Why Church Feels Empty (And How to Bring Joy Back to the Body of Christ)

Church doesn’t feel empty because God has left—it often feels empty when the Church loses sight of what it was designed to be: a place of love, joy, discipleship, and true spiritual growth.

In this conversation, we talk about why so many people feel disconnected or spiritually stagnant in church, and how the Body of Christ becomes alive again when we return to environments where people can truly flourish, mature in faith, and grow in love over time.

Many believers quietly sense that something is off in modern church culture—but can’t always articulate it. In this episode, we explore that tension, why so many Christians feel spiritually stuck, and how that dissatisfaction may actually be an invitation into deeper Kingdom life, authentic community, and renewed joy in following Jesus.

The 2 or More Podcast is a conversation for lost balls and sleeping giants—followers of Jesus who are hungry for authenticity and to grow in their gifts and calling. Mike Bishop and Joel Henson explore what it looks like to plant sustainable microchurches, build spiritual family, and live out the kingdom of God in your whole life.

Who is Everyday Mission? We are a people seeking transformation in our everyday lives and in the church. We are a people drawn into the harvest field by love. We are using our unique gifts, talents, and resources to influence the world with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to help equip Everyday Missionaries.

Website: https://www.everydaymission.com/
Instagram & TikTok: @EverydayMissionFlorida

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

What's your north star for building up the church? Like what do you hope that what do you wish that the church knew? What do you wish people were hearing and gleaning from from their church communities and their church bodies?

SPEAKER_01 0:14

Yeah, I think I think it's it's to bring the joy back into being the church together. Um you know, I have just there's been so many times over the past 25 years where I kind of look around and and I I I'm so grateful for for what God has allowed Amber and I to do. Um because without a lot of fanfare, without a lot of, you know, having to kind of manufacture anything, we've just been able to to just have a lot of moments of joy with people as we see them grow and flourish. And um, you know, kind of my my definition of leadership is a leader is is a person who creates space for others to grow and to flourish and to mature, right? And so for me, when I see the church not doing that, um it just grieves my heart because I've been I've been really blessed to be a part of environments where like God's and and it's not it's not all me. You know, a leader's job is just really set the table. You you set the environment, but to see people actually respond to that environment, and then over maybe it's several years, and all of a sudden you wake up one day and you realize that person's completely different than they were the first time they set foot in my house or you know, some venue or whatever. And so, yeah, I would say for me, that's the North Star is just like I always keep coming back to is that work being done of creating that environment where people know, like like in AA, they say it works if you work it, you know, because you're worth it. And and so if if that person understands that if I just keep coming back, if I keep doing the work with the Holy Spirit and with this group of people, um, they're not gonna be perfect. Mike's not gonna be perfect, uh, Joel's not gonna be perfect, we're gonna make mistakes, we're gonna have to learn how to forgive each other. Um, but man, we're gonna we're gonna laugh a lot. We're gonna see how the Holy Spirit just like just starts taking over at various points in our life and and and and our maturity. And um, yeah, we're just gonna have a lot of fun doing it, you know? So that's what that's what I really hope for.

SPEAKER_00 3:04

Yeah. You talk a lot about flourishing and maturity and enjoyment of each other and the Lord. Kind of bring that down to ground level for me. Like, how do you matri how do you matriculate, you know, growth and thriving in the church? Because I feel like a lot of people are grow growing and thriving even in broken situations or maybe churches that uh are pretty unhealthy. So how how what's your metric for that?

SPEAKER_01 3:29

Well, first of all, matrix matriculation's a big word. And if you're gonna start using those words um This early, you know, this early, Joel. I you know, I don't know what to say. I'm gonna have to like have Google on a tab here.

SPEAKER_00 3:41

Got Chat GBT just translating in his ear.

SPEAKER_01 3:45

Um, what's the what's the metric? I mean it it I think the metric from Jesus is is is love, is growing in love. That's that's what Jesus that was his metric was growing in love. And so what does that look like in practice and how do you measure that? Um it's unfortunately for us Westerners and particular particularly people that have been trained in church leadership in the past generation, okay, is that all of our metrics have nothing to do with that?

SPEAKER_00 4:20

Literally, yeah. All the numbers that I see are about uh quantifiable, sure, uh measurable growth.

SPEAKER_01 4:30

I'm an engineer, you know that you're you're great with your numbers, man. I'm pretty good with them. Um but yeah, that is the result of the history of the church moving in the West through the Industrial Revolution and everything up until the present day has been about how do you quantify success, right? And so for us, I think early on I had to just come to grips with like faithfulness is gonna be the the first primary met metric, measuring stick of success. Like, can I do this for the long haul?

SPEAKER_00 5:18

Am I okay? Specifically sustainability being like like, hey, is this is this scalable, I guess, in that sense.

SPEAKER_01 5:25

But but as a leader, yeah, like I think you you really have to ask yourself the question, and this is where it starts getting into um, okay, if if you're getting paid to do this, if there's you know, there's all all kinds of different things. Set set all that aside for a second, right? And just ask yourself the question Am I okay if the sum total of my ministry is to a group of say 10 people? And that's all I get to do. I get this 10 group of ten people to sew into, and maybe it's only for five years, right? And that's it. And then maybe you move on to another 10, or maybe you don't. But like, are you okay with that?

SPEAKER_00 6:16

Yeah are you okay with that? Yeah, I think I think that's just pretty categorically a pretty narrow, narrow window that people think that church can fit through, you know, like it's just this very small definition of well, church is going to this place, it is singing these types of songs, standing in this type of configuration, like and it's it's just pretty, pretty narrow. And so I think a lot of people just don't have vernacular for how their church can look. And so, like, what I hope when whenever anyone turns on this podcast, or the reason maybe someone would turn on this podcast, is to get one extra tool in your tool belt, get one more word in your vocabulary for how differently the Lord can operate in your ministry and what that could actually look like, right? Like, this can be more fun than you think. Jesus is more good to you than you think. The Holy Spirit can do more through you than you think. And so realistically, this is all good news that yeah, thriving is on the horizon for those who like reach out and take it.

SPEAKER_01 7:18

Yeah, and I would add to your statement about uh thriving in your ministry to thriving as a disciple of Jesus. So I really want to make this clear from the outset, too. I mean, I've been what I like to call, and I didn't make the term, but co-vocational, um, for 25 years, uh really 30 years, and that is really important to me for a lot of reasons, and we'll get into that on an on another occasion. But um, one of the things that I think is essential to that is to see your whole life as a disciple of Jesus as all part of the same story, and so yeah, it does involve maybe a practical um outflow that looks like ministry, right? So whether that's you're leading a group of people in your home, that's a missional community, microchurch, whatever you want to call it, um, or maybe it's a it's a nonprofit ministry that you're helping to steward and grow. Um, but the way you treat your family, the way you treat your co-workers, um, how you're pursuing seeing God work through you in all of those areas, all is inclusive in this conversation.

SPEAKER_00 8:47

I like I like the way you said that is it all contributes to the same story. Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. I I see that of just like, okay, this this decision contributes to the story of my business, this decision contributes to the story of my family, extrapolate to a thousand. But what would you say to somebody who has that kind of fragmented view? Like what how do you kind of amalgamate that into uh sorry, another big word. Uh, how do you bring that into how do you bring that into one story? You know, how do you narrow that down and and have have the revelation actually that my whole life is following in the footsteps of Jesus and every decision is not outside of that?

SPEAKER_01 9:26

Well, um, I think I don't know how how have you done it? I want to turn the question around because you have a business and you have a family and you have a church. Um what what what were some of the triggers for you to start to see like, hey, I this actually all comes together into one story? Because I know that's that's been your story.

SPEAKER_00 9:54

Yeah. Yeah, certainly. Um, bringing it all into one story is I I think I just realized at an early early age that the Lord doesn't live in one part of my existence and not in another. Yeah. And so as much as I would like to try and escape him in various facets of my life, yeah, especially across various seasons, um, that's just not possible. Uh the thing about the Lord is that his faithfulness as your father follows you into your brokenness. And when I look around at rock bottom and I like find the Lord there with me, I was like, oh, you're here too. And so I realized that there was just nothing outside of my decision-making purview that that didn't affect my relationship with God. Like all of this is my formation as a disciple. And so not like C. S. Lewis talks about how there's no positive, uh, there's no neutral all only things that bring you towards the Lord or push you away from him. Um, and and so for me, that I kind of internalized that from an early age of like, oh man, I'm either making my life better and I'm getting closer, or I'm really messing this up. There's really nothing right down to the TV shows what you watch and the music you listen to and the friends you spend time with, like those are huge things. And people fragment that out and kind of try and pretend like, well, this is church Joel and this is yeah, business joel or whatever. Um, so I I think just having the realization when you look around at your worst and like the Lord comes and like ministers to you there, you it would you gotta do some cognitive gymnastics to convince yourself that like God isn't in those situations at that point, you know?

SPEAKER_01 11:41

Yeah. Yeah, I would I would add that um when there is challenge and conflict, and particularly you get put in a situation where all of a sudden in one of those one of those segments, all of a sudden you gotta make some really big decisions really fast, and you realize, um, wow, I need every resource that God has given me. Let's say in ministry, I all of a sudden need it over here in business. Yeah. So we were just talking beforehand, you know, two years ago, my brother-in-law, who was our president CEO of our family business, unexpectedly died. Tragic accident, right? The next day, I'm standing up in front of our 50 employees, um, basically having to put every resource of my shepherding gift in action immediately, right out of the gate, and for weeks and months afterwards. So actually, I I I could easily say I've expended more of the shepherding gift at my business for the past two years than I have even come close in any kind of ministry context. So I think once you once something like that happens and you see how oh my gosh, I've spent the last 20, 25 years sewing into learning how to be a good shepherd, like Jesus talks about, and then all of a sudden something like that happens and you're thrust into a situation where you don't have a choice, but guess what? You've done the work, and because now those stories come together in a way that God always intended, yeah, it believe me, it was it's this has been a lot of the hardest last years of my life in a lot of ways, but God prepared me for it, and because there wasn't that barrier between the two, where I was like, Oh, well, I can't hear I didn't have a choice. I had people crying on my shoulder, literally in the conference room, you know, just trying to make sense of their life and what happened and everything. And it's like I was ready for it, right? And the problem is when you separate those things and you say, Well, that's business, this is ministry, or this is my family, um, it's very easy to really lose sight of how God is weaving together all of these things for one purpose.

SPEAKER_00 14:33

That's great. It seems like I think kind of a core theme of of of this whole message, specifically with your your book, as much as you want us to talk about that, um, uh or this podcast, um, is an invitation to real thriving and real deep connection to the Lord that completely supersedes your involvement with uh church, yeah and goes goes um goes a thousand miles past that. And so uh the invitation is clear. Like the the Lord is inviting us into incredible responsibility to build something of immense value and immense purpose eternally and in this lifetime.

SPEAKER_01 15:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:15

And I think that that's what we want people to take from this.

SPEAKER_01 15:19

Absolutely, and that when you say build something, it doesn't have to look massive. It doesn't have to be automatically this thing that takes over your life, and you have a board of directors, and you you know that that's not what we're talking about. This isn't hustle culture, no faith. No, yeah. I mean, this is this is all about, and we're gonna get into and talk a lot about how the kingdom of God is the story that's woven into all of our stories. That's what matters, and and when we see the kingdom take its rightful place in our lives, then you can go back to that question you asked before about or or that I posed. You as a leader, are you okay with being in this room with 10 people? If that's what God has called you to do, are you okay with that? Can you survive in that? Because the hustle culture would say, no, that's not good enough, it's not big enough. You need to multiply that thing, it's got to turn into a a hundred groups or a thousand groups or whatever. And in the kingdom, it's always no, the the faithfulness that's produced in you and the love that's produced in the fruit of the people that you're ministering to is really what matters.