telling you to go to another church, right? But I'm literally like I'm gonna buy you lunch. I'm gonna say, like this sunday, take the sunday off, go experience another ministry, go connect with these people, like we have friends who are in ministry we can connect you with, just kind of see how things work for them. But at the end of the day, just go get away for the weekend and enjoy another service. And they're like and now we don't want to. And I'm like no, no, no, you need to like pass it, I don't want to. And I'm like no, no, no, you need to Like, I don't want to go.
Speaker 1:And I'm like I don't see the value in it.
Speaker 2:I'm like, well, fine, don't go. Then you know, but yeah, and now your head is the size of this wall too.
Speaker 1:Because they do that. I don't want to leave you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, no, no.
Speaker 1:It's dripping oil, yeah, okay, hey, let's jump to number four. Four rest can become culture, but it starts with leadership. If you're struggling to find rest and your church or the people you're involved in ministry not releasing you or not just giving you time, it's because you haven't created a culture that rest is a priority. You have to do it as leaders so your people can embrace it, like you are the example. So like in our, in our party, with the pastors and stuff, and we talk about rest, like hey there's many Sundays we won't be here, and here's why because we value rest.
Speaker 1:We value time with family, and you've got to start creating culture in your church. You've got to learn to take Sundays off. I've done this before. This pastor has talked about it. It's called the bus test. If I got hit by a bus on Thursday, what would the church do? And it gives you when you step away as leaders. It gives you an opportunity to see cracks in your ministry that if you're always looking right inside and not from the outside in, you'll miss. And so rest is not just for you but it's for the overall health of the church, because it gives you a fresh eyesight to things you may not see, and I think that's very important. So you got to do the bus test.
Speaker 2:I think I will. I was sitting here thinking about that. I'm going to try to figure out a way to make that happen.
Speaker 1:Do the bus. I came back one Sunday in December and I, when I was on vacation, I came back and I said, well, y'all passed the bus test. The church can survive.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So I think one of the things is that when we think about rest and we think about well I don't know if I can leave Leadership is seen in your absence, not your presence Right, and we think that is seen by us pointing fingers and delegating, but it's really proof, when we're not there, how the people we've been mentoring operate Right. It's seen in your absence, and rest is trusting God to take care of the world without you. I think some of us have big egos and thinks that people's problems can't be dealt with and people's lives can't be best when you're not there. Lives can't be best when you're not there. And so I think when we trust God in our rest and know that he can handle it, if you have to step away for a day or two, that just shows you trust him.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 1:I've struggled with that at times.
Speaker 2:Man, I remember and I think you remember this, when we were at the other church and Pastor Ed's the first time I had ever I don't even think I was associated then I think I was just kind of you know, a leader in the church and he's like hey, I'm going away for the weekend, it's all yours, my goodness, great. Yeah, and man, there were some issues that I ended up having to deal with and I called him and I was like I hate to bother you, but this is going on, and this is going on, and this is going on. And he's like yeah, you're having fun.
Speaker 2:And I'm like I need you to come back and fix this, and so he's like you're doing great man, you're going to be just fine, but yeah, the bus test I'm going to have to see what I can do with that.
Speaker 1:So I think this now you've got to have a decent, healthy church financially, but eventually I want us to do this as well is that you make rest part of your church budget.
Speaker 1:Now, what I mean by that is those who are high-value leadership maybe it's staff you dedicate times throughout the year that you schedule for them, that you pay for them to take Like what you're talking about with your leaders, what you've done and just pay for them to go out for a weekend and just spend time with the Lord, get refreshed, spend time with their family, that kind of stuff and what happens is you'll see the fruit of this, because you will see a healthy leader versus a worn-out leader, and what happens is a lot of churches are getting the worst out of their leadership instead of the best, and it's because we don't invest in the rest.
Speaker 2:And here's what I'll say too.
Speaker 2:I know when we went on a leader's retreat it's the first time we've ever had a leader retreat and we're at the size now where it's like, okay, we have to get away to do something. It sounds crazy, but when we plan for the year, like I want us away enjoying time, what I didn't see out of that. So I know what you're saying has validity to it, because I've experienced it in terms of getting away with, with leaders and even just getting away and hanging out. I mean, it doesn't have to be necessarily, you know, some long, lengthy thing or whatever. We we just went to the beach for a few days and, man, we came back and you're right, I seen the camaraderie and the, the connectivity, how connected they were, and and the, the ideas and the vision and the creativity flowing. So that's simply just getting away together and the whole time it wasn't like Leader Labs, we were actually just enjoying the time together, eating and it was just a really good time, and they'll love it too and they'll be so grateful that you've invested in them.
Speaker 2:They were like hey, let's do this every six months. Yeah, I bet.
Speaker 1:All right, let's raise your tithe up a little bit. But yeah, I think that it's so much. But we got to put value in this and even not just your leaders, but even yourself, because you will kill yourself and destroy the church if you always run on fumes and you never take time, pastor Jay, to break away from ministry and break away from the hustle and all that stuff that all ministry from the missions. Break away from the missions, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, I think too and this is a whole other conversation really but what are you doing? That's because you thought it was a good idea versus what God told you to do. Like, we can be so busy with good things that we never really do the God things. That's right. We miss the importance of what we're doing. Yeah, but anyway.
Speaker 1:I think our heart is that you would consider rest. The church needs healthy leaders. They need strong leaders who have confidence enough in God and in who they're building and leading in ministry that if you step away for a few moments to be with the Lord, to get refreshed, that the church will survive without you. You don't have to carry the weight, you don't have to carry the burden all over your shoulders. Do like Moses. Jeff Erd told Moses delegate some things, take the weight off of you, give it to people, give it to the Lord, and just find rest in that you're doing what the Lord's called you to do, with what he's given you to do it with.
Speaker 2:Right Now I will say that's probably one thing that I do well. If I had to kind of assess this rest thing is I do delegate pretty well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that takes a heavy burden off.
Speaker 2:Huge, huge burden. And you know we talk about the rest thing too. Like in our Next Step class we say if you're not healthy, you need a break, take a break. Yep. Like if you need a few weeks off to not teach kids or if you need a month off because you're doing something. Like if you need a break, take a break, because if you're not healthy, ministry won't be healthy.
Speaker 1:Yep, we say something along the same lines as we say the church is only as healthy as the families that make it up. Right, and that's why it's important that you worship together, you serve together and you rest together. Yeah and so, hey, thank you so much for being a part of this beautiful, beautiful podcast on rest. I hope I've encouraged you to not just take a nap, but actually spend time with the Lord.
Speaker 1:Spend time with the Lord, yeah, and get refreshed and we want to bless you with a priestly blessing here. It's found in Numbers, chapter 6. May the Lord bless you and protect you. May the Lord smile on you and be gracious to you. May the Lord show you His favor and give you peace. Thank you so much for being a part of what God's doing here through Pastor to Pastor podcast. We'll see you here next week.
Speaker 2:Hey, we'll see you next time. God bless you.