Latest / Every Church Flourishing by the Great Commission Association / Episode 1: You Need a Team! Introducing the ECF Podcast, the Great Commission Association Directors and A Fascinating Korean Soda.

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Episode 1: You Need a Team! Introducing the ECF Podcast, the Great Commission Association Directors and A Fascinating Korean Soda. · Every Church Flourishing by the Great Commission Association

0:23
Speaker4: Join hosts, Pastor Chris Cole
0:25
Speaker4: and Dr. Chase Thompson from the Great Commission Association, led by Dr.
0:30
Speaker4: Mike Stewart, as they explore the frontiers of ministry and aim for the goal
0:33
Speaker4: of making every church flourish.
0:36
Speaker1: So today we're talking about the benefits of not being alone,
0:41
Speaker1: being in mission together.
0:43
Speaker1: And that's really important wherever you are in the world, in the body of Christ.
0:48
Speaker1: Jesus always sent out his disciples two by two, never alone.
0:52
Speaker1: And especially if you're on the West Coast, where we are, the Central Coast
0:55
Speaker1: of California is almost like another country compared to the Southeastern states.
1:01
Speaker1: Moving from the Southeast to California, it's been really important to be part
1:06
Speaker1: of a team, to be part of an association.
1:08
Speaker1: I was in an association in Alabama, never saw anybody.
1:11
Speaker1: But out here in Salinas, in the Central Coast, I'm part of the Great Commission Association.
1:16
Speaker1: And for today's episode, we have a real treat for you. We have gathered together
1:21
Speaker1: the senior directors of the Great Commission Association, and they'll tell you
1:26
Speaker1: all about themselves, so I don't want to preview that.
1:28
Speaker1: But I do want to ask you, Chris, give us just a really quick overview of who
1:33
Speaker1: the GCEA is and what it does.
1:35
Speaker0: Well, Great Commission Association is a family of churches,
1:40
Speaker0: a missional network of churches There's about 90 churches spread out over 290
1:46
Speaker0: miles from the border of San Francisco on the peninsula,
1:52
Speaker0: the San Francisco Peninsula there.
1:54
Speaker0: All the way down through Silicon Valley, all the way down California's central
1:58
Speaker0: coast, all the way into Santa Barbara County.
2:01
Speaker0: So it's a massive association geographically, and it's a very diverse association,
2:08
Speaker0: a family of churches that includes highly,
2:11
Speaker0: highly educated communities ministering to people that are in the middle of the tech industries,
2:17
Speaker0: that the center of much that shapes global culture all the way down into agricultural
2:22
Speaker0: workers working in communities where a huge amount of the U.S.
2:27
Speaker0: Agriculture comes from, our produce comes from these places,
2:29
Speaker0: like where you serve, Pastor Chase.
2:31
Speaker0: So the Great Commission Association is that family of churches trying to reach
2:37
Speaker0: those communities with the hope of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
2:40
Speaker0: And we've been doing that since 1947.
2:43
Speaker0: And we plan to, by God's grace, to continue that until Jesus returns or he has a reassignment for us.
2:51
Speaker0: But we're excited about all that God is doing in that missional network.
2:56
Speaker0: Well, Pastor Chase, one of the most exciting things that happens in our churches
3:00
Speaker0: is what happens on a Sunday morning.
3:03
Speaker0: And you had a really special Sunday morning this past week.
3:07
Speaker1: And we did. Yeah. Just real quick. We're at Valley Baptist Church in Salinas. we have a service order.
3:12
Speaker1: We have like kind of an order of operations we do on a Sunday.
3:15
Speaker1: You don't really find that in Scripture, so I wrestle with that a little bit.
3:19
Speaker1: But it's good to be decent and in order, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 12 and 14.
3:24
Speaker1: And this Sunday kind of things went far different than the service order,
3:30
Speaker1: different than the way I expected.
3:32
Speaker1: We had a really good, deep worship time.
3:35
Speaker1: And after worship, we usually transition into the preaching portion of the gathering.
3:41
Speaker1: And I don't know, the Spirit of God was there just in a thick way,
3:48
Speaker1: To the point where I just kind of looked around like, whoa, like people are crying.
3:52
Speaker1: People are bowed down and seeking the Lord, which, you know,
3:56
Speaker1: that doesn't happen every Sunday with us.
3:58
Speaker1: And my wife is one of the worship coordinators on the team.
4:01
Speaker1: And she told me that before the service started, there was a family that comes
4:05
Speaker1: with several kids, one of whom is in the worship band and helps us out with percussion.
4:10
Speaker1: And another of whom was just in the seats, kind of listening to the worship team rehearse.
4:16
Speaker1: And my wife said that this young man, Sage is his name.
4:20
Speaker1: It was like he was completely enraptured with worship as the worship team was playing.
4:27
Speaker1: And she felt like that was in a sense a catalyst for what happened next,
4:31
Speaker1: to a degree, at least from a human perspective.
4:34
Speaker1: And after worship, people were just crying out to God. And you've probably heard
4:38
Speaker1: stories of pastors going ahead and giving an altar call or whatever.
4:42
Speaker1: And that could sound corny if you weren't there, but I really had a message.
4:46
Speaker1: I was looking forward to preaching, but the only thing we could do is just invite
4:49
Speaker1: people to come down and bow down and seek the Lord as the worship team played.
4:55
Speaker1: They had all left the stage.
4:57
Speaker1: None of this was scripted or set up or anything like that.
5:00
Speaker1: And just all across the sanctuary, people were either up front,
5:04
Speaker1: you know, seeking the Lord or weeping in their seats.
5:08
Speaker1: There were so many tears and presence of the Lord was just there in a really
5:11
Speaker1: thick way and not engineered by any human hand or human idea.
5:18
Speaker1: And it was a very refreshing, encouraging kind of gathering on Sunday.
5:21
Speaker1: What about you? Where were you this Sunday?
5:23
Speaker0: Oh, well, most Sundays I'm usually traveling between a number of our different
5:28
Speaker0: churches, part of the work of being an associate director of missions.
5:32
Speaker0: And so I got to share God's word with the saints at one of our Renew churches, Calvary
5:39
Speaker0: Baptist Church in Santa Clara, California, a wonderful community and gathering
5:44
Speaker0: of saints right there in the heart of Silicon Valley.
5:47
Speaker0: I got to do a Bible study beforehand and then preach and be a part of that worship
5:53
Speaker0: service, and it was a blessed time together there with that diverse family.
5:58
Speaker0: And then I got to go have a fellowship lunch with Foothill Baptist Church as
6:02
Speaker0: they are welcoming their new pastor to their church, and we're super excited
6:07
Speaker0: about all that God's doing with that community as well.
6:10
Speaker0: And then a little bit later in the day, I got to spend some time helping do
6:14
Speaker0: a Renew consultation with another one of our churches.
6:17
Speaker0: So it's a very full day, very exciting day. It's always good to see God's people
6:21
Speaker0: growing in many different ways and to see the Spirit moving.
6:25
Speaker1: So I love church. I love other churches.
6:29
Speaker1: But for the last, I guess, 18 years at least, and really probably dating back
6:34
Speaker1: before that, I have been in the same church on average 49 Sundays a year.
6:41
Speaker1: I mean, I might be on vacation or whatever, but it really, it's on average.
6:44
Speaker1: I don't miss a lot of Sundays at our own church. And I know you,
6:49
Speaker1: prior to coming on with the Great Commission Association, you pastor churches.
6:53
Speaker1: So what's it like that transition from being in the same place pretty much every
6:57
Speaker1: Sunday of the year to being in a different place every Sunday of the week.
7:01
Speaker0: Yeah, it's very different. It's a different kind of ministry.
7:05
Speaker0: It's a lot more perhaps like I think of the old Methodist circuit writer preachers
7:12
Speaker0: or different times and seasons in American church life where churches may not
7:17
Speaker0: have had a pastor of their own. It feels a,
7:22
Speaker0: know for sure how the congregations are going to engage with me.
7:26
Speaker0: Although I'm very familiar with many of our churches, I'm getting more familiar with them.
7:30
Speaker0: When I'm not preaching, I'm usually visiting one of our partner churches in
7:35
Speaker0: some way just to bring them greetings from the association, seek to encourage
7:39
Speaker0: the pastor, build them up.
7:40
Speaker0: And that's very different than sitting with the same congregation week in and
7:45
Speaker0: week out, which has its own beauty and joy and rhythms and challenges,
7:50
Speaker0: which is, you know, what I've done in two separate lead pastorates.
7:54
Speaker0: And you're right, that's a very different kind of ministry, but both have their
7:59
Speaker0: joys and both have their challenges.
8:01
Speaker1: Yeah, I bet they do. I bet they do. Well, I tell you what, probably the deepest
8:05
Speaker1: theological and ecclesiological thing we do on this show is every week we pick a different, odd,
8:16
Speaker1: strange soda.
8:18
Speaker1: And And although, you know, we're not probably going to put out the Calvin's
8:22
Speaker1: Institutes of Religion or author an epistle that's up there with 1 Corinthians or Romans,
8:28
Speaker1: I think maybe one of our major contributions to the body of Christ,
8:32
Speaker1: Chris, after we're gone, is going to be our catalog of weird soda reviews.
8:38
Speaker1: If I have a chance of being a saint in the Catholic or the Orthodox Church,
8:43
Speaker1: it might be because of these soda reviews.
8:45
Speaker0: Well, that would be an amazing sainthood right there to advocate for the overconsumption
8:52
Speaker0: of sugary beverages that are probably very toxic to our bodies and our system.
8:58
Speaker0: Bring us great joy as reminders of the goodness of God's grace.
9:03
Speaker0: And today we have one that's pretty fun, right? Is that cherry bubblegum flavor?
9:08
Speaker1: Yeah, cherry.
9:09
Speaker0: How did we find this one?
9:11
Speaker1: I think Miss Grace, the podcast overlord and coordinator gets these sodas for us.
9:17
Speaker1: She gets them from parts unknown in her travels across Mongolia,
9:22
Speaker1: Siberia, and the deserts of Africa, probably from street vendors.
9:27
Speaker0: Well, this one here is made in Korea.
9:30
Speaker1: Are you kidding?
9:32
Speaker0: No.
9:32
Speaker1: I did not notice that.
9:34
Speaker0: This is coming to us from Korea. And you know, like all K-pop,
9:40
Speaker0: it's probably pretty good. Sorry. Little pun there.
9:44
Speaker1: I would have expected more Korean on the can if it was made in Korea. But you know what?
9:49
Speaker1: I'm going to take your word for it. I believe you because I've never. Oh, yeah.
9:53
Speaker1: Made in Republic of Korea. I've never seen this soda.
9:55
Speaker1: In the United States of America. So this is going to be a trip.
9:59
Speaker1: And it's 345 milliliters instead of 12 ounces. That's another tip off.
10:04
Speaker0: Right. And I'm looking forward to this one. I like cherry.
10:09
Speaker0: When I was a young guy, I really liked bubblegum.
10:13
Speaker0: But I don't know that I've had a lot of fruit flavored bubblegum.
10:18
Speaker0: But when I was in seventh and eighth grade, man, I loved bubblegum.
10:22
Speaker0: Would pack my mouth with it.
10:24
Speaker1: Me too. You know, this is the same thing, you know, and one of the great joys
10:27
Speaker1: of life, in my opinion, even though it only lasts for about seven or eight seconds,
10:30
Speaker1: is a big mouthful of fruit stripe gum that if you've never had that,
10:34
Speaker1: boy, that stuff's incredible.
10:36
Speaker1: And the flavor, it just turns into garbage in your mouth within a minute.
10:40
Speaker1: But the first few seconds, what a thrill. Let's drink.
10:45
Speaker0: Let's do it.
10:50
Speaker1: All right. Got an interesting smell. I can smell some chemicals.
10:54
Speaker1: Oh, that's a dessert beverage right there.
10:57
Speaker0: I'm looking at it. It seems like it's a light pink, but I didn't get a ton of
11:02
Speaker0: flavor on my first sip there. Did you?
11:05
Speaker1: Oh, yeah. Yeah. I got flavor. You know what? And I can tell this is not a can
11:11
Speaker1: made for American mouths.
11:12
Speaker1: This can has got a smaller opening than my can of Coke Zero by about 25% to
11:20
Speaker1: 35%. So that's one difference right off the bat.
11:24
Speaker0: Well, I don't know if you noticed this, but there's Braille on the can's lid.
11:30
Speaker1: There sure is.
11:31
Speaker0: There's Braille right there. That's interesting.
11:34
Speaker1: It is interesting because I've got my Coke Zero can here and there's no Braille on that.
11:39
Speaker1: No Braille. Braille for those that are watching the video.
11:42
Speaker0: Which, by the way, Chase, I think we didn't give our Spurgeons on this.
11:47
Speaker0: I'm going to give our Chupa Chups Cherry Bubblegum, because it's very drinkable.
11:52
Speaker0: I'm going to give it four out of five Spurgeons.
11:55
Speaker0: Not five, but I'm going to give it maybe a 3.5.
12:00
Speaker0: Let's go with, I'll lock in 3.5 Spurgeons. How about you?
12:04
Speaker1: That's a great question. And Chris, you've been so faithful to remember our
12:08
Speaker1: Spurgeon scale, named after one of our great heroes, Charles Spurgeon.
12:12
Speaker1: I am going to agree with you. It's a very drinkable soda. It's fun.
12:17
Speaker1: It had a little chemically smell, but I would say it tastes smoother than it smells.
12:24
Speaker1: I could drink this, but this has a good taste.
12:27
Speaker1: It's a unique taste. It's not weird.
12:29
Speaker1: We try to go for weird. It's not weird. It's tasty and normal.
12:34
Speaker1: I'm going to say three and three quarters Charles Spurgeon's for this soda.
12:39
Speaker1: I would happily drink this on a dinner date or a lunchtime.
12:43
Speaker0: Well, it's 100 calories, by the way, which is pretty low.
12:46
Speaker1: Could be worse. Could be worse, right? Got some questions for you.
12:50
Speaker1: You've already brought up one of them.
12:51
Speaker1: So let's see what kind of scientist of bubblegum you are.
12:55
Speaker1: Question number one, bubblegum is almost universally pink. And maybe you think
12:59
Speaker1: that's intentional, but when Walter Deimer invented the first commercial bubble
13:04
Speaker1: gum, which was Double Bubble in 1928, he colored it pink, Chris, because?
13:10
Speaker0: Because he thought people wouldn't want to see something that looked different
13:16
Speaker0: than the inside of the mouth.
13:17
Speaker1: That's a good guess. How close am I? You're not there. But that's okay.
13:21
Speaker1: Oh, for one. Here's the thing.
13:23
Speaker1: Mr. Deimer was not a chemist. He was an accountant and he was messing around
13:28
Speaker1: in his home lab. He had a shelf full of ingredients, but the only food coloring
13:33
Speaker1: he had on hand was pink and the tradition stuck.
13:37
Speaker1: So question number two, this is about Singapore. I love Singapore.
13:41
Speaker1: Yeah, you probably love it.
13:43
Speaker1: And it's lovely in part because you cannot get or chew chewing gum in Singapore, but there's a loophole.
13:52
Speaker1: You can legally buy gum in Singapore, but not at the candy store,
13:56
Speaker1: gas station, or grocery store.
13:57
Speaker1: You have to purchase it from a pharmacist and you need to provide your ID and
14:04
Speaker1: what kind of reason in Singapore is the only valid reason to buy gum.
14:11
Speaker0: Well, I know a good bit about Singapore. And as a child there,
14:16
Speaker0: we were instructed very much like, you know, you couldn't drop trash on the streets.
14:21
Speaker0: And when my kids were going through Singapore, when they were really little
14:25
Speaker0: and we were living overseas, we would go there very often.
14:28
Speaker0: They were terrified that they might drop gum on the street because there's a
14:32
Speaker0: stiff fine associated with it and you can even get in really big trouble.
14:37
Speaker0: So I'm going to guess that the answer is you have to have a prescription,
14:42
Speaker0: type reason, like you have to have medical halitosis or something like that.
14:47
Speaker0: You got really bad breath and the doctor says, hey, this person needs some help.
14:52
Speaker1: How did I do? You nailed it. So you're one for two batting 500.
14:56
Speaker1: You have to have a medical reason
14:59
Speaker1: in Singapore to get gum. You lived in Singapore or you just visited?
15:03
Speaker0: Well, we lived in Indonesia, which surrounds Singapore.
15:07
Speaker0: The other north side of it is
15:09
Speaker0: Malaysia. The rest of it is surrounded by Indonesian territorial waters.
15:12
Speaker0: So we would go there because it's a wonderfully advanced, world-class city with amazing medical care.
15:20
Speaker0: So a lot of our INB missionaries ended up going there for medical care,
15:24
Speaker0: which is the reason we were there very often.
15:26
Speaker0: I had a child that needed some ongoing medical care, so we would go there.
15:30
Speaker0: And also it's a great place to vacation. So a lot of us would end up going there
15:34
Speaker0: because you could get far more American goods and beautiful parks, beautiful zoo great.
15:40
Speaker1: Internet i hear
15:41
Speaker0: Phenomenal internet and world-class transportation system you don't need a car
15:47
Speaker0: in singapore hey that's fantastic literally do not.
15:49
Speaker1: Might be a little bit jarring for you, but that was a good appetizer for what we've got ahead.
15:55
Speaker1: We gathered the entire senior directors, all four of them, of the Great Commission
16:00
Speaker1: Association for this episode.
16:02
Speaker1: We've got part one of the interview today, and I normally wouldn't point out
16:07
Speaker1: something like this, but I'm not sure if you don't watch the video,
16:11
Speaker1: you're going to see this.
16:12
Speaker1: You're going to realize what's going on. But early on in the interview, we asked Dr.
16:16
Speaker1: Stewart a question, and the answer comes haltingly and hesitatingly.
16:23
Speaker1: And I'll just say I was in the room, and it's not because he was thinking or
16:27
Speaker1: stumbling over his words.
16:29
Speaker1: It's because he's so invested emotionally and passionately in care of churches.
16:38
Speaker1: And the only reason I point that out is not in any sort of make fun of way,
16:43
Speaker1: but I was impressed by that.
16:46
Speaker1: Dr. Stewart is not the kind of man I would normally associate with tears of
16:50
Speaker1: emotion, but I was just grateful to see his emotion and passion for the church
16:57
Speaker1: come out in this interview we've got upcoming.
17:00
Speaker0: Yeah, he was being very transparent, very real.
17:04
Speaker0: And for those of us that get the privilege of working with him day in and day
17:08
Speaker0: out, one of the things that we get to know about him is that he cares maybe
17:14
Speaker0: more deeply than anyone could really understand, except the Lord,
17:18
Speaker0: about the churches of our association and the work of God amongst them.
17:23
Speaker0: You know, you get to taste in this interview of what the interactions are like
17:29
Speaker0: with our senior director team.
17:31
Speaker0: And we know and trust that it's going to be an encouragement and a blessing
17:36
Speaker0: to everyone that gets to listen to this segment.
17:39
Speaker1: All right. So we got the whole big group together now. Everybody that's a senior
17:43
Speaker1: director of the GCA is here.
17:45
Speaker1: I would like to ask you guys to introduce yourself and tell everybody just a
17:49
Speaker1: bit about you, starting with you, Dr. Michael Seward.
17:51
Speaker4: I'm the executive director of missions at GCA, have been for the last 28 years.
17:56
Speaker4: And I'm happily, happily married to Sheila for over 40 years.
18:00
Speaker4: And I love being a part of GCA.
18:02
Speaker1: I've heard your story about how you got here in maybe about two minutes.
18:08
Speaker1: Give us a nutshell. How did you come to be the director of GCA?
18:12
Speaker4: My director of missions when I was serving in Texas was Dr.
18:16
Speaker4: Larry Rose. And he was instrumental in my life. In fact, directors of missions
18:19
Speaker4: in my ministry life were really important to me. They were the people I knew.
18:25
Speaker4: And they knew me, and they talked to me about what God could do in my life.
18:28
Speaker4: And he mentioned that he thought I should think about and pray about becoming director of missions.
18:32
Speaker4: And growing up in Southern Baptist Church, I never even knew what an association
18:35
Speaker4: was, but these men were influential.
18:37
Speaker4: And I began to pray about that, and he offered me an opportunity to go to training
18:41
Speaker4: with the Home Mission Board at that time.
18:44
Speaker4: And I went to it and called Sheila on a real phone, a landline phone,
18:49
Speaker4: and told her what had happened.
18:51
Speaker4: That she had been praying and she told me that God had spoken to her,
18:53
Speaker4: that we were supposed to pursue this ministry and had no destination in mind,
18:58
Speaker4: but it wound up being, in fact, she had told me she wanted to serve anywhere except in California.
19:03
Speaker4: And I said, all right, took my orders. And the first thing they talked to me
19:07
Speaker4: about is, how would you like to go to California? I said, no.
19:10
Speaker4: My lieutenant general tells me we are not going there. And they talked to me
19:15
Speaker4: about several different locations.
19:17
Speaker4: And when I called Sheila that night, I told them, yeah, they kept talking to
19:20
Speaker4: me about going to California.
19:22
Speaker4: And she said, where at in California? And I said, the San Jose area.
19:25
Speaker4: And she said, that's the one area I would be interested in living.
19:30
Speaker4: And I said, that would have been helpful to know today. I turned them down like nine times.
19:35
Speaker4: And so wound up coming and, you know, God having to move through all those kind
19:41
Speaker4: of issues you think about when you go someplace else. California is hard to come to.
19:45
Speaker4: And but God provided through other other ways.
19:48
Speaker4: But that's how we got here through prayer, through the direct direction of a
19:52
Speaker4: director of missions and God opening a door to wonderful, wonderful church leaders here.
19:57
Speaker1: All right. That's a great story. I got here from Alabama and I was in Birmingham.
20:03
Speaker1: Senior pastor of a church for over 10 years.
20:06
Speaker1: And I can say that I probably see you 12 times a year, maybe more than that, Dr.
20:13
Speaker1: Stewart. I don't even know.
20:16
Speaker1: There's a new director of missions in Birmingham now. It seems like a great guy, very involved.
20:20
Speaker1: I don't even know what the guy who was there when I was there pastoring for
20:25
Speaker1: 10 years, I don't know what he looks like.
20:26
Speaker1: As far as I know, I never met him.
20:29
Speaker1: So just coming out here and being part of this team has been very refreshing
20:33
Speaker1: for me and getting to know you guys face-to-face in a real way.
20:39
Speaker1: Chris Cole, when I met you, you were pastoring just like me.
20:44
Speaker1: Now you're the assistant director
20:46
Speaker1: of missions for the Great Commission Association. How did that happen?
20:50
Speaker0: Well, we started...
20:52
Speaker0: To try and build an associational team under Dr.
20:55
Speaker0: Stewart's leadership to focus on how assisting churches with renewal.
21:00
Speaker0: I had served on the association's board and then Dr. Stewart and CJ actually
21:05
Speaker0: took me to Atlanta for training.
21:08
Speaker0: And we came back with, I think, a shared conviction that we needed as a association
21:15
Speaker0: to come up with a strategy to help churches that were declining or plateaued to come back to life.
21:22
Speaker0: And so we started doing that, and I was doing it on a volunteer basis,
21:26
Speaker0: and the ministry began to grow, and we began to try to experiment our church,
21:31
Speaker0: helping replant one of the other GCA churches, and that began to grow.
21:36
Speaker0: And then Dr. Stewart approached me about the idea of me becoming a contractor
21:40
Speaker0: to assist the association build out that ministry more.
21:44
Speaker0: And it sort of just exploded from there and grew into that.
21:49
Speaker0: And then the association needed some shifts in their leadership.
21:54
Speaker0: And so Dr. Stewart approached me and said, would you take on the role of being
21:58
Speaker0: the associate director of missions and lead our mission advanced team,
22:03
Speaker0: which includes our Renew ministry focused on church renewal.
22:07
Speaker1: Fantastic. This great verb, explode. So what kind of, you know,
22:12
Speaker1: with a background in church revitalization, my understanding is since COVID
22:17
Speaker1: and its aftermath, that's had a huge effect on churches.
22:21
Speaker1: So generally speaking, without having to cite a lot of statistics or whatever,
22:25
Speaker1: what did COVID do to California churches in our area?
22:30
Speaker0: I think COVID revealed the reality of our churches, which was the churches that
22:36
Speaker0: were already significantly plateaued or in decline.
22:41
Speaker0: COVID accelerated those realities. People not coming back to church to attend.
22:48
Speaker0: Church attendance nationwide has gone from an average of two and a half times a month.
22:54
Speaker0: I don't know how you come up with two and a half, but that's what it is.
22:57
Speaker0: Two and a half times a month for the average church attender,
23:00
Speaker0: dropping now to one time a month for the average church attender.
23:04
Speaker0: So things got accelerated. Financial stresses on churches got accelerated with lack of attendance.
23:12
Speaker0: It's hard to do mission when people don't show up for church or they become scared of each other.
23:17
Speaker0: And so all of those things got accelerated in. So churches that were already
23:21
Speaker0: plateaued or in decline, those things tended to accelerate rapidly in those churches.
23:27
Speaker0: They were not prepared for the significant transitions that were coming to them.
23:32
Speaker0: Churches that were healthy tended to adapt relatively rapidly to the COVID realities
23:39
Speaker0: and tended to come back more quickly.
23:43
Speaker0: And they have tended to thrive. Actually, megachurches thrived under COVID.
23:48
Speaker0: For example, across the United States, they've actually increased in their growth.
23:52
Speaker0: Churches that were in the upper quarter percentage of churches continue to grow
23:57
Speaker0: even now, five years later, at a pace that's much more rapid then.
24:01
Speaker0: But if you are a struggling church, a normative-sized church,
24:04
Speaker0: which is any church that's under 100 in regular attendance, then you were very
24:10
Speaker0: likely to struggle more.
24:13
Speaker0: In and through COVID. And then to come out of COVID, yeah, you were going to
24:17
Speaker0: come out of it, most cases, facing even harsher realities than you entered COVID with.
24:23
Speaker1: Yeah, absolutely. The whole growth of the megachurch dynamic that's been happening
24:28
Speaker1: in the last few years, we're going to have to do a couple episodes on that because
24:31
Speaker1: there's a lot of meat on that bone.
24:33
Speaker0: Yes, sir.
24:34
Speaker1: Pastor CJ, Dr. CJ, when I got to know you, you were the interim pastor at Valley
24:40
Speaker1: Baptist Church, which is the church I've been at now for almost seven and a half years.
24:45
Speaker1: But you were in that role because you were part of the GCA and the church had
24:51
Speaker1: a need. You stepped in as interim.
24:53
Speaker1: You were there for almost a year, right? How did you get involved with the GCA
24:57
Speaker1: and what is your role here?
24:59
Speaker2: My role, first of all, has evolved. I came in as a director of church and pastoral
25:05
Speaker2: ministries, then took on the role of associate director of mission.
25:09
Speaker2: Now, it's the director of mission operations.
25:13
Speaker2: And I really think I got here because I was just searching for my next assignment
25:19
Speaker2: after a couple of mission work I've been doing overseas.
25:23
Speaker2: And that ended because of different financial realities across California, across the world.
25:29
Speaker2: And Dr. Stewart actually met me and said, hey, this is a position or a role. Pray about it.
25:36
Speaker2: Come on board. I really think Looking back at it I really think They caught
25:43
Speaker2: my They probably I caught their eyes Probably because
25:48
Speaker2: CCBA back then Did several church Leadership training At the center that I was
25:55
Speaker2: Overseeing and helping And we held this church Leadership training and
25:59
Speaker2: As we were doing it, I was serving and I was doing everything I can and taking out trash.
26:03
Speaker2: And I think I caught their eyes taking out trash. And I think this is really
26:07
Speaker2: why I'm here today. Just willing to do what it takes.
26:11
Speaker4: I was taking out the trash right beside you, right behind you.
26:14
Speaker4: I was rolling that bucket. So I said.
26:18
Speaker2: That's really how I got here. I came in really with the fresh,
26:22
Speaker2: not even fresh, blank slate of what this mission or work is.
26:27
Speaker2: And started learning.
26:29
Speaker2: Started processing needs to be and how we could help our churches.
26:34
Speaker2: And so that's sort of the long story short of how I got here.
26:37
Speaker2: And right now the work is supporting our schools, properties,
26:42
Speaker2: math, as well as operations and all different things.
26:46
Speaker1: Awesome. So one of the mega churches I was familiar with back home had a pastor
26:51
Speaker1: in the whole kind of deal at that church if you were on staff or whatever.
26:57
Speaker1: You served him. You helped him.
27:00
Speaker1: He was like a king pastor.
27:03
Speaker1: And if you were on staff at that church or if you were a member of that church,
27:06
Speaker1: you kind of served his kingdom.
27:08
Speaker1: But we get the example from Jesus that he was among us as one who served.
27:14
Speaker1: So that's good to hear that you got brought into this organization from serving,
27:21
Speaker1: Because I think that should be the front door to the kingdom rather than incredible
27:26
Speaker1: entrepreneurial ability,
27:28
Speaker1: high charisma or something like that.
27:30
Speaker1: So, Ms. Lynette, you are the superintendent of schools for the Great Commission Association.
27:37
Speaker1: That seems like an incongruous kind of thing for a church association.
27:42
Speaker1: So, how did you come into that role and how did that role evolve even to begin with?
27:47
Speaker3: Well, in 2003, I received a letter in the mail when I was working at a Nazarene
27:53
Speaker3: church preschool. Mm-hmm.
27:57
Speaker3: I put it away in my purse for many months, and then things started going south
28:02
Speaker3: in that school where things were getting taken away,
28:07
Speaker3: the kids were leaving, so it was kind of getting weird.
28:13
Speaker3: And so I dug out my purse. Anyone who knows me knows that I keep a lot of stuff
28:18
Speaker3: in my purse for many moons.
28:21
Speaker3: And so many wives, you know, it's in there somewhere.
28:24
Speaker3: And so I dug out my my old paper. I got a letter about a preschool that wanted to open in Watsonville.
28:32
Speaker3: And I opened it up and I gave them a call just out of curiosity and super excited
28:41
Speaker3: on the other line that I guess I was the first one to call. And I thought, oh, okay.
28:47
Speaker3: And went down and finally got to meet Mike Stewart and George Yates,
28:52
Speaker3: who was working for the association at the time.
28:55
Speaker3: And that's where it started is it was a vision and they were reaching out.
29:00
Speaker3: They actually cast a net to try to see what fish they were going to catch,
29:04
Speaker3: to see what was available and who they could get, who had knowledge of opening preschools.
29:10
Speaker3: I had never opened a preschool before, but I dove into it.
29:13
Speaker3: I went in and I did a lot of licensing research and I had really good connections
29:19
Speaker3: with licensing analysts that I could call and ask them questions.
29:24
Speaker3: And I was kind of weird coming on because I had never worked for an actual Christian organization.
29:30
Speaker3: And at that time, when I heard the word Baptist, I was all, which Baptist? Which one?
29:37
Speaker3: Um, so that's how I came about. It was a God thing. It really, really was.
29:43
Speaker3: I took a big leap of faith. Then I knew it was time to leave and to take this
29:48
Speaker3: opportunity to open a preschool in Watsonville.
29:51
Speaker1: Fantastic. Uh, yeah, you're right. There's a lot of different flavors of Baptist
29:54
Speaker1: and different ones taste very differently spiritually and theologically.
30:00
Speaker1: Uh, so how many schools and preschools and all of that do we have in the association?
30:05
Speaker3: We have eight preschools and one K-8 anthem school.
30:10
Speaker1: Yes. So how many, roughly, how many employees and students does that entail?
30:15
Speaker3: We have about 80 to 85 employees that we have throughout our system,
30:20
Speaker3: and we have about 350 students altogether.
30:24
Speaker1: See, I've been with the GCA for almost
30:26
Speaker1: eight years now, and I would have underestimated both of those numbers.
30:29
Speaker1: So anybody listening that's part of the GCA, well, you just learned something.
30:33
Speaker1: So far, we have been very polite and we've gone one at a time and been very structured.
30:39
Speaker1: Now it's time to grind those gears and completely change into a real kind of conversation.
30:46
Speaker1: So Pastor Chris and I are going to throw out some questions and we're just going
30:50
Speaker1: to answer them conversationally. And my first question is kind of a softball,
30:55
Speaker1: but what does the GCA mean to you and why are you part of it?
31:00
Speaker2: GCA, I believe it's a family of churches. And for me, it's a current assignment from God.
31:08
Speaker2: And so we're part of it. I'm part of it because this is where God wants me to serve.
31:12
Speaker2: Use my talents, gifts, and everything else.
31:15
Speaker2: But GCA really is a place where pastors and churches don't have to do ministry
31:21
Speaker2: alone. And I think that's sort of been our backbone.
31:23
Speaker2: We are a phone call away, letting pastors and everyone know that,
31:27
Speaker2: hey, anything you need help with, if we can't help you, we'll try to get help
31:31
Speaker2: for you from somewhere else.
31:33
Speaker2: So that's sort of been our model, I guess, of mode of operations.
31:37
Speaker2: And everything we do, even with schools and operations, we do it all so that
31:41
Speaker2: we could advance that kingdom effort. And so that's GCA.
31:45
Speaker3: Being that friend, the helping hand, being their support, just being there to
31:50
Speaker3: help whoever needs help when they need it.
31:53
Speaker3: It doesn't matter if you're a teacher, staff person, a pastor,
31:57
Speaker3: a ministry leader. We're going to help you.
32:00
Speaker1: How many churches do we have?
32:02
Speaker0: On any given moment between our church plants, replants, potential mission sites
32:08
Speaker0: that are still in process.
32:10
Speaker0: We're somewhere right around 90, 92 years.
32:15
Speaker1: And that's from down near the Santa Barbara area up to almost San Francisco, right?
32:22
Speaker0: Yeah. From Daly City, which is Daly City or Hayward, depending on which side
32:26
Speaker0: of the bay you're on, are probably our northmost points.
32:29
Speaker0: All the way down into Solvang, which is in Santa Barbara County,
32:34
Speaker0: a good distance into Santa Barbara County.
32:36
Speaker0: It's about 290 miles north to south, which is, I think, one of the unique things
32:42
Speaker0: about our association. We're actually farther north to south than the entire
32:46
Speaker0: state of Oklahoma is from north to south.
32:50
Speaker4: But a prettier drive.
32:52
Speaker0: Yeah. True. True story. Yes.
32:57
Speaker1: As an Alabama boy, you know, in the pines of Alabama, which I love,
33:01
Speaker1: those coastal drives are mind-blowing.
33:03
Speaker4: Yeah. I think of GCA, we're a loyal friend. I pray that.
33:09
Speaker4: I pray that our pastors and churches would always sense that from us, from our staff.
33:14
Speaker4: We always tell our staff the most important call we get is from a member church.
33:18
Speaker4: And so if you have to make a choice about what you're going to spend your time,
33:21
Speaker4: the president of the United States calling you or Pastor Chase calling you, Pastor Chase wins.
33:26
Speaker4: He is the most important person in the kingdom of God work, and that's who we
33:32
Speaker4: serve. And so we're loyal.
33:34
Speaker4: I think everybody else is running for the woods. We're still standing out there
33:38
Speaker4: with our church and trying to help them.
33:40
Speaker4: And we've had to make a lot of tough calls with that.
33:44
Speaker4: But I think because I've always wanted to be before the Lord and say to him,
33:55
Speaker4: I don't know why I'm doing that, to him and the pastor and the church members
34:02
Speaker4: that we are in this together and we are trying to honor God with you.
34:07
Speaker4: But we're not perfect. They aren't either, but they don't have to worry.
34:10
Speaker4: We're not leaving the field. There's nothing for us to win except the glory of God.
34:14
Speaker1: Yeah, amen.
34:16
Speaker2: Perhaps one more thing that highlights, I think, uniqueness of an association
34:21
Speaker2: or GCA is that we have the capacity or the relationships to actually convene
34:27
Speaker2: and to ask for churches to collaborate.
34:31
Speaker2: And perhaps that's because of the long history of relationship and trust,
34:35
Speaker2: but we are able to ask Pastor Chase.
34:38
Speaker2: We're able to ask other churches to come alongside and help.
34:41
Speaker2: So we have renewed churches, fostering churches.
34:44
Speaker4: And they want to.
34:46
Speaker2: And they want to.
34:46
Speaker4: They want to. Yeah.
34:47
Speaker0: I think that...
34:49
Speaker0: Because of care, which is one of our four key pathways that we try to emphasize,
34:54
Speaker0: we care for the churches, we care for the pastors, we are able to be on that
34:58
Speaker0: collaborative mission together.
35:00
Speaker0: And the resourcing that's provided through the schools and the relationships
35:04
Speaker0: that they help us build into communities lets us move not just into caring for
35:11
Speaker0: one another as churches,
35:13
Speaker0: but we are a, in a very real way, we're a mission agency.
35:18
Speaker0: We share together in mission.
35:20
Speaker0: We send out church planters or guys to minister with unreached people groups.
35:26
Speaker0: We renew one another. We have a strategy. We have a plan for church renewal.
35:31
Speaker0: We come alongside churches for the long haul. And we've been talking a lot on
35:36
Speaker0: our team about this new acronym we developed called STIR, where we want to help
35:40
Speaker0: churches be stirred up to love and good works.
35:44
Speaker0: And we talk about giving churches strategy and training and helping them,
35:50
Speaker0: you know, build those relationships together.
35:53
Speaker0: And that, I think, encompasses GCA in so many significant ways because of all
35:59
Speaker0: of those bringing together those resources and those tools and the different
36:04
Speaker0: avenues and aspects through relationship we're able to be on mission together.
36:09
Speaker0: And I think that's one of the key things that GCA means to a lot of our churches.
36:13
Speaker0: We're not just caring for one another.
36:16
Speaker0: We're enabling each other to be on mission and doing it well.
36:19
Speaker0: So whether we help a church solve a conflict or a crisis, or we help them figure
36:24
Speaker0: out how they can reach their community with the gospel better,
36:27
Speaker0: or help them figure out how to come back to health, GCA is involved in all of
36:32
Speaker0: those different aspects.
36:33
Speaker0: So we built this podcast around the idea that we wanted to have a resource and
36:38
Speaker0: a tool for leaders and church leaders of all types, deacons.
36:44
Speaker0: Children's pastors, women in ministry leaders, pastors together. Yeah.
36:48
Speaker0: The focus is that leaders can come together and think about this idea of every
36:54
Speaker0: church flourishing together.
36:56
Speaker0: We believe that as a GCA team. So as we think about the idea of what it means
37:02
Speaker0: to be a family of churches and to be this through the local associational model,
37:08
Speaker0: what are top two things that you guys can shout out, popcorn response?
37:14
Speaker0: What are the top two things that you would tell people about GCA?
37:19
Speaker0: If you had two things that you would say, hey, what are two things that
37:22
Speaker0: are the value of being in an association.
37:26
Speaker0: Maybe even think of it in this way. Why should a church consider being part of GCA?
37:32
Speaker0: And you get two things. And Chase, I would love to hear your response as a local
37:36
Speaker0: church pastor in our association.
37:38
Speaker1: When I came here, again, from Alabama, I hate to keep mentioning that,
37:42
Speaker1: I come from the Bible Belt. I had a lot of friends who were pastors there.
37:45
Speaker1: I worked at a seminary, the New Orleans Baptist Seminary there, for around 10 years.
37:49
Speaker1: So I had deep connection, even though it wasn't with our local association.
37:54
Speaker1: In fact, that was relatively foreign to me. I've told this story before.
37:58
Speaker1: When I came to preach at Valley Baptist Church in view of a call,
38:03
Speaker1: Pastor CJ and Dr. Stewart were there.
38:05
Speaker1: And I was like, this is weird. What are these guys doing here?
38:08
Speaker1: After I preached and while the church was voting, they took me out to lunch.
38:12
Speaker1: And again, I'm thinking, I'm not used to this. This is strange.
38:16
Speaker1: I hear people talking about California back in the South, like a wasteland,
38:21
Speaker1: a spiritual wasteland, like, you know, basically 0.01% unreached or whatever.
38:27
Speaker1: And within a month or two of being in Salinas and being part of the Great Commission
38:33
Speaker1: Association, I realized, hey, the body of Christ is thriving in California.
38:39
Speaker1: Now, it may not be a church on every street corner like the Bible Belt.
38:44
Speaker1: It's a completely different kind of situation here.
38:48
Speaker1: But being part of this association, you, Dr. Schultz, you use the word togetherness.
38:53
Speaker1: It's really provided a kind of togetherness. I didn't even have an Alabama.
38:59
Speaker1: I probably had 50 or 100 friends who were in ministry. So I had the relationships,
39:05
Speaker1: but not the partnerships because we kind of were all working in our own sectors.
39:12
Speaker1: This feels a lot more like we're working together. Yeah.
39:16
Speaker0: That's such a good word, Chase. So I'm curious, you guys have been part of the
39:20
Speaker0: association for a long time, Dr.
39:22
Speaker0: Stewart, nearly 28 years, over 28 years.
39:25
Speaker0: And Lynette, over 20. And CJ, I think 12, 13, 14 now. 14. 14 years. So top two things.
39:33
Speaker1: Just that is incredible. Right. That is incredible. In a situation where most
39:38
Speaker1: pastors move on, I think the average three, four, five years.
39:42
Speaker1: Yeah. That's an incredible amount of longevity.
39:45
Speaker1: I've never heard all of those numbers together. I'm sorry. I was struck by it. Right.
39:49
Speaker0: By the way, the answer to that is now that if you want to know,
39:51
Speaker0: the current recent stat on pastoral stays is 18 months. It's actually decreased.
39:56
Speaker1: Are you kidding?
39:57
Speaker0: 18 months. That's, I don't know. It's astonishing.
40:00
Speaker0: But these guys have been here a super long time helping us build this organization. So top two reasons.
40:08
Speaker4: That's the reason we had to take Chase out early. Just so we get one lunch with him before he goes.
40:15
Speaker0: Okay, so aside from the great lunches that we do take pastors out to,
40:19
Speaker0: what are the top two reasons that a leader should say, hey, we want to be part
40:24
Speaker0: of this kind of partnership, even if it's not specific to GCA, but certainly GCA?
40:30
Speaker0: Why should a church be part of an active partnering association?
40:35
Speaker0: And if they're interested, be part of GCA?
40:38
Speaker2: This might cut both ways because some really don't want to be known.
40:42
Speaker2: But I think one thing you will get from GCA is you're going to get a genuine relationship.
40:47
Speaker2: You're going to be able to be known as a pastor, as a friend,
40:51
Speaker2: somebody who's doing the same mission work.
40:53
Speaker2: You're not going to be a stranger unless you want to be a stranger.
40:57
Speaker2: But that's really our hope and our goal. It's not that we do all kinds of tasks,
41:02
Speaker2: but that we have an ongoing and growing relationship with each other.
41:06
Speaker2: And 28 years, 14, 20 years We have many,
41:11
Speaker2: many histories And many relationships That have
41:14
Speaker2: come and gone But we maintain that because that's the value That's really the
41:19
Speaker2: value When you join GCA It's not a contractual thing I don't see it that way
41:24
Speaker2: I see Chase Not Valley Baptist Church as a separate thing And so I think there
41:28
Speaker2: is a value in that You will be known And you will be cared for as an individual
41:34
Speaker2: We have so many stories of how different pastors or anonymous people are helping other pastors.
41:42
Speaker2: Just saying, hey, I know that they're going through struggles.
41:45
Speaker2: And so we see them reaching out, sending anonymous donations, gifts.
41:50
Speaker2: And this happens because of that value. We care about pastors and co-laborers.
41:56
Speaker2: And same thing with our staff.
41:58
Speaker2: I mean, all of them know that we care deeply about them.
42:01
Speaker3: Yeah, and I think it's not just the pastors. I think it's the church.
42:05
Speaker3: Church members know us because we show up.
42:08
Speaker3: We show up when we tell them we're going to show up. And I think the relationships
42:12
Speaker3: that we've built through the church members,
42:16
Speaker3: the pastors, also, it develops a trust that they know that when we have the
42:22
Speaker3: resources and we say we're going to do something, we do it.
42:25
Speaker1: Okay. Well, hey, that's a good part to cut the interview. The interview goes
42:29
Speaker1: almost an hour, and we decided rather than have one massively long podcast episode
42:34
Speaker1: with the whole interview, we would cut it into two pieces.
42:36
Speaker1: So, download the episode with part two of our interview with the Great Commission
42:41
Speaker1: Association senior directors. I love their heart, their passion,
42:46
Speaker1: just being able to sit at the table.
42:49
Speaker1: And if you've never been to the GCA office, they have the coolest table with
42:53
Speaker1: this thing that looks like a river that runs down in the middle of it.
42:57
Speaker1: You can probably see a little bit of that on the video, but we had to cover
43:00
Speaker1: the table with a tablecloth to prevent too much sound bleed in.
43:04
Speaker1: But great interview, great time, genuine people that I really love.
43:08
Speaker1: Now, Pastor Chris, you have an app that you emailed me about weeks ago that
43:14
Speaker1: you think really highly of, and this is perfect for pastors,
43:19
Speaker1: church leaders, or whatever.
43:20
Speaker1: Tell us a little bit about Free Show.
43:22
Speaker0: Well, we're not getting any kind of kickback on this, although maybe if we keep
43:29
Speaker0: advertising Chupa Chups, we will.
43:31
Speaker1: And to be clear, we're not opposed to kickback. So if you want to send us money, that's fine.
43:37
Speaker0: Right. Or free sodas.
43:40
Speaker1: Free sodas. Or soda recommendations. Yeah, whatever.
43:41
Speaker0: Soda recommendations would be fantastic, right?
43:44
Speaker0: But as a pastor, you know, one of the biggest challenges in working in a modern
43:50
Speaker0: church environment is that people are engaged multimodally.
43:56
Speaker0: They're not just sitting there. That's a big word. Listening passively.
44:00
Speaker0: Thank you. I do pull out words out of the dictionary every once in a while.
44:05
Speaker0: And so they're expecting to encounter information in many different forms.
44:12
Speaker0: And one of those is visually.
44:14
Speaker0: So for many, many years, the church has been growing in this from the old days
44:18
Speaker0: when we had those overhead projectors.
44:20
Speaker0: Did you ever use the overhead projectors and the vinyl strips and the printouts?
44:26
Speaker1: I am that old. Yes. Yeah, me too. Not a lot, but yes.
44:28
Speaker0: Right. So we started doing song lyrics that way.
44:31
Speaker0: And then as we got more sophisticated, moved over to like the video projectors and so on.
44:37
Speaker0: Now, you know, pretty much every element of
44:41
Speaker0: worship service has some sort of visual interactive element with it.
44:45
Speaker0: I use extensive sermon notes, and that's because I have a conviction that people
44:50
Speaker0: learn better when they can see something at the same time that they hear it.
44:55
Speaker0: And so I'll try to have scripture up there and so on.
44:58
Speaker0: Well, that means churches have to have good presentation software.
45:03
Speaker0: And there's many great presentation software products out there.
45:07
Speaker0: Sort of the old school standard is Microsoft PowerPoint, but there are,
45:13
Speaker0: of course, many that are aimed at very specifically presenting during worship services.
45:19
Speaker0: There's software from companies like Easy Worship
45:22
Speaker0: and Proclaim and OpenLP and Video Psalm and the sort of the creme de la creme
45:31
Speaker0: for most major churches and sort of trickles down to those of us that work in
45:37
Speaker0: the normative size church is a product called ProPresenter.
45:42
Speaker1: That's what we use.
45:42
Speaker0: It's used in large video venues all around the world. It's got tons and tons of capability.
45:48
Speaker0: It's got amazing tools and I've used it in my church and we've always loved
45:54
Speaker0: working with them. It's cross-platform, so you're not stuck with just Windows
45:59
Speaker0: or just Mac or just Linux.
46:02
Speaker0: Well, I think ProPresenter only is Windows and Mac, but it has great tools.
46:07
Speaker0: It's expensive. And for the average normative size church, spending several
46:12
Speaker0: hundred dollars a year on constantly updating software that requires a subscription,
46:18
Speaker0: that can be a little bit pricey.
46:20
Speaker0: Well, one of our volunteers at one of our Renew Churches was helping rebuild
46:27
Speaker0: the sound and video technology system, and he found a product.
46:32
Speaker0: I can't take credit for this, called Free Show.
46:35
Speaker0: Free Show. That's F-R-E-E-S-H-O-W dot app, A-P-P.
46:42
Speaker0: So Free Show dot app. It is 100% free.
46:47
Speaker0: And here's some amazing things about Free Show.
46:50
Speaker0: It has almost all or all of the functionalities of ProPresenter and ProClaim
46:57
Speaker0: and all of those and even some functions they don't have, and it is compatible with Windows,
47:05
Speaker0: with Mac, with Linux.
47:07
Speaker0: It has tremendous app support, so you can use your iPhone, your iPad,
47:13
Speaker0: or tablets of different kinds, your Android devices.
47:16
Speaker0: You can use it to do the presentations. It's got scripture and lyric integration all built in.
47:24
Speaker0: It's a very familiar interface for those that are used to the Pro presenter
47:29
Speaker0: interface, huge options for web output.
47:33
Speaker0: For example, you can send a separate feed to your musicians so that they can
47:38
Speaker0: see something different than what the audience is seeing.
47:41
Speaker0: And it's got tremendous remote control capabilities, just a really,
47:46
Speaker0: really neat piece of software.
47:48
Speaker0: And we're not getting any kickbacks or anything for this recommendation.
47:53
Speaker0: But if you've been looking for an upgrade to your church's presentation software,
48:00
Speaker0: I recommend that you check out freeshow.app.
48:03
Speaker0: See if it's a good fit for you.
48:08
Speaker0: And, you know, the great thing about it is that you could try it out.
48:11
Speaker0: And, of course, it's 100% free.
48:14
Speaker0: So if it doesn't work well for you, you haven't sunk a bunch of money into something
48:18
Speaker0: that doesn't work well or fit for your congregation.
48:22
Speaker1: Hey, fantastic. Just look at the website. It looks great.
48:26
Speaker1: I don't know how in the world they can make it for free, but we will check that
48:29
Speaker1: out. And I made a joke earlier about taking kickbacks.
48:33
Speaker1: And to be clear, we don't do that. What we're going to try to do in this show
48:36
Speaker1: as we go forward is to give you, if you're a church leader, a pastor,
48:41
Speaker1: a church member, we're going to give you great.
48:43
Speaker1: They're not always going to be free, but they're not going to benefit us when you get them.
48:47
Speaker1: We're going to give you great resources that are very helpful that we've used,
48:51
Speaker1: that we recommend, we'll try to save you money along the way as well.
48:55
Speaker1: And we don't do that with any sort of influence or money greasing the skids
49:00
Speaker1: or anything along those lines.
49:01
Speaker0: And if you've got a tool, a resource that you've found beneficial in your church
49:08
Speaker0: or in your ministry, and you think we might want to feature it on upcoming episodes,
49:13
Speaker0: would you shoot that information to us?
49:16
Speaker0: You can reach out to everychurchflourishing.com is our website,
49:20
Speaker0: and there'll be contact information there.
49:23
Speaker0: I think show notes, all kinds of good stuff, right, Pastor Jason?
49:25
Speaker1: That's correct. So the way to get in touch with us and the way to get a list
49:28
Speaker1: of all of our resources and to get show notes, to download the podcast,
49:33
Speaker1: to subscribe, to share it with your friends is our website, everychurchflourishing.com.
49:38
Speaker1: That's where to check us out. And hey, we will be back next week and we will
49:43
Speaker1: be talking to the Great Commission Association senior directors again,
49:47
Speaker1: not just to tell you about that association, but also to highlight the importance
49:52
Speaker1: of not doing ministry alone.
49:54
Speaker1: In fact, coming up in February, when we get to our next block of episodes,
49:59
Speaker1: we really are going to double down on that.
50:01
Speaker1: The loneliness that is sometimes prevalent in pastors and church leaders,
50:07
Speaker1: we're going to help equip people to move through those choppy waters.
50:12
Speaker1: And for the next few episodes, we're going to try to get you connected,
50:17
Speaker1: if not with our association,
50:19
Speaker1: A team where you're not feeling alone, where you're in partnership with the
50:24
Speaker1: Great Commission and the Great Commandment that Jesus has called us to.
50:28
Speaker1: Thanks for listening. We'll see you.