Latest / Every Church Flourishing by the Great Commission Association / Episode 29: Leading through Change. How Does Church Transformation Happen? Church Turnaround Stories: What is Church Replanting All About? Soda Review: "When I look at this can, it does not scream Ramadan to me."

Transcript

Episode 29: Leading through Change. How Does Church Transformation Happen? Church Turnaround Stories: What is Church Replanting All About? Soda Review: "When I look at this can, it does not scream Ramadan to me." · Every Church Flourishing by the Great Commission Association

0:00
Speaker0: We're talking today with two Central California pastors, Pastor Jeff and Pastor
0:05
Speaker0: Michael, about how change and transformation happens in the church.
0:12
Speaker0: And the thing about it is, if we force those changes, if we shove them through
0:19
Speaker0: with our own power, they're not going to work out as Pastor Michael talks about here.
0:26
Speaker2: Pastors talk about nickels and noses or butts in seats and bucks in the plate or whatever you want.
0:31
Speaker2: You can't expect those things to change without a heart change first.
0:35
Speaker2: It will be temporal, it will be our doing, and I don't want anything of it.
0:40
Speaker2: It will have the smell of human on it if we can just force it.
0:59
Speaker2: Leaders and pastors find health, encouragement, practical advice,
1:03
Speaker2: soul care, and resources that work together to build up your local fellowship
1:07
Speaker2: and the broader kingdom of God.
1:09
Speaker2: Join hosts, Pastor Chris Cole and Dr. Chase Thompson from the Great Commission
1:13
Speaker2: Association, led by Dr. Mike Stewart, as they explore the frontiers of ministry
1:18
Speaker2: and aim for the goal of making every church flourish.
1:21
Speaker0: Hello, everybody, and welcome in to episode number 29 of the Every Church Flourishing podcast.
1:27
Speaker0: I am your host, Chase Thompson. I'm a California pastor.
1:30
Speaker0: I'm going to be joined in just a moment by Pastor Christopher Cole,
1:34
Speaker0: who is with the Great Commission Association, a family of churches that spread
1:40
Speaker0: out all over North and Central California.
1:42
Speaker0: If you're in our area or anywhere near it, we would love to partner with you,
1:48
Speaker0: and I will invite you to check out our website,
1:51
Speaker0: gcasbc.org, to find out more information about that.
1:57
Speaker0: We've got two other California pastors joining us today, four California pastors in total.
2:04
Speaker0: It might be this week's sign of the apocalypse, but Pastor Michael Denton from
2:10
Speaker0: First Baptist Napomo and Pastor Jeff Wollstenhoom from Foothill Baptist in Los Altos is joining us.
2:17
Speaker0: And we're going to be talking about something that is universally important
2:23
Speaker0: in every church, the process of change and transformation.
2:27
Speaker0: We're going to talk about it in the context of church replanting,
2:31
Speaker0: but every pastor and leader listening will be able to benefit from the wisdom
2:36
Speaker0: that you're going to hear on the process of change.
2:39
Speaker0: How does transformation happen? What fuels it? What part does prayer play in?
2:46
Speaker0: And that whole process. How can you lead and pastor the church through change?
2:52
Speaker0: What are some tips that will help you bring about healthy and needed changes
2:58
Speaker0: in the church you're part of?
3:00
Speaker0: It's a great discussion. I just was pumped to be a part of it.
3:04
Speaker0: Let's dive in. All right. We have the privilege to be joined by a couple of
3:09
Speaker0: our Great Commission Association pastors who are serving right now in replant situations.
3:17
Speaker0: Not only are their churches interesting and their stories interesting,
3:21
Speaker0: but their hobbies are kind of interesting too.
3:23
Speaker0: So I am really looking forward to talking to Pastor Michael and Pastor Jeff
3:28
Speaker0: about replanting and about surfing and about water polo and all sorts of things like that.
3:34
Speaker3: You know, Chase, I'm super excited that we We get to have these guys on the
3:38
Speaker3: show as a part of our series on
3:41
Speaker3: our GCA Renew strategy, and in particular, how GCA has been involved in church
3:47
Speaker3: replanting in the past few years.
3:50
Speaker3: For about six years now, we've been thinking seriously about the work that God
3:55
Speaker3: has called us to do in helping work with churches that are plateaued,
4:00
Speaker3: in decline, or maybe even
4:03
Speaker3: approaching really spiritual
4:06
Speaker3: Death as a church.
4:07
Speaker3: And so we've been thinking about it, praying about it. And then over the past
4:11
Speaker3: few years, we've been developing out an intentional strategy to help churches engage in
4:18
Speaker3: becoming a church that has been brought back to life, brought back to flourishing and to health.
4:24
Speaker3: And cornerstone to that strategy is finding guys who want to serve and are called
4:30
Speaker3: to serve, gifted to serve as replanters.
4:34
Speaker3: And we'll talk more about the difference between replanters,
4:37
Speaker3: revitalizers on either this episode or some others in this series.
4:41
Speaker3: But these two guys, I am so proud of. I think they are amazing.
4:46
Speaker3: They are the best of the best.
4:48
Speaker3: And we are stoked to have them in our association.
4:51
Speaker3: And they serve in very different environments, different contexts,
4:56
Speaker3: but they're both doing similar work in replanting our churches.
5:00
Speaker3: Pastor Michael's been doing this now for over four years.
5:03
Speaker3: And Pastor Jeff's just a few months into his actual first lead replanter role.
5:11
Speaker3: So we'll get some of that information out of them today to talk about how their
5:15
Speaker3: stories are similar and different, but I'm excited to have them on the show.
5:20
Speaker0: Yeah, me too. And particularly, as I said earlier, their hobbies.
5:24
Speaker0: Pastor Michael is known as the surf pastor.
5:27
Speaker0: I'll tell you this real quick before I ask you for a story, Pastor Michael, I'm
5:30
Speaker0: When I was in high school, I grew up in Birmingham, Alabama,
5:33
Speaker0: which is about five hours from the beach, and I was looking for an identity.
5:38
Speaker0: I played a little bit of football, but not enough to have that as my identity.
5:42
Speaker0: So I started buying all the surfing clothes I could, Ocean Pacific,
5:47
Speaker0: Hobie, Panama Jack, et cetera, and I wore surfing clothes every time I could to my school.
5:53
Speaker0: And people eventually just assumed with a little help on my part that I was
5:57
Speaker0: a surfer because I went to the beach a lot and I was pretty tan.
6:00
Speaker0: But I could not surf five feet for a million dollars.
6:05
Speaker0: I was the biggest poser in Birmingham. But you're not a poser.
6:09
Speaker0: You're a real surfer. So give us either a surfing story or a shark story.
6:16
Speaker2: Sure. I'm becoming more of a poser the older I get and the more my kids are
6:20
Speaker2: able to surf better than me.
6:21
Speaker2: So I definitely enjoy as much as I can getting out there in the water still.
6:26
Speaker2: So I think catching the wave of my life off of St. Thomas Island,
6:31
Speaker2: they have one surf spot there called Hole Bay.
6:33
Speaker2: It is after a hurricane and natives were encouraging me to not go in the water.
6:38
Speaker2: And I only had one day there. So I did and caught the wave of my life was cool.
6:41
Speaker2: But for any surfer, the day that you see a dorsal fin cut the water and you
6:47
Speaker2: feel the invitation to walk on water back to the beach as fast as you can,
6:51
Speaker2: usually as a dolphin, almost always, always is a dolphin.
6:55
Speaker2: But still, your heart does pick up a beat, that's for sure.
6:58
Speaker0: Yeah, no doubt. I saw a shark in the water one time from a pier swimming and
7:02
Speaker0: it was blindingly fast. I feel like I'm a decent swimmer.
7:07
Speaker0: I would just be eaten before I even knew what happened. So, Pastor Jeff,
7:11
Speaker0: your senior year at California Baptist University, you were a water polo guy,
7:18
Speaker0: and you played in 36 games.
7:21
Speaker0: You had 27 goals, 17 assists, 26 steals, and those are really good numbers.
7:27
Speaker0: You scored four goals against Redlands. You scored a goal against number 11, UC Davis.
7:33
Speaker0: That's really impressive. And from my just memory here, you drew 23 ejections,
7:40
Speaker0: which is more than Tommy Hunter, Bo Brumley, and Chris Nguyen put together.
7:45
Speaker0: And we're really happy to have you on the show to talk a little bit about your water polo career.
7:51
Speaker0: Now, I'm not a water polo expert. So what is that stat about the ejections?
7:56
Speaker0: Does that mean you were ejected 23 times or you got people ejected 23 times? Yeah.
8:03
Speaker1: It means I got people ejected 23 times. I was really good at selling.
8:07
Speaker1: So you see soccer where the guy, you get to see falls, but he never even got
8:11
Speaker1: touched by someone's foot.
8:12
Speaker1: I was really good at swimming down the pool and acting like a guy's pulling
8:15
Speaker1: my leg backwards and I would lurch backwards.
8:18
Speaker1: And the referee would call an ejection, which would, in hockey terms, put us into a power play.
8:23
Speaker1: Nice. We had an additional player and we go into a power play,
8:27
Speaker1: which is about a 25 second power play.
8:30
Speaker1: And in water polo, it's a huge advantage that you get power play and you're
8:34
Speaker1: going to score probably six to seven out of 10 times on a power play.
8:38
Speaker0: Oh, hey, wow. Just in that 20 seconds. That's pretty fascinating.
8:41
Speaker1: It's quick. You get down there real quick and you can't move super fast in the
8:44
Speaker1: water. So once you have one person less, formation is set up to make you score quickly.
8:49
Speaker0: Fantastic. Now, do you think causing people to commit fouls,
8:54
Speaker0: essentially making them stumble, is that a Christian thing?
8:58
Speaker0: No, I'm just kidding. But Pastor Christopher, over to you for more serious pastoral questions.
9:05
Speaker3: Well, we want to hear on the show, we want our listeners to hear the unique
9:10
Speaker3: story of how God's been at work in your churches and in your life.
9:15
Speaker3: And your churches are very unique. So we kind of want to do just a little bit
9:20
Speaker3: of background on each of your churches, how they're different from each other.
9:26
Speaker3: And then also to talk about how you guys got drawn into this particular role. So Pastor Michael,
9:34
Speaker3: Tell us a little bit about the first Baptist church of Napomo.
9:39
Speaker3: What was its condition in the year before you arrived?
9:43
Speaker3: And then how did you end up getting there?
9:46
Speaker2: Yeah, boy, I love telling this story because anytime it involves God's call
9:50
Speaker2: in your life, there's some heartstrings attached and you're just seeing God work.
9:55
Speaker2: It's awesome. I had just finished up about 10 years at one of our churches up
9:59
Speaker2: in Milpitas. Loved the time there as a youth and family pastor.
10:03
Speaker2: Saw God's faithfulness. And then during COVID, like with so many churches,
10:07
Speaker2: there was some decline that caused them to need to shuffle things as a staff.
10:12
Speaker2: And so I was asked if I would be willing to resign to make things a little easier
10:15
Speaker2: financially for the church.
10:17
Speaker2: That was hard, but I always know that God was going to put us somewhere.
10:22
Speaker2: And he'd always had on my heart to be a lead pastor.
10:24
Speaker2: In my desire to serve some small church somewhere, I didn't know where,
10:29
Speaker2: but I just have a heart for smaller churches thanks to a class I took from Dr.
10:34
Speaker2: Stewart many, many years ago on pastoral leadership in a small church.
10:38
Speaker2: I just wanted to serve somewhere where they might even need someone just to
10:40
Speaker2: lead music on a Sunday or something.
10:43
Speaker2: But I heard about this church in Napomo where the pastor was getting ready to
10:47
Speaker2: retire at some point, and they had a handful of members, roughly five or six,
10:51
Speaker2: still attending on Sunday morning per week.
10:55
Speaker2: And they were older ladies, most of them, and what I was told is that they didn't
11:01
Speaker2: want their church to die.
11:02
Speaker2: And that phrase so gripped my heart. God used that to show me sheep without a shepherd.
11:08
Speaker2: And I didn't honestly know where Napoma was. I thought it was Inland Valley
11:12
Speaker2: or something, but I told Katie, we got to check this out.
11:15
Speaker2: I want to be put in conduct with the pastor, see if we can serve.
11:18
Speaker2: And so that's really how we found out about it.
11:21
Speaker2: It turns out it's on the Central Coast, 15 minutes away from Pismo Beach and
11:26
Speaker2: a literal stop on some of the surfing tours.
11:29
Speaker2: That was the furthest thing from our mind of location was not on our minds.
11:35
Speaker2: So I just see that as the kindness of God to put us a place where we love the
11:39
Speaker2: place as well. But the people are amazing.
11:42
Speaker2: And so that's really how God brought us here.
11:44
Speaker3: That's so awesome. And Pastor Jeff, your church is in a radically different location from Napomo.
11:52
Speaker3: And so tell us about Foothill Baptist Church Los Altos, how they got to where
11:58
Speaker3: they were maybe the year before you got there and how you ended up showing up
12:04
Speaker3: and being part of the work that God's doing there now.
12:06
Speaker1: Yeah, so Padilla was founded in 1954, part of a Southern Baptist campaign, a million more in 54.
12:13
Speaker1: Wow. And so the church was planted and immediately grew over the next 10 years.
12:18
Speaker1: It would grow to about 500 members.
12:21
Speaker1: They built a large building. And essentially what happened from about 1964,
12:25
Speaker1: 1965 is the church began to decline.
12:28
Speaker1: So by the time we get to 1980, there's only 200 people in regular attendance.
12:32
Speaker1: By the 1990s, there's 100. By the time you get to the early 2000s,
12:36
Speaker1: there's 25. And the last baptism was in 2003.
12:41
Speaker1: So in 2025, the church called me in July of 2025 to be the pastor,
12:46
Speaker1: and there were eight members left.
12:49
Speaker1: And so I was in Portland, and I was pastoring at a Baptist church in Portland, an associate pastor.
12:55
Speaker1: I wanted to be a lead pastor. I grew up in Southern California,
12:59
Speaker1: wanted to get back to California, couldn't take the Portland weather anymore,
13:03
Speaker1: and just wanted to be somewhere that God wanted to use me.
13:06
Speaker1: And like Michael, I didn't have a list of God, this is exactly where you need to put me.
13:11
Speaker1: But I always had a heart for being somewhere strategic, being somewhere near college students.
13:17
Speaker1: I used to do college ministry. And so college students have always been near and dear to my heart.
13:21
Speaker1: And so when I heard about Foothill Baptist Church in Los Altos,
13:24
Speaker1: which is, if you look it up on the map, it's kind of the heartbeat of Silicon Valley.
13:28
Speaker1: Surrounding it is the Apple's about 10 minutes away from us.
13:31
Speaker1: Google's about 15. Facebook's about 20 minutes.
13:34
Speaker1: And Stanford University is about 15 minutes away. When I heard about the opportunity
13:38
Speaker1: to help this church that was dying, we just felt like this is what God was calling us to do.
13:44
Speaker1: It wasn't how I had designed the process. I'm sure we can get into that later.
13:49
Speaker1: But I was excited about the opportunity and the potential. And so we started
13:54
Speaker1: interviewing, And that was about a six month process.
13:57
Speaker1: And then we answered the Lord's call when the church called us.
14:00
Speaker3: Awesome story there. Just guys, how's it going? Michael, you've been doing this
14:05
Speaker3: for just over four years.
14:06
Speaker3: Jeff, you're in, this is month number seven. So Michael, how's it going?
14:12
Speaker2: We just passed our fifth anniversary, but I wasn't the lead pastor.
14:16
Speaker2: Those first nine months was a strategic process, which we can talk about later.
14:20
Speaker2: But I tell you, I wish that the numbers were higher as far as in the auditorium, but literally
14:27
Speaker2: we just got back from youth camp with 15 teenagers and I've got boys coming
14:32
Speaker2: back, fired up to walk with Jesus and meet together and memorize scripture.
14:37
Speaker2: I have people who are taking leadership roles. I have an elder candidate where
14:41
Speaker2: it was just me and the lead pastor, the pastor that was getting ready to retire.
14:46
Speaker2: No other men in the church. Now I've got, you know, deacon candidates and elder candidate.
14:50
Speaker2: Jeff, it gets better, man. I don't know what you've got over there,
14:53
Speaker2: but I tell you, there was a lot of lonely Sundays and I guess I'm going to probably
14:59
Speaker2: pray again this week and I'm probably going to lead the music and do a few other things, you know,
15:04
Speaker2: and just to have people who are discipling others and it's the best thing ever.
15:10
Speaker3: Jeff, how's it going over there at Foothill in month number seven?
15:16
Speaker1: I think it's going really well. The first five, six months were really particularly
15:21
Speaker1: difficult for me just personally.
15:23
Speaker1: I remember reading a book about month two and about pastoral character and that
15:28
Speaker1: he was talking about patience and praying for slow growth, counterintuitive,
15:33
Speaker1: but praying for slow growth.
15:34
Speaker1: And I thought, nah, I'm not praying that prayer.
15:38
Speaker1: And a few months later, I started praying that prayer because I was just struggling
15:43
Speaker1: to see how we're going to do this.
15:45
Speaker1: You know, it wasn't seeing necessarily any growth, at least numerically.
15:50
Speaker1: I was starting to see some growth in the people, which was encouraging.
15:53
Speaker1: Now, seven months in, I do feel like we're seeing growth both numerically and
15:58
Speaker1: in our other members. And that is super encouraging and growth in me as pastor.
16:03
Speaker1: My wife told me early on, she said, Jeff, I think God wants you to go through
16:06
Speaker1: all of it, the highs, the lows, the difficulties. Wow.
16:10
Speaker1: And that has rung true in just the short seven months that I've been going through
16:14
Speaker1: a lot of different highs and lows as I think the Lord is trying to shape the
16:20
Speaker1: man that he wants to use for his work here at Foothill.
16:23
Speaker0: Yeah, I think that is something pastors may not and church leaders don't think about enough.
16:28
Speaker0: We are often so committed to the process and the outcome and the results.
16:32
Speaker0: And I think it seems to be something higher on God's priority list to shape
16:38
Speaker0: the people and the leaders involved in their character and their maturity.
16:42
Speaker0: And that's that's hard. That's hard for all of us.
16:45
Speaker0: So, guys, there's going to be church replanters and potential church replanters
16:51
Speaker0: that are listening to this interview.
16:54
Speaker0: And I would ask you, we'll start with Pastor Michael first, then Pastor Jeff.
16:58
Speaker0: What would you say as an encouragement to those replanters, especially those
17:04
Speaker0: early in their runs replanting?
17:07
Speaker0: And what kind of, give us a pro tip, a something, a truth that will help them in their journey.
17:15
Speaker2: Sure. Boy, what comes to mind immediately is to remember that your real legacy
17:22
Speaker2: is living at home with you and to make sure that you are investing in them and
17:28
Speaker2: that this church and your role in it will come and go.
17:31
Speaker2: But God will continue to work in the hearts of your own children and family.
17:35
Speaker2: That's important because your work can literally never be done if you don't
17:40
Speaker2: want it. I mean, if you want to, you can just continue working at this all the time.
17:44
Speaker2: And there are people who gladly meet with you. And so there's real people attached
17:49
Speaker2: to it, not just busy work in your office somewhere.
17:52
Speaker2: And so I think the one pro tip I would give is really to communicate well when there's changes.
18:01
Speaker2: There will be changes and be willing to go slow. I think I would just ask myself,
18:06
Speaker2: does this really need to happen right now?
18:08
Speaker2: And how can I help communicate in the best way possible without making the old
18:14
Speaker2: way or the old decision seem like it's dumb or not reaching people or I can't
18:20
Speaker2: believe why we haven't done this yet.
18:22
Speaker2: And so I think that I mostly did that well,
18:28
Speaker2: But there are certain times where, man, if I had to go back,
18:31
Speaker2: I just say, let's just, as we're going to make this change, let's just spend
18:35
Speaker2: a little time to grieve the thing that needs to go and just say,
18:38
Speaker2: as Marie Kondo would say,
18:40
Speaker2: thank you for your service as we take it out to storage where it will in the
18:44
Speaker2: dead of night find its way to the dumpster.
18:47
Speaker2: So that would be my pro tip for anyone doing this.
18:52
Speaker0: Okay, two tidbits of wisdom there. Over-communicate, especially when it comes
18:57
Speaker0: to change, and focus on your family first. What will it profit a pastor who
19:02
Speaker0: builds his kingdom and loses his family in the process?
19:06
Speaker0: All right, Pastor Jeff, over to you. What is an encouragement you would give
19:10
Speaker0: to replanters and potential replanters, and what are the pro tips you've learned
19:16
Speaker0: from seven months in this process?
19:18
Speaker1: Yeah, I think one of the things that guys need to remember is this is both a
19:22
Speaker1: church plant and a revitalization.
19:25
Speaker1: And so you need to know your priorities. You need to think through how you're
19:29
Speaker1: going to spend your weeks.
19:31
Speaker1: Like Pastor Michael said, there's a black hole worth of stuff to be doing.
19:35
Speaker1: You've got to, if you're going to revitalize, you've got to preach excellent
19:38
Speaker1: sermons to your people. You need to build up the eight people.
19:41
Speaker1: I preach to eight like there's a hundred.
19:45
Speaker1: I don't want them to feel like I'm preaching to eight. So if three people show
19:48
Speaker1: up, we don't sit around and have a Bible study.
19:50
Speaker1: I preach the full sermon that I wrote that week. And we trust that the Lord
19:54
Speaker1: is using it for his work in their lives. And maybe some people that will listen
19:59
Speaker1: to it on the internet or whatever he wants to do with it. Maybe it was just
20:01
Speaker1: because I needed that sermon that week.
20:03
Speaker1: So make sure you have your priorities straight and that you preach excellent sermons every week.
20:08
Speaker1: And then I think pro tip is just that, man, we're in this for the long haul.
20:12
Speaker1: I mean, I'm only seven months in, so it's somewhat easy to say it,
20:15
Speaker1: but I know Michael would affirm this.
20:18
Speaker1: It's that truism that God will do far less in one year, but he'll do a lot after five.
20:23
Speaker1: And there is just that longevity, the importance of sticking to it,
20:27
Speaker1: that the way that God builds his church and his people is through slow and steady growth.
20:31
Speaker1: And we've got to trust in the longevity of the process.
20:34
Speaker0: Yeah. Amen. All right. Let's chase a rabbit trail here real quick.
20:37
Speaker0: You brought up preaching, Pastor Jeff.
20:39
Speaker0: If I had to guess, and I'm about to find out if I lose my bet,
20:43
Speaker0: I bet you and Pastor Michael have different preaching philosophies.
20:47
Speaker0: So Pastor Jeff, I know you are an expository preacher, but also that you just
20:53
Speaker0: preached through a series on Deuteronomy in what, six, eight weeks for the whole book?
20:59
Speaker0: Five weeks for the whole book. Okay, so Martin Lloyd-Jones, if he was preaching
21:04
Speaker0: on Deuteronomy, it would take him three lifetimes.
21:08
Speaker0: So first to you, Pastor Jeff, what is your preaching philosophy?
21:12
Speaker0: I find it very interesting. And then we'll ask the same question to Pastor Mike.
21:15
Speaker1: Yeah, so I mean, I would be committed to expositional preaching and that the
21:20
Speaker1: main point of the text becomes the main point of the sermon.
21:22
Speaker1: And so you can preach expositionally, like Martin Lloyd-Jones and you can preach
21:28
Speaker1: 100 sermons in Genesis chapter 20 or whatever he's done on revival.
21:33
Speaker1: You can preach 13 books worth on Romans like I have on my shelf.
21:36
Speaker1: And you can do those things.
21:38
Speaker1: You can also do one sermon on the
21:40
Speaker1: whole Bible like Mark Dever has done at Capitol Hill in Washington, DC.
21:44
Speaker1: So it's all types of, you can go through Deuteronomy in five weeks or 50 weeks.
21:49
Speaker1: Expositional sermons don't have to follow one rigid pattern.
21:52
Speaker1: But that's the commitment that I have is that I want the main point of the text
21:56
Speaker1: be the main point of the sermon that we walk away with having been taught how
22:00
Speaker1: to read our Bibles better and transformed by the word of God.
22:03
Speaker0: Hey, that's a great nugget of preaching wisdom there.
22:06
Speaker0: I really do think we are largely, and I don't want to get emails on this because
22:10
Speaker0: I could be wrong. I think we're largely past the day of 250 to 300 sermons on the book of Ephesians.
22:18
Speaker0: So I kind of like your method of going through the book of Deuteronomy.
22:22
Speaker0: So Pastor Michael, what is your preaching philosophy?
22:25
Speaker2: I strongly disagree with Jeff.
22:26
Speaker2: Oh, boy. No, it's fantastic. And I love what he said there at the end.
22:32
Speaker2: And I would add to what he said at the end that my goal, because I have so many
22:38
Speaker2: new believers in my church, literally they received the Lord and were baptized
22:42
Speaker2: here and being discipled by someone here.
22:44
Speaker2: I want to turn them from spiritual toddlers who need to be fed to people who can feed themselves.
22:49
Speaker2: And so I want to show them through the message how to get into the Word of God.
22:53
Speaker2: And that's what I heard Jeff saying just now, how to study the Word of God,
22:58
Speaker2: and then yes, to apply it to their lives.
23:01
Speaker2: So as I'm praying through a series, and yes, it'll be from a book,
23:05
Speaker2: or most recently through the Sermon on the Mount, I'll take and say,
23:09
Speaker2: this is what I think our people need
23:11
Speaker2: in their walk right now, and talk with my elder candidate about that as well,
23:15
Speaker2: so we can both be in prayer about it, and then go into it that way. So I took
23:21
Speaker2: 50-something weeks, I think, through Genesis.
23:25
Speaker2: So I need to watch Jeff's sermons online since he says they're readily available
23:30
Speaker2: and find out how I could have done that in about probably seven weeks,
23:34
Speaker2: I'd say, for Genesis. It's going to take a little bit.
23:37
Speaker2: But no, I just love that because I have a desire also, Lord willing,
23:41
Speaker2: in my time here to preach through the Bible.
23:44
Speaker2: And so I can't realistically be taking 66 years or whatever it is to preach
23:49
Speaker2: through all things. So I'm going to have to switch things up a little bit in
23:53
Speaker2: my style as well. So I love that. Kudos to you, Jeff. All right.
23:56
Speaker0: Well, handing back control to Pastor Christopher, I will ask you as I hand it
24:00
Speaker0: off, what is your style of preaching? What is your method, Pastor Christopher?
24:05
Speaker3: Oh, I just open up my Bible and stick my finger in it and comment from the beginning right there.
24:12
Speaker3: At this point, this many years into the ministry, dude, I don't need to do any studying or anything.
24:17
Speaker3: And if you are listening at home, please do not listen to that advice or that counsel.
24:23
Speaker3: No, man, I love the expositional preaching of God's word. I love to take it
24:29
Speaker3: and apply it well while revealing the intent of the text and what God is speaking to his people about.
24:36
Speaker3: And I love these brothers' heart for teaching the Word of God,
24:40
Speaker3: centering the church around the revitalizing, the strategic work of the Word of God.
24:47
Speaker3: Because Scripture reminds us, you know, it's the Word of God that's living and
24:50
Speaker3: active and sharper than any two-edged sword that pierces to the division of soul and spirit.
24:56
Speaker3: And it's that word of God that discerns the thoughts and intentions of the human heart.
25:02
Speaker3: So, you know, I think anybody that we want to work with in our GCA strategies
25:08
Speaker3: is we want men who are centered around the word of God. And both these guys
25:11
Speaker3: are great examples of that.
25:13
Speaker3: And I love their heart for God's word, for God's people. Well,
25:16
Speaker3: guys, let's talk about replanting as a strategy.
25:22
Speaker3: And in this day and time, there's a lot of different people who have sort of
25:26
Speaker3: jumped on the replanting bus.
25:29
Speaker3: You know, when I was doing this 35 years ago for the first time,
25:34
Speaker3: there was no one wanting to do this, right? This was not...
25:37
Speaker3: A, a exciting part of church ministry.
25:41
Speaker3: And now, you know, even, even 15 years ago, there were almost no books,
25:46
Speaker3: No major books on this topic, not a lot of that had been written about it.
25:52
Speaker3: But today there's a lot of people throwing around terms like,
25:54
Speaker3: oh, I'm a replanter, I'm a revitalizer.
25:58
Speaker3: And there's not a lot of clarity or definition about that. And I've,
26:02
Speaker3: I work with both of you guys through your processes as you guys were coming into this role.
26:08
Speaker3: So I'm curious with your experience now, how well you think my analogies resonate
26:15
Speaker3: as I try to teach and coach on this particular point.
26:19
Speaker3: One analogy that you guys I think are both very familiar with from me is this,
26:25
Speaker3: that I tell guys who are considering the work of planting or replanting or church
26:31
Speaker3: revitalization They're trying to discern.
26:33
Speaker3: I say, listen, the scripture talks about the church. It uses the analogy at
26:38
Speaker3: times of us being like a building. You know, Peter uses this analogy. Paul uses this analogy.
26:45
Speaker3: So I say, so what kind of spiritual building do you think God's called you to be in or to steward?
26:51
Speaker3: Or to help build. And some people,
26:53
Speaker3: they just want to go into sort of the suburbia equivalent of a church.
26:58
Speaker3: It's just, it's an existing house.
27:00
Speaker3: They want to maintain it well. They may even want to expand it just a little bit.
27:04
Speaker3: And I say, hey, if that's you and that's your spiritual house,
27:08
Speaker3: you're probably a pastor. Other guys want to find that empty field and they
27:13
Speaker3: see that empty spot and they just dream up that great, big, beautiful home that
27:18
Speaker3: they want to build there.
27:19
Speaker3: And they spend their life and ministry building that.
27:23
Speaker3: And I say, man, if that's you, you're a church planter, right?
27:26
Speaker3: And if you're a replanter or a revitalizer, though, you've got a little bit
27:30
Speaker3: different wiring and you're the guy who's passing through the neighborhood and
27:35
Speaker3: you see this old run down Victorian or craftsman home and you can't help it.
27:41
Speaker3: You keep walking by it and you see the raccoons, you see that the wiring is
27:45
Speaker3: shot, you maybe even poke your head in through what once was beautiful glass
27:50
Speaker3: windows and realize that the house is full of mold.
27:53
Speaker3: And yet you are crazy enough to buy that house and move into it and room by room, not knock it down,
28:02
Speaker3: not try to turn it into something completely new, but room by room,
28:06
Speaker3: renovate that house spiritually so that it becomes a place both that holds the
28:12
Speaker3: history and beauty of the past
28:14
Speaker3: and is functional and fruitful in a modern time.
28:18
Speaker3: So that's my analogy that I use. I'm curious, how do you guys feel about that
28:24
Speaker3: analogy now that you're in this work? And we'll start with Michael.
28:28
Speaker2: You've been doing this for
28:29
Speaker3: Almost five years. Is that still a good analogy? Where does it fall apart?
28:33
Speaker3: Critique it if you want to.
28:35
Speaker2: Well, I'll let you know in year 10, if the house falls apart,
28:39
Speaker2: you know, you got to shore up the foundation or something. But I like that analogy.
28:43
Speaker2: I've used it myself. And it was very poignant that when I came here,
28:47
Speaker2: the parsonage needed to be literally renovated.
28:51
Speaker2: And God kept sending us people. When we moved in there, one of the upstairs
28:55
Speaker2: ceiling fans was held together with hair ties.
28:57
Speaker2: The downstairs carpet in the dining room was held together with duct tape.
29:01
Speaker2: And so you can just imagine the rest of it. And so
29:05
Speaker2: I see that, that you don't, I guess the admission is you don't get to be a church
29:10
Speaker2: of just a handful of people meeting on Sunday morning by loving your community
29:13
Speaker2: well, and by there being intention to the important things
29:17
Speaker2: that just, that doesn't happen by accident or oops, you know, we didn't mean to.
29:23
Speaker2: And so that takes someone who loves that church to say, God,
29:28
Speaker2: would you give me wisdom and carefulness and time?
29:31
Speaker2: And so that's what we committed to is Pastor Christopher, you told us at the
29:35
Speaker2: beginning, told Katie and I that would take probably between seven and 10 years.
29:39
Speaker2: And so we committed to at least
29:41
Speaker2: 10 years, should the Lord tarry and allow us the opportunity.
29:44
Speaker2: So there's not been delusions of, boy, this was supposed to have happened a
29:48
Speaker2: couple of years ago, or why aren't we at a certain spot by now?
29:52
Speaker2: We want to continue being faithful, yes, but we're in it for the long haul and
29:56
Speaker2: expecting it to be that from the get-go, from the jump. So yeah, I love the analogy.
30:04
Speaker2: And though I'm not a remodeler.
30:07
Speaker2: I used to say that God sent us people and the people sent me to Home Depot.
30:11
Speaker2: So that was my role in the whole renovation of the parsonage.
30:16
Speaker3: I recall that renovation work. I pulled up a good bit of carpet in there.
30:20
Speaker2: You did it. I did your lovely wife.
30:24
Speaker3: And that was, it was gross. There's a funny story here we got to tell.
30:29
Speaker3: No joke, on the day that we took over the parsonage, which had been rented out.
30:36
Speaker2: For 10 years.
30:36
Speaker3: And for 10 years, the church had reassumed authority over this parsonage.
30:42
Speaker3: But on the day that we show up with these renovation crews to gut the place
30:48
Speaker3: with multiple church volunteers from different churches there.
30:51
Speaker2: 18 volunteers from different churches, yeah.
30:53
Speaker3: Yeah, different churches were there. Michael goes over there,
30:56
Speaker3: but he can't get in the house.
30:57
Speaker3: So he breaks into the church's parsonage, Only to find there's a dude in the
31:03
Speaker3: shower and, and the family has, has decided to stay because they have COVID.
31:11
Speaker0: Oh, I know. Wow. What a story.
31:16
Speaker2: That's called pivot. So we cleaned out the food storage instead with those volunteers.
31:20
Speaker2: But Pastor Chris and his wife masked up with us after the renters finally got
31:25
Speaker2: out that day, and they still tore out carpet in that COVID-infested home.
31:28
Speaker2: So it's good to have ministry partners.
31:32
Speaker3: It was quite the story. Well, Jeff, you've heard me use that analogy.
31:37
Speaker3: You've been living in this reality. You come from also a church that's a little
31:42
Speaker3: bit farther on their revitalization journey.
31:46
Speaker3: So does that analogy stand up? How would you explain the differences in these
31:51
Speaker3: kinds of work to guys that are considering it?
31:55
Speaker1: Yeah. I mean, I think that part of what differentiates a replanter versus a revitalizer is that
32:02
Speaker1: a revitalizer is in a church that can fully support the pastor,
32:05
Speaker1: and he's there for the long work of turning around what has become a spiritually
32:10
Speaker1: dying and or dead church.
32:12
Speaker1: A replanter is taking on a building, a people, a history, has to externally
32:17
Speaker1: fundraise to support the work, and
32:19
Speaker1: has to balance church planting and revitalizing, which means you have to
32:24
Speaker1: love and appreciate the people who are there and their history
32:28
Speaker1: While not getting only caught up with them and their history,
32:33
Speaker1: but also helping them see the way forward.
32:36
Speaker1: There's a reason why we got here to where we are.
32:39
Speaker1: Now we need to move forward while not losing the history, but appreciating,
32:44
Speaker1: valuing, and looking ahead.
32:47
Speaker1: And so it's why when I came in, I had no intentions of changing the church name
32:50
Speaker1: because I wanted the witness that has been on the corner of Grant and Fremont
32:54
Speaker1: for 60, 70 years to continue.
32:57
Speaker1: And for this community to see a church that is dying, turn around and flourish.
33:02
Speaker1: And isn't that just a picture of the gospel? People who are dead, who come to life.
33:06
Speaker1: And so I love that vision of in a decade, you know, Lord willing,
33:10
Speaker1: if he tarries, Michael, that we're seeing a church that has turned around as
33:14
Speaker1: life and that the community takes notice of because of the way that we love
33:18
Speaker1: each other and that we love them.
33:19
Speaker1: So if you want to be a church planter, I think you're after a really good work.
33:22
Speaker1: It's just a very different work as is revitalization.
33:26
Speaker1: Replanter, I love the term or renewal as others use. I love the term because
33:30
Speaker1: I think it captures the essence of what we're doing. We're both revitalizing
33:34
Speaker1: and we're church planting.
33:36
Speaker0: Yeah. Well, let's shift gears a little bit because both of your answers are
33:41
Speaker0: getting us into a discussion of how transformation takes place.
33:45
Speaker0: And a big part of that is practical. A big part of that is spiritual.
33:50
Speaker0: So let's think about those spiritual aspects, specifically prayer,
33:55
Speaker0: but going beyond that as well.
33:57
Speaker0: So again, starting with Pastor Michael, what role did prayer intercession,
34:03
Speaker0: both in the church and outside the church, what role did that play in kind of getting you,
34:10
Speaker0: through the years you are now to getting you from point A to where you are now?
34:14
Speaker2: Yeah, boy, it was foundational at first. I'm so grateful for Pastor Chris Cole,
34:19
Speaker2: who came and led some amazing
34:23
Speaker2: heart-transforming Bible studies and suggested some things to me,
34:28
Speaker2: was my coach along the way.
34:29
Speaker2: And one of the things that we've done is even recently going back to a 21 days
34:34
Speaker2: of prayer emphasis as we're looking to have an outreach in the park across the
34:39
Speaker2: street, just calling people to prayer again.
34:41
Speaker2: At the end of last year, when finances were really in limbo,
34:46
Speaker2: basically, hey, we're not sure what God is saying to us through the lack of finances.
34:51
Speaker2: God, would you do something and would you make it clear because we'll be obedient,
34:55
Speaker2: but we just need to hear from you.
34:57
Speaker2: So called the church for a season to be praying intentionally and God answered
35:03
Speaker2: and finances really picked up. We're so grateful. But that's not the story.
35:07
Speaker2: It's not about finances. It's about that there need to be a reliance on God.
35:11
Speaker2: You can't expect just the outward things of, as pastors talk about,
35:16
Speaker2: nickels and noses or butts in seats and bucks in the plate or whatever you want.
35:21
Speaker2: You can't expect those things to change without a heart change first.
35:24
Speaker2: It will be temporal. It will be our doing, and I don't want anything of it.
35:29
Speaker2: It will have the smell of human on it if we can just force it.
35:33
Speaker2: It's not a popular thing that I did, but I did not put up a new sign outside here in the Pomo.
35:39
Speaker2: I'm not suggesting this is the strategy for elsewhere. I did not put up a new
35:42
Speaker2: sign, new logo for almost three years because I was afraid in this town of 19,000
35:48
Speaker2: people, we have one chance with some people.
35:51
Speaker2: They might come one time and it's a small town.
35:54
Speaker2: And I was not sure that our people would love them if they came in the door.
35:58
Speaker2: Just to be gut level frank with you, I didn't know because they had not loved
36:03
Speaker2: their community well to get to this point. They'd become insular. And we do that.
36:07
Speaker2: It's not because they're bad people. They're very, very good people. They're sweet people.
36:11
Speaker2: But they just lost sight of mission in order to keep
36:15
Speaker2: And turn it to let's keep these doors open in a sense, rather than remembering
36:20
Speaker2: that we have a public elementary school literally across the street from the
36:24
Speaker2: church who can see us and did not know who we were, knew nothing of that.
36:29
Speaker2: So to transform their hearts, we started literally praying for the school across
36:34
Speaker2: the street. God, would you help us to love them? Would you show us how to love
36:37
Speaker2: them, their families, whatever.
36:38
Speaker2: And so prayer, absolutely foundational. And I don't take credit for even thinking through that.
36:44
Speaker2: Like I said, Pastor Christopher Cole, again, you've heard me thank you in private,
36:49
Speaker2: but also publicly, just amazing your heart for our church and for me.
36:55
Speaker2: We had to do that. We had to do the hard spiritual work.
36:59
Speaker2: And I'm so grateful that the ladies were willing to do that.
37:02
Speaker2: The former pastor and his wife, Tom and Nancy, stayed with us at my invitation,
37:07
Speaker2: stayed for three years and as our emeritus pastor for the first little part
37:13
Speaker2: as paid and then just being here because they love the people.
37:16
Speaker2: And so I'm so grateful for them being willing to go through that work with us,
37:20
Speaker2: but just, yeah, all glory to God for, for him transforming hearts.
37:24
Speaker2: So then we actually do love, love the school across the street and they know it.
37:29
Speaker2: So anyway, anyway, I just want to say that that's been foundational.
37:33
Speaker2: Pastors should not overlook that work of prayer.
37:37
Speaker0: I don't want to paint with too broad of a brush, but I'm going to anyway.
37:40
Speaker0: I know for most of us men, when our wives come to us with an issue,
37:46
Speaker0: our first instinct is almost always to fix it instead of to sympathize,
37:51
Speaker0: empathize, listen, and extend compassion.
37:54
Speaker0: And my anecdotal survey of pastors is about 92 to 93% of us are doers.
38:03
Speaker0: You would think pastors should be great at prayer. It's hard for us to pray
38:07
Speaker0: because there's so much to do.
38:10
Speaker0: And there's always that pressure of if it's to be, it's up to me.
38:14
Speaker0: And I'm glad to hear your testimony.
38:17
Speaker0: And I hope all of us hear it well that, you know, the work of the kingdom is
38:21
Speaker0: not going to primarily be accomplished
38:25
Speaker0: by our tasks and our work and our gifts and our efforts, but by
38:29
Speaker0: God moving on behalf of our prayers. So Pastor Jeff, over to you.
38:34
Speaker0: In the seven months you've been serving in Los Altos. Tell us about how prayer
38:40
Speaker0: has played a part in that.
38:41
Speaker1: I think one of the cornerstones of what I encourage our people to do,
38:46
Speaker1: and I'm trying to model as well, is I had to pray for each other.
38:49
Speaker1: To pray for the members, there's about 14 members of the church,
38:53
Speaker1: and I have a membership list that I pray through regularly for each person by name.
38:58
Speaker1: Just pray scripture because I believe that it's prayer that does the work and
39:03
Speaker1: it's prayer that changes people.
39:04
Speaker1: And so I'm encouraging our members to do that, to pray for each other.
39:07
Speaker1: And then my wife and I just been in a regular season of prayer for the church,
39:12
Speaker1: prayer for the work that's happening.
39:14
Speaker1: And what's interesting is, you know, just a quick story. We were praying for
39:18
Speaker1: just that the Lord would grow the church. He'd bring more people.
39:21
Speaker1: And then we decided to pray on a Sunday for one. So, Lord, just bring us one family.
39:26
Speaker1: And amazing enough that following Sunday, one family showed up with three kids.
39:33
Speaker1: And they showed up and they walked in the door. And within the first week,
39:36
Speaker1: I had met with the husband and he said, how do I join? We want to be a part of this church.
39:40
Speaker1: And that was such an encouragement to me and to us just praying.
39:44
Speaker1: And then there's other stories of prayer as well, but I did feel like the Lord
39:49
Speaker1: was directing us to pray for that one.
39:50
Speaker1: And then I was also just convicted that I'm encouraging the church to pray,
39:54
Speaker1: but we're not making any time as a church to pray.
39:58
Speaker1: If you come to our service, you'll hear long prayers. I'm all about prayers
40:01
Speaker1: of petition, prayers of confession, prayers of thanksgiving.
40:05
Speaker1: So you're going to get long prayers that I'm leading or someone else is leading,
40:09
Speaker1: but we weren't actively praying as a church together.
40:11
Speaker1: And so we've started monthly lunch where we get together to eat,
40:16
Speaker1: fellowship, and then spend some time praying.
40:18
Speaker1: And that's prayer that I'm directing, that I'm leading and guiding us so that
40:22
Speaker1: we're not just praying for each other's health, but we're actually praying for
40:26
Speaker1: the ministry of the church.
40:27
Speaker1: Praying that we would have a church that has a culture of hospitality,
40:30
Speaker1: of discipling, of evangelism.
40:32
Speaker1: Praying for one another, praying for the preaching of God's word,
40:36
Speaker1: praying for evangelistic opportunities in the community.
40:40
Speaker1: So, I mean, prayer is the bedrock of what we're doing. And so I think the Lord
40:43
Speaker1: has been just shaping the way that that plays out in my own life,
40:46
Speaker1: but also how we work that out in the life of the church.
40:49
Speaker0: Yeah, fantastic.
40:51
Speaker0: So while we were talking, Pastor Christopher live added a question to my notes.
40:57
Speaker0: And I think it's an excellent question. So I'm going to throw it out to you
41:01
Speaker0: guys. Let me tell you a quick story first.
41:03
Speaker0: I am an Alabama football fan and grew up watching the Crimson Tide play.
41:08
Speaker0: And I remember a running back we had back when I was very young in the 80s named
41:12
Speaker0: Kerry Goode. Kerry Goode is a Christian. He was a fantastic running back.
41:17
Speaker0: Either his cousin or his brother, Pierre, is one of the fastest players I've ever seen.
41:21
Speaker0: But Kerry Goode has ALS now, one of at least a handful of Alabama players I'm
41:27
Speaker0: aware of that has ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease.
41:30
Speaker0: And I follow Kerry on Facebook, and he writes all the time about ALS.
41:35
Speaker0: And what he wrote about just, I think, yesterday was that moment when the tests
41:43
Speaker0: had been run and his doctor had come in and told him that he has
41:50
Speaker0: ALS, Lou Gehrig's disease, which if you know anything about ALS,
41:53
Speaker0: it's a terrifying diagnosis.
41:55
Speaker0: You don't normally get over, you know, there's no cure. It's just degenerative,
42:01
Speaker0: essentially, usually apart from the miracle of God until you die.
42:05
Speaker0: So huge deal, breaking bad news. And that gets me to Pastor Christopher's question,
42:12
Speaker0: which is about breaking bad news. Over to you, Pastor Michael.
42:16
Speaker0: What is the spiritual work of helping a church see and understand and acknowledge,
42:23
Speaker0: the spiritual reality and the natural reality of the fact that they are,
42:30
Speaker0: dead or near dead at the beginning of that replant process?
42:34
Speaker0: What does that look like communicating that news and saying,
42:39
Speaker0: hey guys, we don't just need a band-aid, we need miraculous intervention.
42:44
Speaker2: Yeah, the people here were very painfully aware of the lack of young people.
42:52
Speaker2: And my family shows up with a bunch of kids and including a couple teenagers
42:56
Speaker2: and the result was jarring. You could see they're so excited,
43:01
Speaker2: but they were very aware.
43:02
Speaker2: The problem is that they don't always associate that with spiritual lack in
43:09
Speaker2: some way or something that's happened.
43:11
Speaker2: And so what I did early on, so if we came in mid-April, this was very first
43:17
Speaker2: part of June, I'm talking
43:19
Speaker2: within two months, I had asked them to come to a night, I believe it was a Sunday
43:25
Speaker2: night, which we called Humility Night, and that we would just be,
43:30
Speaker2: That we would repent as a church.
43:32
Speaker2: And not all of us had been there for the wrong things that had been said on behalf of the church.
43:39
Speaker2: Not all of us had not done evangelism in our community, but all of us were reaping that.
43:47
Speaker2: And some of us had had some part in that or had rude things said to us.
43:52
Speaker2: And so there were a lot of tears that night and it was not a flashy service at all.
43:58
Speaker2: And I've not done it since. I haven't felt the need to do that since,
44:02
Speaker2: but to own as a church and for my family to be with them in it.
44:08
Speaker2: And because we're now part of the family and we grieved together for what had
44:14
Speaker2: been said or done on behalf of the church or to people
44:18
Speaker2: And I just feel like that helped to then set the tone for additional conversations that you need to have.
44:26
Speaker2: Well, we want to see people welcome here. We want whatever. And so,
44:31
Speaker2: yeah, I think that was foundational for that.
44:34
Speaker0: Awesome. Jeff, you got anything to add to that?
44:37
Speaker1: I might not be the best one to answer this question. I've not had any conversations
44:42
Speaker1: or acknowledgements of the failures of the past.
44:45
Speaker1: Partly because I trust that the remnant that God has kept here is going to respond
44:51
Speaker1: to the preaching of his word, that they're going to grow, that they're going
44:54
Speaker1: to grow in their love for Jesus. They're going to grow in love for the community.
44:57
Speaker1: And as they see people come to the church, it's going to encourage them.
45:01
Speaker1: It's going to embolden them. They're going to want to see continuing what we're doing.
45:05
Speaker1: So essentially, I think what I'm trying to do is just love the people and trust
45:10
Speaker1: that God has kept them here for a reason.
45:13
Speaker1: There are so many reasons why this church should not still exist,
45:16
Speaker1: and yet it's still here. And so now is the time where we see the fortunes of
45:21
Speaker1: the Baptist Church turn, but it's going to be because the Lord is growing His
45:24
Speaker1: people and the Lord is adding to His people.
45:27
Speaker1: And I just want to keep pointing them to that testimony and to that witness.
45:31
Speaker1: And I trust that the Christians will see it and rejoice.
45:34
Speaker1: And if there are any that are not Christians, they will not like it.
45:38
Speaker1: And I can just trust the Lord and then the work that he's doing.
45:41
Speaker0: I appreciate the fact that both
45:43
Speaker0: of you have two significantly different approaches to the same problem.
45:50
Speaker0: And I think that is a great example of spiritual giftedness and the individual
46:00
Speaker0: way that God calls people.
46:02
Speaker0: We're different and we're going to be different. And I'm not going to do everything
46:06
Speaker0: like Mark Dever or David Platt or J.D.
46:09
Speaker0: Greer does. And that's not only American individualism deeper than that.
46:14
Speaker0: It's God's way of calling and crafting his people. So thank you guys both for those answers.
46:21
Speaker2: If I could also say, I came following a very faithful pastor who had not left,
46:27
Speaker2: not left these ladies in the lurch and was regrettably retiring.
46:32
Speaker2: And so it was not his fault the way that he got the church when it had 20 in it on a Sunday.
46:38
Speaker2: And so he was gently leading them into the future with the people that he had.
46:44
Speaker2: And so that in a very real sense, so far from wanting to put blame on anybody,
46:49
Speaker2: there wasn't like just a person.
46:51
Speaker2: Like you couldn't just point back if there had been a pastor who had been malicious,
46:55
Speaker2: for example, or had divided the church, that was not this pastor.
46:59
Speaker2: He had loved them well to the point where I said, I want him to stay.
47:02
Speaker2: I would not have asked him to stay if that were the case.
47:05
Speaker2: And so I just want to say that that also played into how I led through that,
47:10
Speaker2: that careful realization of now, what can we do?
47:15
Speaker2: We didn't have people before that could go across and bring snacks to the monthly,
47:19
Speaker2: to the school across the street.
47:21
Speaker2: Now my family could at least do that until we end up having other people who
47:25
Speaker2: could come alongside us, which we eventually did.
47:28
Speaker0: Okay. I think that's a good place to pause the interview for now.
47:32
Speaker0: We've got a whole second part coming for you next week, where we keep on talking
47:37
Speaker0: about that process of change and transformation with Pastor Michael and Pastor Jeff.
47:41
Speaker0: I think the conversation gets even deeper.
47:45
Speaker0: It's always the same in these kind of interviews. The first half is good,
47:49
Speaker0: but the second half just has a tendency to go deeper and deeper and deeper and
47:53
Speaker0: better and richer, further up, further in.
47:56
Speaker0: Now, before we are finished, we're going to review a soda from Manchester, England.
48:04
Speaker0: That has black currant and all sorts of other fascinating ingredients in it.
48:09
Speaker0: I have no earthly idea what to expect out of this one. Let's see how it tastes.
48:15
Speaker3: Well, Pastor Chase, I have a question for you that's really important. Are you ready?
48:18
Speaker3: What was invented in 1908 in Manchester, England?
48:24
Speaker0: Well, it just so happens I know the answer to that question because I did a
48:29
Speaker0: little bit of research before the show.
48:30
Speaker0: I want to be a soda academic when I grow up. And the answer to that question
48:34
Speaker0: is Vim Tonic, which was brought about by the famous Mangunian urban spice merchant, a guy named John Noel.
48:44
Speaker3: Yeah.
48:45
Speaker0: And we're going to find out shortly whether we should thank John Noel or go,
48:50
Speaker0: I don't know, spit on his grave or something.
48:52
Speaker3: Well, Vim Tonic was intended to give people Vim and Vigor.
48:57
Speaker0: I love that. Vim and Vigor. I want more Vim and Vigor.
49:00
Speaker3: I need Vim and Vigor. I often feel like this, and even though it started in
49:05
Speaker3: Manchester, England, Chase, it's sold today in more than 60 countries
49:11
Speaker3: and is especially popular in the United Kingdom and the Middle East.
49:16
Speaker0: Okay, that's fantastic. Yeah. And even though the Every Church Flourishing podcast
49:21
Speaker0: was started in California, USA, it is heard in dozens of countries, maybe close to 60.
49:28
Speaker3: Okay. Well, I don't know if any of those countries are in the Middle East, but
49:33
Speaker3: apparently Vimto, as Vimtonic is known today, is the cultural staple during
49:40
Speaker3: Ramadan in many Middle Eastern countries.
49:45
Speaker3: So now on a Baptist podcast, we are going to drink the Vimto,
49:50
Speaker3: a deeply popular Middle Eastern soda.
49:54
Speaker3: What's the flavor profile supposed to be on this thing?
49:56
Speaker0: It's got a mix of 23 fruit essences, herbs, and spices. You think, hey, it's grape soda.
50:04
Speaker0: But it's got all sorts of things. Gray, raspberry, blackcurrant.
50:09
Speaker0: Do you know what a blackcurrant is? Because I do not.
50:12
Speaker3: I do know what a blackcurrant is.
50:13
Speaker0: Fill me in.
50:13
Speaker3: Because I grew up drinking blackcurrant cordial.
50:17
Speaker3: What? Because that's very popular in countries where Britain was a colonial power.
50:23
Speaker0: Okay.
50:24
Speaker3: I grew up drinking blackcurrant cordial. That's one of the reasons I'm excited
50:27
Speaker3: about this particular soda. I'm excited about this in the way I think you've
50:30
Speaker3: been excited about some of the other sodas.
50:32
Speaker3: Because I liked the flavor of blackcurrant cordial when I was a kid.
50:36
Speaker1: Okay.
50:37
Speaker3: And having a blackcurrant profile, which is supposed to be strong in this particular
50:43
Speaker3: soda, is hopefully going to be as refreshing as I remember having blackcurrant cordial.
50:49
Speaker0: I hope so too. Were you a part of Her Majesty's Army, the imperialists that
50:54
Speaker0: basically conquered most of the world?
50:56
Speaker3: I was not myself.
50:58
Speaker0: Okay, okay.
50:59
Speaker3: But as a little child, I had friends that were heavily from the greater commonwealth nations.
51:08
Speaker3: So a lot of kids from Australia, New Zealand, anywhere where the commonwealth
51:13
Speaker3: was, Hong Kong, Singapore.
51:15
Speaker0: So you didn't conquer other nations personally?
51:19
Speaker3: I did not. I did not.
51:20
Speaker0: Okay, that's good.
51:20
Speaker3: But they have a lot of British cultural things. So a black currant cordial,
51:25
Speaker3: cordial is a concentrated fruit syrup, right?
51:28
Speaker3: Right. And typically when I was a kid, it would be mixed with like either a
51:32
Speaker3: still or a sparkling water that was cold.
51:34
Speaker3: And it was very tasty.
51:37
Speaker3: There was an orange one that was for some reason always called squash.
51:41
Speaker3: But the best known black cordial, black currant one is called ribena.
51:47
Speaker0: Never heard of that. Okay.
51:48
Speaker3: I loved ribena when I was a kid. My family couldn't afford ribena. We were poor.
51:53
Speaker3: But I had wealthier friends that could afford Ribena and I got to go to their house and drink Ribena.
52:00
Speaker0: Oh, maybe we have to get some Ribena on the podcast at some point soon.
52:04
Speaker0: Okay. Before we crack these open, I look at the risk of saying something dangerous
52:10
Speaker0: and culturally offensive.
52:12
Speaker0: When I look at this can and look, I'm not a scholar of the Middle East or of
52:18
Speaker0: the Islamic faith. But when I look at this can, it does not scream Ramadan to me.
52:24
Speaker3: It does not. Perhaps they package it differently in the Middle East.
52:29
Speaker3: Maybe in the Middle East, it doesn't say love the taste or your money back.
52:33
Speaker3: That seems like a distinctly American packaging of this particular product or
52:39
Speaker3: maybe for the U.S. market.
52:41
Speaker0: Hey, what's that green thing on there?
52:44
Speaker3: I think it's supposed to be a grape.
52:46
Speaker0: Oh, okay, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah.
52:47
Speaker3: Yeah, but interestingly, I don't know if you noticed, Chase,
52:50
Speaker3: it has barley malt in here.
52:52
Speaker0: Oh, so it's sort of beerish.
52:55
Speaker3: Well, you know, I'm on a Baptist podcast. Yeah, really? Right, exactly.
53:00
Speaker0: Let's check the alcohol content. Okay, I think we're good. Okay,
53:04
Speaker0: I'm ready. Look, you've got me excited. I'm ready.
53:07
Speaker3: I'm excited. After all the bad things you have made me try.
53:12
Speaker0: Wait a minute. This isn't me. We are supplied these drinks by our podcast overlord,
53:16
Speaker0: Miss Grace. It's so true. We are just slaves to her whims.
53:21
Speaker3: And she does seem to enjoy torturing us. All right. Apparently. I'm ready for my go-to.
53:25
Speaker0: Okay, let's go.
53:26
Speaker3: Oh, now see, that's a pleasant smell right there.
53:30
Speaker0: It takes you back to your childhood conquering nations for the queen and country. There we go.
53:36
Speaker0: It smells a little bitter to me. Whoa, you already tasted it. I better catch up.
53:39
Speaker3: I was eager.
53:41
Speaker0: Mmm, that's yummy. And it does have a little, it reminds me a lot of the aftertaste. Iron brew.
53:50
Speaker3: Of iron brew.
53:51
Speaker0: Yeah. Iron brew. Because it has a little bit of a, I don't know if bitter is the right word.
53:56
Speaker3: I think it's that barley malt in there, I think.
53:59
Speaker0: Yes, I think you might be right.
54:01
Speaker3: Yeah. Interesting.
54:03
Speaker0: It's got a flavor that is somewhat unfathomable, somewhat difficult to describe, but I really like it.
54:13
Speaker0: Trying to see what kind of, how many calories it's got.
54:16
Speaker0: 18 kilocalories. Is that the same as 18 calories? I don't know.
54:22
Speaker2: I'm not British.
54:23
Speaker3: I don't know that either. We might need to look that up.
54:26
Speaker0: I am. Okay. 18 kilocalories is 18,000 calories? What?
54:32
Speaker3: No.
54:33
Speaker0: No, surely not. Maybe I'm reading that wrong. Hmm.
54:39
Speaker0: 73 KJ. Kilojoules?
54:41
Speaker3: Yeah.
54:42
Speaker0: 18 Kcal. Surely that means kilocalories.
54:47
Speaker3: I don't know. I don't know.
54:48
Speaker0: What is a K-Cal? There we go.
54:52
Speaker0: Oh, okay. K-Cal stands for kilocalorie. In everyday language and nutrition,
54:57
Speaker0: one K-Cal is exactly equal to one calorie.
55:01
Speaker0: Well, that's confusing, England. Right. But 18 calories for this can,
55:05
Speaker0: that's good. That's a good deal. This is tasty.
55:08
Speaker3: No, it's per 100 milliliters. How many milliliters? This is three. What?
55:13
Speaker3: Yeah, this is whatever three times 18 is, which is 54 and another half. So 60 calories.
55:22
Speaker3: That's actually not bad, Chase. 60 calories.
55:25
Speaker0: It's not as bad as Lester's Fixin's, which is 170 calories per bottle.
55:31
Speaker0: But I still wouldn't call it a diet beverage. It's kind of an in-betweener.
55:34
Speaker3: Yeah. Yeah. It's not a diet beverage. That's true.
55:38
Speaker0: But I like it. I can't tell what you think. What do you think?
55:42
Speaker3: So here's the thing. I'm a little bit disappointed because I had hyped it up so much in my mind.
55:46
Speaker3: I would say this, I wanted that stronger black currant flavor.
55:51
Speaker0: Okay, gotcha.
55:52
Speaker3: I enjoy the bubbles on this. The color is really nice. It's a pretty light purple.
55:58
Speaker3: It's a little too grape soda-y for me.
56:01
Speaker3: But I think if you like grape soda, you probably would like this a little bit
56:04
Speaker3: more. I was hoping for a stronger.
56:06
Speaker3: I do like that back end barley malt flavor, whatever that is that's on there.
56:11
Speaker0: Yeah.
56:11
Speaker3: A little more distinctive, I guess, is what I was thinking.
56:15
Speaker0: If you're super disappointed, unfortunately for you, the can says that the money-back guarantee...
56:21
Speaker0: Is only in effect from 01-07-25 to 30-09-25, which are obviously made up dates,
56:30
Speaker0: but appear to be in the last year.
56:34
Speaker0: I know they're not made up dates. I'm just aggravating our British.
56:36
Speaker3: Right. That's exactly, exactly. Well, if you are in the United Kingdom and you are listening to
56:44
Speaker3: our Every Church Flourishing podcast, we are so excited that you are one of
56:49
Speaker3: those listeners that we have detected on our streaming tool that helps us figure
56:54
Speaker3: out where people are listening, and we're grateful that you are listening to us.
56:57
Speaker3: And if you have other sodas from the United Kingdom that you want us to try,
57:03
Speaker3: and you send us one of those sodas, we will send you some Every Church Flourishing swag.
57:09
Speaker3: Or if you just send us a reference and we pick it up, we will absolutely do that.
57:14
Speaker3: And let us know your thoughts about Demto. Or if you're in the Middle East,
57:18
Speaker3: Let us know if it has a different can than this or in the Middle East,
57:24
Speaker3: it says love the taste or your money back.
57:27
Speaker0: Are we authorized to offer days out of purgatory for participation in imperialism
57:33
Speaker0: for our UK listeners or not?
57:35
Speaker3: I don't think that's actually authorized for Baptists.
57:39
Speaker0: Oh, my bad.
57:40
Speaker3: We kind of leave that over to the folks on the other side. Okay.
57:45
Speaker0: The Tiber. I'll just check. I've only been a Baptist for a few decades now.
57:49
Speaker0: I don't feel like I've learned all about it.
57:51
Speaker3: You haven't quite figured out which side of the Tiber River you're on.
57:56
Speaker0: No, no, I have not. Hopefully I'll get there.
57:59
Speaker3: Like C.S. Lewis, you don't know which side of the time we're on.
58:02
Speaker3: So you're in good company there.
58:05
Speaker3: So Pastor Chase, what is your Spurgeon rating for Demto?
58:09
Speaker0: Yeah, this is like, it's going to be strong. I really like this stuff.
58:13
Speaker0: I like something that's unique. It's fresh. I'm going to say four and a half Spurgeons.
58:17
Speaker0: Four and a half? Yeah, it's Charles Spurgeon himself.
58:20
Speaker0: I have the bad habit, or most people say it's a bad habit, of drinking a soda
58:24
Speaker0: or drink every time I preach.
58:26
Speaker0: Charles Spurgeon would drink this while he preached. I'm pretty sure.
58:29
Speaker3: Wow. I think Spurgeon probably would drink Vim Tonic and get his Vim and vigor up.
58:35
Speaker3: And I really would like to say that I would give it a higher rating,
58:41
Speaker3: but the truth is I'm going to give it three and a half Spurge.
58:45
Speaker3: That's not terrible. No, it's not bad.
58:48
Speaker3: It's good. I would drink it again if somebody passed it to me at a party.
58:51
Speaker3: I would enjoy it. But I just am a little bit disappointed. I expected there
58:56
Speaker3: a little more of them and a little more bigger.
58:59
Speaker0: All right. Well, I'm happy. So this is two in a row where I've been a little
59:03
Speaker0: more positive than you, Pastor Christopher. If it's three in a row.
59:06
Speaker3: Just in general in life, I think.
59:07
Speaker0: Yeah. We might just have to check in with your therapist and counselor and make sure you're okay.
59:12
Speaker3: That's exactly.
59:15
Speaker3: That is so correct. That is a wise idea for us to check in there.
59:22
Speaker0: Okay, well, that was a good soda. And now it's time to say goodbye to Jed and
59:26
Speaker0: all his friends and your friends at the Every Church Flourishing Podcast.
59:30
Speaker0: But before we go out for the week, I do want to point you to a couple of upcoming
59:36
Speaker0: events with our Great Commission Association Family of Churches in September, September 19th.
59:43
Speaker0: The Flourish Equipping Conference for Women in Ministry is happening,
59:48
Speaker0: and that is going to be at Journey Christian Fellowship, which is in San Louis Obispo, California.
59:55
Speaker0: If you want to sign up for that, just go to gcasbc.org slash flourish,
1:00:01
Speaker0: And I am teaching the next Great Commission Training Institute class on church
1:00:07
Speaker0: history, which starts August 25th.
1:00:11
Speaker0: I can't wait. I love early church fathers. I love early church history.
1:00:16
Speaker0: It's going to be a blast. It's really inexpensive, but also a good deal in terms of education.
1:00:22
Speaker0: And the GCTI has all sorts of classes.
1:00:26
Speaker0: You can check those out on our website, gcasbc.org.
1:00:32
Speaker0: And if you want show notes for today's episode or any other episode of the podcast,
1:00:37
Speaker0: just go to our webpage for the podcast itself, which is Every Church Flourishing.
1:00:43
Speaker0: We would love to hear from you. You can leave us a message through our website.
1:00:47
Speaker0: You can leave us a voicemail.
1:00:50
Speaker0: Good day to you and Godspeed.