ILI: History Makers Leadership Podcast
Explore the transformative journey that is leadership. In each episode, we will dive deep into strategies, stories, insights, and the core values that shape and inspire effective Christian leaders who make an impact - all around the globe. Get ready to unlock your leadership potential.
When leaders are equipped, kingdom impact multiplies. Equipping leaders and spreading the Gospel. Let’s change history together!
This podcast is brought to you by the International Leadership Institute.
ILI: History Makers Leadership Podcast
Ep. 50 | Your Church is a Launchpad, Not Just a Building
Pastor Judy Stevenson's journey to Macland Community Church began with a profound "Macedonian call" - a divine confirmation that God was sending her and her husband to steward something special. What followed was an extraordinary eighteen months of community transformation that offers powerful lessons for any leader experiencing or hoping for a move of God in their midst.
Rather than imposing their vision, Judy and Lee recognized that "when Jesus is present, there is life, and you can't manufacture that." They observed the existing passions God had already stirred in their congregation - hearts burdened for both neighbors and nations - and helped put language and structure around this divine energy.
Implementing ILI's Christian to the Core curriculum as a church-wide initiative with multiple teaching voices created a unified foundation of purpose and language that equipped their community for ministry. The results speak volumes. When Judy preached on God's vision for individual lives, people throughout the congregation stood trembling in response to God's calling.
If you're seeking to lead effectively during times of spiritual awakening, this episode offers invaluable wisdom: pay attention to what God is already doing, champion it in others, and create pathways for His vision to flourish through your community.
When you begin ILI training, you will discover how the Eight Core Values will lead to the Seven Outcomes in your life and the lives of those you lead. Join a community of leaders who are ready to change history and make an impact in this world. Discover more at ILITeam.org/connect.
Welcome to the History Makers Leadership Podcast, where we explore the transformative journey that is leadership. Each episode, we will dive deep into strategies, stories, insights and the core values that shape and inspire effective Christian leaders who make an impact all around the globe. This podcast is brought to you by the International Leadership Institute. Get ready to unlock your leadership potential and let's change history together.
Speaker 2:Hi, welcome back to ILI's History Makers podcast. Today we have a special guest, judy Stevenson. She is a local pastor at a church that has seen a great move of God beginning, and they have been stewarding that and mobilizing leaders in their church, and so we wanted to have a conversation with Judy today just on what do you do when God begins to move in your community and how do you steward that and bring out leaders within your church. And so I'm excited that you're here leaders within your church, and so I'm excited that you're here to join us for this conversation. I'm really excited to talk with you today, judy, and so I guess, to get things started, can you tell us a little bit about how you ended up at the church that you're pastoring right now?
Speaker 3:Sure, macklin Community Church is in Powder Springs, georgia, and while I'm from the South, I'm not from Georgia. Leah and I my husband we co-pastor Macklin. We were in Tennessee and we were praying for God to lead us into a new place to be in ministry together. We were excited to see the Global Methodist Church born and wanted to be part of that. We felt called to be part of that and we just began to pray Lord, lead us where you want us to serve. And I really didn't know if there would be an opportunity for us to be together in the same church and what that would look like, since we're both pastoring and we we've received a phone call from this church searching for a pastor and we talked to them together and we're ready and willing to move to Georgia.
Speaker 3:As soon as I heard one of the gentlemen from the church, a retired pastor, we were on Zoom and he kind of leaned into the camera and he said I feel like the Holy Spirit is saying come, and if the two of you will come, god will do things that we've never seen before. And he said it's like the Macedonian call, which, in scripture, was a moment when Paul had this vision of a man from a place called Macedonia saying come over here and help us. And I had prayed the night before Lord, I want a Macedonian call. Literally prayed that because I wanted assurance that we were going where God wanted us to be, and so it was an answered prayer that not only were they they wanted us and we wanted them, but they they were able to offer both of us to come on board as pastors.
Speaker 3:So, we put our house up for sale, gave our notice in the at the. You know in the church that we were in and moved to Georgia within five weeks and we've been at Macklin Community Church for about a year and a half.
Speaker 2:Wow, that is a great story and it's a great way that God really gave you that affirmation I'm sending you because it's not easy, especially if I remember it's more like a church plant that you guys are rallying around.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so God's blessed that fast forward and you guys have really been stewarding that well and mobilizing your community, and one of the things that we had discussed that I found so encouraging is how you guys are not just mobilizing them for your community, but even globally. So how have you been able to do that? How have you been able to mobilize and come alongside them?
Speaker 3:There's a couple of thoughts I have. One is when Jesus is present, there is life, and you can't manufacture that. The presence and life of Jesus is already active in these people. Leah and I came with a heart loving Jesus and wanting to serve him, and we came to people that were already captivated by Jesus and already filled with the Holy Spirit. They were paying attention to what God is doing around them and in the world. They had a heart for their neighbors and the nations, and I think what Lee and I were able to do is put language to what they were expressing, and we began to build some structure around the energy that God had already stirred up in them, and so we began to point out to them we are being led by the Holy Spirit and you do have a passion to share Jesus with your neighbors and you already have some direction for certain nations, a heart of love and relationships already there, and so we were able to just form teams and equip those teams to work together to identify this is where God is calling us and begin to give them some tools, and one of those is just hearing us share our story about how Jesus has brought salvation and healing and empowerment into our lives, and when they hear our testimonies then they start to share their stories, and so just helping people be storytellers of how God has worked in their life has been one of the pieces.
Speaker 3:And then, very early on, we knew we wanted to use a common curriculum that would give us a foundation as a church. In a church plant, it's important to know who you are and to share language with each other, and so we grabbed the Christian to the Core resource and we crafted a sermon series around that, and there are eight core values of what it means to live as a follower of Jesus, to have a vision for your life, to make new disciples and to really take that next step of leading others to this beautiful place of life in Jesus. And we turned that into an eight-week sermon series and we asked all of our small groups to do that study together, and during that time we had our family ministry director preached on family priority, we had one of our lay leaders preach on stewardship and being a good steward of the gifts and talent and resources that God has given you.
Speaker 3:We had another pastor in our church, a retired pastor, preach on intimacy with God, and then Leah and I filled in some of the other pieces, and they got to hear from different people that they have a relationship with While they were studying the same material in a small group with people they have a relationship with, and then they practice sharing their testimony through that material too, and so everything fell into place for the church to be equipped. This is what it looks like to follow Jesus. We share this language together. We're getting excited at kind of at the same pace, and it was just such a beautiful eight or ten weeks that we went through last year that, I think, laid a good foundation for our church.
Speaker 2:That's wonderful and you know, we hear stories all the time of people experiencing significant impacts through God. I mean ILI does the History Makers trainings. We hear stories quite often of God meeting people right where they are at a History Makers trainings. We hear stories quite often of God meeting people right where they are at a History Makers training event. We hear of God birthing a vision in people, and one of the things that I really find encouraging is that you guys didn't just bring another resource or bring a material, but you walked alongside. I love what you said about having different voices and that you didn't carry that burden alone. You actually shared that and you rose leaders up to be a voice for that. So is there some stories or some fruit that you've seen either in your sermons or maybe next steps that have happened through that? Because I think there are some things that have happened. I know we've talked, but how you encouraged people and took that next step with them and didn't let it just be another book that they read Right, right.
Speaker 3:I think for me, one of the most powerful moments is when you see the message that God has birthed in you as a pastor, as a preacher, when you see that message be delivered. Mm-hmm and you want to see that it's caught.
Speaker 3:You can stand up there and preach and wonder, is anyone catching this? And so when I preached on God's vision for your life, that particular message that Sunday was so powerful that sermon landed. It landed on a lot of people. There was a moment at the end of the message when I invited anyone that God had stirred up in them, in their kind of, in a holy imagination or out of their heart, just this desire of a vision for their life and whatever that looked like for them, a unique calling where God was saying this is your purpose, this is how I've gifted you and this is how I want you to, to advance my kingdom and be my servant. And I invited people to stand that felt that. And so many people stood up and it wasn't one of those. Oh, everyone else is standing, so I'm going to stand.
Speaker 1:I mean.
Speaker 3:It was almost a sense of just people trembling with a response God has done something in me and I am going to stand up and show God and my church family that he's working and I'm catching it. And so several individuals an older teen, a mom, a granddad, different people started standing up and I saw in their lives after that some changes, like a renewed energy or a focused ministry. One of them was a man who was leading a ministry that was struggling and he was ready to give up and walk away from it. But when he stood up and everyone knew his passion, what that ministry niche was, when he stood up, it was like everyone recognized that he was saying I'm not going to give up on this. Wow.
Speaker 3:And we've seen that ministry get new life in the last six or eight months in phenomenal, miraculous ways. God is pouring resources into that ministry and I have seen that that older teen boy that stood up is now going on a international mission trip with us this year and he is discipling kids at school. There was definitely a connection with a purpose for each person that came out of that. Another beautiful thing that came out of it was our youth ministry at the time was in a different study and so they didn't grab a hold of that Christian to the Core study at that time. They wanted to finish the study they were in. So they started Christian to the Core several months later and they've just finished it.
Speaker 3:And I think the integrity lesson for them, what I love about that value of integrity is it's living in consistency with what the work of God is doing in your life, with biblical values. It's honoring God with your whole life, and if I were teaching on that, I would use the word holiness, but sometimes the word holiness has baggage or it's misunderstood. The word integrity feels a lot more real and fresh to our youth. They know what that is and they know they want to live with integrity. Our youth they know what that is and they know they want to live with integrity and I think that gave them and the youth leaders some great language to help them understand.
Speaker 3:my whole life is lived to honor God and it looks different than the way the world lives. So, yeah, it's been a beautiful season of ministry for me to be at Macklin.
Speaker 2:That's so great, you know. Season of ministry for me to be at Macklin that's so great, you know. Even just going back to something you said about that common language, I know we're friends on Facebook so I saw that you didn't just haphazardly choose Christians at the core because you know our ministry. You had a lot of resources that you were combing through and praying over and seeking God about whether or not it was the right resource for you, and so I just want to make sure that everyone watching understands that you really did some due diligence in praying and fasting over what God had for your church, and it's refreshing to see just your heart for discipleship and for your community to be impacted.
Speaker 2:And just those few people being impacted is plenty. I mean, that's God just outpouring His Spirit upon your obedience. But he didn't stop there. He's still going, and so I'll let you share. But you guys ended up going to Kenya and getting an opportunity that you thought was just one thing and it just kind of blew up to become something miraculous. So I'll let you share a little bit about how you guys have taken it internationally now.
Speaker 3:Sure, macklin is blessed with a lot of passion for the nations, and we have a gentleman in our church that had already put in some clean water systems in Kenya. And as we were exploring and praying about what mission partners does God want us to partner with Sorry, I keep hitting that what mission partners did God want us to partner with? We're looking for someone in our church that has those personal relational connections, and so Living Water is the name of the ministry of one of our church members, and as we prayed about going to Kenya and looking at putting in clean water systems, we knew we wanted to do more.
Speaker 3:We knew God was opening an opportunity for us to equip the larger church with leadership training and we prayed about how can we do this. And we specifically made a connection with the Global Methodist Church leaders in Kenya and they wanted Christian leadership training and we knew that history makers would give us great material to come in and spend time with the pastors, the conference leaders, the lay leaders of the Global Methodist Church in that area, and so we were able to combine a lot of components on that mission trip. We took a team from Macklin and we went to some orphanages to explore those as places to put in clean water systems, and then we went to a tent camp location and all of the Global Methodist leaders met us there and we spent three days going through the History Makers Module 1 and deepening our relationships. It was renewing some friendships. For some, but especially for me, I'd not been there before. It was making new connections and forming relationships and seeing the hunger that they had to learn, wanting to be equipped with Christian leadership training that they could duplicate.
Speaker 3:We were giving them something that they would then be able to take back to their local church or to a region of churches and equip their leaders, and we kept hearing over and over. This is exactly what we needed. This is the right time. This is the right material. So thankful for the experience. A couple of quick stories that came out of that. I sat down at lunch beside one of the women and she said I thought my coming here was a mistake at first because I'm not a pastor and I thought this was only for pastors.
Speaker 3:And I didn't know why I got invited, wow. And she said you know, in just sort of a, I'm just, I'm just a laywoman, but she's a leader in the Global Methodist Church from the laity side. And she said my vision is not like a vision to lead a church. The vision I have is to minister to young women who are being exploited and abused. And she described a whole scenario where she knew of a place where these young women were being mistreated and how her heart was broken and how she felt God calling her to go in there as an advocate and a protector for these girls. And I just sat there and I looked at her and I said that's the most remarkable vision I've ever heard. And you are exactly in the right place and you are being equipped to be a leader and take what God is stirring up in you and to go and make a difference. That's impactful. A leader and take what God is stirring up in you and to go and make a difference. That's impactful. And she just you know the rest of the time there I could tell she was leaning in and learning and responding in a different way. So it was just a beautiful few days and so many, so many great stories of how God was stirring up new ministry ideas and making connections. That came out of that and I was able to come back to my people in my local church and say thank you for sending us.
Speaker 3:It wasn't just the team that went. You all had a hand in this. This was your mission. You did this. You provided the funding. You gave us permission to be gone. Mission you did this. You provided the funding. You gave us permission to be gone. You prayed for us every single day and because of you and your yes to God, we have been able to equip leaders and then do some really practical. You know clean water is so important. Do?
Speaker 3:some really practical pieces too, and we're going to go back and we'll continue those relationships.
Speaker 2:Right, wow, and you'll keep investing and building'll continue those relationships. So, wow, and you'll keep investing and building that up and encouraging You'll. One day you'll see that girl and she'll have that ministry. And we've we've seen that a lot, actually over the years. People get that birth of that, that, uh, that vision, at a training event and then they go on and it becomes alive and it becomes a ministry. It's incredible.
Speaker 2:And so, for those of you watching with us right now, we are the International Leadership Institute, we have the History Makers Training material and for Judy, that has been blessing them and doing amazing things in their church. But we know we're just one of thousands of resources and, like I said at the beginning, she really focused and prayed and asked God. So I just want to encourage you. If you're inspired by our story, we might be a resource for you, but there's plenty of other resources out there. I would encourage you to pray, seek God, what is best for your community and your church, and then maybe to close us out if you would like to share what are some practical things that you did to help continue the fire that your church had? I know that you guys specifically wrote a vision based on what you noticed in them. So maybe what are some practical things as a pastor you did to keep that fire ignited in your church.
Speaker 3:When we look at people and listen to them and we're looking through the lens of what is God doing here, and we began to see common stories and common passions. One of the things that we do to fuel that fire is to really put some language around it, and then people begin to respond oh yes, that is what God is doing, and they begin to own it. And so we wanted to have a phrase we can call it a vision statement for our church that was born from God's activity in us and not just an aspiration of what we think we want to do. Oh that's good.
Speaker 3:And we want to be a people who are led by the Holy Spirit was such a common phrase that we heard over and over that we had to begin our statement with we're being spirit led. And the next piece was we have to stop saying that we want to be disciples. What we want is to be disciple makers. We want to be people who multiply, who lead others to Jesus and then disciple them into living a life that honors God and it's their best life, because it's what God has for them. So we want to be spirit-led disciple makers. And what is it? The only thing we have to share is Jesus. He's the Savior, he's the hope of the world. And so Spirit-led Disciplemakers sharing Jesus with neighbors and nations and that became the phrase that we repeated.
Speaker 3:And this summer we're putting a whole sermon series around Spirit-led Disciplemakers sharing Jesus with neighbors and nations. And each piece of that will get a few weeks of unpacking and pointing back to Scripture and saying this is what this looks like biblically and this is what it looks like in our church and this is what it looks like in the world. So we really celebrate what God is doing and then propel that outward to what God can do and how are we going to reach new people? So we put a lot of strategy around reaching new people Right and equipping, building again building teams of people to work together to create strategies. But that has to be started with what God is bubbling up in us.
Speaker 2:I just love that. I love how you identify what God was already doing, put some language around it and then gave them pathways to run with what God was doing for them. So, moving forward, how are you guys reaching your neighbors? Because I know that we kind of just talked about the nations, but I want to neglect how your neighbors work into that.
Speaker 3:So that was a little bit, you know, just concept and theory. So practical, what does that look like? I've been listening over and over to various people in different groups in the church say I want to reach my neighbors but I don't know how and I'm a little bit unsure of what that looks like. And when one lady named it in particular, she said you know, I have these neighbors and I invited them over for dinner because I wanted to be able to share Jesus and build a relationship with them. And I think I want to start able to share Jesus and build a relationship with them and I think I want to start a small group for my neighbors.
Speaker 3:And I just began to pull together all of those conversations and we are going to launch what we're calling neighborhood groups and I've already got four or five host homes, people who said, yes, we can do this group in my home and I will reach out to my neighbors, paired with a facilitator who said you know, I'll be the one to teach and lead the group. And so we're doing this together with one another and we're going to start with Christian to the core, because we know that's going to help our neighbors understand what it means to start with an intimate relationship with God and how to build on that and follow Jesus, practice spiritual disciplines, grow in that followership of Jesus and then share Jesus with others. The whole piece, from beginning to a life lived as a disciple, is there and that's the material they're going to use to start those groups. And so that's born from what God is stirring up putting some teams together around piloting this, having a good resource to use and then just launching it, just doing it Right.
Speaker 2:So beautiful. Well, thank you for being here, judy. It has been a really great conversation and, for those of you that are joining us and watching, I just want to give you some encouragement. If you take anything away from today, I would say really pay attention to what God's already doing in your church, in your community, maybe in your workplace, wherever you find yourself as a Christian leader. What is God doing and how can you champion what he's doing in others and lead them to fulfill God's vision for their life? I think that's been such an incredible and remarkable story to hear from you. I look forward to hearing back from you in a couple of years maybe, and seeing just how much God's continuing to do in your church. So thank you so much for being here with us today. Thank you.