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Interview with Rev. Mike Jones · What You Have Seen and Heard

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_02: Well, hello everyone and welcome back to What You Have Seen and Heard.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_02: It's the title that comes from when John the Baptist sent a delegation to Jesus
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_02: and said,
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_02: are you the one that we're looking for or should we wait for somebody else?
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_02: And Jesus said, go and tell John what you have seen and heard.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_02: And so the whole point of this is my name is Travis Stevick.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_02: I am a pastor in Marcus, Iowa in the Global Methodist Church.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_02: My goal is to just kind of have a conversation.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_02: This is very unofficial.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_02: Nobody is kind of overseeing it.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_02: This is not an official ministry of the Global Methodist Church.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_02: It's just me as some guy who thinks that we have stories to tell.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_02: We have people to hear from.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_02: We have exciting things to report.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_02: And I want to share that with other people.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_02: And so today is just the second of these recordings.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_02: And so what I have with me is I have the Reverend Mike Jones.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_02: He is a pastor in Walcott, Iowa, on the far edge, opposite edge of Iowa from where I am.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_02: But I want to welcome you, Mike, and welcome to this conversation.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, thanks for having me.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate it.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_02: So one of the things I'm,
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_02: I kind of want to start,
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_02: I think every conversation that I have with the basic question
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_02: that I hope everybody can hear.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_02: And that is, I want,
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_02: I would love for you to tell and share a bit about how is it
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_02: that you ended up becoming a Christian in the first place?
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_02: Because my recollection is that like me,
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_02: you grew up without faith, but unlike me, you grew up in the church.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I actually grew up going to private school.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: It was kind of funny growing up in Davenport,
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: which is kind of back where I'm At now,
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: just outside of Davenport, I grew up going to Catholic school.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: It was kind of known as the ghetto Catholic school.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: So it was in the bad part of town.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: And we had all the stuff the private schools or the public schools had.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: We had drug problems, all that stuff.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: But I got told from a young age that this God that they were teaching us
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: about was Not one that I have come to know today.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: It was a God of you have to jump through this hoop.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: You have to jump through that hoop.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: You have to do all these things.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, by the way,
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: your mom's going to hell because she had a divorce from her first husband at
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: the time who I didn't even know.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: I never met because it wasn't my dad.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: But from a young age,
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: I got turned off and didn't want anything to do with faith
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: because it was all No relationship,
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: all jumping through these hoops and then still not being good enough.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: And we had nuns.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: We had the old school nuns in class that made us do rosaries on our knees in front
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: of statues of either Mary or saints.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: And it was on tile floor.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: It was probably now looking back, it was probably asbestos
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: tile too.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: But we were doing those every day and it was...
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: It was rough.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: There was nothing that I wanted to do with it.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: So I fell away from the church and started getting in trouble,
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: started doing some things, drugs and drinking and chasing girls.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: And it was a rough upbringing from that perspective.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: And actually, it was a girl that brought me back to church.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: She invited me when I was in high school.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: I think she knew what I was up to.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: I think she knew I was dealing and doing that stuff, um, dealing drugs and doing whatever.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I don't know,
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: but she invited me to youth group and Craig Peters, um,
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: who is now, um,
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: and the global Methodist pastor,
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: I believe too, um, is, uh, was the pastor of the church at the time.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: And he invited, uh,
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: I went to the youth group that was there and, um,
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: Started to get told about a Jesus that was much different than
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: the Jesus I knew growing up.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I got invited to summer games where I'm now on the board.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: And I got to learn about this relationship that my savior wanted to have with me.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I knew pretty early on,
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't want to, but I knew pretty early on I was called into ministry.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: I just wanted to be rich and be the next Hawkeye head coach.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: Realistic dreams, I'm sure.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: Well, he's still going.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: You never know, though.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: But that's when I first felt my call to ministry,
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: but I ignored it for a long time, a very long time.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: So eventually kept getting pushed by friends.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_02: Mm-hmm.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_02: So, so what,
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: so between,
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: I'm going to ask you in a minute to tell us more about your kind of call
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_02: and how you ended up following it.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_02: So what were you doing?
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_02: So right now you are, so that was in kind of high school.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_02: You started kind of feeling a bit of a call and you are hopefully if everything,
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_02: unless anything very unexpected happens,
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_02: you'll be ordained as a deacon in the Globe Methodist Church in June.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_02: So, but what happened between,
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_02: you know, first becoming a Christian and beginning to follow through on that call?
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, actually, it was a lot of ups and downs.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: It was a roller coaster.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: So when I first started being a Christian, I was still hanging out.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: I gave my life to Christ.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: I thought it was just, hey, life's about to get way easier.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: But the thing I'll never forget,
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: and it's still one of the most powerful verses in my life,
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: is my youth pastor at the time,
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: Keith, told me that I needed to look up Proverbs 27, 17.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: And Proverbs 27, 17 says,
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: As iron sharpen iron, so one man sharpens another.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: I have no idea what it meant at that time.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: No idea.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, cool.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for the verse, bud.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: But I started to learn that as much as I wanted to follow the right path,
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: as much as I wanted to do the right thing,
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: I kept hanging out with people that didn't want to do that stuff.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: And they wanted to continue to see the mic that was getting in fights and And
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: the Mike that was drunk and the Mike that was chasing girls with him.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what they wanted me to be.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: They didn't want me to have this relationship with Jesus because it changed who I was.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: And what I didn't realize,
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: and I jokingly say all the time now,
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: is what my youth pastor was really telling me was that if I didn't want to be
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: an idiot, I needed to stop hanging out with
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: idiots.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: If I wanted to become the man that I could be,
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: I needed to start hanging out with people that I wanted to emulate and that wanted
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: that for me.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: But as a 17 year old kid and I wasn't a very popular kid at that
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: because I was starting to lean towards Christianity.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I was a football player, had scholarships, that kind of stuff.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm losing this group of friends.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like, okay,
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: I'm moving over here,
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: but this kind of people,
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: are they hanging out with me because they care about me or because,
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: frankly, they were afraid of me?
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm an idiot.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: I fought at the drop of a hat all the time.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: So I wasn't sure.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: So I had some ebbs and flows of going back and forth.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: And going away to college football is probably the best thing that happened to me.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_00: I went and played football at Iowa Central Fort Dodge.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: Accepted a football scholarship up there because I couldn't accept any of
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: the other offers I had.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: There was this problem with they really want you to go to class.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't do that.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: There's this thing called a GPA I had to learn about.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, yeah.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: And so I went up there and it got me away from a lot of the stuff.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: And it got me really starting to...
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: Dig into my faith more because I didn't have other things to fall back on.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: So as I did that,
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: I also started to talk to some more
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: of my summer games friends like Doug Cloven was one of my good friends back then.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: Still is his best man in my wedding and just started to learn
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: from them what it meant to be a Christian.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: I was still on an island, but the island wasn't filled with people wanting my Bad behavior.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: It was people I was,
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: I guess the best way I could put it is people that wanted to get to know who I was,
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: not tell me who I was.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: And so it was a reset and that's where I really accepted it.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I fell off again because I went to college.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: I lost a couple of friends in a short period of time and dropped out of school.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: Which is why I'm 40 years old and finishing seminary stuff for school now.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: My professors at United are really tough though.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, especially your doctrine one, I'm sure.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah,
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: yeah, yeah.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_02: I have not said yet so far on any of these interviews,
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_02: I teach Christian Doctrine,
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_02: Western Theology, and Apologetics at the United through their certificate program.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_02: So he's had me as a professor three times, but we've known each other for some time before that.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_02: So, I mean,
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_02: it sounds like the difference in people,
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_02: so part of what I'm,
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_02: there's a couple of things I think are going to be common
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_02: through almost everybody's story.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_02: Oops.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_02: But they talk about how they come to faith and how they start to take their faith seriously.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_02: And that is how important other people are in that role.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_02: I would imagine that most people do not go from being kind of antagonistic to God
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_02: to really Being on fire for God without some other people around kind of fanning
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_02: that flame.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_02: And you've mentioned a couple of folks,
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_02: you mentioned,
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_02: the pastor you had, you mentioned your youth pastor at the time, you mentioned Doug.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_02: I don't,
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_02: you don't need to name every person who's had a role in that,
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_02: but would you,
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_02: how much of a difference would you say it makes to have people in your life
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_02: who are encouraging your faith rather than not?
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my gosh.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: It means, it means everything.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: I was actually terrified to come home.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: And it's,
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: I think I shared that with you before,
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: but my joke I kind of make to make it a little more lighthearted is,
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: you know, when Jesus went home, he kind of ended up crucified and it was perfect.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: I was far from perfect.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: I was like,
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: as soon as the Walcott opportunity came up,
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, God,
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: you need to make this abundantly clear that this is what you want me to do.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: And then the house next door to the church went for sale.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: My wife got offered a job not far away.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: I got offered a coaching position down here and I'm like, okay, I get it.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I mean, that's all in like a week's time.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_00: So that shows you God needs to slap me upside the head sometimes.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but, uh, uh, I was afraid of that because of who I was.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: But the funny thing is,
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_00: is the people that have been around me and shaped me,
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't realize how much I actually have changed.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Even with my own family,
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: like I got to be back here for my grandpa, my uncle, my cousin, all of them passing.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: I was back here to be there with my family.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: And now I'm like the youngest of my cousins on one side of the family, on my dad's side.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: And now rather than being little Mike or little Michael, um,
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: when something bad happens or tragic happens,
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: a family, the family calls me, um, and says, Hey, we need you.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it's like, wow.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, they, they can see that.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: And if, I mean, if anything, we both know the hardest people to minister in our lives is family.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but God is open to those opportunities a little bit, um,
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: being back here and,
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: uh, I got to baptize my cousin as she was going through terminal cancer.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: And that was one of the most amazing experiences I'll never forget.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: And she passed shortly after.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: But I got to talk to her about Jesus and I know where she is now.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: And if God hadn't sent me here,
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if that happened,
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: but that was all because of people that shaped me like it's almost like God had
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: to send me away.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: To go find other mentors and not rely on the things I had here.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: And honestly,
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_00: it's probably why I became good at networking because I thought to myself,
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just some idiot that God called into ministry.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I have all these really smart,
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: good people around me that I call and I nag you all the time and ask you questions
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_00: and a few others.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: And it's just like, guys, I need help.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I feel like I need even more help.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: The more I dig into my faith, the more I need that community.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_02: So you said you felt that maybe God was calling you into ministry
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_02: when you first started exploring your faith.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: And I know that it didn't start.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_02: So right now you are a pastor serving as the solo pastor of a church,
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_02: but that's not where your journey of ministry started.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_02: Can you tell us some of the story of how it is you got involved in ministry in the first place?
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's kind of funny.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: I kind of given up on trying to get in.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: I had applied at like six different churches, including my own, three different times.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_00: Got passed over by three different people.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: And every time I got told, oh, you were a second choice, if blah, blah,
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, I don't know if that necessarily helps the situation.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: They told me I was number two.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: But my wife and I had kind of said,
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: you know what, I'm going through this carpenter's apprenticeship.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: I'm making good money.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to stay with this.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: This is what I'm going to do.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: I don't love what I do.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't really enjoy the apprenticeship.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: I like working with my hands.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's just something about it didn't feel like I was doing what I was called to do.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, right.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I get a call a week before I graduate from my apprenticeship
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: from Bruce Erson down at Wesley in Muscatine.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: And says, hey, Mike Jane said to come and interview.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: We'll have you interview for my youth pastor job.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, okay.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I asked my wife, I'm like, do you want me to do this?
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: And in my head, I'm just thinking, I'm going to take second.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's fine.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: You're used to it by now, right?
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, it's just going to be, it's fine.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: And we go do the interview and it feels really good.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like, okay, we'll see what happens.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: I graduate my apprenticeship the next week.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: And for those that haven't done an apprenticeship,
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_00: it's like a five to $6 an hour raise when you become a journeyman.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so I'm like, yes, I'm finally going to make really good money.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to be a journeyman.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to do all this stuff.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: My father-in-law owned a construction company I was working for.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: This is what's going to happen.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: This is going to be good.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: I get a call the day.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, before graduation,
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: like we go do the graduation,
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: I had already got my journeyman car,
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: all that stuff, but like they do a formal ceremony.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: I get a call from Bruce offering me the job.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: He's like, well, we want you to meet with some people.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: And Mariah and I sit down,
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: my wife and I sit down and we're like,
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: this is the exact numbers we need to be able to make it work.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_00: And they have to give us a place to live.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, so this is the exact number we need.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: This is the exact, whatever.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: And it was nuts.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: It was like less than half of what I was making current.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_00: At the time.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: And, uh, we sit down across the way from the person coming to offer the job.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: And it's the exact number we prayed about.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I look at her and I'm like, are we going to do this?
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: And she said, we have to, we said, God, if this is it, this is what we need.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: And it was,
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: so we sold our house,
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: took a loss on it and moved to Muscatine and spent two years there.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: We had a youth group of about seven kids when we got there.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's terrifying,
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_00: by the way,
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_00: when you show up to a job and like, oh, I'm seven kids away from not having a job.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_02: Right, right, right.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: And we spent two years there and our vision of what could be in the churches after
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_00: about two years,
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: they had reached a point that they just wanted to kind of stay where they were.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_00: They didn't want to grow anymore.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_00: And anybody that knows me, no, we got to reach people that don't know the gospel.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: Right, right.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: Cool.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: And I got called by Shoeville and went up to Shoeville.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: They had about 20 or 25 in youth group and was there for three years and we grew it
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_00: over a hundred and then COVID.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: And just to note,
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: and I don't know if I ever told you this either,
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: never had an intention of becoming a senior pastor.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um, youth ministries problems.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: My girlfriend dumped me is so much easier than adult problems.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um, But in that midst of it, we actually had a pastor retire and I had to take his spot.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: We had an interim that was doing less than stellar and I had to kind of step in.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: And so I saw what it was like to have to be the senior pastor and youth pastor at the same time.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: And when our new pastor eventually came in,
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_00: he's like, dude, you've already done this and you did it well.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: I think you need to start going back to school and do this.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for confirming what I didn't want to do.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: Right, right, right.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: So ended up in Epworth.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: Sorry.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: Ended up in Epworth for three years.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: Had some growth in ministry there.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: And unfortunately we missed the vote by like one person to disaffiliate.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: We had some,
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: like a lot of other churches,
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: we had some people come from Far away that we're no longer in the church to vote.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_00: So, and then here we are.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know,
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: at first I was really angry,
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: but it's like, Oh God, you had the hand in this the whole time.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: So, sorry.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't know if you wanted the whole one or not.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_02: No, I mean,
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_02: you had to be,
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_02: you had to be at least open to the idea of being,
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_02: you know, um,
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_02: a lead pastor a bit because, um, you went through licensing school before COVID.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_02: You know, cause I was at it Friday.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_02: So I saw you there.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_02: So I knew you had to at least been open to the idea.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, honestly,
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: at that point, um,
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: the thing I was considering, um,
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: and I don't know if it was more of a,
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: I think I, I do know it was more of a, I didn't feel worthy to be a lead pastor.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um,
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: which I'm kind of learning when we kind of get to that point where we feel worthy is
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_00: the problem.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um, uh, I had considered very much so to say,
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: and I talked to a few of my people about this, that I trusted.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_00: I said, I need to put myself in a position where I can be an associate pastor that leads youth.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: So that was what I was thinking because I never saw myself in small town Iowa again.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought I wanted to live in the big cities and be an associate and all that stuff.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: Now I don't know if I'd wanted to.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: Right, right.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_00: I love this place.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_00: I love smaller towns.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_02: So you're in Walcott.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_02: About how many people live in Walcott and how close are you to the nearest good-sized town?
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: So about 1,500 in Walcott.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: Our Bluegrass is 2,500.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: That's south of us by eight miles.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: Durant is about 2,500 and they have their own high school and that's Probably 10,
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_00: maybe eight, two.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: And then Davenport is the biggest city.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: And that's probably a 10 minute drive.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: So it's not too far, but it's it's the Davenport.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know another way to put it.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: The Davenport crime doesn't necessarily reach us.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_02: No, I just as someone who, you know, my, the biggest towns near me are 20 minutes away.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_02: And, and they are a fraction of the size of Davenport.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_02: And I just, I,
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_02: so I wonder a little bit about what the difference is in those kinds of contexts,
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_02: but that's,
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_02: that's neither here nor there necessarily, other than I'm curious about the context.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so we're close enough, but we're right off the highway too.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_00: So we're right off the interstate.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_02: Cause that's the,
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_02: just for anybody who doesn't know where Walcott Iowa is,
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_02: that's, that's where the, the big highway 80, uh, big truck stop is.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_02: So that's, that's the claim.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_02: I did find it.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: The Moon family is the one that started the truck stop,
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_00: and I believe the Moon family also was the first group to help start a family
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: to help one of the first families to help start this church.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: They have no connection anymore.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_02: Sure, right.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: But Walcott was a very German town.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_00: They didn't want – during Prohibition like 77 years ago when they did it,
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: they did not want a church in town, I think.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_02: Sure, right.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_02: So you did not grow up in a small town.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_02: You were not working in a small town.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_02: This was not part of your plan.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_02: You find yourself in a small town.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_02: What is it?
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_02: I realize this is a thing that's going to go to a public audience.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_02: I hope nobody who has a connection with either you or me ever takes any offense at these things.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_02: But I'm curious about what is it that you have found that's a pain about being in small towns?
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_02: But what is also...
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_02: Is there anything that's really good and positive?
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_02: I imagine, I mean, we've talked before and you know how I feel about this too.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_02: I know that there's a lot of good,
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_02: but tell us something that you find frustrating or different
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_02: about small town ministry that's difficult and share a bit about what you find
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_02: to be very positive in the situation you're in.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: Honestly, I think it's the same exact thing.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody knows everybody and everybody knows everybody.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: Because everybody knows everybody's business, every little detail.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: And everybody,
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: but at the same time,
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: my kids can walk outside and people are watching to make sure they're okay.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: Instead of a neighborhood watch, it's Walcott watch.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: But it is good.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: We have people that genuinely care about our kids.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: I've never lived in a town where Growing up, it was different for us.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like you probably were like me that you got to ride your bike and you just had
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: to be home when the street lights turn on.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's not necessarily the world we live in in the city anymore.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: But my kids, we fast pitch men's softball is huge in this town.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: We have a world qualifying event here.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: Kids go and watch or go play in the playground and hang out there all summer long.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, your kids won't leave home ever.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_00: They come home to go to bed.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: We joke that we don't know what's more feral.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: The cats are our kids.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: They're just always out in the mouth.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: But we know they're safe.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll get a text from me.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, just so you know, your kids showed up at my house.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_00: They're playing here.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: The only thing that's weird for me is like kids will just walk in.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, sure.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: And like,
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so glad that I'm nothing like,
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_00: like, My dad was the guy that walked around and stuff.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: People shouldn't walk in the house.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_02: I don't do, but,
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_00: um, it's like, man, I'm glad this wasn't my friends back in the day.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: My dad would have embarrassed me so bad.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but from like eight o'clock in the morning until eight o'clock at night,
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_00: kids are walking in and out of each other's houses and you just know that's
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_00: the case.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and, uh, um, Yeah.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_00: So that's, that's awesome, but also frustrating.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: The hard part of it too, small town is I live next to the church.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: That was a sign, but also a curse.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: I can't like have a fire in my backyard without people like, Oh, that means I'm invited.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_00: Because I mean, I have church friends that are my actual like friends outside of the church.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but everyone thinks they're the pastor's friend.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: Outside church.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, It's hard sometimes to check out of work.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_02: Sure, yeah.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm excited.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: We're actually going on a real vacation this year.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_02: All right.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: I'm turning my phone off.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_02: So I kind of have two main goals with these videos, at least in these early days.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_02: Who knows how things shift over time.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_02: But one of them is,
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's important that leaders in churches, to be clear, not only pastors.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_02: So far, you're the second person I've talked to, and you're also a pastor.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_02: So far, it's just been pastors.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_02: But my goal is to talk to lay people who are doing leadership as well.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_02: And so part of it is just to get people out there.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_02: Because I think it's so easy to look in the distance and say,
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_02: oh, those pastors, they're like different kinds of people.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_02: And the fact of the matter is, we're folks like everybody else is.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_02: Part of why I think telling the stories about how is it we found ourselves
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_02: to be Christians in the first place?
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_02: How is it that we found ourselves called into ministry?
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_02: What did that feel like?
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_02: How did we respond to it?
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_02: Is I sometimes think people will say, well, if I was called to ministry, I would know it.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_02: Everyone would know it.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_02: It would be obvious to everyone.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_02: And what I've learned from my own life and other people's lives is that is far
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_02: from being the case.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_02: And so to a certain degree,
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_02: one of the ulterior motives of all this is
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_02: to let people know God may be calling you even if you don't think so yet.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_02: So to be praying about it.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_02: So just generally getting to know each other and to know each other's stories and
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_02: to know a little bit about what brings us together.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_02: And again,
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_02: the other day you and I were talking and you made a comment about how,
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_02: except for like the church and Jesus, we don't really have a whole lot in common.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that it's wonderful that we can have what Jesus brings together
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_02: in people is very helpful.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_02: But that's one of my goals with these.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_02: The other goal that I kind of want to do is I want to lift up Uh,
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_02: churches and leaders that are doing things that are interesting,
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_02: or, or at least can bear witness to what God is doing in their midst.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_02: That's exciting.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_02: And, um, so I,
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_02: I think that what I know is that Walcott,
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_02: there's some guys, those are pretty exciting things there in Walcott.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_02: And would you be willing to share a little bit about what God's doing in your context?
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: So it's, it's been really crazy first three years.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, didn't know, you never know that God has planned it to go in somewhere.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, But I think when we got here, we were worshiping around 60-ish people.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: The church was its own thing.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: Like everything was inward focused.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_00: And how are we going to survive?
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, we got here, we didn't have a budget set.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_00: We didn't know what was coming in.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_00: And that kind of freaked me out.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_00: So that was the first most important thing.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: And the second most important thing was we have got to get out in the community.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_00: Like we are literally like our church is the only church in town and we're in
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_00: the center of the town.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, sure.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: We are literally dead center.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like, why are we not involved in everything?
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_00: The five K's in town, we have three, all of them run past us.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then the two big parks in town that all the games are at are right next to us.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um, they're each on each end.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, And it's literally has this potential to do all this stuff.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: So I started pushing, we need to do that.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_00: We need to be involved with the youth because we were probably average age 60,
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_00: upper 60s to mid 70s when I got here.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_00: In just this past year, we welcomed over 30 new members.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_00: And all of them between, I mean,
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_00: we had probably one, I think we have one person in that group that was over 40.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: Two.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yep, two people in that group that were over 50.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone else was 20s to 40s.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I mean, that's the largest increase in membership the church has seen in a long time.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_00: And a lot of it is honestly just from being in the community.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_00: We are very active in the community.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: We are at everything.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_00: I'm at everything.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: I always say if I'm sitting in this desk 40 hours a week, You should probably fire me.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_00: Because I'm not getting anything done out there.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, this isn't the mission field, right?
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: This is the place where hopefully the majority of the people that walk
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: through these doors have a personal relationship with Jesus.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_00: I am very much a, I want to go where the people that don't know them are.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: Because if it wasn't for people like that,
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, just being real, I'm six feet under or in prison.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like, I don't know.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_00: What if they wouldn't have reached out for me?
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_00: What if they would have not had a mission mindset?
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_00: But our average attendance has gone in three years from 60 to this week was a little down.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think we had like 117, but we're averaging in the 120s to whatever.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_00: And then we were having Easter service and Christmas service was what we're averaging now.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: And this year, Easter and Christmas, we're both over 250.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_00: And people are talking about us in the community for positive things we're doing,
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: not, oh, there's that building.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_00: We're trying to be a place that gets known for where people can go when they need us.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, next step is to really start getting small groups going.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: They hadn't had many small groups here.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_00: There's like two, but they're for retired age people.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's my next goal is to get that going.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_02: So I imagine that while you and your particular interests and your gifts
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_02: and your background has shaped some of this,
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_02: I imagine you probably haven't done all the reaching out all on your own.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_02: What role have the laity done to really assist this growth and this change in attitude?
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_00: So really,
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_00: truthfully,
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_00: essentially what happened is we probably got like four young families that my wife
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_00: and I, when we first got here, we got really close with.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't necessarily at first,
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: hey, let's get together and start to hang out with these people.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's not a small group per se because we don't study the Bible,
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_00: but we just get together and hang out all the time.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: Whether it's we go over and barbecue at somebody's house or our kids all go play
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_00: and we just hang out in the driveway with the fire pit.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_00: Whatever it may be, we get together and...
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_00: In that,
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_00: they started being like,
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to invite one of my friends and then their friend would come over
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_00: and they'd hang out.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: And it was funny because one of the things I've been told quite a bit is,
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: man, you're not like a normal pastor.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what does that mean?
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: Well, aren't normal pastors like snooty and think they're better?
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, okay, what pastors have you met?
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, right.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_00: Well, well, I don't know of any.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, okay, so you're assuming.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_00: But I mean, some of them are like, well, you'll have a beer.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm not getting drunk.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_00: I'll have a drink with you.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm not going to act like an idiot.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_00: And honestly, if you are, I'm going to probably tell you, you know, you probably need to stop.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_00: But.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: Just the fact that I'll go where they are has made the difference, I think.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_00: And now they've started to go and tell their friends or they brought their friends
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_00: to church and do different things.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe it's because I've been yelled at by a couple elderly
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_00: because I've said turd from the pulpit before when somebody's being a...
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_00: That's so irreverent.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm sorry.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I hate to break it to them that Paul uses worse language than that.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_02: That's for sure.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_00: But no, honestly, it's just been about caring, genuinely caring for people.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't hurt that I am extroverted, so it's not as draining for me.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_00: But the thing I'm learning is even as an extrovert,
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: I need to find time to introvert or I lose my mind a little bit.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_00: So but a lot of it is that leadership that lady is now out talking about shoot.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_00: We just talk about one family real quick, one of our friends and I won't use their name.
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_00: They just bought a building that basically wasn't being used in town that used to be
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_00: a center of it.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's called the Coliseum.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like everybody used to get married there.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_00: It used to be a bar.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_00: It used to be all this stuff.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_00: And now they're turning in coffee,
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: breakfast and lunch place that they want to be Christ centered.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, sure.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_00: And they're like, hey, Mike, we want you to have Bible studies here.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_00: We want you to bring people here.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_00: We want you done.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_00: Are you kidding me?
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: It's so much easier for me to say, Travis, you don't know Jesus.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: Let's go have a cup of coffee at the coffee shop than it is to say,
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_00: hey, come sit down in my stuffy office.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_02: Whenever I meet with folks before they join the church or before baptisms,
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_02: before weddings and all those things, and I try to never meet in my office.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_02: I always feel like it has the vibe of calling someone to the principal's office.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_02: Like the worst place to meet is in my study, in my office.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, not that I ever spent any time in the principal's office.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_02: Wow, okay, sure.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_02: I actually try to meet with people in the space that I'm in right now.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_02: Actually, I spend a lot of time doing stuff in here.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_02: So you talked about, so everybody's different, right?
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_02: Every pastor is different.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_02: Every experience is different.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_02: But I think we are all shaped, not trapped in the past, but we're shaped by our past.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_02: And so I'm curious,
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_02: in what ways do you see your background in your pre-Christian life,
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_02: all those other things, in what ways does that shape your ministry today?
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: I think that one of the ways it really has helped shape me is that it's hard for me
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: to write anyone off because it would have been really easy for any of my pastors
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_00: or any of my people that mentored me to write me off so many different times.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_00: But they stuck with me and they kept believing in me and they kept trusting
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_00: That God was using me for something and they believed in me when I didn't believe
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_01: in myself.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_00: So I feel like I guess it's developed me a heart for the broken and to be able to look and say.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_00: People didn't necessarily understand all the stuff that I was going through at
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_00: the time,
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_00: their stuff I kept hidden and from people like a lot of the reasons I did this,
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: I was molested at a young age.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I grew up in an alcoholic dad that was an alcoholic and only cared about us
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: during certain times of the year.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_00: And that hurt from the church.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_00: And all of those would have been excuses to say,
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_00: you know what, write them off, let it go, whatever.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_00: But nobody did.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: So like, I want to reach those broken because I know that it's usually for a reason.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_00: God didn't make them broken.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_00: Something in the world broke them or hurt them.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus very clearly ran after those people.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_00: Everywhere throughout scripture, he went where the undesirables were.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_00: So shoot, he claimed Paul.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_00: Who was literally killing the people spreading his message.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's got to have a huge impact on the way you just see the world.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_02: So far, you're the first one I'm talking to, and I don't know right now on my list.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I guess one person who is at least half interested,
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_02: we'll see if we follow through with it.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_02: But you are still, you're finishing up your educational component.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_02: You have another year or so, but it's kind of a year of almost part-time education.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_02: Now, I am not fishing for any comments about any classes you may have had with me,
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_02: but I am curious,
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_02: as somebody who values upper education a lot,
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_02: I appreciate probably more than anybody else around is going to.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_02: I'm curious,
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_02: even when I,
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_02: this may surprise you,
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_02: when I first started in seminary,
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_02: one of the questions I was asking was,
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_02: how can I get through this as quickly as possible so I can get to the real work
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_02: of ministry?
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_02: And I was really shaped by my educational experience.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_02: And you're in a different program, a different whole model of education and serving the church.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_02: But I'm curious,
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_02: have there been any benefits of kind of having to do the formal education?
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_02: Has there been any of that that's really affected your ability to be a faithful
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_02: and effective pastor?
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_00: I would say absolutely.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_00: Like right now,
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_00: actually, I feel like a caring counseling class that I'm in has been super helpful.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_00: Just as far as like,
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_00: even some of it was to,
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_00: yeah, understanding people and a lot of the care and counseling stuff.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_00: For others, we can't necessarily do.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's all about like, okay, I can handle it to this point and then find them a professional.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_01: I knew that stuff.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_00: But honestly, it was more about kind of some of the self-care stuff that I am not good
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_02: at doing.
• 38:05
  SPEAKER_00: And in some of my writings, my professors kind of called me out on it.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_00: Like, You need to do this, otherwise you're not going to last.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter how tough or whatever,
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_00: how hard a worker you are, if you don't self-care, you're going to be a troll.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_00: And he's like, you can run as hard and as long as you can, but you also need to manage XYZ.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_00: The other thing that I think I have really appreciated is actually
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_00: a couple different classes that have revolved around learning more
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: about John Wesley.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_00: As somebody who grew up Catholic and then actually had a lot of Baptist influence
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_00: as far as different,
• 38:47
  SPEAKER_00: some of the teachers that I've had,
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_00: not teachers,
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_00: but mentors I've had were not,
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: may have claimed Methodism, but probably closer to Baptist.
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't realize,
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_00: I knew that there was aspects of what I believed that John Wesley was all about.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_00: The bands and small groups, I think that is huge.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_00: I've always thought that.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_00: But then there's other stuff that throughout those meetings or those readings and
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_00: the history of the Methodist church is like, oh,
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_00: even some of Wesley's stuff,
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_00: I agree with maybe more than what we're doing right now.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, hey, maybe we need to start to march some of this back in.
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe we've gotten away from this.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_00: And the more I learn about John Wesley, it's like, okay, I agree with a ton of Wesley.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_00: We need to move.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_00: I am hoping the goal is to move more towards that as we continue
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_00: as our generation hopefully continues to be the one to have some influence on that
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_00: and sets the precedent.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I know we're so young that there's when it comes to the denomination
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_00: that there's a lot of shaping left.
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_00: And as I learned that,
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_00: like that's the stuff I'm like, OK, I never wanted to be in a leadership position.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_00: I never wanted to serve on a board.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_00: In the conference, I just wanted to do my own thing.
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_00: Now it's like, okay, I think the only way I can kind of push back is if I say I will.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_00: So I think those classes have moved me towards like, hey, shut up or join the chorus.
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, right.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_02: So one of the things that,
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_02: one of the reasons why I'm talking to you is not only do I know you well enough that
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_02: in these kind of early steps and trying to do this interview format,
• 40:32
  SPEAKER_02: That I know you'll put up with me as I fumble through things,
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_02: but also part of it is because your congregation has been growing a lot.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's significant.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_02: And also part of it is because in just a few weeks from now,
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_02: the time of this recording,
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_02: we're going to have our annual conference and we're going to have breakout sessions.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_02: And one of the sessions that's going to be out there, you're going to be leading.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_02: Can you tell us a little bit about,
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_02: kind of how that came about and what you're hoping people will get out of
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_02: that breakout session, kind of as a commercial for it for a couple of weeks?
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm actually kind of getting past the point I was when it was like,
• 41:09
  SPEAKER_00: when I first James called me,
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_00: Pastor James Parks calls me and messages me and is like, hey, Mike,
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_00: would you be interested in leading a breakout session over
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_00: a small town church growth and blah, blah, blah.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_00: He's like, we've seen a lot of this and a lot of growth in your church.
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_00: What would you think about doing that?
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_00: My first mindset, whether it's derogatory towards myself or whatever, was who am I?
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_00: I am not even an ordained deacon yet.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: I'm still working on ordination.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_00: Well, technically that's done.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: I should be soon.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_00: And then hopefully elder by the year after or the earliest, obviously.
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_00: But like, who am I?
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody knows who I am.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_00: The people that know me is because of summer game stuff.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like,
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_00: who am I to be leaving something like this,
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_00: which is part of the reason I asked you to help,
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_00: because I feel like you are much more qualified and much.
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_00: And honestly,
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_00: we also have very different personalities and we have we're in
• 42:13
  SPEAKER_00: a very similar context,
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_00: just in opposite parts of the state, just to show it works more than one place.
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_00: But it's all about just about that,
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_00: like making the church become mobile,
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_00: making the church be getting out and being a part of the community,
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_00: whether it's stuff like you've done with going to the state.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, football and all the sports stuff.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you don't hate it,
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_00: but it's not your number one thing,
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_00: but you still got to do it because it matters to your community.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_00: I don't love a band or show choir.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's not my gig.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_00: But do I miss the band or show choir or choir events?
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_00: No, because it's important to the community.
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to watch 700 t-ball games in the summer, but do I try?
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I do.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_00: Because it matters being present.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_00: And it's going to be a lot about being present and being the church outside
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_00: the walls and doing as much as you can to connect with the community and become
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_00: a place the community feels like isn't Um,
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_00: just the church, but it's the, a place for the community to come together.
• 43:22
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the,
• 43:23
  SPEAKER_00: it's funny because the sermon series just happened that we're,
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_00: we're going through the book of Matthew right now.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_00: And it just happens to be falling perfectly in line where we're talking about that
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_00: in church, uh,
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_00: church too, about, Hey,
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_00: we need to stop claiming to be church on Sunday and start being
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_00: the church outside Monday through Saturday, because that's when it matters.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_00: The people that come through the door are already looking for hope.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_00: The ones outside may not know.
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 43:53
  SPEAKER_02: I'm laughing because something that I think came very naturally to you that had
• 43:57
  SPEAKER_02: to drag me along kicking and screaming is one of the things
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_02: that people always say this.
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_02: They say things like they don't care how much you know
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_02: until they know how much you care and the presence and all the rest.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_02: And I must have when I was younger thought to myself, no, hang on a second.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_02: You don't know how much I know.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe it's not how much you know, but how much I know.
• 44:15
  SPEAKER_02: And what I'm realizing,
• 44:15
  SPEAKER_02: and God has dragged me kicking and screaming into this,
• 44:18
  SPEAKER_02: is that without being weird about it, I know the Bible pretty well.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_02: This has been a thing that I've taken very seriously, and I know theological issues really well.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_02: And if that is what it took,
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_02: I've heard more often than anything else,
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_02: the reason why I can't go share my faith with people in my community
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_02: because I don't know enough answers.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_02: What if they stumped me and all the rest?
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_02: And I said,
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_02: if the problem could be solved,
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_02: By learning more, then I would be just so good at all of this stuff.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_02: But the point is, it's not.
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_02: It's not.
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, it's not like it's completely unrelated, right?
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_02: You should learn something.
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_02: It's good to learn.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_02: I asked you a question about how learning has helped you.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_02: But it's unbelievable how low the bar is for how much you have to know to go out
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_02: and share the gospel with people and to be present with them and to share it
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_02: by your presence and by showing that you care, like you've been talking about.
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_02: And that has been, for me, you and I are about the same age.
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_02: I've been a passer for a whole lot longer,
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_02: but it took me so long to really figure out that knowing
• 45:15
  SPEAKER_02: the right answer is not actually the right answer.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I mean, just like somebody told me early on, like,
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_00: Don't preach above a certain age level because if you do,
• 45:29
  SPEAKER_00: people feel stupid, don't come back to church.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_00: They want to understand what you're saying.
• 45:34
  SPEAKER_00: That doesn't mean you water down the message.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_00: It just means sometimes you have to speak in not
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_00: the high theological terms we may have to learn for college.
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_00: But one of the things that has always stuck with me is
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_00: that I had somebody tell me one time That I felt stupid because they had asked me
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_00: a question.
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_00: I can't remember what the question was.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't know the answer.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, you know what?
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know,
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_00: but I can go do some research and let me get back to you tomorrow
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_00: because I have some people I can ask.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_00: I can go to scriptures and try and find the answer.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought I was like, dude, I failed.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_00: And when I went back to the person and said, hey,
• 46:15
  SPEAKER_00: here's what I found, they said to me, they're like, you realize that made you real.
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_00: What do you mean?
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, because you don't have all the answers.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, no, not even close.
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, that's what we have all these things were around us.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, I'm still learning.
• 46:32
  SPEAKER_00: If I ever get to the point that I know everything,
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_00: it's probably because I'm dead and I'm in heaven.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_00: But it's constantly striving to be better.
• 46:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that having those conversations and letting people see
• 46:47
  SPEAKER_00: that you're imperfect, Um, which I am far from perfect, uh, helps.
• 46:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so yeah, that's, that's what I have seen in some of my context and I screw up too.
• 47:00
  SPEAKER_02: So I, I'm
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_00: better off.
• 47:02
  SPEAKER_02: Oh yeah.
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_02: So I asked this question once before I'm going to ask it now.
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_02: And I, I may,
• 47:06
  SPEAKER_02: I may live to regret asking this question,
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_02: but I want to remind everybody that this is not an official podcast,
• 47:11
  SPEAKER_02: the global Methodist church.
• 47:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and, and, uh, both, both myself and Mike have been in enough churches.
• 47:15
  SPEAKER_02: So you can't pinpoint anything to any particular church.
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_02: The reason why I'm prefacing it that way is to say, so you've been in a few churches, right?
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_02: Either by attending or by serving in one capacity or another.
• 47:29
  SPEAKER_02: If you could name one thing that is like a sickness in the church that needs
• 47:34
  SPEAKER_02: to be dealt with,
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_02: that's getting in the way of effectiveness in ministry, what might that be?
• 47:41
  SPEAKER_00: Can I use one word?
• 47:43
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_00: Gatekeeping.
• 47:45
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's happening at every level.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_00: At every church I've ever been at,
• 47:54
  SPEAKER_00: there's something that's their sacred cow or whatever that they protect and say,
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not letting this change.
• 48:02
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, we want people to come in and take over and do this and do this amazing ministry.
• 48:07
  SPEAKER_00: Cool.
• 48:07
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I want to.
• 48:08
  SPEAKER_00: Well, but you have to do it the exact way we've done it for 45 years, even if it's unsuccessful.
• 48:13
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 48:14
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that doesn't make any sense.
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 48:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and,
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_00: and it's whether it's, um,
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_00: the color of the carpet, um, the fact that pews for, why are pews viewed as holy?
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_00: I just will never understand that.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's like they're, they're okay, but they're uncomfortable.
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_00: Anybody that says pews are comfortable, I, I'm going to introduce them to a leather chair.
• 48:41
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 48:41
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um, But whether it's that at a local church or maybe even the music,
• 48:48
  SPEAKER_00: because we still have worship wars.
• 48:49
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, sure.
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 48:51
  SPEAKER_00: And then honestly,
• 48:52
  SPEAKER_00: my church has gotten to the point they're just happy if it's good and done well.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm happy we're not having that battle.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_00: But it is still a lot of other places.
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_00: Whether it's I'll try to be careful.
• 49:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 49:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 49:05
  SPEAKER_02: No, I understand that.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm not trying to get you in trouble or anything like that, but I,
• 49:08
  SPEAKER_02: but so how do we,
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_02: cause I presumably,
• 49:11
  SPEAKER_02: presumably people like you and me also have gates that we like to keep,
• 49:14
  SPEAKER_02: even if we don't realize it,
• 49:15
  SPEAKER_02: you know, so what do you, how do we, how do we fight against that temptation?
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_02: Like, what can we do to,
• 49:20
  SPEAKER_02: to practice, um,
• 49:22
  SPEAKER_02: letting go of those,
• 49:23
  SPEAKER_02: that protection that we,
• 49:24
  SPEAKER_02: that we put in place that's more protecting our kingdom than God's kingdom?
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's as easy as, you know, we have to look and ask ourselves and break it down.
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_00: Is this scriptural based or is it our experience based?
• 49:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's where we got in trouble in our former denomination is a lot
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_00: of times like the way I understood the quadrilateral is that everything is supposed
• 49:47
  SPEAKER_00: to be viewed through the lens of Scripture.
• 49:49
  SPEAKER_00: All the other three parts is like, hey, Scripture's number one.
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_00: Well, at some point we all decided experience was number one.
• 49:58
  SPEAKER_00: And then we put all the other things.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like, no, because our experiences are flawed with sinners and we are sinners.
• 50:04
  SPEAKER_00: Scriptures first.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I think if we say, okay, I believe in X, Y, Z in order to get to this.
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 50:13
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what does scripture say about, well, that doesn't matter.
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_00: Well, timeout.
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_00: Let's look.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 50:19
  SPEAKER_00: And then honestly, let's just look at what's being effective.
• 50:22
  SPEAKER_00: Let's look and say,
• 50:23
  SPEAKER_00: okay, if it's the pews, is anybody come to your church because you have pews?
• 50:29
  SPEAKER_00: Mm-hmm.
• 50:30
  SPEAKER_00: Or are people able to get around easier because of that?
• 50:33
  SPEAKER_00: Or let's say it's, well,
• 50:37
  SPEAKER_00: even in the, well,
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_00: part of the reason,
• 50:40
  SPEAKER_00: and maybe this is leftover from the UMC,
• 50:43
  SPEAKER_00: is as a licensed pastor, we got looked down upon.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_02: Didn't matter what our ministry looked like, didn't matter, whatever.
• 50:49
  SPEAKER_00: You were less than.
• 50:51
  SPEAKER_00: I think we're starting to get away from that.
• 50:55
  SPEAKER_00: But there's some of us that are probably still holding on to, hey, you're not, The same as.
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 51:03
  SPEAKER_00: Because you're a sinner and I'm a sinner and I'm pretty sure God looks at us the same.
• 51:09
  SPEAKER_00: I understand the importance of education now more than ever because I have learned a lot.
• 51:16
  SPEAKER_00: But that doesn't mean that like I love that I'm allowed to vote now.
• 51:21
  SPEAKER_00: Wasn't allowed to vote and it's like, dude, this affects me more than it does a retired pastor.
• 51:25
  SPEAKER_01: Why is it still get involved?
• 51:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I think we're getting there,
• 51:31
  SPEAKER_00: but I think that we just got to constantly be doing that when we come
• 51:34
  SPEAKER_00: to this headway and say, okay, first scripture.
• 51:38
  SPEAKER_00: Scripture doesn't have an answer on it.
• 51:39
  SPEAKER_00: Then we need to look towards our book of discipline.
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_00: If book of discipline doesn't have an answer on it,
• 51:44
  SPEAKER_00: then we need to actually look around and go to the people it affects,
• 51:48
  SPEAKER_00: whatever the thing is, and say, okay, this affects you guys directly.
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_00: How can we make this best so you are successful and set up to do well?
• 51:57
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 51:59
  SPEAKER_00: In every aspect.
• 52:02
  SPEAKER_00: So whether it's somebody like me going through process or somebody that's been
• 52:08
  SPEAKER_00: a member of the church for years.
• 52:11
  SPEAKER_02: So I know you're running out of time here, so I kind of want to start wrapping things up here.
• 52:15
  SPEAKER_02: But so I want to say,
• 52:17
  SPEAKER_02: as I kind of bring this to a close,
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_02: I have a couple of people that I'm reaching out to now.
• 52:22
  SPEAKER_02: To do things like this with, and at least a couple of them are definitely still in the process.
• 52:26
  SPEAKER_02: Some of whom I think kind of found themselves in ministry
• 52:28
  SPEAKER_02: without necessarily realizing it was coming their way until it was kind of
• 52:31
  SPEAKER_02: upon them.
• 52:32
  SPEAKER_02: But I want to make it really clear that if somebody's watching this
• 52:34
  SPEAKER_02: and like I am not interested in interviewing and talking to,
• 52:39
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 52:40
  SPEAKER_02: people who have like key leadership positions,
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_02: you know, there's lots of people who are doing that kind of thing.
• 52:43
  SPEAKER_02: They get all kinds of airtime.
• 52:45
  SPEAKER_02: What I'm really interested in is sharing the stories of the people in the ministries
• 52:49
  SPEAKER_02: of folks who are maybe out,
• 52:51
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 52:51
  SPEAKER_02: the reason why you haven't heard about them is because they're so focused
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_02: on doing quality ministry and following where the Spirit's leading them
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_02: that nobody has,
• 52:59
  SPEAKER_02: you know, that they haven't bothered to tell anybody what's going on.
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_02: And so I don't care if the person is, you know, ordained or not.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_02: I don't care if they're...
• 53:08
  SPEAKER_02: I want to hear about the stories of what's going on across the conference because there's no
• 53:24
  SPEAKER_02: I
• 53:27
  SPEAKER_02: want to say thank you, Mike,
• 53:32
  SPEAKER_02: for being willing to be interviewed,
• 53:33
  SPEAKER_02: to have this conversation with me,
• 53:34
  SPEAKER_02: to share a bit about your story, share about what God's doing in your midst.
• 53:38
  SPEAKER_02: And I realize now this is the second time in a row I have not given you any warning
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_02: for this, but would you be willing to close us out in prayer?
• 53:46
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 53:48
  SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
• 53:50
  SPEAKER_00: Gracious God,
• 53:50
  SPEAKER_00: thank you so much for This new ministry and this new podcast format, Lord,
• 53:56
  SPEAKER_00: I just pray that as Travis continues on this road,
• 53:59
  SPEAKER_00: that you continue to help lead him to new people,
• 54:03
  SPEAKER_00: to help get a connection, help us get to know each other better, Lord.
• 54:07
  SPEAKER_00: That's what the connection and the blessing of the Methodist Way is about,
• 54:13
  SPEAKER_00: is getting that connectional ministry going and getting to know each other and learn
• 54:17
  SPEAKER_00: from each other and grow, Lord.
• 54:18
  SPEAKER_00: Help us to Continue to find ways such as this podcast to do so, Lord.
• 54:23
  SPEAKER_00: I just pray that you continue to bless Travis's ministry,
• 54:25
  SPEAKER_00: continue to bless Calvary and all the others who will come on here, Lord.
• 54:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I just thank you for the opportunity to continue to be a light to your community
• 54:35
  SPEAKER_00: and to the world.
• 54:37
  SPEAKER_00: In your name we pray.
• 54:38
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 54:39
  SPEAKER_02: Amen.
• 54:39
  SPEAKER_02: Well, thank you very much.
• 54:40
  SPEAKER_02: So I have been Travis Stevick.
• 54:42
  SPEAKER_02: This has been What You Have Seen and Heard, and we have had our guest, Reverend Mike Jones.
• 54:46
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks for being with us, and we'll see you next time.