Latest / The Christian Podcast Community / #102 - When Your Church Doesn’t Share Your Heart for Evangelism (Part 3)
Transcript
- 0:00So this is part three of working through an email we got from one of our listeners,
- 0:06pastor's wife, Erica. And we're picking up here about halfway through
- 0:13the email. And one of the things we're looking at today is when people push
- 0:20back, when there seems to be discouragement that comes into the equation.
- 0:25We've covered a lot.
- 0:27Read the email in the first episode.
- 0:28If you didn't catch part one, you really should go back and listen to it.
- 0:32And then part two, and this is part three.
- 0:35But let's dig into how do we work through these issues in a church setting.
- 0:41We are all, hopefully, all of us,
- 0:44part of a church family. And if you haven't had these issues,
- 0:49you probably one day will or be in a church that will.
- 0:52How do we biblically work through these situations?
- 0:59Welcome to Gospel Talks Podcast,
- 1:00where we help Christians all over the world become more effective
- 1:04in relational evangelism and discipleship.
- 1:06My name is George Binoca, and with me today is Jeff Musgrave,
- 1:10the author and founder of The Exchange.
- 1:12And Jeff, how are you? I really excited.
- 1:15You showed me the cover of your the newest book coming out,
- 1:18a new book that you just finished.
- 1:20Do you want to tell us a little bit about that?
- 1:23It's just volume two Conversations with Jesus.
- 1:25So we the the first conversation with Jesus dealt with the first twelve chapters
- 1:30of the book of John. And this deals with the latter part of the book.
- 1:34So you've got the upper room discourse.
- 1:37you've got the beautiful prayer that Jesus prayed.
- 1:41We call it the great high priestly prayer,
- 1:43the arrest, which is exciting all by itself,
- 1:47watching Jesus say, I am, and everybody fall over backwards.
- 1:50the the trials, the death and resurrection of Jesus,
- 1:54the restoration of Peter. I I I really feel like Paul or John put that
- 1:59as kind of the climax so that we could all see this is what the ministry
- 2:05of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ provides.
- 2:08And then it we end the book by looking at Peter
- 2:13in his restored role preaching at at Pentecost.
- 2:18And seeing what God does through restored believers,
- 2:21praise the Lord, God's a a God of second chances.
- 2:25Amen. I love that. That's one of my favorite passages there.
- 2:29so let's dig right into this email again.
- 2:33been praying for Erica and her husband,
- 2:36been praying for this church, been thinking about them a lot as we've kind
- 2:39of worked through this content.
- 2:41you know, there was a comment here in the email,
- 2:44just read it for you. Somebody came to them and basically started pushing back
- 2:48and saying, Why aren't you organizing
- 2:50Door knockings, which is to say,
- 2:52that's the method I prefer. Why aren't you doing stuff like that?
- 2:55And when they would encourage the people towards personal evangelism,
- 2:59people just seemed really uninterested.
- 3:02and the question I think we should start with today:
- 3:04what does a pastor do when his people criticize the evangelism methods he's using
- 3:10and not showing interest in evangelizing themselves?
- 3:14They want to be part of a group,
- 3:15but they don't actually themselves want to do it.
- 3:17Personally one on one with anybody.
- 3:19Yeah. I think anytime someone starts criticizing us as pastors,
- 3:23it's important for us to check our own heart,
- 3:27kind of recheck our own methods,
- 3:30make sure that we're we're doing what what we believe God is calling us to do.
- 3:35I think the very first instinct is I've been attacked,
- 3:40I gotta I've gotta respond. I gotta I've gotta it's it's kind of like that fight
- 3:44or flight. And most of us are pretty good at fighting.
- 3:47And I ask ask God, do you want me to to think about new things?
- 3:54Should I should I look for a new direction or should I look for confirmation
- 4:00of what I'm doing? I just feel like it I think I've used this with you before.
- 4:05One of the things that I've learned in the last couple of years that
- 4:09has just really radically changed the way I try to think.
- 4:14And it's this very, very simple statement,
- 4:17I might be wrong. Now that doesn't mean
- 4:19Mm.
- 4:19I am, but but I think that every single time there's a conflict,
- 4:25we have to ask ourselves, am I wrong?
- 4:27And and and so I feel like that's kind of the first thing we have to
- 4:32do is is re-examine our our own selves.
- 4:35but then
- 4:35Hm.
- 4:36secondly, man, there's nothing like
- 4:40new life to squelch complaints.
- 4:45so pray for personal fruit.
- 4:49John fifteen verse sixteen,
- 4:53Jesus said, I chose you and appointed you that you should
- 4:58go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide.
- 5:02And and the the beautiful picture that I see here is that every single one of us
- 5:07whether we're a shepherd or whether a sheep,
- 5:09of course all of us are sheep,
- 5:11is that we would go and bear fruit and that our fruit would would stay.
- 5:17The the I the word abide here means to remain.
- 5:20It's it's they're literally remaining in following Jesus.
- 5:25And so I I feel like if we see personal fruit,
- 5:30it's gonna change everything. So what do you think
- 5:32Amen.
- 5:32about that, George?
- 5:34I think you're exactly right. I think churches get into bit
- 5:37bit bickering when you're not doing the mission what you're supposed to be doing.
- 5:41and so if you're really heavily engaged in what you're supposed to be doing,
- 5:44accomplishing mission, that kind of goes away because you're too busy to be,
- 5:49you know, that's when you have idle hands,
- 5:51and those are the devil's workshop.
- 5:52I think too, as pastors and leaders,
- 5:55just speaking to myself here.
- 5:57Sometimes people, their starting point is not my ideal starting point for them.
- 6:01I want them to start at my starting point.
- 6:03And what the people may be saying is,
- 6:05this is what we've known and what we're comfortable with.
- 6:08And a good teacher says, okay,
- 6:09we can start here, but let me start you here and I'm gonna create a plan
- 6:13to get you over here. I'm gonna teach you along the way.
- 6:17and so a starting point's a starting point.
- 6:19You know, it doesn't matter 10 miles behind target or 25 miles behind target.
- 6:24As long as we start walking in the right direction,
- 6:26I think it's gonna that's the important thing.
- 6:29Yeah, absolutely. I it's something else that I thought that I'd really like
- 6:33to bring up in this episode and flesh it out a little bit from time to time.
- 6:37I if if a pastor would pray for one partner and then have
- 6:44the two of them pray together for one person that they could lead
- 6:50to Christ and begin to disciple that
- 6:53that that really is the beginning of the reset for culture.
- 6:58And and if instead of thinking about how do I change this whole church,
- 7:04if we can just say, Lord, give me one partner,
- 7:07and I think prayer is the key,
- 7:09that we can pray together and then begin to see fruit together.
- 7:14Hmm. I I do love that. And I think there's a humble confidence
- 7:18in what you're talking about. The general attitude with which you're you're kind
- 7:22of setting up here and and what you're saying would be the response is not
- 7:26a my way or the highway, you know,
- 7:29kind of, but a, hey, let me model it for you because I'm really confident that this
- 7:33works. But I have the humility to hear you say,
- 7:36I'd like something different and mean not to get defensive about it.
- 7:40I I think the other question we could ask here is how should a pastor respond when
- 7:45we hear because this kind of grinds on my gears.
- 7:47That's not how we've always done it.
- 7:50And it's kinda like, well, my attitude sometimes is not good when
- 7:53I hear that because I think the way you've done it is really bad.
- 7:56It's like it you should have turned the page five years ago.
- 7:59But anyway.
- 8:00Anyway, actually we
- 8:01should have turned a page 15 years ago.
- 8:03Yeah, I know.
- 8:04Yeah.
- 8:04that phrase, we ain't never done it that way before,
- 8:08is the recurring theme in churches.
- 8:11And frankly, older congregations and many of our churches are aging.
- 8:16And I I I feel like we have to be patient with those people.
- 8:20Those are the people who built this church,
- 8:22those are the people who are faithful.
- 8:25Who
- 8:25are currently keeping things vibrant.
- 8:28And you you don't want to push them away.
- 8:33at the same time, they are people who are very zealous for this church to thrive.
- 8:38And so I I feel like a good I don't know,
- 8:42challenge for them is you know,
- 8:45if if that's working for you.
- 8:48Then by all means keep doing that.
- 8:50But if we're
- 8:51Mm-hmm.
- 8:51not seeing what we want to be seeing,
- 8:55then let's talk about some changes we could make that God would be pleased with.
- 9:00And I I
- 9:01Mm.
- 9:01feel like rather than thinking about,
- 9:03man, we gotta get with the culture.
- 9:06We gotta, because we recognize there's a lot of ugly things with the culture.
- 9:10And ~
- 9:10Mm.
- 9:11and
- 9:12It feels like we're just giving ground all the time.
- 9:14And so people are thinking in terms of I d I'm tired of giving ground.
- 9:19I don't want to change anymore.
- 9:21And and if we can instead of talking about let's get with the culture,
- 9:25if we can start thinking in terms of what kind of changes could we
- 9:30be making that God would be pleased with and really be talking about
- 9:34the stuff that God wants us doing as opposed to what would practically work better.
- 9:40Couldn't have even said it better myself.
- 9:43And anyway, I'm not even going to try to add to it.
- 9:45I think that's exactly right. You don't want to throw away people along the way.
- 9:49You don't want sacrifice one generation to gain another.
- 9:52And I think that's a mistake some pastors and and leaders,
- 9:55Christians, make. And so it's like,
- 9:56nope. I think listening and then guiding lovingly,
- 10:00and it takes time. It just takes time.
- 10:02It's not going to happen. You can't snap your fingers and people have been doing
- 10:06it a certain way for 40 years.
- 10:08are not just gonna change in forty seconds.
- 10:12it it takes lots of time, love,
- 10:14prayer, teaching.
- 10:15Yeah.
- 10:15one of the things I love about our relationship,
- 10:17George, is that we're from two different generations and we look at things very,
- 10:22very similarly. And it's because we're looking at the Bible and we're looking
- 10:25at the Lord and we're both willing to ask the question,
- 10:29How could I do this better? And if we can help people see that,
- 10:33I what I am not willing to do is to ride the the boat into
- 10:40the ocean floor. I mean, I
- 10:42Yeah.
- 10:42I really do believe we have to make adjustments.
- 10:47We we have to figure out how do we reach this world we live in.
- 10:52But let's do it in a gentle and kind and compelling way.
- 10:56Yeah, I think you're right. I say this all the time to our staff here.
- 11:00No sacred cows. If if something's not working,
- 11:03you really do need to stop. because you have to be a steward of God's resources,
- 11:08but there are different measures of value too.
- 11:13So for instance, sometimes the measure of value of something is that
- 11:17it builds the people that are in it,
- 11:18even though it may not attract people that are unsaved,
- 11:21you know, it it
- 11:22It encourages the people that are in it.
- 11:24So you just have to look at the whole equation in the big picture as
- 11:28a leader and say, okay, how am I edifying God's people?
- 11:31How are we evangelizing the lost?
- 11:33How are we lifting God's name up and and try to do all those things principally?
- 11:38Now, is there a danger in constantly creating more evangelism programs?
- 11:45Because over the years you know this.
- 11:47You cause
- 11:47We are you this is the exchange.
- 11:49I it's we're talking about evangelism.
- 11:51But there is a hundred of these programs,
- 11:54and there's ones I haven't even heard of.
- 11:56and but what is the danger of of creating more and more programs this night,
- 12:02that night, this program, that program,
- 12:03and but for people who aren't personally evangelizing,
- 12:07who aren't engaging in that relational form?
- 12:10Yeah, I I think the whole concept of programs is
- 12:14a concept that the in the culture we live in has to be rethought.
- 12:21we have to programmatically go at things or we will never accomplish anything.
- 12:26But when we think in terms of programs,
- 12:28for instance, the the church that I pastored for a long,
- 12:32long time, we
- 12:34had a Tuesday night. I used to do Monday night,
- 12:37but the people told me Monday night football is a problem.
- 12:40Tuesday night, we would go out and we would visit people that came to our church.
- 12:45We would have different ways of making contacts.
- 12:48that was our evangelism program.
- 12:51And I began to realize that what we were doing,
- 12:54we were pulling people away from their very best contextual
- 13:00connections with the unbelievers,
- 13:02which is their neighborhoods, their workplaces,
- 13:05their sporting events, where they exercise at the gym.
- 13:08You know, the the and and so rather than having a program,
- 13:14what we decided to do is how can we programmatically help people utilize
- 13:20the context that they live in
- 13:23And to be able to find the people that God is placing in their paths.
- 13:27What we try to do at the exchange is provide tools and training that
- 13:33are going to be effective for them
- 13:37in that non-program approach.
- 13:41So in other words, if I'm gonna ask my
- 13:45Head
- 13:45deacon who has never led anybody to Christ,
- 13:47to go and talk to his neighbor.
- 13:50I've got to give him a tool that's gonna make that conversation effective.
- 13:54So that's what the tools and training is all about.
- 13:57But you know this,
- 13:58Yeah. Yeah.
- 13:59George. Better curriculum is never gonna change heart.
- 14:03And what
- 14:03Yes.
- 14:04we have to do more than anything else,
- 14:06not thinking programs.
- 14:08a aim at heart and heart change.
- 14:10That's really the issue. Because the the the last part of your question
- 14:14is if they how are we going to actually add more and more programs
- 14:18for people who aren't personally evangelizing?
- 14:19If they're not personally evangelizing,
- 14:21we've we've got to get at that heart issue.
- 14:24Yep. Yep. And i it you're usually gonna find it's fear.
- 14:28they think they're responsible for something they're not.
- 14:31we're just all we're responsible to be is counted faithful to do the right thing.
- 14:35and doing the right thing is taking the chance,
- 14:38taking a risk that we just did two part series on that.
- 14:41You know, are playing it too safe with evangelism?
- 14:43What does it look like to take risks for the gospel?
- 14:46and and I would encourage you to go back and listen to that.
- 14:48Now I know this
- 14:50As a pastor, you've known this.
- 14:52There comes a point, it's like you've created opportunities and you've
- 14:55put it there on the nine yard line.
- 14:57You've brought Jeff in and you've done the series,
- 15:02you've done the seminar, you've got the books and they know and they should know
- 15:06and they've been trained, but they just don't.
- 15:08At what point do you start just going to people one on one and being like,
- 15:12Hey, what what's the problem?
- 15:15How can I help you? Can I challenge you?
- 15:16Can I encourage you? How do you do that?
- 15:18How do you finagle that as a leader?
- 15:20Yeah, well i i frankly, I actually think that the very first step oughta
- 15:25be aimed at individuals, not the congregation.
- 15:27it it has I it has been said, if a pastor and his leadership are together,
- 15:34the church is gonna be fine. And so start with your leadership,
- 15:38help them and I this is not a nice
- 15:44church word, but I think people understand what I mean.
- 15:46Get help them to buy in. help them to to say,
- 15:49this is, I want to do this myself.
- 15:52I I want to move this direction.
- 15:54I want to set this example. You know,
- 15:56I I've known pastors who preach a message kind of aimed
- 16:02at an individual problem rather than talking to the individual that
- 16:07has this individual problem. That
- 16:09That is never healthy. I I feel like talking to individuals is number
- 16:16one the biblical pattern, but number two the most effective pattern.
- 16:19I've told you I wanted to talk about this kind of repeatedly through this episode.
- 16:23if if every pastor had a single partner that you
- 16:29and I are that are are
- 16:32Prayer
- 16:32partners and discipleship focused people.
- 16:35we're gonna be disciple makers together and then let it spread from there.
- 16:38Mm. Mm.
- 16:39I I really feel
- 16:40like all of this conversation we're having will go away.
- 16:43we just start with one. And so yeah,
- 16:45go browbeating people from the pulpit is never a an effective means
- 16:51of of motivation. Finding an individual who will go with me.
- 16:55in terms of my my strategies,
- 16:58th this that's what I want to try to do.
- 17:01I think you're exactly right. just grab somebody and start.
- 17:05You're gonna create a club. it's gonna be the best kind of fishing club
- 17:09in the world. you're gonna get the best kind of fish.
- 17:11it kind of let leads right into our next question,
- 17:14which is because I've noticed this,
- 17:16you've noticed it too. We've all had that awkward,
- 17:18what do they call it? The floor meeting,
- 17:20where everybody's looking at the floor because there's somebody up
- 17:23in the pulpit frustrated.
- 17:25combative, just you know, red in the face.
- 17:28And I'll ask you how how had a few times,
- 17:31because you've encountered a lot of people in the seminars.
- 17:33I don't travel on the road. You know,
- 17:35you and Anna do all the traveling.
- 17:37And so you guys go to all these different churches.
- 17:39How do you protect your heart from becoming frustrated or cynical or combative?
- 17:44Because we ran into pastors like that who are a little,
- 17:48I don't know, just out of their wits a little bit about it.
- 17:50And and so they just kinda maybe almost have on the verge of giving up.
- 17:53But but how have you guarded against that?
- 17:56Well, I I think the very first thing is what I am hungry for is not what's best
- 18:02for me as the the leader, really not even what's best for the church organization.
- 18:08When I start working down on the level of what is best for each person that
- 18:14I'm trying to minister to, you know,
- 18:16God wants every single human to be fruitful and to reproduce themselves spiritually.
- 18:22And when I want the best for what's best for my people and and and then
- 18:27I pursue that with them in love,
- 18:30then this is not about me. It's not about what I'm trying to get our church to do.
- 18:35It's about how can I help you be the very best that God wants you to be.
- 18:41And I love you. I want the best for you.
- 18:43I think it goes way back to we've covered this in the past,
- 18:47right? You teach this in the seminars.
- 18:49The show and tell, right? There there's an aspect of just show them.
- 18:55You know,
- 18:55Yeah.
- 18:55you you hear something described to you,
- 18:57you know, it's described over and over and over again.
- 19:00Okay, like for instance, in the Bible,
- 19:01Israel is described over and over again,
- 19:03the topography and you've heard it all in messages.
- 19:05But if you went there, if you actually got to see it with your eyes,
- 19:09I mean that changes things. It's like
- 19:12That's what that is. I I think it's the same thing sometimes.
- 19:16We have to be willing to just,
- 19:18like you said, find a partner,
- 19:19just go start showing what that's all about.
- 19:22and I think that instead of being discouraged or letting our energy
- 19:28get deflated that way, because we need to deal with the topic
- 19:31of a pastor's discouragement here in a second,
- 19:34instead of letting our energy go to that,
- 19:36I think our energy is better spent on I'm just gonna go start doing that.
- 19:40And let it build its own momentum,
- 19:42let it become its own thing. So what would you say?
- 19:46I I I think I know what I would say,
- 19:48but what would you say to the pastor who has poured years into his church
- 19:52and it feels like nothing's happened?
- 19:55Well, let me say first of all to our listeners who are not pastors,
- 19:59please pray for your pastor. number one,
- 20:02it's a hard job, but number two,
- 20:04it's for your own well being that you that your pastor is encouraged
- 20:08and healthy spiritually. I mean,
- 20:10it's it's gonna bless the entire church.
- 20:12So be a relentless encourager to your pastor.
- 20:15I mean, when you hear your pastor preach a
- 20:18message that stirs your heart.
- 20:20Don't just say a good message,
- 20:22but find the one thing that really spoke to you.
- 20:24Speak it back into his ears. I mean let him know that that he's being effective.
- 20:30it it's it's hard. I don't know that I totally understand it,
- 20:35but people feel very, very welcome to share all their complaints with their
- 20:42pastor and
- 20:43it it what I would love to encourage everyone in our audience to do is
- 20:49to be the person who is gonna be I'm I'm gonna be the encourager of my pastor.
- 20:54I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be the one who lifts him up in prayer
- 20:57and is constantly helping him.
- 20:58for the pastor who has been faithful without a lot of earthly success,
- 21:04I would just
- 21:04Mm-hmm.
- 21:05simply say to you, you are in good company.
- 21:08Yeah.
- 21:10I look at John the Baptist, I look at the prophet Jeremiah.
- 21:14if if you want more not biblical examples,
- 21:19Adaniram Judson. I mean, I I think by the time he left Burma he
- 21:25had about a hundred people that in and this is a lifetime of ministry that he'd seen
- 21:31saved, it did
- 21:32grow
- 21:33from there and the little bit of a seed that was planted blossomed over
- 21:38the the century next century. but I think it's it's important
- 21:42to recognize that what God wants from us is to be faithful
- 21:49and to recognize
- 21:49Mm-hmm.
- 21:50that this is what ministry is.
- 21:53I mean I I
- 21:55Hate to say it, but this is what victory looks like.
- 21:57When we are continuing to do what is the right thing to do in
- 22:02the face of discouragement and battle,
- 22:03that's what victory
- 22:04Yep.
- 22:05looks like.
- 22:06Yep. Yeah. I think and we could talk about this here for a second,
- 22:11and because how do we measure that faithfulness when we when we don't
- 22:16see the result? But I think there's a tendency on our part.
- 22:19we tend to go towards the quantitative because it's quantifiable versus
- 22:25the qualitative. And and in ministry,
- 22:27I we're actually supposed to be
- 22:29much more focused on the qualitative things,
- 22:32the things that we do because they're the right thing to do,
- 22:34it's a good thing to do. And I mean good like God is good.
- 22:37it's the biblical thing to do.
- 22:39those are the things that we should be focused on.
- 22:43you know, if I build the people with the truth of God's word,
- 22:47they will build the church instead of focusing on how do I just skip that step
- 22:52and make the church bigger.
- 22:54and I think it's really important,
- 22:55like Adnan Aram Judson said, I have to be faithful,
- 22:59willing to be faithful enough and keep sowing,
- 23:01sowing, sowing, even when I'm but so so much so that I don't
- 23:06see the results springing up out of the ground until I'm in the ground myself.
- 23:10And
- 23:10Yeah.
- 23:10so that's the kind of leadership that Jesus Christ taught because at the
- 23:15end of his life, what he had twelve,
- 23:17well, eleven disciples, maybe a hundred and twenty followers in total.
- 23:23But out of that sprung a huge revival.
- 23:26~ yeah. yeah.
- 23:27Turn the world upside down. Yeah.
- 23:28So literally.
- 23:30So how would you how
- 23:31would you say how do you measure the faithfulness when a guy is
- 23:34not seeing the metrics he wants?
- 23:37I I you know, I agree with you that
- 23:40Quality versus quantity. I I really do think that's valuable.
- 23:44Having said that, sometimes you don't even see the quality coming that you want.
- 23:49I think
- 23:49Sure.
- 23:50another key is for me personally to constantly be innovative,
- 23:55you know, always fresh. In other words,
- 23:57don't don't let it become stale and I Anna and I
- 24:02This is not nice, but we've seen a lot of people,
- 24:04they're just doing church. They're doing the same thing this week
- 24:06Mm.
- 24:07that they did last week, and they're faithful.
- 24:09and faithful, yes, but I believe it is appropriate for us to ask
- 24:14God for innovative ideas, to ask God to keep us fresh,
- 24:19to be genuinely spirit empowered,
- 24:21to be spirit led, to be hardworking.
- 24:25quite frankly, some of our problems are self-inflicted and we we can't just keep
- 24:32doing the same thing and expecting different res results.
- 24:36We we've we've got to figure out what can we do that would be helpful
- 24:42in this situation.
- 24:44Yeah. I we just I love the way you put that.
- 24:47We just can't be scared to take risks and innovate.
- 24:50I think about Jonathan and his sword bearer.
- 24:52There's two swords in all of Israel.
- 24:54Just two. And they could have thought the mentality could have been
- 24:58a scarcity mentality of, well,
- 24:59because there's only two swords,
- 25:01we better not take chance with these.
- 25:03Instead,
- 25:03Yeah.
- 25:04Jonathan's like, Well, there's a Philistine camp right up there,
- 25:07and there's only two of us with swords.
- 25:09Let's go take it. And they go take it.
- 25:10Well now there's thirty swords in Israel because they took a chance with those
- 25:14two swords. And so this is that multiplication model you talk about all the time.
- 25:18It's why we teach that. Is because that multiplication by one
- 25:22on one multiplication is far more powerful extrapolated than just
- 25:27the one guy who has all the talent in the world and you know is winning lots
- 25:32of people by himself. is
- 25:35Just go start swinging the sword and take a risk and watch God bless.
- 25:39Yeah. I I haven't talked about this yet,
- 25:42George, and
- 25:43don't think it's wrong at some point to ask God if it's time for a new assignment.
- 25:50I I think I think it's not wrong to look to God for change.
- 25:57I mean address change. I I I've often heard said God gives
- 26:02us itchy feet before he
- 26:04Mm.
- 26:04gives us a new assignment.
- 26:06And so I think it's okay to do that.
- 26:09I here's the here's the warning.
- 26:11Don't run in front of him.
- 26:14~ don't
- 26:15Mm.
- 26:16don't just get discouraged and say,
- 26:18I quit. but I don't think it's wrong for a pastor who's really felt like he's done
- 26:24everything to to ask, is it is it time?
- 26:28I I think you're right. very wise advice.
- 26:30especially don't run in front of him.
- 26:33we have to be willing to wait in the waiting room for as long as it takes
- 26:36God to get to us, to be ready for us.
- 26:40next week, I think this is where we should start off next week.
- 26:43How do we all of us keep our pastors from becoming bitter toward people
- 26:49who aren't responding?
- 26:51Leadership. How does that pastor keep himself from becoming bitter?
- 26:54I think we've all been in situations where we've seen a pastor
- 26:57get really discouraged and become bitter.
- 26:59and it's just something that is is really tough.
- 27:02It then it becomes really tough on the ministry because that that spreads,
- 27:06you know, that spreads to a lot of different things that affects that that leader
- 27:09in a lot of different areas of his life.
- 27:10And so that's what we're gonna talk about when we come back next week.
- 27:14But pray to the Lord of the harvest that he would.
- 27:18Send forth laborers. Pray, pray,
- 27:21pray. God is answering prayer.
- 27:25God does answer prayer. He listens to our prayers.
- 27:29And so no better thing we could do to pair evangelism with lots of prayer.
- 27:34boy, that's a formula for just for for just revival.
- 27:37but we love you guys. If this has been helpful to you,
- 27:40you haven't subscribed already,
- 27:41subscribe to the show, subscribe to the podcast,
- 27:44go to the YouTube channel, check us out there.
- 27:46subscribe to our newsletter. You can go to exchangemessage.org.
- 27:50Go to the website. Lots of resources there for you.
- 27:52Our bookstore. and look forward to Jeff's volume two of we're gonna Jeff's talking
- 27:59about doing a crazy deal. I think we're probably gonna run out of some of the books,
- 28:03but we usually do a crazy deal for this new,
- 28:05new bundle, the volume one, volume two.
- 28:07So we're really excited about offering you guys you know,
- 28:11just
- 28:12Just a awesome deal on those two books.
- 28:14And if you haven't picked up the first one when the second one comes out,
- 28:17there's going to be a great bundle deal for it that I think we've kind
- 28:20of mentioned here and there. I'm really excited for you guys to see that.
- 28:23but we love you guys. Stay in the fight.
- 28:26We'll see you next week.