Latest / Wesley at FSU & TSC / BEACH RETREAT | "Go and Make Disciples" | Pastor Bryant Manning | September 19, 2026

Transcript

BEACH RETREAT | "Go and Make Disciples" | Pastor Bryant Manning | September 19, 2026 · Wesley at FSU & TSC

• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Have you had a good weekend?
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_01: It is it's like lightning.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: It's lightning outside and inside.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_01: Crazy.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_01: Crazy.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: Alright, you had a good weekend?
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: What what has been good so far?
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: Come on, tell me.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_02: The game.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: Small groups, the game.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, yeah.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um the game had a great beginning.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: What'd you say?
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: Go pink, come on, color wars.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: How many of you enjoyed the beach this afternoon?
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah?
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um, how many of you enjoyed uh the sun this afternoon?
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_01: I saw a few of them enjoyed the sun again.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: No, not so much.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_01: How many of you went to Pier Park?
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_01: Tell me what you did at Pier Park.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: What'd you do at Pier Park?
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_02: Ice cream.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: Ice cream?
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, that's good.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: What else?
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sorry, what?
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: You ate crickets?
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: Alright, yeah, Sam.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: Hold on, what?
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: What?
• 2:09
  unknown: Quaid and I ate hot tubs.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: Quaid and you ate hot tubs?
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_01: Alright.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: What what else?
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: What else?
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: What else?
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: What else for the minute?
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_02: My good buddy rile and gonna pretzel.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, hey, hey, hey.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: Alright, Zach.
• 2:25
  unknown: We have it went on the pier.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: Sick! Sick, amazing.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: Libby!
• 2:30
  unknown: We saw like a good sunrise.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: A good sunrise.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and sunset.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_01: Amazing.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um is that what you said, sunset?
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: You said sunrise.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um I want to read our censoring passage real quick from Matthew 28.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and uh, I'm just I'm not gonna say this judgmentally.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not gonna say this with any sort of feeling in heart, but nobody talked about the baptism as something they are celebrating.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, come on, we're celebrating Taylor's baptism today.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: Uh this passage, you've heard it a couple times this weekend.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: You've probably read it a little bit.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: This passage is from Matthew's gospel, it's the 28th chapter.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's the famous commissioning.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: Say commissioning.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's the famous commissioning of the disciples because this is the end of Jesus' story.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: Very important to put yourself in the context of what's happening here.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: There's chaos happening outside.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: Is everybody okay?
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_02: It's like just a story outside messed up.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: We're all gonna center ourselves on Christ, right?
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's just things, right?
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_01: All right, all right.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_01: All right, so here's here.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: Can we focus?
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_01: Can we focus?
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: Can we focus?
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: Can we focus?
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: Can we bring it on here?
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: I know it's storming outside.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: It'll be okay.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's all gonna be okay.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: It's all gonna be okay.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: I'll talk to the staff about how disruptive this is later.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and I I won't say it in nice terms.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um in this uh in this moment, can we can we stay here?
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: Can we stay here?
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah?
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_01: All right, all right.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: Here's the thing this is the end of Jesus' life.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_01: He's he's been dead, he has been in the grave three days, and he has been resurrected.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, and at this point, he's now gone around and talked to the people he's shared in the ministry, and then he has decided to leave in because in the beginning of Acts, he's going to uh rise into the heavens.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: So, this is the last thing that he's telling the disciples.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: Might it be important?
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: Might it be important?
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_01: All right, here we go.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: This is the 28th chapter of Matthew, the 16th verse.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee to the mountain where Jesus told them to go.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: When they saw him, they worshiped him, but some doubted.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus came near and he spoke to them.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: I've received all authority in heaven and on earth.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything that I've commanded you.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: Look, I myself will be with you every day until the end of this present age.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: Let's pray.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: This is a preaching of God's word.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_01: Oh God, your word is a lamp into our feet, and it's a light into our path.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: May it speak to us and may it speak through us for the establishment of your kingdom on this earth.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_01: Oh God, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable only in your sight and in your sight alone, oh God.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: You're our rock and you're our redeemer.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_01: We love you.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_01: You have been in school your entire life, right?
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_01: More or less, most of everything that you remember involves some sort of school.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: When did you first go to school?
• 6:21
  unknown: Six years.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, maybe six, five, six years old.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: Somebody said preschool.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of you might have gone to preschool, three years old, two years old, literally before you can even remember you've been in school.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: School has a certain amount of rhythm to it, doesn't it?
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: You you go to school and you get up in the morning and you get all your stuff ready, and then you come and then you get to school, whether you were the bus.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_01: How many are bus riders in here?
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: How many of you were parent pickup drop off?
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: How many of you walked?
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: Anybody walked?
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: Really?
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: Rode your bike to school?
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: Is that allowed in modern day age?
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, if we could, if we could really, if we could keep that door closed, that would be ideal.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so we all got to school.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: You would get to school and you would go to your classroom, right?
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: You would go to a classroom, you would go to your teacher's classroom.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, how many of you, uh my daughters have um they have a thing called walk and talk in the mornings?
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: They have a thing called walk and talk in the mornings.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_01: I drop them off, and then if I drop them off early enough, they go and they literally just walk in circles and they talk to each other because there's too many kids for the playgrounds.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: And as soon as the bell rings, then they go to their classroom.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_01: Usually there's some sort of announcements or something like that, right?
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: Usually there's some sort of pledge of allegiance, right?
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_01: There's a now a moment of silence.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and you'll see, like, you'll see the news.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_01: And any of you ever get a star on the like the elementary school news?
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: Come on, come on.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: Broadcast journalists, we have right here, right?
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_01: Broadcast journalists.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_01: So here's what here's what uh we have this kind of rhythm to school, all right?
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_01: And then what we would do is as you would go through, you'd go through lunch, you would have PE three, four times a week, it seems like uh you would have music.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: Anybody remember the Orf instruments?
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we just purchased, we just purchased Collins's first recorder.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_01: Isn't that amazing?
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: So it's it's uh this is an amazing time.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, so we would go through school, we would you'd have lunch, you would eat.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: How many of you ate the lunch from the cafeteria?
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, how many of you, your parents, packed your lunch?
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: How many of you you packed your lunch?
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, half of you telling the truth.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, and then at about two o'clock or so, you would start to wrap up your day.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_01: Now, Collins is now in third grade, which means she has multiple teachers.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_01: She does her STEM classes with one teacher and she does her uh like humanities teachings with others, the other teachers.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_01: So she gets to have two different classrooms.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: How many of you do that in third grade?
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I didn't know this was a thing, honestly, until I now have a kid in it.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and then and then as you go through time, middle school becomes a really fun time because you start to transfer to different classes, right?
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: You you might go from classroom to classroom to classroom to classroom.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_01: That's the first time I remembered doing that.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: That was very scary for me that first sixth grade year, right?
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_01: It was like very, very, very scary to go from thing to thing to thing.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: I need you to focus here.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_01: I know the door's gonna open 16 times.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: I've already made the statement.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: I just need you to come here.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: Can we all come here?
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: Can we all come here?
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so uh I find myself in that same in that same situation, be feeling a little bit nervous, going sixth grade, whatever.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: And you'd have these different teachers, they would all have different subjects, they'd all have different things that they would focus on, and you would learn from these teachers who specialize in something.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: When you get to high school, you start to have some extracurricular activities, right?
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and the extracurriculars are uh what did you do for agricurculars?
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: Anybody in high school marching band?
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, how many of you play sports?
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: Any other things I forgot about?
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: What?
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_01: All right, theater, music, theater.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: But then after high school, and I think high school was the first time I started to follow particular professors.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: Do you know what I mean?
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like teachers.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I started to like get to know some of the teachers on a very personal level.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: Do you know what I'm saying?
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: Like you started to have your favorites, you started to have the ones that were maybe less so.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_01: You started to have this kind of connection with some of them.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_01: And then when you go to college, it it expands, doesn't it?
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: It expands.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: When I went to college, I studied music and I was a voice performance major.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Joe.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: Joe, really, really love the voice performance majors.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the things about a voice performance major is you get assigned to a vocal teacher, right?
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: And you spend a significant amount of time on a weekly basis with this professor, learning different pieces, learning different ways in which to sing, learning different techniques.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: And so you start to grow close to this person.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I went to a small school, and so my vocal professor was a PhD, like holding professor, but he also was the opera theater guy, and he also did a couple of other things.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_01: I took German diction with him, right?
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_01: And so I started to get to know him on a very personal uh basis.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: His name is John Thomason, and I adore John Thomason till this day.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but I learned a lot about how to sing in his like presence.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: That's different than high school when you're one of like 40, right?
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_01: But when you have this one-on-one relationship with a professor who's trying to teach you their ways, you start to follow, don't you?
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_01: Also in college, I had a campus minister.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_01: And uh not unlike you.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_01: That's why you're here.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: My campus minister was referred to as a chaplain because I was at a small private school and I got to know him in a pretty intimate way as well.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: I was on the worship team and I was really involved in the ministries, and so I got to connect with him in that way.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: And as I went through college, I started to find myself on two diverging paths toward my future.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: One of them was academic, like I did my bachelor's degree in music, and then I could have gone on to do a master's degree in music, and maybe more.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_01: The world may never know.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: But I started feeling this like stirring in my soul toward the end of college, toward doing something more ministerial-based.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't know which direction to go.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: Do I follow Dr.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: Thomason and what he did and what he wanted me to do?
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: And he clearly wanted me to do that.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: He's connecting me with all these graduate school programs, and he's like showing me how to create an audition tape and submit it and all of these things that you have to do in order to get into the next level of your education.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: And my chaplain sat down with me and he was like, I feel like you're probably called to ministry.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, Isn't that something God's supposed to tell me?
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: You know?
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: And he's like, I really feel like you're called to ministry, and so maybe you should start exploring ministry.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought, that sounds like a waste of money.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: And as we're as we're kind of developing this divergence in my life, I started to have a crisis of self.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: I think a lot of us have had a crisis of self.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_01: If you've ever thought about changing your major, if you've ever been like, maybe this isn't the school for me, if you've ever been like, maybe this isn't the ministry for me.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: We've had a crisis of self.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: All of us have been there.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_01: I was there.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: I sat down with a couple of friends of mine who were like mentors in my life, um, but weren't, you know, there on a day-to-day basis.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, like, I don't, I just, I don't know what to do.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: I was really overwhelmed with life.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: I was getting married, which is awesome.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: Chaotic and amazing and stressful.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: I was doing a senior recital, and somebody was like, you gotta apply to seminary.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought, when?
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: And they basically said last week.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: I thought, well, that's late.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I I found myself articulating this divergence of my path.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: Am I going to go follow Dr.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_01: Thomason's joys and goals for my life?
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: Or am I gonna follow Chaplain Wright's conversation that he had with me?
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: See, have you ever noticed that the academic world can sometimes not be the practical world?
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's hard to see that because your whole lens has been college and or since it has been school since you were two years old.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: All you've ever known is school.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: But I started to find myself in this well, what am I gonna do?
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: All that I've put my energy and effort and money and time into may not be the path I'm gonna go down.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: Start talking to these mentors.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: You know what?
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: They didn't ask me the question that I think I probably would ask you if you were in my office saying this same thing.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_01: I I would ask, like, don't worry about what that professor says, or don't worry about what I say.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_01: Just what do you need to do?
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: What is God calling you to do?
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_01: That would be the conversation that we would have.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: That's not what they asked me in that moment.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: They asked me, Who have you been more formed by?
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_01: And that's a really freaking weird question.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_01: Who have you been more formed by?
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_01: Who have you been more shaped by?
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I started to see this kind of divergence was because there can be a difference between knowing something and becoming something.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: The goal, by the way, in your academic career is for you to find those not as a divergence, but as a connection.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: But how often do we want to know something but not become it?
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: Do you know what I mean?
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: A few weeks ago, I said it is totally possible to get an A in the Bible and an F in Christianity.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I mean.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_01: It is totally possible for you to know something and not have been shaped and formed by it.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: So I've been thinking a lot about discipleship when we're talking about this.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: Because the truth was is I had to answer the question who had discipled me?
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: How had I been changed?
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: Transformed.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_02: How had I been shaped?
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_02: Formed.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: In the Greek it's a completely academic term.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_01: Completely every other evidence of that term disciple is academic in nature.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_01: But Jesus, when he calls the disciples, it's a spiritual term.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: He flips it upside down.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: Or at least brings nuance to it.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_01: You have somebody in your life who has discipled you.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not talking about somebody who just told you something, somebody who showed you something, a professor that you're like, okay, I've got to get through the rigmarole roll of getting the syllabus and learning how to do canvas and getting the assignment submitted and passing the test, studying enough that I can pass the test and then immediately forgetting it right after the test.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I'm not talking about that.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: I'm talking about somebody in your life, whether it's spiritual or academic, who said, Hey, I really care about you and I'm gonna invest in you as a student.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna invest in you as a person.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to invest in you as the disciple.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: They may not have used those terms, but they have done it in your life.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_01: And you have been shaped and transformed and changed by that person.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: You have.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_01: You have, even if you don't know it.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_01: Even if you don't know it.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: Being a disciple is a gift because it means that somebody has invested in you.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: It means that somebody has put their time, their energy, their money, their know-how, their everything into you.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: And they have discipled you.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: In a few weeks, we're going to talk about a program that Wesley does called Dusting.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it's basically based off the idea of following behind somebody so closely.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: This is, it comes from the old rabbis.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_01: You follow behind an old rabbi so closely that the dust from their feet would come onto your body.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_01: And that, like you, when you follow somebody like that, you don't just learn their ideologies, you don't just learn their arguments, you don't just learn the academic stuff.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: You learn what they are, you learn who they are.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: You learn to be more like them.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_01: And that's exactly what Jesus does when he calls the disciples to follow him.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's literally what he says.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: Follow me.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: Period.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: Put away your fishing nets, put away all this stuff, and follow me.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's almost easy like, hey, and could you stay so close to the dust?
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: It's on your robe.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_01: You've had someone in your life that has discipled you.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: You're probably thinking of their name right now.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: In some form or fashion, you're probably thinking of their name right now.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: I would also say something else is true.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_01: You are, whether you know it or not, discipling somebody else.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_01: Again, whether you know it or not, there is somebody, perhaps they're even in this room, but it might not be.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_01: There's somebody who is following so closely to you that they are learning who you are, how you behave, how you act, what you say, what you do.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: And they're then emulating that because that's how humans learn.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus does it with his disciples.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_01: Somebody has done it for you, and so too are you doing it for somebody else.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_01: That last point is freaking scary, is it not?
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: Because when you learn that somebody's following you enough, or you learn that somebody's like like paying enough attention to you, that they're they're like trying to behave like you because they see you and they say, I want to be like Ejack, right?
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_01: They they see you and they say, I want to, I want to be like Joe, right?
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_01: They they see that and they say, I want to be like Aiden, right?
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_01: Like that is a thing where they're they're looking after you and you're like, no, that's too scary.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_01: Couldn't be me.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: No way, couldn't be me.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's scary for me.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_01: The summer, I was finally, after 17 years, ordained as a full connection elder in the United States.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: And elders in the church wear a stole.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_01: Do you know what a stole is, right?
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_01: It's this kind of thing that hangs down, this fabric piece that hangs down.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_01: I'll be honest with you.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_01: I grew up in the modern church.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't grow up United Methodist, and so I was like, I don't, I don't think stoles are for me.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'm more of a blue jean jacket guy.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm not much of a stole guy.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: Not much of a stole guy.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: And the part of the process is you get up there, you answer some historical questions, just like we kind of did the baptism, but there's a lot more of them.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, and then you get down, you finally you kneel in front of the bishop and all the people around you.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: The bishop lays his hands on you, he hopes to remember your name, and then he he ordains you and calls you to go out and make disciples.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_01: So he says go out, perform the sacraments, go out, teach.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_01: That's these are literally the words that he says.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: What he's saying is go out and make disciples.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_01: And then for the very first time in my life.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_01: They put a stole on me.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_01: And I'll be honest with you, I was like, I want to wear this thing.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: I have zero interest in wearing this stall.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: Only because I didn't think it was that cool.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I don't know.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_01: And no jean jacket.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_01: I got up, hand to God, honest truth.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_01: I got up and I felt this like overwhelming weight.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't that heavy of a stool, but I felt this weight, this gravity to this thing that had been placed over my shoulders.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's scary.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_01: But I feel inadequate.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know about you, but I feel like I'm never gonna be as good as that pastor.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_01: And God, I see him all over my Instagram.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_01: You know?
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know about you, but I'm like, I'm never gonna be as faithful as that person who reads their scriptures every day, who knows them inside and out, who prays faithfully.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_01: When I hear somebody pray in a group setting, I'm like, man, why can't I have a faith like that?
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I have been there and I get paid to do it.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_01: I feel inadequate.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so when I hell had this stole on me, I thought, this is heavy.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: Because making disciples is scary.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_02: It's so scary.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: When Jesus is baptized, it's the beginning of his ministry.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: He's baptized in the Jordan.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_01: We read that earlier today.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_01: And when he's baptized by John, the spirit descends like a dove on him.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: And God says something.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: The Father, the Creator, the Almighty, says something to him.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_01: He says, This is my son in whom I am well pleased.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_01: This is my son in whom I am well pleased.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_01: And I said earlier when we were baptizing Tabor, I said, this is the moment in which God claims Jesus.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_01: Isn't it true that so too does God claim you, even when you feel inadequate?
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_01: So your identity is not wrapped up in like how many people can you attract to the Wesley Foundation at FSU.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: And TSC.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: Fly Eagles fly.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: Your identity is not wrapped up into like how good am I reading my Bible?
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: Your identity is not wrapped up into like how many times can I come to Bible study?
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: Although please come.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: Your identity is not wrapped into whether I'm raising my hands in the air during worship or not.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: Your identity is not wrapped up in that.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: Your identity is wrapped up in a God who has claimed you.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_01: And so here's the good news the scary part, the scary part of like, I can't do this, I'm inadequate.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: It was never you in the first place.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: It was only the creator who claimed you and gave you an identity that you could claim for yourself.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: That's the work of grace.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_01: And so there was this moment, I'm holding this stole on me.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I just felt so much angst turn into peace, and I did not have words enough for it.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, to prove my point, I walked from Branskom Auditorium to the Fannon Center, which is where I used to work before I came to FSU, for a party they were throwing for me.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I walked in my black robe, still wearing my stole.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_01: And everybody there was like, you can take that off now.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_01: We're having a party now.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought, uh, this is me.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: This is me.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: I felt this like overwhelming sense of like, I'm not alone.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_01: I was never the one in charge of it.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_01: This ministry is not about Bryant.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_01: This ministry is not about anybody other than Jesus Christ who gives us and sustains us.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_01: You have this calling on your life too.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_01: You might not have the stole calling, but you have the disciple-making calling on your life.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm sorry if you don't want it.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't optional.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_01: It came at your baptism when you were claimed.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: Those of you who aren't baptized there are saying, I can still get out of this.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: Nope.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: It came when you uh welcomed somebody for the first time.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_01: It came when you were sitting like late night at Wesley uh when shenanigans happened, and you were uh just having a conversation that like started really superficial and then it got really deep.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: It it came when you like saw somebody who was like headed to the beach and you're like, Can I come with you?
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_01: And then you guys start talking today.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_01: It happened when you were like, I'm gonna go to Pier Park and do what?
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_01: Eat crickets.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_01: People followed you.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_01: Joe with adequate applause tonight.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_01: Let me tell you share you with this.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_01: Let me encourage you.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_01: There are people following you.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: You probably should watch what you say.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_01: There are people watching you saying, I want to be more like them.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_01: I want to be more like them.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_01: You should honor that.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_01: You should understand the gravitas of that.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_01: And you should say, Lord, help me.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_01: Some people have asked why at Wesley we don't just go pound the pavement and hand out things uh all across campus every day and try to talk to people about the Lord.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_01: You there are churches that exist that do that, and I don't want to uh downplay their work.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_01: But I have always felt that the best evangelism does not happen from trying to get you to pray some prayer on Landis.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_01: The best evangelism comes from one-on-one discipleship from one follower of Jesus to the next.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_01: It is long-term, it is relational, and it takes a lot of work and energy, but isn't that the calling?
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_01: And we do that day to day today.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: If I look at what happened in this ministry over the past five or six years, it wasn't anything I ever did.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_01: And I love our band, but it wasn't them either.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't even any sort of graphics package or Instagram, or it wasn't all the cool photos, it wasn't anything.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_01: What has made this ministry what it is today, and what I hope it becomes in the future, is the one-on-one investment and disciple making that happens when we invest in each other, when we understand the gravitas of our own calling and accept that identity that God gives us at our baptism.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_01: That's what's made this place what it is, and we'll continue to make what it is in the future.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_02: It's a fun calling, it's a fun thing.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: My encouragement is that you don't feel alone in it.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_01: When we announce dusting coming up, I encourage you to sign up.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_01: Be a duster or a dustee, doesn't matter.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: Participate in discipleship.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_01: When you find yourself in a conversation with somebody who's outside of this organization, but in class or something like that, and they're like, Where do you go to church?
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_01: And you're like, Wesley, and they might have thoughts.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_01: There's so many churches, they have thoughts.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_01: But you might say to them, hey, why don't you come and see?
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_01: Haven't we been saying that for the first couple weeks?
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_01: Why don't you come and see?
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then once they come and they see, may they then be invested in as a disciple that you might say, okay, come follow.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_01: Come follow this God.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_01: This ministry will continue to blossom if we all take that so, so, so holy calling so seriously.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_01: We share it with the world.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_01: Not in a way that, like, you know, we're trying to hand out a card and tell them about Jesus on land, but in a way in which we say, Hey, can you can we be friends?
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_01: Can I talk to you about this thing?
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_01: Man, yeah, I remember when I did that.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_01: Can I take you to lunch?
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_01: What about coffee?
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_01: That's the way in which we will continue to make disciples.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_01: Let's pray.