Latest / Leadership Hub / The Healthy Christian Leader - The Most Ministry Transforming Lessons | Reid Stairs

Transcript

The Healthy Christian Leader - The Most Ministry Transforming Lessons | Reid Stairs · Leadership Hub

• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: To invite you into today's conversation with a leader who will share a bit of their life and experience with us.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_01: We hope that it will encourage you, challenge you, and equip you as a leader and Christ model.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: Let's introduce our guest for the day.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: Well, hello, friends, and welcome to the Healthy Christian Leader.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Dwayne Habermel, and I have our guest today, Reed Stairs.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_01: Reed, it is so good to have you on the program today.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_01: And uh particularly because uh you've been a friend for a long, long time ministering here in Halifax and just a real blessing.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: And uh your family have been a real blessing, and and you've got a big birthday coming up that's being celebrated in your family uh this week.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: We do.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: My dad will turn a hundred on Sunday.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: That is incredible.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and the celebration is going to be at the church where he's uh he attends, participates in regularly.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah and uh so yeah, we're looking forward to that.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: That is amazing.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: Now he's been in ministry most of his life, hasn't he?
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: He has, he's been in ministry over 70 years.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: Incredible.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: When was the last time that you heard him speak?
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, uh uh two years ago, I think at when he was they were celebrating his 75 years ordained in the ministry.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: And uh he spoke at the ordination service for the new ordinance that were coming on at Beulah Camp two years ago.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: But he's preached since then, but I have I've only heard that was the last time I heard him live.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: But that would have been at 98 years old, which is absolutely unbelievable.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: And you have uh a son that's in pastoral ministry as well, so it's really a generational and a grandson.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: And a grandson.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: Isn't that incredible?
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: That is uh an incredible thing to watch, you know, God's calling and anointing pass through a family from generation to generation like that.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: It is, it's really amazing.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: And it actually is a great intro to the conversation um we want to have today, because we want to talk about some of the most uh ministry-transforming lessons that you've learned in this leadership journey, because you've been pastoring now for how many years?
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: Uh about 47.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: 47, just a few.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I and I was actually preaching before that, even during university days.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: I filled in at an interim as a in a church.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: So in my 20s, so probably over 50 years total.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: That's amazing.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: So if uh you're looking back over the years of ministry, what are some of the biggest lessons that God's taught you along the way?
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: Well, this could take the rest of the podcast.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, I'm sure.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: Well, the the lessons he's tried to teach me.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not I'm not sure.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: There's a difference between the lessons he's tried to teach me and the lessons I've really learned.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: But uh Yeah, I I think, you know, one of the lessons I think I have tried to learn is that the kingdom of heaven operates very differently than the kingdom of this world.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: And and even at a young age, I can remember Romans 12, 2 was an important verse for me.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: And and I remember my wife and having discussions way back then, like, it seems so often the church is conformed to do things the way the world does it.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: Or our expectations are like the world's expectations for growth and numbers and all of that kind of stuff.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: And just learning over the years that the kingdom of God is far more about relationships and presence and power and glory and transformation than it is about building organizations.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: And they're necessary to facilitate all that, but those aren't the end.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: They're the means to get where he wants us to go.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: And I think trying to learn that and operate in that, because we are so familiar with how to operate uh businesses and schools and organizations from a world's perspective with world's objectives, world's metrics, that trying to learn to do church in a relational presence of God kind of way, with kingdom and mission uh the the whole, you know, he said, pray your kingdom come, your will be done.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: And that that's the mission of the church is to bring the blessings and benefits of the kingdom of heaven to as many people as possible.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: That is a very different perspective, or at least from my way I've seen it, than to build an organization or run a church.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: I remember years ago, one Sunday in the middle of my sermon, God sometimes speaks to me in the middle of my sermons, which is inconvenient because now I've got two things going on.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: But I remember I was preaching and and uh I just felt like I heard the Lord say, I haven't called you to run a church.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: I've called you to be my people and to raise up my people.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: And it was like that was life transforming or missional transforming for me, and began to really uh to work on that.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, so that that's one of them.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: I think um the whole idea of the necessity of the five-fold ministry operating in the church, and that's another whole discussion that uh the the the importance of that.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: I I remember in my younger years thinking I was the pastor, I I had to do everything.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: It was my job to do everything.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: Rather than to see my job as facilitating and making sure everything happens, but that the five-fold ministry uh in the church is so absolutely necessary for health.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: Those are a couple of things.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: So, how did you find that the Holy Spirit shaped that understanding?
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, there are lessons that God taught, but specifically what kind of uh ways did he speak to you in in shaping these ideas and thoughts of the kingdom and its difference from the world?
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that's a really good question because um I I really I find for me the Holy Spirit speaks to me in a multitude of ways.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I mean there's the obvious in prayer and in the word uh being primary, of course, that God that He speaks to me and shapes me, but through people.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the things that I think over the years I've come to appreciate is that the the Holy Spirit is just as wise in a young Christian as he is in an old Christian.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: He's the one that's wise.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: And even like sometimes uh it's amazing to me how children, God has used children, the Holy Spirit spoke, spoke and used what they've been saying or doing to speak into my life.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: That's been an incredible joy, an incredible discovery that that he speaks through the body as well.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: And learning to listen for the Spirit's voice in my leaders, in the people I'm pastoring, in my relationships.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um I remember hearing someone say one time, look for God in every person, every situation, and every moment, and and be alert to that.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I think I've tried to learn that over the years.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: And that is where so often the Spirit speaks to me.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_00: And you know what's fascinating to me is uh sometimes it's in it's not in sermon situations.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I've said this before, it's frustrating to be a preacher sometimes because most of the things I've learned I haven't come through sermons.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's come through people moments.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, someone I remember years ago, a lady uh leading a pre-service prayer time, and she shared something with us, and I could tell you where I was sitting, I could tell you the impact that had on me.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: Isn't that amazing how the Lord uh actually earmarks or marks things in our heart in our mind when you can actually remember specifically where you were sitting?
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like that's the Holy Spirit.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: He got my attention on that one.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: And when he does, and and and when he does, it's that, okay, now how do I listen further and develop that and let him speak into that and shape who I am in my ministry?
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's another whole dimension of that.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's like it's great to hear it, and it's great for him to speak so vividly, like that morning.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: I haven't called you to run a church, but now what does that mean?
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: How do I work that out and live through that?
• 8:50
  unknown: Yeah.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: The um what have you learned about caring for and walking alongside people through different seasons of life in the life of the church?
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that's a big challenge, isn't it?
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, because there's so many seasons.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: There is.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: You know, uh, I mean, I I I think back to one particular day when I did a funeral in the morning and a wedding in the afternoon.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and just that shifting uh totally different seasons for those people, and yet how do you pastor that?
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: How do you walk how do you jump from one environment right into the next and be connected?
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: And be connected, yeah.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: And and that's I think that's a that's a good way to put it is I think in walking with people through those seasons, it's it's genuine being genuinely connected to them where they are.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I think the Jesus with Mary and Martha Lazarus whole thing, he came into that situation and he listened, even when they were saying some pretty critical things.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: Like if you'd have been here and and he didn't respond to that.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: He he he entered into their sorrow and walked with them through it to redemption, which was so powerful.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: And for me, that's my goal.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: How well I do it, I don't know sometimes, but to no matter what season of life someone's in, to genuinely walk into that, connect with them and walk them through it, with them through it, uh to whatever conclusion he decides to bring.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: You know, not rather than trying to engineer it or and and so on.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: I I think I learned fairly early on, because I was a high school guidance counselor at one point in my life before I was a minister, and uh was that people aren't always looking for answers, they're listen looking for someone to listen to them and value what they're going through and not dismiss it.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I think Jesus did that so well.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: So well he just walked into it and valued them and valued what they were going through and let them work through it.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, now that's been a really big theme in your life to actually walk with people versus to try and change people.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that yeah, and that goes back to question number one.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: One of the things that I felt God has tried to teach me is I didn't call you to fix people.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: I called you to walk with people and let me fix them.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: And and let me work through the work of sanctification.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, and recovery and and victory and deliverance and all of those things.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: He does it.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: And and my calling, like I I remember feeling so frustrated at one time in my ministry that I I wasn't seeing people change.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: It was like, God, I'm trying so hard to get them to change.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: And it was like, well, then stop it, because that's not your job.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: That's my job to do the transformation.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: Your job is to to love them and walk in relationship with them and present the word and and prayer and so on to the so that I can do the work.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: Well, when God brought that lesson into the life of your ministry, how did you see the fruit change?
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_01: How did you see the difference and peop how people responded?
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I think, well, first of all, it was really somewhat discouraging because when I began to to change how I did that ministry, they got real.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like all and uh I was hearing things I wasn't really wanting to hear.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: And it was and they were exposing messes in their lives because they felt they felt they they could trust me.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they were safe.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: I wasn't going to try and condemn them or judge them or fix them or or whatever.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: And so it was wonderful because there was a genuineness there in the relationships, but it was it it sometimes felt a lot more messy.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_01: Is it hard to get there as a pastor when you have that sense of call to be you know bringing the word and bringing truth and bringing the gospel and bringing transformation?
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: Is it a hard place to get to?
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: You have to give up measuring your pastoral ministry success by uh the metrics of our world.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: Numbers and and programs and all of that sort of thing.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: And uh but in the end, I saw so much more transformation happening in people's lives.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: Genuine transformation.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: Uh where it seems it I felt like when I'm in ministry and it's my job to fix people and make it run smooth and make it look good.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the people were were hiding behind masks.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: And it may have looked fairly good, but it wasn't as genuine.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: But once those masks came off, and and once people began to relate and be honest and genuine in relationships, um you you can then walk with the mess.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like it wasn't it's not as much fun.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: I would rather just relate to you as a good friend and we all laugh and have a great time and pretend we're all doing spiritually well.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: But when my parishioner, my friend, sits down and begins to share where they really are spiritually and realize we're walking in a mess here, uh, but they give what the potential is then for the God to do a genuine work in their life.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: How did you see that kind of ministry reflected in Jesus?
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I mean, I I think Jesus it's it's like he uh I mean he just modeled it so well.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: Everything was about relationship with him.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: Everything was about relationship with his disciples and and with the people he connected with and meeting them where they were and walking through them with it.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I mean, like, I mean, like you look at Peter and the incredible messes he got himself into, yeah and the failure and so on.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: But we see Jesus on the beach with Peter and going, You still love me?
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: And and he was willing I I I would say this, I think.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus had a genuine trust that his father would bring to fulfillment whatever the purpose was.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I think if I can walk in relationships with people in my church, and even though it seems messy or it's taken a long time or they've fallen off the wagon again, but to believe that God will fulfill his purpose, he will get the work done in them, uh, and that I'm just part of that.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm I have this privilege of joining him in that ministry, whether I see the fulfillment of it or not, all of a sudden it becomes a joy of partnering with him rather than trying to do something for him.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: Does that make sense?
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: It does.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: And it's really trusting God's work in them.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, do I trust the Holy Spirit and his capacity to do the work in the life of another?
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: And he may not do it the way I think it should be.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: I remember hearing Jerry Cook say one time, uh a pastor from the West, and he said, he said, your job as a pastor is to find out what God's doing in the other in their life and partner with him in that, not what you think he should be doing in their life.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_00: Because, you know, yeah, your agenda may not be his agenda.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_01: How has your understanding of leadership changed throughout the years in ministry?
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think that that's been a fairly significant shift for me over the years, uh, in that initially, and we've sort of touched on this, but initially I'm I kind of felt like I was being called and paid to do it all.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I mean, of course, I look back when I started the ministry.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: I led this, I taught a Sunday school class, I led the music, I preached the sermon.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like and and and then and the Sunday morning and then Sunday night, you did the same thing again.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_00: You picked the songs, you led the music, you did every all of that.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_00: But it it there was a sense of you're you're here to do, to run the church.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I over the years I I really feel there was a shift in that I began to understand, no, I'm here to facilitate all of that, but it takes a team.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I think, you know, and and this goes back to to Aaron ministries back when we were about years ago talking about Ephesians 4 so strongly, the the five-fold ministry, the graces.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and that really helped shape me to understand I'm not all five, for sure, but I need to make sure that in my church, all five of those ministries, those grace gifts are being expressed in order for there to be health in the body.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_00: That was a major shift for me.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_00: To then begin looking at it, how can I make sure that there is prophetic ministry and evangelistic ministry and so on?
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I remember in that conversation many years ago, as if you've got a problem and you're a carpenter, the solution to everything is a nail.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and uh and uh you know basically uh we tend to see things through the view or the lens of our gifting, yeah, and the solutions through our gifting.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: Well, if you're a prophet, uh you know, that doesn't necessarily bring the uh pastoral lens uh or the evangelistic lens or whatever the case may be.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: So it really brings a health and a balance to the life of the church, doesn't it?
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, absolutely.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh you know, and that was for me uh the the example of that for me was that when I came to understand and and realize my primary gift is not pastor.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: I think I learned to do pastoral things quite well, but it wasn't my primary gifting.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_00: And when I realized that that this my church needs the pastoral gift to be operating, and and how we produ did it was we uh raised up cell group leaders, small group leaders, and we chose people who had pastoral giftings to do that.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_00: And the people began to feel pastored to a gr much greater level.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, and so that was for me an example of how that actually worked out.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: So tell me about trusting God and patience and ministry.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: I tell I don't have any patience.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like it's uh you know, when you're um like you stepped out uh to plant a church and started from scratch.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you basically had to trust the Lord for the revenue, you had to trust the Lord for the people.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, you've had experiences of real trust and also being needing to be patient.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: You know, tell me about that.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_00: Well, like I said, patience isn't my gift thing.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: My wife said to me the other day, she got in the car, we've been talking about something anyway, and she said, I didn't marry you for your patience.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's true.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: I I mean I'm a get it done, get it done now kind of person.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_00: And and in ministry, that's that's that's a challenge because often things take far longer than you want or expect.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and that trusting uh trusting thing is uh that I I think I have really learned uh that God will get things done and that it's not all up to me.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_00: I I'm a partner in it, but I'm a partner, I'm not the the leader of the thing.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I I I the older I get, the more confident I am that I can trust him.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I wish that I could somehow at 30 have had the same level of trust that God will get his thing work done that I do as I do now, you know.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like my my dad a few years ago, uh uh he and I had been to a service, I'd preached, and and afterwards he said, Reed, why didn't we I know some of this stuff when I was 30?
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_00: He was 90, you know.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I've said, Yeah, that's that's the challenge for all of us, isn't it?
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_00: It's like now I feel at 76 I'm ready to pastor.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, but yeah, I I think learning to trust him brings us to a place of rest.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_00: It takes the drivenness out of it.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, tell us more about that.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah, I mean I think and for me, I I certainly was there for many years, this drivenness to make it happen and the sense of failure when it didn't.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: And it just it's a spiral we get into, and then you work harder and it just but when I say I'm gonna do what he's called me to do, I'm gonna be faithful, but I can trust that he will bring the fruit that he wants to bring out of it.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: Uh there is a wonderful sense of rest there, of of it's not up to me.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_00: And and all of a sudden that drivenness goes.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: I I think I think that many pastors experience burnout because of that.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: That drivenness.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_01: So it would be a weight or an expectation that's falsely upon them internally.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: That burns them out through drivenness.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: And and I mean the reality is our whole our whole kingdom of this world reinforces that drivenness.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: Hebrews talks about entering God's rest.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: Work hard to enter the rest.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: In Hebrews it says.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: Tell me more.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: Which is interesting.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: Like I mean, I think he's I I think he's saying if you're going to put your energy into something, put it into learning to trust me.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: And be in such relationship with me that you can be at rest in all of this.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's so good.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: You can quit working it.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like I think he was saying that, you know, work hard at it.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: He was gonna, it's that important.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: If you're gonna give yourself to something, give it to trusting me and building relationship with me so that you can walk in a rested position.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: What are some lessons about ministry that you hope the next generation of leaders can learn from your experience?
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think you know, I think it falls along with what we've just been talking about.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um that I I I sometimes talk about rest as being a relaxed intensity.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: I remember hearing that uh an athletic coach was talking about if he could get his athletes to run the race with a relaxed intensity.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_00: If they just are intense, their muscles get tightened up, they the stride becomes mechanical, and but if and if they're too relaxed, then they're they're they're just gonna jog along.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_00: But if somehow you can have a relaxed intensity, and and I would love to see that among young leaders that that when you go into ministry, run with a relaxed intensity about this.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: A rest in God, a trust in God, but give it your best shot.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_01: So it's like energy without tension.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, Paul, I think Paul said to him, he said, I struggle with all his energy.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I work hard, but it's with his an energy that he supplies, a grace that he supplies, not with my own um my own motivation, my own drivenness to get it done.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: Now, Reed, do you think that when we're walking in a position of spiritual rest that we actually have more resource available to us?
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: In terms of everything, pretty much.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that that's well said.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_00: I I absolutely I I feel like if I can get rid of all the stuff that I'm trying to do and the the expectations that I have for myself and so on, it makes room for his resources.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: If I'm saying, okay, God, I got this, it's okay, then I'm but when I say I haven't got this, fill me with your resources, then then it yeah, it makes room for that.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it's a good place to be.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: It's such a good place to be.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: Because all of a sudden, ministry becomes not a burden and a crushing load, but it becomes this incredible adventure.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: And joy.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_00: And joy.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_01: It really is.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: We've got just about a minute or so left, but what is one ministry lesson that you find yourself coming to back uh again and again?
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I think uh these days maybe it's the kingdom of heaven thing.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's it's coming back to understand what the kingdom of heaven is and what the mission is uh as my individual calling in the kingdom of heaven and the church's calling in the kingdom of heaven.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: And just keep coming back to that and back to that and saying it's not the kingdom of this world, it's not gonna look like the kingdom of this world, we're not gonna use kingdom of this world principles to get there.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and just keep coming back to that.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: And then the other one I would say is for me learn to know who you are in Christ.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_01: Boy, that's a big one.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: Oh huge.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_00: I I got you know, it's it's I gotta be quick here, but at Jesus' baptism, the father said, This is my son, yeah, in whom I take great delight.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he'd done nothing, he'd never preached a sermon, you know, healed, nothing.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: But and then the devil, what's the devil's first thing?
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: If you are the son of God.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but if as a new people coming into ministry, if we can know who we are in Christ.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's a powerful lesson.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's a powerful lesson.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Reed stares, folks.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: Reed, it's been great to have you here on the program.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: And we've got another one coming up.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_01: And I can't uh wait to share more uh with our friends in our conversation.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: So we'll see you next time on the Healthy Christian Leader.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_01: Well, thanks for joining this conversation.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_01: I trust that you were encouraged and challenged by the stories and experiences that were shared today.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: Would you join us next week?
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: You can find new episodes weekly in video form on the Aaron Ministries YouTube page and in audio form wherever you get your podcast.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_01: Erin Ministries is an interdenominational network of friends and ministries with a mission to foster healthy.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_01: Check out our website.