Thanks for joining us at the unSeminary podcast. In this episode we’re talking with Kara Powell, the Executive Director of the Fuller Youth Institute and Chief of Leadership Formation at Fuller Theological Seminary.

How is your church engaging with the next generation? Building connection and trust with young people can be difficult in today’s world. Kara’s work is all about helping churches equip leaders and engage young people, and in this conversation, she shares powerful insights for creating a church that truly connects with today’s youth.

Visit futurefocusedchurch.com to learn more about Kara’s new book, Future-Focused Church
Leading Through Change, Engaging the Next Generation, & Building a More Diverse Tomorrow, and explore the resources available.

Plus, check out Fuller Youth Institute at fulleryouthinstitute.org for help coming alongside the young people in your community, and connect with Kara on social media @KPowellFYI.

Click here to listen to the unSeminary podcast episode Healing the Racial Divide in Your Church with Derwin Gray.

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Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in. I’m really looking forward to today’s conversation. You know, this is one of those topics… in fact, I was reflecting recently, it revolves around one of the saddest things I ever heard a church leader say, which was, “It’s been decades since there were young people at our church.” And man, we don’t want that to happen at any of our churches.

Rich Birch — And today we are in for a real treat. It’s our honor to have Kara Powell. She’s the executive director of the Fuller Youth Institute and the chief leadership and the chief of leadership formation at Fuller Theological Seminary. That’s a lot. That’s a long title. she’s really an expert in this whole area. She speaks regularly at national parenting and leadership conferences, and is an author and co-author of a number of, from my perspective, must-read books. She’s got a brand new book that’s just come out that we want to make sure you read. But, Kara, welcome to the show. So glad you’re here.

Kara Powell — Thanks, Rich. It’s wonderful to be with you and all of your awesome listeners and viewers.

Rich Birch — This is great. I’m I’m honored that you would be with us. For for those that might not be familiar, kind of unpack a little bit about your role at Fuller Youth Institute and Fuller Theological Seminary in general.

Kara Powell — Yeah, well, I’m a faculty member, and I certainly love that role at Fuller Seminary. You already mentioned another role I’m passionate about, which is I’m the executive director of the Fuller Youth Institute. And our mission there is to equip diverse leaders so that faithful young people can change our world. And we do that by turning research into resources.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Kara Powell — So we take the best research that Fuller and others are doing and turn it into practical resources. One of FYI’s major initiatives is the ten by ten collaboration. So an additional role is that I’m the founder of the ten by ten collaboration, which seeks to help faith matter for 10 million US teenagers in the next ten years in the spirit of John 10:10.

Kara Powell — And then my broadest role at Fuller is I’m the chief of leadership formation, as you said. And that means I oversee all of Fuller’s non-degree training. And so really, in all these roles, I’m about turning research into resources.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Kara Powell — And in many cases, that aligns with the needs and opportunities of the next generation.

Rich Birch — Yeah. That’s so good. Well, you’ve been influential in my own thinking. And so many. I know you’ve helped so many people. And so I’m really looking forward to today’s conversation. You know, one of the things that I mentioned, this on the top, literally one of the saddest conversations I had was with a church leader in a church that we ended up that the physical building we ended up adopting. And one of the things they said was, man, there, it has been decades since there were young people at this church.

Rich Birch — And, you know, this is a major challenge for many of our churches engaging young people. I’d love to dive right in. What are some key reasons younger generations disconnect from the church and and what can we do to address that? That’s like a huge question, but let’s start there.

Kara Powell — Yeah, absolutely.

Rich Birch — I feel like you’d say, well, that’s my life’s work. So, you know…

Kara Powell — Sit down. We’re gonna have a long conversation about it.

Rich Birch — Yes, exactly.

Kara Powell — So, you know, it’s impossible to point to just one factor that is causing young people to distance themselves from the church. But I’ll say, one that we’re hearing about more and more these days is that young people are not trusting the church. Now let’s let’s back, you know, zoom out a little bit. I will say, in general, people are not trusting institutions.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Kara Powell — Young people are not trusting institutions. And in particular, young people are not trusting the church. They view the church as unkind, hypocritical, full of moral failure. And so as a result, young people are skittish about being connected with the church. As one pastor’s 13 year old daughter said to him recently, like, why should I tell others I go to church; people who go to church or jerks?

Rich Birch — Oh wow.

Kara Powell — And that’s that’s kind of the reputation in our world. Now, I’m an optimist. And so, you know that that’s the bad news. But I’ll say, here’s the good news, and the Barna Group has done some fantastic research on this, that while well, while teenagers in the US and globally are often, distant from the church, like, they’re very pro-Jesus.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Kara Powell — There’s a lot about Jesus that they find really intriguing and appealing. While they might say the church is unloving, they understand that Jesus is a person of love. So the good news for us is the more and more that we can all state the obvious: be who Jesus wants us to be…

Rich Birch — Yes, yes.

Kara Powell — …and do what Jesus wants us to do, I mean, that’s gone on for so many reasons.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Kara Powell — But we also think and have seen that that’s really attractive for young people.

Rich Birch — Yeah. That’s like, so I’m classic Gen X and, you know, when I get to heaven, I think Bono’s going to be leading worship there.

Kara Powell — Totally.

Rich Birch — And he said, you know, I love Jesus. I’m just not so sure about his friends. And you know, that that seems to continue to resonate in, you know, in generation. I know in your work you’ve emphasized, you know, trying to break that down a little bit more. How do we build trust, relational discipleship, kingdom diversity and loving neighbors? Why are these important? Why are these important to kind of unpack those? What do you mean by those? Why are those important for us to be thinking about?

Kara Powell — Yeah. Well, here’s what they all share. First off, I want to say they’re very grounded in scripture, and scripture’s invitations and commands. Secondly, they reflect some of the most important opportunities according to what we’re seeing through research and real recent data. And then we also have seen them be really powerful catalysts for churches. And so so that’s what all three of them have in common. You know, when it comes to relational discipleship, especially of young people, too often we in the church, and this is very much Kara including herself in that “we”, we’ve offered program maybe we’ve offered teaching, but we haven’t offered real relational discipleship. And when churches do that, especially when the next generation, especially investing in the next generation, what’s so exciting is not only our young people changed, but the whole church has changed.

Rich Birch — So true.

Kara Powell — So we think one of the most, you know, exciting catalysts for revival, renewal, whatever you want to call it based on your theological tradition is, is emphasizing relational discipleship.

Kara Powell — And secondly, when it comes to kingdom diversity, you know, God’s made us in God’s image and yet we all reflect that in different ways, different ethnicities, different cultures. And, you know, in the US, we crossed a line in 2020, according to the US census, that now half of those under 18 are young people of color. So, you know, the US has never been more ethnically diverse than it is now. And how can churches not force that, but how can we reflect the communities in which we live? I mean, that’s our that’s our ongoing question to churches.

Kara Powell — And then lastly, I mean, we just can’t get away from the importance of love. I was on an early morning prayer meeting this morning with folks, and we were looking at what’s going on in our world. And, you know, one of one person said, what we need to do is kind of move away from culture wars and instead lean into love wars. Now, you know, I don’t love military, violent metaphors.

Rich Birch — Yes, yes.

Kara Powell — So I’m I’m not saying let’s like, go brand that and hashtag that and all that, but but like, wow! You know, back to what young people think of the church. Like what if, what if we could be known…

Rich Birch — Right.

Kara Powell — …as some of the most loving people on the planet? What a difference that would make. So we think that young people and kingdom diversity and really loving our neighbors is Jesus’ command. They just offer amazing leverage right now for churches.

Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. Why don’t we why don’t we step through those, double click on each of those and kind of unpack it a little bit at a practical level, this idea of relational discipleship.

Kara Powell — Yeah. Yeah.

Rich Birch — Yeah, I went I found it convicting when you said that I’m the one that’s thinking systems and scale and like, okay, how do we scale this thing up? Let’s come up with a new program.

Kara Powell — Yeah.

Rich Birch — But it’s deeper than that. Unpack that. Relational discipleship. What do you mean by that?

Kara Powell — Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Well, we we especially expand this on the ten by ten website, but we’ve identified five keys to faith formation, for young people, and what it means to relationally disciple young people. And I’ll just I’ll just hit them real quickly.

Kara Powell — Number one, it starts with an adult young person relationship where faith is shared with adults. Adults are sharing faith with young people. As Paul describes in first Thessalonians 2:8, I was so delighted to share with you not just the gospel, but my very life.

Rich Birch — That’s so good.

Kara Powell — Second, that young people are engaged in spiritual practices and learning. I mean, that’s something exciting we’re seeing with this generation. They really want to experience God. You know, they love prayer and worship, when it’s in a community they trust. They’re really drawn to that, as well as interesting teaching. Third, that young people are serving, like that’s one of the great things about this generation. They want to be involved, sharing their faith, seeking justice.

Kara Powell — And then the fourth and fifth are that families are partners in the faith formation of their young people. And then lastly, that the overall church prioritizes and emphasizes young people. So when, as we’ve looked at the research on youth discipleship as well as scripture, those are the five drivers that we think are most important.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s specifically on the adult, the kind of adult-young person relationship…

Kara Powell — Yeah, yeah.

Rich Birch — …there’s I know you’ve done a lot of work on this area, but that to me that that is a profound understanding. I think we’ve so much of our programming bands to like, let’s keep everybody together…

Kara Powell — Yeah, yeah.

Rich Birch — …as opposed to cross-generational. Talk a little bit about that.

Kara Powell — Yeah. Yeah. Well, one of the metaphors that I like to use is, you know, growing up when Grandma and Grandpa Eckman—my grandparents—had all of us over, it’s way too many people to sit in one room, say, on a holiday meal. So they created the adults’ table and the kids’ table.

Rich Birch — Kids’ table. Yes.

Kara Powell — Yeah. And that’s what we tended to do in churches…

Rich Birch — Yeah, yep.

Kara Powell — …is create the adults’ table and the kids’ table, two separate experiences. And let me tell you, we’ve been well intentioned, like I’ve been part of the professionalization of youth ministry.

Rich Birch — Yes, yes.

Kara Powell — I have championed that. And yet we’ve been so well-intentioned. And yet the, the, the backlash is that young people are separate, silo-ized, segregated, which is not a verb I use lightly. And so, you know, when they graduate from high school, they they know the youth group, they know their youth pastor, but they don’t have a vision for what it is to be part of church. So, you know, do 16 year olds need to be on their own, some talking about life stage issues? You bet. Just like 46 year olds and 76 year olds do.

Rich Birch — Sure.

Kara Powell — But how do we find the right balance when, yes, there’s some of that, but there’s also a lot of intentional mentoring that’s happening in a faith community.

Rich Birch — Yeah, I know in my own life this when particularly when you’ve talked about this in the past, this has had profound impact on me, reflecting on my own experience, where I’ve had this weird disconnect in my own life, where the churches I lead in, I’m not sure the church would that would be that would appeal to my parents. When we first became Christian…

Kara Powell — Interesting. Yeah.

Rich Birch — …you know, we we were in a very small church and very multi-generational.

Kara Powell — Yeah, yeah.

Rich Birch — And, you know, then I’ve led in these very like you say, kids table, adult table churches over the years, which has been fascinating.

Rich Birch — Let’s talk about kingdom diversity.

Kara Powell — Yes.

Rich Birch — Every zip code in America is more diverse today than it was ten years ago.

Kara Powell — Yes.

Rich Birch — It will be more diverse ten years from now. And and it seems like young people have always been appealed, you know, have always wanted kind of a diversity. Is this different than just normal kind of maturation we’ve seen, or is there something behind this that’s even more like, hey, this is an emphatic thing we need to really be leaning into?

Kara Powell — Yeah, well, I think all of us, but especially our young people, are experiencing diversity more, so they expect it more…

Rich Birch — Yes. Oh that’s good. Yeah.

Kara Powell — …other spheres. And so when you know, when they’re when their school experience from 8 to 3 is very ethnically diverse, culturally diverse, and then they show up at youth group that night or church on the weekend and it’s not that way, well, then they get a sense that the church is out of touch.

Rich Birch — Right.

Kara Powell — And is it really engaged in the community.

Rich Birch — Right.

Kara Powell — So so yeah. And you know, we constantly say you mentioned zip codes, like we encourage churches like ask yourself, do I reflect the ethnic and economic diversity of our neighborhood? And if not, then how do we be more intentional in building relationships, and who we have up front in leadership and the kind of communities that we create? So, you know, we’re not asking you to force diversity, but if you’re loving your neighbors, then hopefully that’s reflected in your neighbors being part of your community.

Rich Birch — Yeah. That’s good. That’s good. I had Derwin Gray on this podcast…

Kara Powell — Oh, great.

Rich Birch — …take me to town on this issue.

Kara Powell — Great.

Rich Birch — And I would highly recommend you go back, friends, and listen to that. I think it could be, you know, just an eye opening experience for sure. So loving neighbors is the last one of these. This is can be a soft thing, but I know you don’t mean it that way.

Kara Powell — Yeah

Rich Birch — There’s like it’s got to have hard traction make a difference in our churches. What does it look like for a church that’s actually loving its community, and how does that connect with young people?

Kara Powell — Yeah. Well, I think a poignant question that I’ve been convicted by when I’ve been a pastor is what percent of our churches’ resources are focused on ourselves, and what percent are focused on what it means to love our neighbors.

Rich Birch — Ouch!

Kara Powell — And, and for a lot of churches, it’s like 90/10, 95/5, maybe 85/15. But, you know, as we think about Scripture, I’m not going to suggest a percentage. I’ll let the Holy Spirit convict all of us on that. But you know what? What kind of allocation would we think Scripture would have to say when it comes to our own internal community versus understanding the needs of our external community, and then tangibly responding? And, you know, the good news is we tell churches all the time, like, please don’t start a bunch of new programs. There’s probably already nonprofits and other ministries in your community already trying to love people. And so, you know, let’s let’s let that kind of love be what’s compelling. You know, we’re we’re recording this not too long after the fires in Los Angeles.

Kara Powell — So I’m sitting in my dining room in Pasadena, and we were evacuated for five days.

Rich Birch — Oh wow.

Kara Powell — And we know so many who have lost so much. And we have a 22 year old living with us who’s been displaced, and a friend of our family, and honored to do that. There’s just a lot of brokenness, but I’ll tell you, there are bright spots in churches when churches are loving.

Rich Birch — It’s true.

Kara Powell — What one one friend was telling me that, you know, when they were evacuated, they they came to our church, which had opened its facilities in the middle of the night to be a home. And their parents live in their back house. Dad’s an atheist. He’s had no interest in church. What he saw in our church’s community in those first 24, 48 hours. Like he started coming to church now, because he saw the body of Christ in action, loving each other and loving the neighborhood.

Rich Birch — Love it. Love it.

Kara Powell — And so, so it’s often I mean, at least what we’re seeing in in LA is in the midst of the brokenness, there’s some real beauty that comes from us loving others.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. I love that. Just even in my own backyard, there was a tornado that went through a number of years ago, and I was super proud of our church. We leaned in and and in fact, there’s a whole ripple. I was just reminded yesterday, there’s a whole ripple in our church of like, families that got connected to our church, not because of some fancy program…

Kara Powell — Yeah, yeah. Totally. Yeah.

Rich Birch — …not because of some thing. It was like the tornado ripped through and within, literally within hours, people from our church were over there helping…

Kara Powell — That’s awesome.

Rich Birch — …and and that had huge impact. That’s, yeah, that’s great. Okay. One of the things I was struck by in your work is this idea of a transformation team.

Kara Powell — Yeah.

Rich Birch – It’s it’s like a super practical kind of we’re thinking about change. What is the transformation team? Why is it important to help us understand this concept?

Kara Powell — Yeah. Well, I’m guessing most people who are listening or watching this right now, like you’re probably watching it on your own.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Kara Powell — And while you can listen to a podcast on your own, you can’t bring about change on your own.

Rich Birch — That’s true.

Kara Powell — And so as we’ve journeyed with over a thousand churches who have successfully made changes toward what we’re talking about, as well as other areas. Like, well, while our book focuses on young people, kingdom diversity, and loving our neighbors, this is true for any change you want to bring about. You want to become more prayerful. You want to become more worshipful. You know, whatever it might be, we highly recommend starting a transformation team. And that’s a group of 5 to 12 who are very focused on the change, who are really who are really dialed into that. That’s probably 1 or 2, pastors, but maybe it’s not led by a pastor. Maybe it’s led by a member of the congregation who really has the vision and skills to lead. One of the interesting things that we’ve seen is transformation teams—like, let’s just let’s double click on young people for a second. A lot of churches want to become more, you know, mindful and more focused on the next generation. Well, we would encourage your transformation team then to have a few young people in it.

RIch Birch — Right, right.

Kara Powell — You know, have people who who you’re trying to better love be part of what you’re of your transformation team. But, you know, we’ve also seen churches have great success by having a few young people, but then really bringing together people from all different areas of the church.

Rich Birch — Oh that’s good.

Kara Powell — Someone from children’s ministry, someone from worship, someone from tech, someone from missions, someone from prayer. And so, you know, you can think about now, how can young people or whatever change you’re wanting to make, become woven into the fabric in all these areas? So, you know, we have a lot of specific recommendations: meet every 2 to 4 weeks, you know, commit to something like six months, most likely, etc. But really, it starts with getting the right people. And we, we recommend some of some who are really core to what the change you’re trying to be and represents that change, but then also diversity across the church.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Love it. What about the mixture of like kind of the big idea people versus the like, guys that love the spreadsheets or people that love the spreadsheets. Talk us through. What does that look like on that?

Kara Powell — Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, like with most everything, we love all of that.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Kara Powell — Like, it’s important to have, it’s important to have both. So you know I think a question becomes where what is our team biased toward, and how do we need to correct for that?

Rich Birch — That’s good, that’s good.

Kara Powell — So, you know and I see this. In fact, I lead two teams at Fuller where one is very big picture and struggles with execution. And the other is awesome at execution, but sometimes can lack vision.

Rich Birch — Right. That’s good.

Kara Powell — And so so, you know, we’re we’re constantly trying to compensate for that. Who who can we add who can we bring in, even for just a time period to really help with execution or to really make sure that we’re dreaming the right big God sized dreams?

Rich Birch — That’s cool. That’s good.

Rich Birch — Well, yeah. There’s a lot we could talk about there but I love that. Just even practical takeaway. Kind of a bit of a meta conversation or discussion about you as a leader. I, so this area, working with young people, thinking about the future, I feel like there’s a lot of people in this area who are like all doom and gloom. Who, like, are like, oh my goodness, the world is falling. It’s all terrible. But you seem to be able to hold this balance of like you’re realist. I don’t get the sense of like, oh, your head’s in the sky, like, hey, things are everything’s perfect. But you do come to the best days of the church are ahead of us.

Kara Powell — Yeah.

Rich Birch — Which I love. I find as I just want to honor you for that. I think it’s incredible that you have that kind of posture. At least that’s my opinion of you.

Kara Powell — Yeah.

Rich Birch — That’s what I’ve seen you lead from. What gives you confidence in that belief?

Kara Powell — Yeah.

Rich Birch — What gives you the confidence that like, hey, there’s good days coming when you’re staring into some tough realities that we face as a church?

Kara Powell — Yep. My theology gives me that confidence.

Rich Birch — Love it. Love it. Yes.

Kara Powell — So, so, yeah, I, I’m very realist. I’m married to an engineer. Like, we are two realistic people. We are a realistic family.

Rich Birch — Yes, yeah.

Kara Powell — But. And I think I’m realistic about the struggles that young people have connecting to the church. I see it in, you know, close friends of our family, etc. But in the midst of those challenges, I believe in a big, loving God…

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Kara Powell — …who’s constantly renewing, who’s constantly reforming, who’s constantly drawing people to God’s self. So, you know, we would say we’re not we’re not necessarily in an era of decline and decay, but we’re in an era of reimagining and renewal.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Kara Powell — So I would say it starts with my theology, but then I’ll it a second less important but still important reason is it has to do with what we are seeing with young people these days. Like young people, again, open to Jesus, they are open to Jesus. And then secondly, when adults can build trusted relationships with young people, young people are hungry to get time with adults.

Kara Powell — So, you know, it takes time. But, you know, some of the very encouraging research on trust by Brené Brown and others is that when it comes to building trust in general, it’s not grand, heroic gestures that build trust. It’s small, everyday acts of listening…

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Kara Powell — …remembering, caring, asking again. And so, you know, for listeners right now. Like if you want to build trust, maybe there’s a young person who’s come to your mind like, why don’t you just text them…

Rich Birch — Right.

Kara Powell — …and right now and say, you know, thinking of you, how can I be praying for you? And then, you know, if they respond, then ask 3 or 4 days later, hey, I was praying for you. How did that test go? How are you doing in that conflict with your girlfriend? You know, whatever it might be. And so the good news is, any of us really, any adult, can build a trusted relationship with young people, and young people are hungry for that.

Rich Birch — Love it. So good. Well, you’ve got a book that just came out “Future Focused Church: Leading Through Change, Engaging the Next Generation and Building a More Diverse Tomorrow”. Talk to us. So this is a big project, pulling together a book with a couple co-authors on this. What’s your what was the drive? What’s the thing that kept you up at night that you’re like, we’ve got to get this into a book? What are you hoping that people will get from this?

Kara Powell — Yeah. Well, I’m so glad that Jake Mulder and Ray Chang, my two co-authors, they shared my hunger to help churches understand what needs to change. A lot of what we’ve been talking about here, Rich. But but I think a tougher question often is how do you bring about change?

Rich Birch — That’s good. That’s good.

Kara Powell — How does the church actually change? And, you know, leaders listening to this now, you know, this struggle of bringing about change. According to Harvard Business Review, about 70% of changes that leaders try to enact end up failing. So, you know, if you’re if you’re batting average is around 70%, well, then you’re right on par.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Kara Powell — Jesus sometimes struggled to bring about change.

Rich Birch — Yes, yes.

Kara Powell — So so based on scripture, based on really good research that others have done and based on how we’ve journeyed with over a thousand churches at the full youth institute, we’ve come up with a four-step map, a four-zone map that any church can use to make change. The three areas we’ve been talking about are really any area.

Rich Birch — Love it. So good. Well, I want to encourage friends that are listening. And you know we don’t do this. We don’t typically have authors on. I really I personally, I think, you know, I got a chance to kind of sneak a little bit into the book, and I think this could be a great book to do as a leadership team, maybe elders, your staff team, that sort of thing…

Kara Powell — Yeah, yeah, yep.

Rich Birch — …to really help us think through, hey, what does the future look like? So, you know, there may be a pastor who’s listening in, who’s feeling stuck. They’re like, you know, things are are not going well in our church. What’s kind of one practical insight from the book that, you know, could help them be a future focused church, that could help them think about, okay, how do we get unstuck? How do we how do we kind of become more ready for the future?

Kara Powell — Yeah. So I mentioned we have a four-zone map in the book.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Kara Powell — And it’s who, you know, who is trying to bring about the change. Who’s your community here? What’s your current reality there? Where is God calling you? And how, how do you actually make the change?

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Kara Powell — So in the book we start with who and we start with who are the people who can help you catalyze change?

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Kara Powell — And how do you start listening to your community. You know, really, almost without exception, when churches listen to their community, they’re better able to love their community.

Rich Birch — That’s so good.

Kara Powell — I can’t tell you how many churches have come to us with, well, we just started this new thing for young people. And we just started this new thing for our neighborhood.

Rich Birch — I’m laughing because I feel like I’ve been there.

Kara Powell — You’ve done that. Oh, thank you. Yes, Rich, I’m actually confessing here. In addition to sharing our research.

Rich Birch — I started this thing. Why are they not coming?

Kara Powell — Exactly. It’s like because you talked to none of them.

Rich Birch — Yes, yes.

Kara Powell — And so so, you know, and we have seen churches pause and say, okay, wait, we thought we thought young adults, for instance, we thought we’d host a young adult new worship service. Or a young adult Sunday school.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Kara Powell — And they offer it. Young adults aren’t drawn to it. You know, a lot of times what young adults want is they want like vocational mentoring.

Rich Birch — Right.

Kara Powell — They they twenty-somethings want to have dinner with people in the church.

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Kara Powell — And so they don’t necessarily want a more separate programming. They want more cross-pollination.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Kara Powell — But you only learn that when you’re spending time with them. So. So, who? First step, first zone. And it starts with actually listening to those you’re trying to serve and creating that transformation team.

Rich Birch — That’s so good. I love that. Any, can you think of any kind of interesting stories you’ve run into? Churches that have done a particularly good job on the listening piece, that like, oh, hey, they did a great job listening. You can think of an example of that?

Kara Powell — Yeah, absolutely. It’s one of my favorite stories to tell, actually. There was a church that we studied in the Upper Midwest that had really struggled with their growth and had shrunk quite a bit, like they were contemplating shutting their doors. They were a church of 50, 75, something like that. But the leadership came together and said, you know what? We are not too old, it is not too late, and the road ahead is not too hard, and felt called by God to to do what we’re talking about, loving their neighborhood, prioritizing and listening to young people. They were near a college, and so they deployed more resources to build relationships with college students. Listen to college students. Well, that church that was about to shut its doors, it’s now a church of 1500 people, a thousand of whom are under 30.

Kara Powell — Now, in all fairness, Rich, that was actually one of the more dramatic turnaround stories.

Rich Birch — Wow. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely.

Kara Powell — It’s much more likely to be slower incremental growth.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Kara Powell — But you know, I thanks for asking me to share a story because I love that story just as a sign of you never know what God’s going to do.

Rich Birch – Right, absolutely.

Kara Powell — And so, you know, we say not only the best days of the church are ahead, but we believe whoever you are, the best days of your church are ahead.

Rich Birch — Oh that’s so good. See this is, friends, this is why you should be following Kara and and doing read everything she produces and this great stuff. It’s super inspiring. So let’s talk a little bit about the book. I’m sure people can get it at Amazon. Are there other places we want to send them to pick up copies.

Kara Powell — Yeah.

Rich Birch — You know, where do we want to send them online to to get this?

Kara Powell — Yeah – futurefocusedchurch.com, futurefocusedchurch.com – one word. We have a host of resources there that you can check out as well as order the book. So that is a great place to dive into our content.

Rich Birch — Nice. That’s that’s so good. I’m I would love for, like I say, friends, I really do think it’d be a great kind of team study. Something to do together. Don’t buy one, buy ten. And, you know, get together with a group of people. Because I think, by definition, like you were saying, I think there could be a problem with this book in that you read it and then you’re like, yes, I want to change.

Kara Powell — Right.

Rich Birch — But really, we should be doing this, like you said, in a team, in your group.

Kara Powell — Yep, yep.

Rich Birch — And let’s talk about this, you know, this together. Any other kind of thoughts about the book or anything else you want to share just as we kind of wrap up today’s episode?

Kara Powell — Yeah, I will say we see this all the time with churches. And this was true at my own church as my own church went through the change process. Churches often under… excuse me, overestimate what can be done in a year and underestimate what can be done in 2 or 3 years.

Rich Birch — Yeah. That’s great. That’s great.

Kara Powell — Part of what we map out in the book actually, is we have a six month and a 18 month change process that helps you set the right goals for that first year, and then continue towards God’s best future for you over that years two and three.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s great.

Kara Powell — So I wish there were really quick fixes. There’s certainly some quick improvements, but it usually takes months if not years to really change culture.

Rich Birch — So yeah, that’s good. I’ve joked in other contexts that, you know, some of the stuff, some of the work I’ve done is like similar. It’s like how to grow your church in 1000 days, but no one would buy that resource.

Kara Powell — Right, right, right.

Rich Birch — Like no one is interested in that. They want the quick fix.

Kara Powell — Yep, yep.

Rich Birch — But that’s not how it works. It’s got to be methodical and process oriented.

Kara Powell — So true, Rich.

Rich Birch — Well, Kara, this has been amazing. Thank you so much for being on today’s episode. Where do we want to send people online if they want to track with you with FYI all of that, where do we send them to connect with you?

Kara Powell — Fulleryouthinstitute.org is our website. I’m on I’m on Twitter/X, Facebook, and Instagram at @kpowellFYI. It’s my first initial KPowellFYI as in Fuller Youth Institute.

Rich Birch — That’s great. And I know I said this earlier, but I do want to honor you for the great work you’ve done. Thanks for being a gift to the church and thanks for being on the show today.

Kara Powell — I am honored in return to be on your show. Thanks, Rich.

Welcome back to another episode of the unSeminary podcast. Today, we’re talking with Diana Rush, the Senior Director of Build Community at Eastside Christian Church, a multisite church with locations in California, Nevada, and Minnesota.

Are you a middle manager in a church trying to balance the pressures from both your senior leadership and your direct reports? It’s not an easy task, but in this episode of the unSeminary Podcast, Diana Rush, Senior Director of Build Community at Eastside Church, shares powerful insights that will help you manage these tensions with grace, clarity, and effectiveness.

Visit eastside.com to connect with Diana and to follow along with what Eastside Christian Church is doing.

Looking to lead more effective meetings and build stronger relationships with your team? The One-on-One Meeting Guide for Middle Managers is designed to help you foster trust, improve communication, and stay aligned with your staff. Based on the insights from this episode with Diana Rush, this practical resource offers a proven structure you can use right away.

Download the guide now: Click here to access it!

This is just one of many helpful tools available through unSeminary Extra Credit—created to make your leadership easier and more effective!

There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally!

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Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. I am so excited that you are here today. Listen, friends, I’m excited you’re here for a couple reasons. First of all, we’re talking to a church that we’ve had multiple leaders on and who I think is is a church that all of us should be learning from. And so that’s one reason why you should lean in. But then also, we’re 800 plus episodes in and we’ve talked about a lot of different things in in leadership and local church, and I don’t think we’ve ever talked about this.

Rich Birch — When we’re today, we’ve got a real expert in this area who’s going to illuminate this for us and really help us think through these issues, particularly if you’re like an executive pastor type person, lead pastor, you’re like a manager of people, ah today is going to be super helpful for you. So lean in. We’re excited to have Diana Rush with us. She is the senior director of Build Community at Eastside Church. They’ve got, if I’m counting correctly, six campuses, four in California, one in Nevada, one in Minnesota, plus Church Online. Founded in 1962, currently pastored by ah Gene Appel. We’ve had Greg Curtis on in the past. This is a fantastic church. Diana, welcome to the show. So glad you’re here.

Diana Rush — So glad to be with you all today.

Rich Birch — Why don’t you kind of fill in the picture? Tell us a little bit more about Eastside. That’s just the kind of boilerplate stuff. Give us the kind of, you know, and tell us a little bit about your role as the Senior Director of Build Community. Tell us about that.

Diana Rush — Yeah, Eastside is just an active church on the move. Gene Appel started here about 15 years ago and it had been a thriving church for years. But when Gene came, he prayed for a fresh wind. And really, God really has delivered upon that. And each season, no matter in the pandemic or anything else, we’ve just seen God moving in miraculous ways in our church. And so in this past season, um I’ve been here about 10 years, on staff for nine. But God definitely blew my family in. And we were just just captured by the vision of this church.

Diana Rush — I did not start at Eastside with the ah the plan of working here. I just was like looking for a place to serve and a place just for God to work in my life in that season.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Diana Rush — And I actually started working or serving with the church’s social media. And in that season, I had been at a law firm for about 14 years as an office manager. So coming from more of the business side, working in the field of labor and employment law. So got to see a lot about management and when it goes bad.

Rich Birch — Nice.

Diana Rush — Right?

Rich Birch — Yes.

Diana Rush — But then I found myself here and really feeling this call to maybe take a step out of what I had been doing and into something different. And so a door opened up and I took the first position I took here was actually the Director of Communications. So I was leading a team of creatives, definitely different than leading a team of attorneys. But I definitely have a creative bent to me. And honestly, I will just say for most things in reality, everything’s transferable from business to you know different types of teams that you lead. And especially in the realm of middle management, if you can lead people, you can lead people no matter what kind of area that you’re overseeing.

Rich Birch — Right.

Diana Rush — You just have to be a student of kind of the content that you’re doing. So I stepped into that role. But after a couple of years in that role, and I really felt God leading me to something different. And so I, uh, a position opened up actually working for Greg Curtis. So everybody knows if you’ve experienced this podcast, Greg is amazing. And, um…

Rich Birch — He’s fantastic. He’s great leader.

Diana Rush — Yes. And so getting to work in a season where ah Greg really became the person developing me um was just such a gift. I had never had really any public speaking experience. And so Greg kind of took me through a journey of of instructing me and really helping me develop some skills that I didn’t have. But of course, I went from a management position to non-managerial position.

Diana Rush — And then over the last several years, I’ve actually changed roles so many times. So I was the Director of Assimilation. Then I was the Director of Pastoral Care. and And then I stepped into this role, which just recently became ah was added to our senior leadership team here at Eastside. And so now I oversee several different department leads here Eastside, everything from guest services, assimilation, small groups, care and recovery, pastoral care, and our volunteer systems.

Diana Rush — And I would say i get to serve alongside some amazing folks and they do amazing work. And I just really get to be their cheerleader, the one that gets to advocate for them and just serve them and see, hey, how how does what God’s calling you and your vision for your area fit into the overall vision of Eastside?

Rich Birch — Love it.

Diana Rush — So it’s been a wild ride and um And I am at a church where I’ve been allowed to grow and step into different roles. And so I’m definitely a product of a leadership development program that is here at Eastside um that are our executive pastor really oversees. But yeah I’ve been allowed to grow and explore and do different things, which is great for me.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Diana Rush — I know a lot of people love what they do, but I’ve just really found my sweet spot. I was saying this last season of, again, stepping into that more managerial position, leading others and helping to champion them.

Rich Birch — Love it. So good. And when we were preparing for the the podcast, I loved kind of seeing your journey in so many different roles at Eastside. You’ve really seen this from a bunch of different angles. And obviously Eastside is a unique church because of its size, because of the, like it’s unique in a lot of different realms, the size that your approach to multisite, there’s lots of different ways to kind of look at this. And one of these things that we’re going we’re going to really dig in today is this whole idea of mid-level management in uh, large churches. And this, this brings some really unique complexities. And we want to unpack those for folks today.

Rich Birch — Talk to me about the tension between managing, both upwards—so like executive pastors, senior pastor—but then also downward—direct reports, campus teams. Why are there, and again, I’m sure you never have any struggles at Eastside, but why are, why do other churches struggle with that? What, why is that? Why is this a common thing that we see that’s a it’s it’s struggle? It’s hard to do that, to manage those tensions.

Diana Rush — I think some of the tension, it first starts with self. Like I always say, you have to start with you know the source material, your own person. And um before you can lead others, you have to really understand yourself and be able to lead yourself well. And so it’s really getting to know who you are, who you’re made of. You know I love the illustration of you know you have like an orange, and if an orange is squeezed from the top and bottom, it’s eventually going to burst, and what’s going to come out is orange juice. It’s the same on the outside as the inside. And oftentimes, in management roles, we are going to be squeezed from the top. We’ve got the top coming down on us. Like we’ve got goals; we’ve got things to achieve.

Rich Birch — Right.

Diana Rush — We’ve got expectations. But then we’ve got the expectations of those beneath us, people that, you know, maybe they’re struggling in their own journey or whatever it is. They everyone’s wanting something from you. You’re going to get squeezed in management. And if you are presenting this like, I am perfectly okay on the outside, but I’m not letting God form me on the inside, what’s going to come out is going to be really obvious.

Diana Rush — So if you’re struggling with anger, it’s going to come out when you get squeezed. If you’re struggling with a multitude of issues, those will all reveal themselves. And so it starts really with like being good about making sure that you’re pursuing Christlikeness in your own life, that you’re actually asking, okay, Jesus, I want to lead like you led others. And I want to shepherd my teams. So I think that’s where it starts.

Diana Rush — And then ah secondly, I would say it’s about building trust, both with those above you and those below you. You know If you are known for success, people will expect success. But if you are constantly making mistakes or going outside the lines, going rogue, then you’re never going to build that trust and you’re not going to be handed, you know, things to to further your path, or even you’re just gonna feel that upward tension of being micromanaged, right? No one likes to be micromanaged…

Rich Birch — True.

Diana Rush — …but how do you get out of being micromanaged? You build trust.

Rich Birch — Right.

Diana Rush — And then you have honest conversations with those above you. And so that, you know, it’s a little bit of boldness as well. You have to not be afraid to ask hard questions.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Diana Rush — But again, when you have a trust in a relationship, I know for myself, I can talk to my executive pastor, who I report to, about nearly anything because we have this trust that we’ve built. Even before I started in this role reporting to him, I had already had an existing relationship with him where I felt like I could go to him if I had questions, concerns.

Diana Rush — So I’ve been building that trust even before I stepped into this role. And then the same thing with the staff below you. You know, my team trusts that I’m going to advocate for them, that I’m not going to overstep them, that I’m going to let them lead and them shine. And so we can work together to make something great, you know, make their plans into realities because I’m going to sell it. I look at myself, male management, I’m a salesperson. I’m going to take their ideas And then I’m going to sell it upwards, you know, and I’m going to craft it into something so that I can, you know, convince everybody else that this is a great idea and we should try it out.

Rich Birch — Yes, yes.

Diana Rush — So…

Rich Birch — Let’s let’s double click on that idea of the salesperson, because you you captured their attention that I’ve seen, I’ve been in, I have felt as a leader in this kind of middle management, is like my senior pastor, the folks the person that’s leading the organization, they um they’re getting filtered information and its frank frankly, it’s being filtered by me. I’m you know I’m telling them, this is what we see happening. Here’s what’s going on.

Rich Birch — Now, vice versa, the people who report to me, I’m filtering what my senior my senior pastor would like them to do. And I’m helping kind of translate the the vision of the church. I’m leading at the vision at the intersection of vision and execution. So like I’m trying to translate that. If I’m just selling, there’s ah there’s an opportunity there to to break trust because it could be like, I’m gonna just send, it’s all rainbows going up, rainbows and unicorns, everything’s amazing, everything’s going great. I tell my senior leader that.

Rich Birch — And then vice versa, I am you know can just report all good news to buy my direct reports. How do I avoid that tension and make sure that the true information, that good feedback’s building, that we’re building trust, and that it’s built on, yeah, actually care for each other and reality, not just kind of what everybody wants to hear, which I think is a tension in these middle mid-level roles.

Diana Rush — Yeah. So I’m just going to say: unpopular opinion, but we’re all in sales.

Rich Birch — Yes. I love it.

Diana Rush — And that’s just reality.

Rich Birch — Yes. True. That’s true.

Diana Rush — We’re all selling something, whether you’re selling an idea or yourself. But I think, A, you have to be 100% sold out for the vision.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — So we’ve got the best product on earth, right? We are, you know, we we’re representing Jesus. We’re representing eternal life and transformation and the hope that you can only find in Christ. And so right there, as long as your heart is connected to the vision of your senior pastor, it’s like, that’s not that difficult. Now, when you are presenting ideas, whether it’s a vision that your senior pastor is saying, hey, I have this idea of something I want to do. You have to first wrap your mind around it. You have to get in with the vision. But it’s okay, in my opinion, no matter which way you’re going, to plant a naysayer. You have to think through all the all the complaints that might come or all the that people will, but what about this?

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — And so you have to be willing to prepare. And so honestly, I prepare for any presentation or any conversation, probably a little too much.

Rich Birch — Good.

Diana Rush — I would say one of my my top strength finder is communication. And so for me, it’s just a natural thing that I talk my way through any scenario and any conversation. But it does allow me to walk into any situation prepared to explain.

Diana Rush — So whether it’s, you know, Gene Appel, my senior pastor has an idea for an all churchwide initiative that we’re going to be doing. We’re actually doing it right now. And I’m going to be leading teams for this. I have to think, okay, well, what are all the pitfalls? What are the things that are going to cost us time?

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — What are the the but the negotiating tactics I need to have? So if I need my entire staff to now show up on a Wednesday night, what am I going to have to give them in return? And, you know, where can I give them space in their schedule so that they’re excited to be here and they don’t feel like it’s a burden?

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Diana Rush — And so, you know, it’s that way I’m selling it. But then, you know, maybe Greg Curtis has an idea. He wants to get rid of our four week next steps program and move to one one week.

Rich Birch — Yes. Yes.

Diana Rush — First step. And so he’s going to change our entire assimilation program. Well, I I mean, for something like that, you have to really get prepared because I know I’m about to take a group of people on a journey who aren’t there with us already.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Diana Rush — I’m going to have to help some people who have long held, um you know, sacred cows, “well, we’ve always done this way”…

Rich Birch — Yes.

Diana Rush — …and release it. And so honestly, it’s in your prep work, but it’s in your constant communication.

Rich Birch — That’s good. That’s good.

Diana Rush — You have to, again, you have to be sold out and believe in what the person wants and have those those questions. I mean, Greg and I, we would sit in my office and talk over and over and over again about what changes he was going to make because I have to be prepared for any questions…

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — …from the executive pastor, senior pastor, even you know our director of you know ah finance. All these roles, I have to be able to go in and say, you know that’s a really good question and let’s process that together. And it’s never, and you as a salesperson or just anyone in leadership, you never want to have a hard no, and you never want to be unbending. You want to be flexible.

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s good. That’s good.

Diana Rush — And be able to receive the feedback and then say, okay, that’s you know that’s a really good thought. And you want to make the person feel heard at all times because that’s part of the process. It’s it’s never a hard line. It’s never, you have to do this. It’s let’s talk about this. Let’s make it a conversation.

Diana Rush — Because I want I want senior leadership, but I also want those reporting to me to have ownership over any idea…

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — …and any direction that we go, which means I have to let them speak into the plan and speak into that the idea so that they do feel that sense of like, okay, I can be a part of this. I can do this. And I think this is going to be a success.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s great. So can we talk, this is slightly different direction now. So one of the things that’s interesting about your, about Eastside is just very different size of campuses, ah different locations, different time zones. How are you developing systems communication approaches within your area that can scale and build trust, you know, yeah, across the different, all the variety of locations that you’ve got. What does that look like for you at Eastside?

Diana Rush —Yeah. You know, scalable ministry is difficult when you’re thinking about, I’ve got a congregation of 300 and I’ve got a congregation of 8,000.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Diana Rush — How do I make it work across the board? And for Eastside, we would say that we’re more of a franchise model. So we’re going to do the same thing everywhere. We follow the same message series. If we’re doing a small group in our Anaheim campus, we’re doing it in our Minnesota campus.

Diana Rush — And so we have to create systems and processes around that. So it starts with, you know, really simplifying things. I think that is key for us.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — It’s we don’t want to do too much. We don’t want to overcomplicate things. So we don’t have a women’s and men’s ministry. We don’t have all these extra things. We do small groups. That is our ministry as, you know, as it happens.

Rich Birch —That’s good.

Diana Rush — And we do, you know, you can have small groups, for about just anything. So we really put that in the hands of our leaders, which makes it easy and transferable for any campus size. But we also do larger on-campus experiences that we we come together and we all do the same thing.

Diana Rush — And I mean, we go as far as, okay, everyone’s gonna do this. We’re all going to do it on Wednesday night at 6.30 p.m. And we’re all having childcare. Because if we align every campus on something, then our senior pastor, or whoever’s on the stage, can talk about it centrally. Then that really simplifies our communication to the congregation, but also to the staff.

Diana Rush — It also saves a central team, which is what I lead, um from having to create lots of versions of the same thing, because we’re saying, okay, we’re all going to do the same thing. But again, it comes back to this trust. I have to be working with campus pastors and campus teams to making sure that we understand their needs at the campus. And so that for the congregation of 300, that’s going to have 50 people in a small group, um that they can run the same play as we’re going to have, you know, 600 people in a small group over here. And so what does that look like and making sure that it’s easy. And so technology is a big part of this for us.

Rich Birch — It helps for sure.

Diana Rush — And so it’s really being on the forefront of what is out there that can simplify this…

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — …that can deliver content in real time to campuses. And so, you know, our our creative teams are working on this constantly, but even in the area of discipleship, we’re working on this as well.

Diana Rush — And so we’re creating, you know, I’m going to create a script that everyone’s going to use. I’m going to create a slide deck that is simplified that a volunteer can use it, but also an expert communicator can use it as well. That just really lays out for them.

Diana Rush — We do a lot of video content because then the content is provided. You’re not asking too much of a campus team. And then ultimately the feedback loop is so big in our organization. We have regular meetings where we have our central team and our campus teams coming together to run the play. But we also, you know and like I said, we keep it simple. So you’re not going to come to Eastside and be like, oh, this weekend they did this and next weekend and it was very different.

Rich Birch — Good.

Diana Rush — No, we’re running the same play over and over and over again. And we’ll do that until, you know, it kind of doesn’t work anymore. Like I said, we changed our assimilation program. It wasn’t working for us anymore. And so we went through about a year long process in strategizing what it was going to look like, laying out the plans, communicating to campus teams, equipping our volunteers until that was ultimately unveiled.

Diana Rush — Because we want our changemakers—and we have a small staff—and so our volunteers, which we call changemakers, we have to make sure that they’re bought in. It’s not just about the staff for us, it’s about bringing in ah volunteers as well.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Diana Rush — So we have a strategic planning process that we do twice a year where we plan six months in advance. And it essentially starts with ah you know coming together, senior leadership team and campus pastors, presenting plans, getting feedback, having plans challenged, being okay with your plans being challenged.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Diana Rush — And then once those plans are solidified, we then kind of unveil the six months to the staff.

Rich Birch — Oh that’s good.

Diana Rush — And then after it’s unveiled to the staff, then it starts trickling down into our volunteer teams. But then it really creates this okay everyone knows the plan. We create kind of how that plan’s going to work, how it’s going to play out everywhere. We stick to the plan and we run the play. And so centrally we’re coming up with executable plans so that the campuses can execute it. We try to never over complicate it but again it is all about simplification. How can I make it simple enough that I can have it scaled no matter what the size?

Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. I want to double click on this idea of simplicity and alignment because that, for friends that are listening in, like man, this is so critical. As a church grows, we it can naturally drift towards complexity. If we and and here you have a senior leader the top, you know, at top of a very large organization who’s, who’s driving towards simplicity and alignment.

Rich Birch — Can you give us a real world example of maybe an area that has naturally drifted towards complexity, that as an organization, you’ve had to push back towards, no, actually we’re going to do it more simply and to to ultimately to try to drive towards more alignment across our locations. Because what we’re seeing with multi-site church is exactly what you’re describing, those churches that are more aligned, this model is working better for them. The more that we can get alignment, the more that we see these churches succeeding and reaching more people. So what’s an area that you’ve seen, it’s kind of naturally wanted to become more complex, but you’ve had to make it more simple.

Diana Rush — Yeah, I have an immediate one that comes to mind, and that really is our small groups model.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Diana Rush — Like I said, we try to keep it pretty simple…

Rich Birch — Yep.

Diana Rush — …but over time, ah we had seen that our campuses were adding all these additional groups on campus. We’ve got a people of the word group that meets on Thursday mornings. And then we’ve got this group on Thursday nights. We’ve got, you know, oh, this was a nice to have. And so it’s like all all of a sudden we’re creating ministries where we don’t normally do that. And and we’re having all this additional activity on a campus.

Diana Rush — So for us, a campus staff is maybe four people, six people, and they have a small staff. So you you can imagine they’re doing their normal daily work to prepare for the weekend. Then now they’ve got all this campus activity happening in the evenings.

Rich Birch — Right.

Diana Rush — We’ve got to do set up, tear down. There’s a lot of costs, not just financial costs, but also, you know, person cost when it comes to all these additional things. And so we had seen that we’d kind of grown into all these extra activities happening on campus.

Diana Rush — And we sat down in one of those six-month planning meetings and had a really honest discussion of, okay, we’ve drifted away from our small group model and we’ve added all of these things, which has kind of chained us to not being able to develop something that we think strategically would work better at campuses. And so we decided that we were going to have all of these on-campus groups go away.

Rich Birch — Wow.

Diana Rush — We the only thing that we kept was a couple of our Friday night care groups. We do regeneration. We also do divorce care, grief share. So we were gonna keep those, but we were gonna go through a six month period of slowly having conversations with these group leaders, reminding them of the vision of Eastside. And our vision is for our small groups to meet in homes and to be out in the community and not have Eastsiders have to come here on campus, but to really establish these small groups in homes where they can invite their friends, their neighbors.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — Again, it’s part of ah an evangelistic view of small groups. And so ah we spent weeks having very difficult conversations at multiple of our campuses that had drifted. And they, some of them were hard conversations. But honestly, most of them, and this is the reality of God going before you. Most of them were great conversations where you were just recapturing the vision.

Rich Birch — Good.

Diana Rush — And these leaders, even though they were sad that their group wasn’t going to be able to meet on campus, that they were going to have to find a solution that they realized, this is the right move. And I understand the decision.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — I trust leadership. That was the thing I heard over and over again. Our small group leaders trusted the leadership. And so they were okay with the move. And I’ll be honest, it was a very, very hard season of working with these groups, helping them define solutions.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — And we did see an immediate decline in our group attendance numbers. But, what it opened the door to is what we’re doing now, which we do now on-campus group launches that are aligned across all campuses at the same time with child care. And it’s providing new people an opportunity to find informed community in a very well-crafted small group and you know way, that we do kind of together around tables.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Diana Rush — And then the goal is that they launch as a table after five weeks or however long we deem the group launch to be, they launch then into an off-campus group. And we’ve had great success with that. And we’ve actually seen, you know, small groups growth in the correct direction. Instead of just saying we’re going to do all sorts of on-campus activity. No, we’re launching groups into home groups, into coffee shop groups, into community groups, into even serving groups, groups that are serving in our community.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Diana Rush — And so that was, you know, it was short-term pain for long-term gain.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s great.

Diana Rush — That’s what I will say. And, and we are experiencing, honestly, where we just launched our groups last night on campus.

Rich Birch — Oh, nice. Yeah.

Diana Rush — And this is the largest group launch we’ve ever had ah in our history of our church. We’ve had at this point over 1,500 people signing up for groups in this season. That doesn’t even include the people that were already in groups.

Rich Birch — Right, right. Wow. That’s great.

Diana Rush — But because we went through that process of really simplifying, of aligning at every campus, it opened the door for us to be able to do something like this that gets now our whole congregation aligned. And we’re asking our congregation to do one thing – we just want you to sign up for what we’re calling a New Testament challenge group.

Rich Birch — Right.

Diana Rush — And the path is super clear for people. So they’ve just said, all right, that’s what we’re all doing. We’re going to, we’re going to do it together.

Rich Birch — You’re doing it. Yeah, that’s great.

Rich Birch — So good. Yeah, I think that’s incredibly important, particularly in this kind of mid-level manager role, because I think that is where complexity comes in. It’s like, because we hear everybody everybody’s good ideas and it’s our job to try to compress and say, no, we’ve got to get to more simplicity.

Rich Birch — Kind of embedded in what you were talking about there is there must be times when things don’t go well, where it’s like people in your area, it’s like you’re trying something, it’s not working. This isn’t, you know, this isn’t happening well.

Rich Birch — How do you how do you balance that with the sales? And I agree with you that we’re all in sales. How do you balance that with always being positive, trying to sell things? How do you talk about stuff when it goes sideways? Or maybe the flip side, how do you talk about stuff when things go well in your area? What are some tips you could give us for middle-level managers as we’re you know as we’re publicly kind of interacting about areas or things in our area with other people in the organization?

Diana Rush — So I’m definitely a numbers and spreadsheet person. It’s just natural bend for me. But the reality is for us in church, our metrics, they tell a story.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Diana Rush — They they tell us how we’re doing. And so being able to say “we’re going to measure things” is really important.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Diana Rush — But that’s really my key indicator for how things are going. And it does take a lot of time to track down numbers, to track down trends, to see, okay, how have we performed you know over the last 10 years in this area? What did it look like pre-pandemic? How has it looked post-pandemic? And then you start letting the numbers tell the story.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — Honestly, if you’re like, if your numbers are going great, that’s like a celebratory moment. But if you’re like, gosh, like we wanted to hit this number and we’re seeing a decline in this area, it it immediately opens up the question of, hey, you know, I’m noticing this.

Rich Birch — Right.

Diana Rush — What’s the story here? Can you start doing research? And so usually what I do, if it’s, you know, a number from one of the ministries that I oversee, I want that leader to go and do the fact finding for me.

Rich Birch — Good.

Diana Rush — I’m not going to start digging into their area. I want them to tell me the story. I want them because I first, I need them to see like, oh yeah, I need to do something different.

Diana Rush — And um I just was thinking about, we were over budget in an area severely. And so I had to put it to the leader and say, hey, I need us to figure out a solution long-term because this is costing us more and more. It was guest leads. We were paying about $10 per guest lead, way over budget.

Rich Birch — Right.

Diana Rush — And so I put it out to our director of guest services and she went through a research period. She came up with a solution and, um, and it’s been great. We’re now at $2 per guest. We have more guests than ever. And yet it’s costing us less. So she was able to work through slow work through some problems and get a solution. But ultimately, it was like a tough conversation of saying, like we can’t keep overspending on the budget. We have to be stewards of our finances.

Rich Birch — Right, right.

Diana Rush — And honestly, when ah any and time it’s connected to a dollar amount, that’s like some of the hardest conversations.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Diana Rush — Nobody wants to hear, like I need you to trim your budget.

Rich Birch — Yes. Right.

Diana Rush — But, you know, any of those situations, whether it is ministry is not going well, it it opens the door to what I would say, I call it a crisis. And I always tell my team, never waste a crisis because that’s where your creativity is going to come into play.

Rich Birch —Oh, that’s good.

Diana Rush — You’re going to be able to take a fresh look at something and say, this isn’t working. So is it a dial turn or do I need to completely refresh it? And so knowing, but knowing the end goal, and having established goals for where we want every campus and every ministry to perform really does help because that points us towards a target. And if we’re not hitting that target, they know, you know, we don’t hide metrics from anybody. The staff knows where we’re doing. They know where they’re at. And we’re always having key conversations.

Diana Rush — And you know I think those conversations ongoing are really important kind of in the middle management stage because I have one-on-ones with my team members regularly. So we’re constantly dialoguing. We’re constantly looking at where we’re going. We’re looking at not only their ministry goals, but their personal goals. Each one of them has six goals for every six months. And so we’re looking at those, evaluating how they’re doing. And so it’s an open conversation.

Diana Rush — That, you know, it doesn’t feel like I’m pressuring them or I’m putting you know the fire under them because it’s just a dialogue. And I they know that I’m a champion for them, that I want the best for them and their area, that I want them to win and see you know be the successful leader that I know they are. And so when something’s not working, it’s not like I’m not going to come down on them.

Diana Rush — And, you know, I have different types of leaders that serve on our team. And some of them really are perfectionists. And they’ll be like coming into my office. Oh, my gosh. Like, I’m so sorry. And I always I jokingly ask two questions. I say, did somebody die?

Rich Birch — Right.

Diana Rush — Now, I do oversee pastoral care, which is funerals. So sometimes somebody did die.

Rich Birch — Yes, sometimes that does happen.

Diana Rush — But my second question is, is someone going to lose their salvation? No. Okay, let’s work through a creative solution. And so they know, like, we’re not going to like freak out. We’re not going to come down on them. You know, nobody’s losing their job. We’re just going to be talking through, okay, well, what’s the next step that you want to do and get creative?

Rich Birch — Yeah that’s good.

Diana Rush — Nothing’s off the table. And let’s brainstorm. Let’s come up with a solution together. And I think, you know, it makes those hard conversations easier because it’s an ongoing conversation. It’s never a surprise.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Diana Rush — I’m really big on, I don’t like surprises. I don’t like to be surprised and I don’t like to surprise my team. And so we’re going to constantly be looking at where we’re at, how we’re doing and how can we make the turn so that we can get where we want to be.

Rich Birch — Yeah. That’s good. So good. Can we double click just even quickly on the one-on-one conversation piece? That’s a key piece of the the puzzle here for middle managers. How often, how long, what’s the cadence look like? Who sets the agenda? What’s your kind of, what happens in ah in an ideal one-on-one? You walk out and you think, okay, that’s gold star. We did exactly what we should do. Talk to us about that a little bit.

Diana Rush — Yeah. So, I mean, it’s a little flexible depending on the person. I have two former senior pastors that report to me, Greg Curtis being one of them.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Diana Rush — And um and so, you know, for those two, ah we do it every other week and we go a little longer. I have I give a little more space for them because we’re not going to meet as often…

Rich Birch — Yep.

Diana Rush — …but we get more into deep discussions. And um and so but then I have a other staff members who are more, you know, we’ve got weekly execution things that are happening, faster moving ministries, or if I’m intentionally seeing someone on my team that I really want, I really want them to be developed. And so they’re more of like an investment. Then it’s going to be every week. And it might be 30 minutes. Sometimes we might go longer. Sometimes they are going to be like, hey, I just need a little more time with you today.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Diana Rush — Or can I pop in again later in the week? Absolutely. I try to also make sure I walk around to their offices and I’m touching base with them during the week as well. But really, a one-on-one, I like to start with more of like care connection. How are you doing?

Rich Birch — Yep. Right.

Diana Rush — Because honestly, we are called first to shepherd and and pastor and love these people. They God has put them in our care to steward their giftings and their call. And so I want to find out where they’re at, what they’re experiencing in their life. And so connection, you know, and sometimes maybe we take too much time with that. Maybe we just start, you know, going on a rabbit trail, talking about life or our kids or whatever’s going on. But I do think that’s like a really important part because if you know a person really at like who they are, their soul…

Rich Birch — 100%. Yeah.

Diana Rush — …then it opens the door to so much more.

Rich Birch — Definitely.

Diana Rush — And so like you go from care connection into more of like coaching. Okay, let’s start looking at where you’re at. Maybe you’re going to look at your goals or what’s going on in their ministry area. What are the challenges they’re facing? What are some things that I’m seeing? That’s when you would have those hard conversations of like, hey, let’s talk about your budget, where you’re at, or I’ve noticed, you know, this campus isn’t hitting the numbers that we were hoping for. Can you maybe work with that that campus team to see what’s going on there? And those kind of conversations.

Diana Rush — And then ultimately, we like to end with time of feedback.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — Okay, what are some feedback that um that you need to give me as a supervisor, right? We don’t want to just be speaking at people, we want them to feel like they’re invited into this conversation. So what’s some feedback you have for me? You know, sometimes you really want to lean into it. How can I be leading you better in this season?

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Diana Rush — But then but then also, OK, I have some feedback that I need to give to you. Maybe there was an interaction that didn’t go so well with them and a campus team member. And and you’re hearing about it so you’re like wanting to help them navigate that situation. But ultimately, you know, depending on how it ends, sometimes it’s just like, okay, great meeting. That’s great. Let’s, you know, we continue on with it. We’ve got our action items that we walk away with. Other times it’s, if you’ve had a hard time, let’s let’s just close in prayer…

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Diana Rush — …ah you know, because ah we need to, we need to just like pray over this and see what God’s going to do next. And also, because you want to, ultimately, you are building a relationship in these one-on-ones…

Rich Birch — Right. That’s good.

Diana Rush — …at all times. And so you want to make sure that you’re preserving that relationship. Again, always going back to that trust. You are constantly building trust with team members so they know they can talk to you. They can come to you. They can be honest with you.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s so good. That’s so good. This fantastic. Super helpful. We’ve, there’s a lot we could talk about and um that you’ve been super helpful today as we’ve really tried to wrestle through this issue.I’m I’m thankful that you’ve been here. Just as we’re kind of starting to land the episode, land the plane. What, anything else you’d love to say that we should be thinking about from a mid-level management point of view, any kind of final tips that you’d have us wrestle with?

Diana Rush — You know, I would just say no matter where you’re at on an org chart, I I think that you are you know called to first really be that person that God’s formed you to be.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — But then also stewarding those gifts in in everybody. You know, as church leaders, it’s a unique position that we’ve been put in. And your congregation, but also the staff, you know your staff teams are gonna be looking at you differently because you are in this position of power. And so do not waste that, and do not look at yourself as the boss if you get elevated into that leadership role. But constantly, it’s it’s keeping that heart check ah throughout because we’ve seen so many leaders that have this problem with power, right?

Diana Rush — Every bad church headline, it starts with a leader who moved into management, whether upper, mid, and they started misusing that power that they were given. And so, and they started, they started misusing their position in the organization. And so just remember, like, that’s my best advice is like, be the leader God’s called you to be.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Diana Rush — Try to model what Jesus modeled. And honestly, we just have to go to the source. We just need to look and see how Jesus led his disciples…

Rich Birch — So good.

Diana Rush — …how he could have done, you know, he could have said and done anything he wanted to, but what did he do? He washed his disciples’ feet.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s so good.

Diana Rush — And so that’s the last call.

Rich Birch — So good. Diana, this has been so good. So great. Great conversation today. Super helpful. If we want to send people online to connect with the church or to connect with you, where do we want to send them to to track along with what’s going on?

Diana Rush — Yeah, I I have nothing to sell you. So I’m just here. But you can go to Eastside.com is our church website.

Rich Birch — Yes. Love it. Perfect.

Diana Rush — And if you want to reach out to any of our our leaders here, you can go to [email protected]. That’s a great email address. And our ah team will connect you.

Rich Birch — Perfect.

Diana Rush — We’re very open. Our staff is very empowered to sharing our ideas, our experience with other churches. Gene Appel, our senior pastor, he models that. He’s always out there sharing with other senior leaders. And so we’re also empowered to do the same thing. You could follow me on social media, but I’ll probably be posting about like my kids and my coffee life.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s real good.

Diana Rush — So it’s probably really boring content. I wouldn’t suggest that.

Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. That’s great. Diana, I really appreciate you. Say hi to Greg for us.

Diana Rush — I will.

Rich Birch — And appreciate what you’re doing at Eastside. Love what you guys are up to. So thanks so much. Thanks for being here today.

Diana Rush — Alright. Thank you.

Welcome back to another episode of the unSeminary podcast. We’re talking with Amy Anderson, the managing director at The Unstuck Group. Unstuck helps pastors grow healthy churches by guiding them through experiences that align vision, strategy, team, and action.

Is your church feeling stuck or overwhelmed by its growth? Wondering if you have the right people in the right roles to move forward? Tune in as Amy shares valuable insights on how to assess and rethink your church staff and structure to enhance growth, productivity, and alignment with your vision.

To learn more about how The Unstuck Group can help your church with a staffing and structure review, visit theunstuckgroup.com. Plus download How to Restructure Your Church Staff for Growth here.

Don’t miss the Church Staffing Health Assessment—a practical tool designed to help you evaluate and improve how you place the right people in the right roles. Inspired by “Right People, Right Seats: Rethinking Church Staffing for Growth with Amy Anderson,” this resource will guide you through key questions to assess role clarity, team culture, leadership development, and more.

This resource is exclusively available through unSeminary Extra Credit, our affordable membership that fuels the podcast and provides you with valuable tools like this and many others!

Click here to join unSeminary Extra Credit and get instant access to this resource and more!

There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally!

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Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Risepointe

Do you feel like your church’s facility could be preventing growth, and are you frustrated or maybe even overwhelmed at the thought of a complicated or costly building project? Are the limitations of your church building becoming obstacles in the path of expanding your ministry? Have you ever felt that your church could reach more people if only the facility was better suited to the community’s needs?

Well, the team over at Risepointe has been there. As former ministry staff and church leaders, they understand how to prioritize and help lead your church to a place where the building is a ministry multiplier. Licensed all over North America, their team of architects, interior designers and project managers have the professional experience to help move YOUR mission forward.

Check them out at Risepointe.com/unseminary and while you’re there get their FREE resource “10 Things to Get Right Before You Build”.

Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. Super excited for today’s conversation. You have tuned in for something really special. This is going to be super helpful conversation. This is one of those conversations where I’m pretty sure that I know that you’re listening in and you are asking some of the questions that we’re going to answer today. You’re wrestling with these things. You’ve been thinking about it in the back of your head and we’re going to provide you with real helpful solutions, walk-away-stuff that you can apply today.

Rich Birch — It’s our honor to have Amy Anderson with us. She is the managing director at The Unstuck Group, which they help churches get unstuck. They help pastors grow healthy churches by guiding them through experiences that align vision, strategy, team, and action. They offer consulting in several different areas, including multisite staffing, digital strategy. And these folks are amazing. Listen, friends, I just love the work of Unstuck. I love what they do. I feel like I’m constantly interacting with churches, either the churches I work with, ah either they’re they’re going to work with Unstuck or they’ve just come off working with them. They have ah they love the local church. Amy loves your church and she doesn’t even know you yet. But we’re so glad to have you, Amy. Welcome. So glad you’re here.

Amy Anderson — So good to be here, Rich. Thanks for having me on your podcast.

Rich Birch — No, honored that you would would do this. What an honor for us. Give us a bit of your background. Fill in the Amy story.

Rich Birch — Tell us a little bit about Unstuck. Kind of fill in the picture for folks that don’t know you.

Amy Anderson — Sure. Well, I’ve been um on the team at Unstuck for 10 years. And ah most of that time I’ve been the consulting director, a new role this year as the managing director. But prior to that is really my ministry story. I uh the local church changed my life. It changed the trajectory of my life, my husband’s life, our three kids.

Rich Birch — Amen.

Amy Anderson — It was back in the late 90s, excuse me. We walked into the front door of a church that finally was what I thought church was going to be like. Meaning, they weren’t perfect, but they were I heard great Bible teaching every week. It applied to my life. I felt like I called the pastor every week and said, can you talk about this this week? Our kids went right into their rooms. And anyways, God, we were My husband and I were both believers, but we were not followers, if I could put it that way.

Rich Birch — Oh, OK.

Amy Anderson — We had I was raised in a very mainline church. I knew the rules, but I didn’t really have a relationship with Jesus and all that came together at this church when I learned to follow Jesus. So anyways having the church changed my life. Well, Jesus changed it. Four years later, we were on staff. Both of us.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Amy Anderson — Husband went back to school, Masters of Theological Studies. Anyways, Eagle Brook is the church. It’s in Minnesota.

Rich Birch — Fantastic church.

We’re kind of neighbors, Rich, here in Canada.

Rich Birch — It’s true.

Amy Anderson — So we might sound alike.

Rich Birch — It’s true. We got the same weather.

Amy Anderson — But I was… yeah I was then hired to oversee the front door of our church, the weekend services. So I left my corporate job.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Amy Anderson — My husband was in Groups, became a teaching pastor, a campus pastor. Today, he’s a lead pastor. But I spent 12 years at this church on this little corner in White Bear Lake. And it was about 1,800 people when I started. And when I left in 2014, we were six locations across the Twin Cities with over 20,000.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s amazing.

Amy Anderson — So you know, this multi-site was kind of a mystery back then.

Rich Birch — It’s true.

Amy Anderson — So it was trial by fire, fail forward. But it was an absolute amazing experience to be a part of that team. And so I thought I was born to do that. And then when I connected ah with Tony Morgan and he invited me on to The Unstuck team, I honestly, I think I was born for this. I just love the local church. And when it’s operating on all cylinders, it is absolutely amazing the lives that are transformed.

Rich Birch — Love it. Well, I, friends, if a little editorial note, there are folks that are in this market in serving churches who, you know, sometimes they make me feel a little bit queasy and a little bit like, Oh, I think they’re just see this as a market. They just are trying to extract value out of us. That’s not Unstuck. That’s not Amy. That’s not your group. Uh, this, this is a group of people that love the local church. And, um, frankly, I’m having Amy on because I love what they do and I’m hope that some of us will get more connected with them.

Rich Birch — Tell us kind of give us a sense of for folks that don’t know Unstuck, give us a sense of the scope, the scale of your ministry. You guys interact with a lot of churches on a regular basis. What does that look like? Help give us a sense of that.

Amy Anderson — Yeah, a lot of what we do is we actually just provide a lot of content for pastors.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Amy Anderson — That’s through our podcasts, our webinars, our Unstuck quarterly church reports, to help pastors just hear what’s going on currently in the church, what we’re learning, what we’re sharing. So that’s a lot of what we do. But obviously our business is being on the ground with churches. So I believe we served, I think we were on the ground with over a hundred churches last year across the United States, some in Canada.

Rich Birch — Amazing.

Amy Anderson — And what we do is we help them assess like, where are we at today? How are we doing? You know, very rarely in church world do we pause and just say, how are we? Because we’re on this treadmill of Sunday, Sunday, Sunday, Sunday.

Rich Birch — That’s so true.

Amy Anderson — We have 52 events every year. But we pause and we just spend a day talking about perspective. Where are we healthy? What’s stuck? And so we we identify a starting point. Then we come in and we help them plan. So now that we know who you are, where’s God calling you?

Rich Birch — So good.

Amy Anderson — And so how can we bring clarity to what the next three to five years might look like, and then actually break that down into key priority initiatives for ’em.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Amy Anderson — And then they work those plans. And then the third part is what I want to talk about a little bit today is then we do a staffing and structure review. So once you have clarity where you are and where you believe you’re going now, how do we organize and leverage our most important asset, which is the people side of things.

Amy Anderson — So that’s where we spend our time when we’re on the ground with the church. Usually multiple consultants are involved with the church. So we get multiple eyes on there. And a lot of it’s, uh, you know, we want to draw out the wisdom in the room, but staffing and structure is actually a little bit more, if I could call it prescriptive. I’ve been doing this for 10 years now. I mainly work with large churches because that’s where my experience is. But I’ve been able to watch these churches over the last decade, see what’s working, what’s not working. And so I’ve got a lot of confidence. Of course, every church has decision rights on the recommendations, but I’ve seen what works and what doesn’t.

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s good.

Amy Anderson — And it just, it, yeah, helps them get some, some churches are not stuck because of ministry. They’re stuck because of their structure.

Rich Birch — Right. Well, I’d love to dive into that. I know as we were kind of preparing for this, I know from my seat and kind of that executive pastor second seat, you know, managing managing the organization side, there are times where—and and, friends, if there’s if you’ve worked on the churches that I’ve worked for, it was not about you it was other people—where I wondered, do we have the right people and do we have them in the right seat on the bus? Like those are really common fears, concerns, and it’s like we’re kind of staring off into the distance wondering, you know, but this this ah like you said, it really struck me there. It’s our most important asset.

Rich Birch — This is obviously true at kind of the cosmic level. We want to care for people. We want to love them. You know we want our people to thrive. But it’s also true, frankly, frankly from a ah dollars and cents, close to 50%, lots of churches, 50 cents out of our dollars being spent on staff. Man, we got to make sure we’re leveraging that well. Unpack this, help us understand why is this such an important issue for us? Why is kind of our staffing, the who and if they’re sitting on the right bus, why a part of the right bus, why is that so important to us?

Amy Anderson — Yeah, there’s there’s some things that come to mind. One, I want to go back to the pace of ministry life. You cannot compare church to corporate. It’s very different because of the deliverables that that a church has um on them every week. And so, when we’ve got this fast pace and now you add in growth, right?

Rich Birch — Yep.

Amy Anderson — We have a lot of churches in in high growth right now. More and more people are coming. There is no pause button.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — And so we’re just doing the best we can to keep everything moving. And typically, we really like the people that are on our team. But you start to notice some symptoms, right? That that gut check that a lot of lead and executive pastors have like, do we have the right people? Do we have the right people in the right seat? Or there’s a transition – someone leaves and all of a sudden we’re just scattering and trying to cover the hole. And, you know, one of the headline questions this whole year was like, where do we find people, Amy? Where do we find future staff?

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Amy Anderson — And I’m like, oh, you’re really behind the eight ball. Because you need to have a system.

Rich Birch — Right. You started two years ago, developed them.

Amy Anderson — That’s right.

Rich Birch — Right. Yes.

Amy Anderson — Cause it’s, can I say it’s a crap shoot, you know, to hire externally.

Rich Birch — Sure, you can say that. Yes.

Amy Anderson — And there are great organizations that help you do that, but that’s just my experience. The the best hires tend to come from within through an intentional development plan. But anyways, just those types of things add um to the chaos. And when we do sometimes pause and take a step back, we recognize we have a structure that we’ve just been adding on to for a decade. We’ve never…

Rich Birch — Yeah, bolting stuff on.

Amy Anderson — …bolting stuff on.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Amy Anderson — And it’s very it’s fracturing and people have worn multiple hats and they’ve gotten attached to some of those things, but now everyone’s got, it’s just convoluted. There are not clear ministry lanes. There are not clear owners over certain… You know, we track a lot of things like vital signs and we’ve, you know, we, no one owns it. I remember when I was over the weekend, it was so clear to me at Eagle Brook when our attendance started to flatline, we all cared about that, but it was my job to lose sleep at night. It was my job to look under the hood and figure out what’s, what’s, what’s drifting right now. What do we need to change? If I didn’t feel that ownership, we would just kind of, you know, my joke on our podcast is what’s the best way to kill a dog? Give eight people the responsibility to feed it. Okay.

Rich Birch — Yes, yes.

Amy Anderson — So if eight people have it, that dog’s not going to get fed.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — And so that’s, that’s another symptom like, well, who’s actually watching that? Who owns that?

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — And so in all that chaos, that’s why I just bring it up. So many churches are feeling the people pressure coming through. I don’t know if this was your view of the world, but in our view of the world, there were three headlines last year. One is we need help with staff and structure. Two is we’re ready to go multi-site. And three, we are dealing with crazy growth. The large churches that I worked with last year, I really, I think they were all growing between like 20 and 35% year over year.

Rich Birch — Right. Yes, I would agree. Yeah.

Amy Anderson — So you just have to stop the insanity…

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — …and pause and get it figured out. Because once you have a staffing plan, once you, you know, one of the things I do when I work with these large churches, let’s say they’re a church of 3000 right now. I’ll say, let’s actually, when will we be a church of 6000? Let’s just play some math forward. And we actually create a plan for that…

Rich Birch — Yes. And then work backwards.

Amy Anderson — …so that we can step backward to a phased approach. So now they’re not manically adding and changing things. They’re strategically shifting where people are going and how they’re being placed.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Amy Anderson — But that’s just kind of a high level perspective on all of this.

Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. We’re going to double click on some of that there because there’s just a bunch there i want I want to follow up on. But I agree that it’s interesting. I in fact, I was talking to our mutual friend, Warren Bird…

Amy Anderson — Yeah.

Rich Birch — …he’s in getting another story a study going and we were talking about this issue. I said, it feels like that kind of K recovery that we talked about coming out of covid, that that has just accelerated that there are kind of prevailing churches, life-giving churches, that are accelerating.

Amy Anderson — Yes.

Rich Birch — And then there are churches that are struggling. And the churches that are struggling are really struggling. Like they’re you know behind the rate behind significantly behind the eight ball. That, I I’ve heard that time and again, kind of both of those realities which is interesting.

Rich Birch — Your idea that hey there’s no pause button, it’s true. There’s that like 12 noon on Sunday, it’s like, okay, we’ve got now how many days until we do this again? But what would be some of those symptoms when I’m looking around in my organization that I maybe have got the wrong people in the wrong seat? What would be some of those either things that come out this idea of like not ownership? I think that’s a good one.

Rich Birch — Are there other things kind of telltale signs that you see that you’ve seen churches like, Ooh, that’s evidence that we we just don’t have the right people in the right seats. What would be some of those things you see in churches?

Amy Anderson — Yeah, let me point back to our vital signs again. You know we we really believe that there’s no one metric that will tell you the health of the church…

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Amy Anderson — …but a couple of vital signs that also may indicate something’s askew. One is that percent ah money ah percent of your budget spent on staff. When that when that sneaks past 55%, there should be a light going off, a yellow light at at the least.

Amy Anderson — When we look at how many staff we have, per average attendance when we call, you know, full-time equivalents. Our best practice is that you hire one full-time person for every 75 people that attend your church. When that number’s dropping to 60, 55, 50. I mean, I’ve seen it go. This is embarrassing, right? I won’t tell you the church. It wasn’t this year, a couple of years ago. They hired one full-time person for every 15 people that attended their church.

Rich Birch — Wow. Wow.

Amy Anderson — I was just like, that’s crazy. Anyways.

Rich Birch — Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.

Amy Anderson — That’s right.

Rich Birch — I talked to a church recently that was at 33…

Amy Anderson — Yes!

Rich Birch — …and which is crazy, right? You start, I’m like, that is nuts. It’s like you got one staff for every couple of families. It’s amazing.

Amy Anderson — You’re basically paying volunteers at that point.

Rich Birch — Yes. Yes. Yeah. Right.

Amy Anderson — But those two numbers, when they are off, it means that we probably have too many doers on our team. And they’re probably great people. But if those doers, and what I mean by doer, they just have a lower level of leadership capacity. It’s not a bad thing.

Rich Birch — Rich Birch — …and which is crazy, right? You start, I’m like, that is nuts. It’s like you got one staff for every couple of families. It’s amazing.

Amy Anderson — You’re basically paying volunteers at that point.

Rich Birch — Yes. Yes. Yeah. Right.

Amy Anderson — But those two numbers, when they are off, it means that we probably have too many doers on our team. And they’re probably great people. But if those doers, and what I mean by doer, they just have a lower level of leadership capacity.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — It’s not a bad thing. But I think back in the days of the Global Leadership Summit, we were all convinced we all had the leadership gift. and And we may, you know, we all lead ourself…

Rich Birch — It’s so true.

Amy Anderson — …but you go back to Exodus 18, you know, there’s different levels of leadership.

Rich Birch — Right.

And so when we have people in positions with a lower leadership capacity than the position demands, that’s when we start hiring all the time. And we see our volunteer numbers drop, which admittedly, volunteer numbers, that has been the hardest number to recover from since COVID, to get people engaged again. But churches that do not have multiplying, equipping leaders, particularly in the discipleship areas and in the next gen areas, that that’s going to be those those numbers will indicate we may need to make some shifts here. And maybe they have the leadership capacity, but it’s undeveloped, or maybe we reward the wrong things.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — Maybe we don’t tell that, you know, that the discipleship leader, um, you know, what the expectations for the role is. Or maybe next gen’s even a better one. You know, if we haven’t really cast the vision, I know you’re a kid’s pastor, but you are primarily a team builder. You are a people magnet.

Rich Birch — Right. Yes.

Amy Anderson — So sometimes those just need to be re-envisioned, but those are some of the symptoms, um, that would also indicate we’ve got some challenges in this area.

Rich Birch — That’s good. That’s super good. I remember years ago I had a a mentor who was ah just a monster leader in kids ministry, like an incredible leader.

Amy Anderson — Yeah.

Rich Birch — And they said, you know, one of the problems with most children’s pastors is they like kids too much. You know, they you know they it’s really more about leading adults than it is um you know leading kids.

Rich Birch — I was going to ask you that if there are common areas where we see overstaffing kind of creeping in and maybe unpack that a little bit more. Because it feels right at the time, right? We’re like, oh, with the discipleship, they can only have so many coffees per week. So let’s just hire somebody else who they can go have more coffees with. Are there how do we see that kind of overstaffing start to creep in? What would what would be some of those ways we see that?

Amy Anderson — Yeah, and by the way, you know overstaffing, it’s such an interesting dilemma because we’ll have churches that feel like, I think we’re overstaffed and we’re understaffed.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — But I don’t know where that is. And they’re usually right.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — And we’ve had a bit of ah of a data deficit in this area for churches to be able to do some comparable, you know, comparisons with other churches. Like how many do you staff in next gen, how many do you staff in adult ministries versus operations versus the weekend. And so we actually started this last year, our Unstuck church report Q2 last year gave the first data thatI’ve seen where you can compare by church size how are we spending our staffing allocations.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Amy Anderson — And actually Q2 of this year, we are we are providing that again.

Rich Birch — Updating it. That’s great.

Amy Anderson — We’re we’re in the midst of creating that survey and updating it so your listeners can watch for that. I find that that’s helpful just to to ask that question.

Rich Birch — 100%.

Amy Anderson — Because um we have this overall staffing ratio 75 to 1, but you could spend that, if I could put it that way…

Rich Birch — Yes.

Amy Anderson — …you know, in a lot of different ways. I see it all over the place where they have under and overstaffing. You know there are some churches that are just saddled with a huge building, a huge complex building.

Amy Anderson — I was working with the church in Philadelphia and I always forget how hilly Philadelphia is. Well, their church is, you know, over like three or four levels and additions and all this. They’re going to spend more…

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Amy Anderson — …on their operational side because they have to care for that facility.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Amy Anderson — But where I see fat in the organization is actually in those adult ministry areas…

Rich Birch — Oh, interesting.

Amy Anderson — …and in next gen. Those are the primary overstaffed areas I see. Because in adult ministries, I hope I’m not going to offend anyone too much.

Rich Birch — No, no, this is good. This is good.

Amy Anderson — But we we talk about, ah you know, not having leadership capacity, but they have a great guy or gal they love. And so they make a change and they make them the care pastor. And the challenge is, now that care pastor isn’t developing the body to go care for the body.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — They’re doing a lot of care.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Amy Anderson — They’re doing a lot of counseling and then they need more staff because I can only care for so many people. So then we have another care pastor or another counseling…

Rich Birch — Yeah. And their their their view on the world is the way we do this is I have 40 coffees a week.

Amy Anderson — Yes.

Rich Birch — And so I can meet with 40 people and then, okay, if we’re going to grow, then we need, we need to keep scaling up…

Amy Anderson — Yes.

Rich Birch — …the number of people that can have 40 coffees a week, right?

Amy Anderson — That’s right.

Rich Birch — That’s their kind of, they would never say it like that, but that’s kind of their, you know, their, their orientation. Wow. That’s good.

Amy Anderson — And then in the next gen area, and I I feel the tension for this. But if, again, if we don’t have those, that mindset of I’m primarily a team builder on the staff teams, then you think about all the diversity in just birth through, fifth grade. I mean, a first grade boy is very different than a fifth grade girl.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — And you have all these rooms and large groups, small group, pre-K elementary. It’s very easy to just hear that drum, we need more staff, we need more staff, we need more staff, instead of building out that tiered volunteer structure where we can give um ministry away. So your big number will tell you a little bit about your overstaffing…

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — …your understaffing. Getting into some of this comparative data hopefully will help as well to kind of evaluate your, you know, the leaders listening, you know, your team.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. That’s good. And I would echo your reports are, you know, kudos to you. Literally the day they come out, when I get an email to your report, I pause whatever I’m doing and I read your reports. I think they’re they’re there and I share them, you know, in the cohorts I lead, I’m always like, Hey, here are the five things that I saw out of this that I think you should pay attention to. Here’s some stuff that’s… they’re always good. And so make sure you’re looking for that Q2 report.

Rich Birch — So that’s kind of on the, we’ll call that the staff size. Like, do we have enough people? What about on the structure side? What are a few kind of, you gave us a few handles there around the total number of staff. But what are some things, again, let’s let’s envision a church of 1,500 people. We’ve got we’ve we’ve maybe hit the 1 to 75, so we’re not overstaffed. But I’m not sure that really we’re structured right. What would be some of the questions that we should be thinking about? You know, beyond call Unstuck…

Amy Anderson — Oh absolutely.

Rich Birch — …what would be some of those questions that we should be and we’d be we’d be thinking about?

Amy Anderson — Here’s some low-hanging fruit in this area. One is um just assessing your span of care.

Rich Birch — OK, good.

Amy Anderson — We find, again, when we’re bolting on, ah we start to feel like, oh, that person has to report to me. Or that person has to stay reporting to me because they’ve reported to me forever, and that would feel like a demotion if I changed it. So now you just added another direct report. And usually in churches of 1,500, we’ve gotten to the point where there’s an executive pastor in place. But that’s not always true at 1500. So you can have a lead pastor who suddenly has like seven direct reports…

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — …and it’s like, hello…

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Amy Anderson — …that’s not, you are not going to have the time to do the four things that you cannot delegate, which is being the spiritual leader and overseeing the teaching, driving culture, right? Being the primary vision caster and leader of leaders.

Amy Anderson — And so, but the big mistake i we often see churches make is they, all right, well, well then we need an an executive pastor. We bolt that one in. And then you know what? Now the executive asterisk has seven direct reports.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Amy Anderson — So that’s an example of how we don’t really fix the problem. But span of care, when that gets out of here out of hand, ah it’s time we’ve got to look at our structure.

Amy Anderson — Another one is when we take these kind of core ministry areas and we don’t have them grouped together in alignment.

Rich Birch — Okay.

Amy Anderson — So it’s really in ah often from you when I first get an org chart from someone before I do a staffing structure, um I’ll see on the direct line, maybe to the executive pastor, we’ve got like outreach and missions to his right. We’ve got the weekend leader. Then we’ve got groups ministry. And then we have, you know, the next gen area. And it’s like, why don’t we take all those adult ministry things, like groups and serving and outreach, let’s get them all tucked under that same ministry lan.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — Because at the end of the day, ah those are all next steps we want people to take. But I often get pushback at first, like, well, that’s way too big of a job. And I’m like, it’s not. It’s it’s having a conductor for all those next steps, because when you don’t do that, you end up they end up competing, right? They end up competing for announcements. They end up competing for volunteers. They compete for any kind of promotional stage time…

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — …where really you need a leader to kind of know here’s where we need to put the spotlight right now.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — And to make sure all of those steps are integrated versus separate programs at the church.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that…

Amy Anderson — So those are a couple that come to mind.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. Do you have a my experience with span of care is there are some leaders that just seem to have a bigger capacity. They can they can have more people report to them and those people seem to flourish and thrive. And then other folks, it’s smaller. Is there are there, you know, so seven is too many, but is three too little? it Talk us through what, what, what are their kind of rules of thumb that when you see that even just on an org chart level, you’re like, Ooh, we should be thinking about this here.

Amy Anderson — Yeah, some of it depends on your leadership capacity and your style, right? So with a lead pastor, there are some that are wired for that executive pastor role. Others kind of push back a little bit. By the way, I think they often push back more so because of fear of being separated from the staff. We’ve all seen, you know, not so good turnouts with that.

Rich Birch — Yeah, they hold too close.

Amy Anderson — I find it works very well to have a key executive pastor who’s really conducting and making sure we’re executing on the vision. But you know, for like my preference, I can have four or five direct reports and I can I can lead them well. And, you know, it’s I know Tony used to say to me, Amy, if I don’t know the name of your husband and your kids and what’s going, you know, what I can be praying for, then I’m not really leading you. I’m just checking a management box.

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Amy Anderson — And so I think we all have that tipping point when we get from being good leaders to good checking box managers of what we’re doing.

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s good. That’s good.

Amy Anderson — So it’s different. And then of course, um you know, at a high level, you need to have some thinking capacity to keep your eyes above the waterline.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — So we we always have to remember we need time to work on the ministry, not just in it all the time.

Rich Birch — In it. Yep.

Amy Anderson — Yeah. So yeah, I think four to five is good for me. I think every leader has to wrestle with that. And that needs to be part of the input when you’re designing the new structure.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. So yeah, not so much just a standard. Here’s the ideal. Just apply this, you know.

Amy Anderson — Right.

Rich Birch — It’s like understand your people. And similarly, I would say in my own world, like I like to have at least, you know, um one significant monthly one-on-one…

Amy Anderson — Yes.

Rich Birch — …that’s outside of the like, Hey, what are we doing? It’s like, I want to actually get into your life and help you.

Amy Anderson — Yes.

Rich Birch — And it’s a one-on-one where we’re not, ah the goal is not that I’m dumping stuff on you. It’s I’m coaching you. We’re working through stuff. And I find frankly, if I do more than four or five of those a month. It’s like, that’s a lot. Like it’s a lot to try to keep on top of. And so, yeah, that’s good. That’s really good.

Amy Anderson — Can I jump in on something you said there?

Rich Birch — One hundred percent.

Amy Anderson — So one-on-ones, just an off-the-cuff comment.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Amy Anderson — One of the things that also might be an indication we don’t have the right ah staffing structure plan is if you have one-on-ones every week with your team members. Like you have the wrong people…

Rich Birch — Good call. Good call. Yes.

Amy Anderson — …if you have to meet with them every week in a church context, yeah I want one solid one-on-one…

Rich Birch — Ooh, I love it. We are dropping the mic here, friends.

Amy Anderson — We are dropping it!

Rich Birch — Cause there’s lots of people that do that that, that are like, I got to stay on top of my people. And so we’re, so yeah, that’s interesting. If you don’t have those, particularly at that level, I’m assuming. Hey, if we, if we got to check in with you every single week, things are not going right.

Amy Anderson — Yeah. I mean, if it’s a brand new employee, great.

Rich Birch — Sure.

Amy Anderson — But in general, no one should need that much meeting and oversight. So you can quote me…

Rich Birch — That’s good. Love it.

Amy Anderson — …you know, Amy said, if that’s you right now and you need a break from all those one-on-ones.

Rich Birch — No, I was I was going through a period where we we were managing a team member, I was managing a team member on my team that was struggling. And I generally would do monthly one-on-ones outside of team meetings.

Rich Birch — But then we went, you know, and when they would start, we would do more and then, you know, kind of phase back to monthly. But this person was going in the other direction. We went from monthly to every other week to weekly and actually eventually got to daily.

Amy Anderson — No!

Rich Birch — And I I said to them as we went to weekly, I was like, you know, this isn’t good, right? Like this is not the fact that I’m having to sit with you and talk about, okay, what are you doing this week? Let’s talk about your is not, you know, it’s not a good thing. And they were a little surprised, which was that led me to like, then we definitely have the wrong person, the wrong, wrong person sitting in this seat. This is not about, this is about a different conversation that we need to have.

Rich Birch — Um, adjacent to what you said there, you talked a little, you kind of hinted towards executive pastor, lead pastor relationships. We didn’t say that we were going to talk about this, but I’d love to get your thought a little bit on that. I notice oftentimes when I’m in a church, not all the time, but oftentimes I’ll have like a lead pastor pull me aside and say, man, I love my executive pastor. They’re amazing or pastors. They’re amazing. They’re great people. Great at checklist, great at getting stuff done. They’re fantastic. Great operational leader. Hey, can you help me though help me understand—there’s no but in the sentence—but it’s like, help me understand how to work better with them.

Rich Birch — Or I’ll have an executive pastor pull me aside and say, I love my lead pastor. So good at casting vision. Man, I’ll run through a wall for that person. That person’s incredible. Can you help me understand how to work better with them? I’m trying to kind of, you know, work on that relationship. I want that to be… What what are some of the things that you’ve seen from your seat that are kind of critical to that relationship really functioning, thriving well, an important kind of flourishing relationship in the life of a church?

Amy Anderson — Yeah, the first thing that comes to mind is how important it is that they spend time together.

Rich Birch — Oh, good.

Amy Anderson — They’re both busy, but the lead pastor, again, having that final exam every Sunday that’s going public, uh, you know, that message becomes really important. But I, I think one of the sins that I see in this area is where these two people don’t spend enough time together.

Rich Birch — Right. Good.

Amy Anderson — The truth is the the executive pastor to do his or her job well needs to have regular connection…

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — …because they are the ones who are making the vision actionable.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — So there just needs to be a high level of trust. Trust comes through time, comes through relationship.

Amy Anderson — When I talk with executive pastors about working with the senior pastor, lead pastor, number one, you have to pay attention to their rhythms and in advance decide what’s what’s a good time for us to have that weekly connection.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Amy Anderson — It could be a brown bag lunch on Monday for a pastor who has those rhythms. It could be Wednesday because they have to get you know some of their message written. But a lead pastor’s rhythms should set the tone for how we do these meetings and intersections…

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Amy Anderson — …so that you get the right energy into that meeting. I also think whenever there’s pushback, like if the executive pastor has a different opinion than the lead pastor, I think it’s always important—I think this is from John Maxwell’s book, the 360-degree leader—you always need to start that pushback by echoing what matters to the lead pastor first.

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s good. Yeah, yeah, that’s great.

Amy Anderson — Like, I know that you want us to be a church that does this. You need to, anytime you’re going to disagree, because they need to know that you’re for them and you’re for the vision that they’re setting. And then bring the appropriate challenge um to an idea or something that just goes so much better.

Amy Anderson — To the lead pastors, I would say, again, you need to spend time with your executive pastor. It’s probably the most important relationship you have on your work team. Here’s the sin I see from that direction is the the lead pastor who starts to go, I don’t really need to be in the senior leadership team meeting this week. Yeah, you’re going to talk about Acts and that’s, I really need to get back to this. Or the executive pastor who says, I don’t think we need the lead pastor in this meeting. Here’s the deal. That is the beginning of a crack that’s going to turn into a larger gap and a fracture between the lead pastor and the team.

Rich Birch — Oh that’s good.

Amy Anderson — It’s critical that that lead pastor is regularly around the senior leadership team table because each of those leaders needs to hear the heart and perspective of that lead pastor because that’s how culture gets transferred.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Amy Anderson — So I think the executive pastor needs to pull the meeting together, has to facilitate the conversation, but that lead pastor needs to be present and engaged in those conversations. So by doing those couple of things, that’s, I think, how that relationship increases and improves between the executive and lead pastor.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. That’s so good. Wow. That’s, that’s super helpful. And you can see that where, you know, there’s, there in some ways it can mask, well, we’re Christian, so we’re good at making things look, you know, maybe more holy than they should be. It’s like, there can be an elite pastor side, like an acquiescence, like, Oh, I don’t want to step on your toes. Like you lead that stuff. I don’t want to, I’m really, frankly, I don’t care what we do with t-shirts at the thing. I’m not interested in that stuff.

Rich Birch — Or the executive pastor will be like, you know, ah just let me take this ball and run with it. Like I Let me help you, serve you. But there’s in there we got to watch that.

Amy Anderson — Yeah.

Rich Birch — That there’s like a there there can be a so potential separation there…

Amy Anderson — Yes.

Rich Birch — …that can you know open up a really negative situation. So yeah that’s good. That’s good.

Amy Anderson — Yeah.

Rich Birch — Good. Well, this is super helpful. um We actually have a resource that we’re going to link link to. This is a PDF, how to restructure your church staff for growth. This is a fantastic resource. It’s not that long, six pages, but is super helpful. Tell us a little bit about this. What you know what were you guys thinking when you kind of put this together? Who who do you think this would be a helpful resource for for folks that are listening in today?

Amy Anderson — Yeah, we put it together because this whole issue of restructuring was such a headline need for churches last year. But ah let me speak truth about it. It’s a great roadmap. This is what we do with churches when we help them restructure.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Amy Anderson — You know, there’s a first step where we have to just do a level of assessment on the health and performance of the team. We do an assessment on the actual team members. That gets into also assessing leadership capacity. And then um we talk through decision rights, how do we make decisions, and then we kind of start to create the the construct of the structure.

Amy Anderson — So everything we do um is mentioned in this resource, but here’s the tension. This is really hard—I’m just, to be honest—it’s really hard for churches to do on their own. So read it, man.

Rich Birch — Right. Good. Good. Good.

Amy Anderson — And you might even have people in your church who are great at it. But anytime we even start to think about making changes, uh, you know, the, the leaders can sometimes get a stomach ache.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Amy Anderson — Because a lot of them are wired on, we do the leading from your strengths wheel, the disc. They have, they’re on the people side of it.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Amy Anderson — And when we’re on the people side, we, I’ll quote my friend Lance Witt, you know, as leaders, our job is to be clear and kind as we move through things, right? Those of us on the people side tend to be really kind, but sometimes we aren’t super clear.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Amy Anderson — And when it comes to staff ah changes, it it it causes stress for the organization. And so you have to be very thoughtful and working through a restructure. And a phrase I use all the time is, you need to make all your plans, you need to pray that you can you have peace about this, that you can afford it, that we’ve thought through how we’re going to roll it out. Because if you tip a domino before it’s ready to be tipped…

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Amy Anderson — …it can be very hurtful to the organization, harmful to the organization. It’s just in a restructure there’s really only a few of you who have decision rights.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Amy Anderson — And everyone gets really nervous. I just actually met with our church staff team and I just went through kind of a staff development exercise, and I think even there, they were nervous. Like, why is she coming in? What are we talking about? So there’s always this fear when we get into this topic. And so that’s why we find most pastors bringing someone from the outside in to help walk through this.

Amy Anderson — Here’s really what they get. They often have a lot of the right instincts. That gut is right on the things that are broken. But what pastors really need in this is a little bit of expertise, but also a lot of confidence. They just want to have confidence they’re making the right move…

Rich Birch — Yep.

Amy Anderson — …because they are moving the cheese, per se, around and they they want to minimize anything that could be hurtful in that restructure.

Rich Birch — Well, yeah, I would echo that. You know, this is one of those situations where having a strategic outsider, someone who has been through this before, has walked through this. You’re being very humble, Amy. You’ve done this in literally dozens of churches and have been able to help them think about these issues in a really critical way. And then frankly, have the accountability to say, OK, so we’ve talked about this enough. We got to actually make some moves here. Like let’s actually, because like you say, I think a lot of us have the we have the intuitive like, um, I’m thinking there’s something here we need to change. But then we’ll just keep, well, yeah there’s next Sunday’s coming…

Amy Anderson — Yep.

Rich Birch — …and then Easter’s coming and then, well, then it’s Christmas time or there’s summer. And, you know, but having, you know, someone to say, like Amy, like good folks at Unstuck to say, okay, let’s actually put a plan in place. Let’s think about this. We’re not going to be willy nilly about it. We’re going to make really smart decisions, but we also are going to make some moves forward.

Rich Birch — I would hate for your church to be held back, for the message of Jesus to be held back, or for you to hit a lid or maybe even be stuck as it might be…

Amy Anderson — Yeah.

Rich Birch — …because we didn’t make a change in this area. So i so we’ll we’ll link to that, but really I think you should, people should reach out and you know get a chance to talk with the team. What does that typically look like? Like that kind of engagement? Obviously you work well you walk through this in this document, obviously you do some sort of assessment and then we’re developing. What does that total process look like? Is that like a year? Is that you know, ah six months, how does that kind of work? If, if I, even before I would want to reach out, give us a sense of what that could look like.

Amy Anderson — Yeah, great question. um Typically, we get through those first three engagements that I just mentioned—that assessment the planning and staffing structure—within 90 days.

Rich Birch — Okay.

Amy Anderson — So sometimes it takes us a little bit longer to get started…

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Amy Anderson — …because you know, I’m i’m booked through June right now.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Amy Anderson — But usually need 30 days to kind of get some of the assessments done and then we do the three onsite visits about four weeks apart…

Rich Birch — Yep.

Amy Anderson — …with churches. And so once you’re there, then you have your plans and then we roll into, we call it implementation. You know, the biggest feedback we would get early on when I started was, Hey, it was great. What’s your biggest challenge? Implementation. They basically got caught up in the whirlwind again. And so we have…

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — …R and D’d this area several times. And how we’re running it now, basically we have every three months, we are back together to see how they’re moving their plans forward…

Rich Birch — Checking in, checking in. Yep, for sure.

Amy Anderson — …helping them, make sure that they don’t get stuck. And of course, you know we’re available to them the whole time as they walk through that.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Amy Anderson — I just wanted to add one more timeframe on here. It might be helpful. When when I work with a church through a restructure, so I worked with a large church down in Louisiana this past year, church of about 3000.

Amy Anderson — Started with them in February, and we spent, it we we just did staffing and structure. They didn’t go through the other parts of our process. It took them until, I think, it was July/August to actually pull the trigger and actually restructure, meaning they spent five, six months getting ready for it.

Rich Birch — Wow, yep.

Amy Anderson — And they are on the other side of it now. It is a new day. It went extremely well.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Amy Anderson — But that’s also when I think about restructuring. It’s not like, hey, this is a problem, and four weeks later, we’re in a new we’re in a new place.

Rich Birch — Right.

Amy Anderson — That’s that’s that that heaviness, I say, with making sure we’re thinking it all the way through.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. Yeah. There’s definitely, you can see the tension on the other side, right? Where it would be like, let’s just, you know, the, we’ve all been in those situations where it’s like, we’re lying awake at night. We draw the org chart and then we’re like, I’m going to change it. Come on.

Amy Anderson — That’s right.

Rich Birch — Let’s just pull, pull people together. That’s probably not as good and maybe as dangerous as the, we’re going to constantly what you know ah we you’re um we’re not moving on things. That’s got its own kind of struggle to it as well.

Amy Anderson — It does.

Rich Birch — So, well, this has been amazing. I know we could keep going. There’s lots we could talk about there. But anything, just as we come to land today’s episode, around structuring and staffing, anything there that you’d you’d like to say just as we kind of go to wrap up today’s conversation.

Amy Anderson — Yeah, I just just way to go out there, churches. Again, the churches that I was able to be with this past year, thanks for your your persistence. And you show up every day. And I mean, the church is just in a great place right now, the churches that are really trying to both reach and disciple people. And I hope you’re encouraged. You have the most important mission, you know, on the planet.

Amy Anderson — And boy, if these people things are challenging, there’s there’s here’s a good word. Some of them are solvable problems. Now, some of them are perpetual. You’ll have them your whole life. You just have to manage it. But on the staffing side, there are some solvable problems and proven ways to go at them. So if it is a pain point, dive into that resource, even some of our other content. We’ve done several podcast series, if that would be helpful. And if you’re ready to take a step further, ah you can just find us at the unstuckgroup.com.

Rich Birch — Love it. Well, this has been fantastic, Amy. I really appreciate you. You know, all the best to you and your team. We’re cheering for you…

Amy Anderson — Thank you.

Rich Birch — …cheering for the work you do. You do such great work, really from like we said earlier, from a place of love for the church. And so just want to honor you for what you do on that front. You mentioned unstuckgroup.com. Is there anywhere else we want to send people online to connect with you, to connect with your organization, that sort of thing?

Amy Anderson — Yeah, you can find us @theunstuckgroup on Instagram and on YouTube. And then of course our webpage is where you can start a conversation if you’d like to do that.

Rich Birch — Great. Thanks so much, Amy, appreciate you being here today.

Amy Anderson — Thanks, Rich.

Welcome to the unSeminary podcast. We’re talking with Tyler Vance, the COO of Apollos, a digital platform designed to help churches thrive by using technologies for personal growth.

Despite being more digitally connected than ever, people lack deep, meaningful relationships. Gen Z has often been called the loneliest generation in history. However, churches are uniquely positioned to solve this problem. Tune in to learn how you can leverage technology to foster authentic community in your church and help people grow in their faith.

Visit apollos.app to learn more about how they can help your church thrive. Plus, listen to the episode Beyond Sundays: Liquid Church’s 24/7 Ministry Model with Lauren Bercarich here.

There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally!

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Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Portable Church

Your church is doing really well right now, and your leadership team is looking for solutions to keep momentum going! It could be time to start a new location. Maybe you have hesitated in the past few years, but you know it’s time to step out in faith again and launch that next location. Portable Church has assembled a bundle of resources to help you leverage your growing momentum into a new location by sending a part of your congregation back to their neighborhood on Mission. This bundle of resources will give you a step-by-step plan to launch that new or next location, and a 5 minute readiness tool that will help you know your church is ready to do it!

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Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. Man, you are in for a real treat today. Super excited for today’s conversation. It’s a follow-up conversation, which you know, that’s like us double clicking, getting a little bit deeper, peeling back the onion on a conversation that we had last spring. And we’re going a little bit deeper today and talking with Tyler Vance.

Rich Birch — You might be saying, who is Tyler? He is the COO of an organization called Apollos. Apollos is a digital platform that helps churches thrive. They’re working to reverse the trend of disconnection and help people flourish. Apollos believes that strong community and healthy habits are necessary ingredients for personal growth. And they leverage technology to make those realities happen literally for millions of people. Prior to, or at least you know in in kind of a part of his past life, Tyler was also a part of Life Life.Church. You might’ve heard of them before. He was both a pastor and technology leader over there. Tyler, welcome. So glad you’re here.

Tyler Vance — Thank you for having me, Rich. Man, that’s quite an introduction. And yeah, I have spent many years as a pastor in a local church. And ah so I I get the opportunity to have a different lens when it comes to technology. I don’t approach it as a technologist first, but as a pastor first. And I love that. And I’m I’m super grateful for that.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Love it. Declaring my bias upfront, leaders, you should be leaning in and listening to today’s conversation. Cause I think you’re going to be, you might be a little bit surprised and you might look at some of your current technologies and be like, Hmm, I feel like they weren’t designed by a pastor. So, uh, we might challenge you a little bit today, which is good.

Rich Birch — Now you make this bold claim about the, well, first of all, fill in the picture, give us anything else there, kind of your background, anything that I missed or kind of just from a general open report of you that you want to make sure we talk about.

Tyler Vance — Well, I I always assume, but I don’t I don’t want to make the assumption. Apollos is a name that, um you know, depending on your historical background, you might think, oh, this Apollos mission, we’re going to the moon. But it’s actually from the writing of Paul, I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. I just don’t want to miss the connection for what the heartbeat of Apollos is. We firmly believe in the work of what pastors are doing, the the thing that God has called them to. We want to come alongside and water the things that you are planting, pastors.

Rich Birch — That’s so good.

Tyler Vance — And we trust that God does His work in the midst of that. So I just don’t want to miss that.

Rich Birch — No, that’s good.

Tyler Vance — As ah as it’s nothing to do with the moon.

Rich Birch — Yeah. No, that’s good though. And I appreciate that. That’s, uh, yeah, that’s, I love that. That’s what a, what a, what a vivid picture for sure. Well, you guys make this strong claim about the fact that you believe in strong community and healthy habits, and which is a lot for a technology company. I’d love to take a step back and talk about why it seems more than ever community is like a big deal. Why is that? Why are we facing this need for community? And then, you know, we’ll narrow down into specifically how technology can help with that.

Rich Birch — But it just, I think people agree, but kind of unpack that problem for us a little bit.

Tyler Vance — Yeah, I think, Rich, I mean, if you go back to and the the first model we have of the early church in Acts, community is the the driver of it, right? And so I think the local church, yes, to empower the gospel, yes, to um to make disciples, but that happens in this context of community. And so you look at the the vision, the picture that that Jesus gives us of the early church, and then you compare it to the statistics that are overwhelming in our society is, you know, this has been coined as the loneliest generation in history.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Tyler Vance — And we have the answer, we we have the model for that as the local church…

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Tyler Vance — …to be the solution to the largest problem our generation is facing.

Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. I was gonna say I love that. I don’t love that we’re the loneliest generation, but I think that’s a good thing for us to point out. A friend of mine, Jeff Brody, says that, ah hey, at the time, at the very moment when the world seems to be the hungriest that it’s been in decades, and I think in generations…

Tyler Vance — Yeah.

Rich Birch — …for what we do as a church, there are a lot of churches that are kind of turning inward and not, you know, even solving like this, helping to solve problems that are in the real world, which is this idea of, you know of loneliness. How do you think the church is good at that? What is it about ah but what we do that drives community, that makes community work in you know in people’s lives?

Tyler Vance — Well, it’s a fabric of ah being a disciple of Jesus, right?

Rich Birch — Right.

Tyler Vance — It’s confess your sins one to another. It’s it’s it’s this tangible, deeply connected tissue of doing life together, having community that you can be engaged with, that you can grow with, that you can cry with. My wife and I, for example, Rich, we ah live many hours away from our closest family, you know. How many times has our small group been there on Christmases where we got snowed in and we couldn’t be there, right?

Rich Birch — So true.

Tyler Vance — Where Thanksgivings, the birth of our children, our small group was the first to the hospital because our families were… this is the this is the fabric of the church when done well, when leaned in. And yeah, we have a loneliest generation. That’s that’s a that’s a ah ah title that has been applied to to that, but we have such opportunity to come in and rewrite that story for people.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s so true.

Tyler Vance — And and it’s very odd juxtaposition because we are probably the most connected…

Rich Birch — Right.

Tyler Vance — …generation ever.

Rich Birch — Right.

Tyler Vance — But those connections aren’t deep in in the things of God. They are not spiritual in nature. And we know intuitively that that they become lacking for what they produce. And so if if there’s ever an institution to be able to solve that is the local church.

Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. And then, you know, the other side of of what you’ve talked about, and and I want to get to what Apollos does, but I I wanted to try to lay the framework here a little bit more at kind of a philosophical level. You talk about healthy habits are a necessary ingredient for personal growth. So when when you say that, unpack that a little bit more. I think people would agree with that, but what how how are health, why are healthy habits a critical piece of, you know, a disciple’s journey?

Tyler Vance — Yeah, I I mean, so the the healthy habits, what we we would say is our are the daily habits that are core to what we do, and and I will lean in a little bit to to the product of what we do.

Rich Birch — Yep. Yeah, that’s good.

Tyler Vance — They are ah daily time with God, prayer, and gratitude.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Tyler Vance — And those aren’t ah those aren’t by accident. We didn’t just you know come up with some great thing. The the history of our of our product is is deeper than 10 years old and it’s built on trying different habits. And so the data overwhelmingly shows that those are the three habits that move the needle most in an individual’s daily spiritual kind of, maybe maybe a different way to phrase it would be their spiritual fitness, or their discipleship, right? And also they become ah leading indicators of weekend attendance, of generosity, of these other things that historically in the church we have counted as the ah the measures of success.

Tyler Vance — And so that’s what our data is showing ah in in and that. And so we’re making very data-informed decisions. One of the things we used to say as I led data at Life Church was, um data has a seat at the table, but the Holy Spirit is still the head of the table, right?

Rich Birch — That’s good. That’s good. Yep.

Tyler Vance — And and so like we want to make sure that we’re making data-informed decisions by allowing God still to be the final say in the direction and and the things of what we’re leaning into.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. So um friends, we back it’s about six months ago, we had Lauren from Liquid Church on and and we were talking about their app, Apollos. And she mentioned this on there. Apollos is the provider behind ah what they’re what they’re doing at Liquid. And so we’ll link to that that episode if you want to kind of talk and hear about a specific church’s application of Apollos. There’s a bunch of churches across the country that are benefiting from this.

Rich Birch — But um but but let’s let’s unpack those three habits. So ah prayer, scripture reading, gratitude, help help us unpack, what does that look like ah at an app level? And and then and layer on top of that community, because this to me is, I think, a part of what makes what you’re doing so unique, that these are really, they so those seem to be ah woven together in a really beautiful way. So talk us through that.

Tyler Vance — Yeah, um so I’ll actually use some stories to illustrate how how this functionality works.

Rich Birch — That’s great. Yeah.

Tyler Vance — First off, as a pastor, I believe in the power of prayer. And um as ah I was in a situation, an environment where we received prayer cards, like many of probably the pastors that that are listening. And you’d go through and as a staff pray for those prayer cards. And then you know probably most of us would have a prayer team that we give those prayer cards to. And you you know that that would kind of be the it. We wouldn’t be able to hear the final story or follow up. I mean we just we were kind of at the mercy of that being the the end of the story. One of the great things that we found by allowing prayer to happen in an app experience is, first off, it takes about 60 seconds for someone to submit a prayer, and then someone else in the church to respond to that prayer, right?

Tyler Vance — So we have cut down the time for the church to really become the church together. We’ve actually empowered this thing to happen that is independent of a pastor, not meaning that a pastor can’t engage in it, but that we’re allowing the church to be the church. And actually Lauren from Liquid shares one of the most powerful stories of this. She was actually on her way to a doctor’s appointment for her kid and shared a prayer in the app. By the time she got to the doctor’s appointment, she had people praying for her.

Rich Birch — That’s amazing.

Tyler Vance — She got to the doctor’s appointment, had a great appointment. She’s checking her kid in the next weekend. And one of the ladies helping her check her kid in says, hey, I was actually one of the people praying for you this week. A, I want to know how your appointment was. But also, if you didn’t know, I spent 20 years in that very specific field of industry.

Rich Birch — Wow. Yeah. Wow. Amazing.

Tyler Vance — And I would love to help you out in a very tangible way. Prayer connects the heart of believers together in such a powerful way. And we’re seeing that across the board. Faith Promise Church in Knoxville, their XP shared a story with me of you know a kid, same similar story: parent praying as they go to a doctor’s appointment, kid had a concussion, and they were really looking for how extensive the brain damage was.

Tyler Vance — Church surrounds them on their way to the doctor’s appointment in prayer. Ends up no no brain damage. And the the kid says to the doctor, as a three-year-old, I know why you can’t find brain damage because my church is praying for me.

Rich Birch — Wow. Wow.

Tyler Vance — All of that is not, that’s not from a prayer card on a Sunday to a Sunday.
 
Tyler Vance — That is real time, the church being the church. That’s that’s a power of what we’re seeing when you put prayer in an app. That is the context of your church body.

Rich Birch — Yeah, I love I love that. And I um so I’m you know I’m lurking on the Liquid app. I’m you know and I’m you know friends with some folks on there. And it’s amazing how, you know as a user, just as a person on the app using it, like that’ll happen. A friend will come up and a prayer will come up and I’ll stop and pause and pray.

Rich Birch — And it doesn’t, you know, and and people are sharing things of you know all different kinds of stuff. And as a as a just a person using this app, it really does draw me in towards them, obviously towards you know what’s what’s going on in their life. So those are vivid examples at kind of the personal level. I remember you you know for years an executive pastor when we would do prayer on a Sunday with prayer cards, we would do exactly that. We would have you know we would take the cards, and we would ensure that they’re getting prayed for by our prayer team. We take that very serious. We’d have, you know, hand them out to people. We would divvy them up and like, we’re going to make that happen.

Rich Birch — But then there was another part of this, which was about frankly, looking at data from people in our church and trying to get a sense of what’s happening in their lives to help us as we’re speaking for the future. Is is there an opportunity through Apollos to leverage data in that way, in a way that’s elegant and, you know, non creepy, obviously, but talk to us about that.

Tyler Vance — Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Data is a big, a big thing. And I think in my time leading data specifically at Life Church and the whole initiatives around that, I think pastors have the the tendency to want to get what I call data drunk. It means that they want all the data in the world. And they have no clue what to do with it. They just want it.

Rich Birch — Right.

Tyler Vance — And so to to your point, we want to be very strategic. We have opportunities to provide whatever data you need. But we want to be strategic in the use case, the purpose of it. Not that we can’t get it, but what we really want is we are we are more strategy than we are a product. And…

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Tyler Vance — …we just really want to help you understand what it is you’re trying to do, what… to to your point, Rich, that such a great example of if I knew what people in my church were praying for, I’d teach differently on the weekend. Yeah. Or I’d create courses or the felt needs, you know, articles or blogs that I’m putting out would would reflect that. Yes, absolutely. We want to equip the church ah in in ways like that. And so absolutely everything is possible there.

Tyler Vance — One of the one of the things that um I think I will highlight is just the, since we’re talking about communication cards, the opportunity for profile creation. And a lot of pastors are missing this, and I wish that they understood this more. An app profile creation is the new communication card. And so what we also are trying to do is we’re also trying to give unknown people in your congregations a known voice and entity, right?

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Tyler Vance — As a pastor, it’s really hard and you stand on stage and you look out and you go, I can identify maybe 20, I know the names of maybe 20% of these people, right? How do we begin, as a church, to know the names of more people?

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Tyler Vance — And really profile creation in a digital experience is, is a new way to do that, and we need to be looking at digital experiences, ah not just for the digital experience they offer but for the profile creation and the ability to know people – that they exist, that they then we can understand demographics, we can understand who our church is reaching, we can really listen in for the heartbeat of where God is moving in our individual churches instead of, and I’m going to hit a soapbox item for me, instead of trying to predict or create a space for God to move, we can listen to where he’s already moving and just move with him.

Rich Birch — That’s “Experiencing God”, Henry Blackaby. That’s great. Where’s God at work? Move towards that. That’s fantastic. Let’s double click on that. When you say profile creation, give us the kind of, give us some free coaching here. We’re taking advantage of the fact that you’re on the call. If you’re thinking of a church that’s you know that wants to ensure that we’re getting, you know, we’re we’re kind of fully taking advantage of this kind of profile creation idea and then management of that. What would be a few of the kind of best practices we should be thinking about on that front?

Tyler Vance — Sure. Well, let me let me actually start off with some real-time data here.

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s perfect.

Tyler Vance — Two two weeks ago, ah we launched a brand new app in a church near Orlando. In that timeframe, in two weeks, they push the app from stage and they did a great marketing strategy around it, and they did a lot of great stuff that was outside of the digital product, right?

Rich Birch — Yep.

Tyler Vance — And so free coaching number one is a great digital product is not the solution. A comprehensive strategy is the solution.

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s good. That’s good.

Tyler Vance — 20% of their church created a profile. And you think, man, that’s great.

Rich Birch — Wow.

Tyler Vance — But what is ah what if as a pastor I could tell you through a great strategy, you could know an additional 20% of the names sitting in your auditorium?

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s amazing.

Tyler Vance — That’s crazy. And so um the the double click on that is, I mean, you have to have a great place for them to go. We believe at Apollos that our app is world-class and it’s a great place for people to go. But you have to have a great way to get them there. And we don’t think about this enough, but the fact that we believe something’s valuable as a local church doesn’t mean that the people sitting in our seats think it’s valuable. So we always have to be customer-centric, right?

Rich Birch — That’s so true. Yeah, that’s so true.

Tyler Vance — And and that we miss that as pastors. I know you you laugh at that, but um we we so oftentimes miss that as pastors because we are used to developing the strategy, creating the vision, doing the weekend message, and people show up for it.

Tyler Vance — And we now live in a society where there has to be a branded value. There has to be some reason why I would want to engage in that.

Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah.

Tyler Vance — And it has to be customer-focused and customer is not like the the sexy thing to say when we’re talking about church and it’s a different way to say it, but we need to be customer-focused.

Rich Birch — Yeah, okay, so yeah, you’ve hit on a, I would say as, again, an observer, someone who’s been in this space, I feel like there’s a lot of, and you’re not talking down about other apps. So this is me saying this, not you. But I feel like there’s a lot of churches out there that have apps that really are just a shortcut to their revenue. They’re like a, you know, it’s ah it’s essentially just a wrapper around a webpage that says, please give us money. And there isn’t really any other reason for people to use the app. And so then we roll this thing out thinking, oh, like, you know, everyone’s going to want to do this. This will be so easy. Well, no, like that isn’t what happens. And there’ll be, there’s low adoption rates. But it seems like to me, Apollos’ focus on these daily habits, bringing people back time and again, for things that actually help them…

Tyler Vance — Yeah.

Rich Birch — …man, that’s like beneficial for us as a church. It’s we’re seeing more as a platform than just like, ah it’s not just one more thing to kind of bother them in their in their lives. Is that Is that kind of the strategy behind it from it from a church and from a you know user point of view, from from your point of view?

Tyler Vance — Absolutely, Rich. And and I I will I will say this and I will say it sensitively. There are a lot of strategies that are solely based on content distribution. And that’s great, but everywhere else in our society, you have content distribution wrapped in community, right? And and the local church has not embraced that to the level that the rest of the world has. And so we really aim to do that. And and to go back to some feature set…

Rich Birch — Yep.

Tyler Vance — …and not to highlight feature set, but to highlight strategy here, we talk about communities. One of the things that we’re seeing in communities is, you know, five years ago, we might have put a felt needs article on our website and understood that that might get someone to engage. We’re seeing incredible traction from taking those felt needs articles and creating short-term experiences and groups around them.

Tyler Vance — An example of this…

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Rich Birch — …a church in Dallas ah did a 21 days to a better marriage, right?

Rich Birch — Yeah, wonderful.

Tyler Vance — $100 Facebook ad spend, ah sign up of like 980 people,

Rich Birch — Wow.

Tyler Vance — 23% of those people had never walked in the door of their church.

Rich Birch — Wow. That’s amazing.

Tyler Vance — And they stuck around for 21 days. So we track that over the course, 12 months later, 17% of those people were still engaged with their church, of of the new.

Rich Birch — Wow, that’s amazing.

Tyler Vance — It’s incredibly sticky because they offered something that no one else offered, and it wasn’t just content…

Rich Birch — It’s community.

Tyler Vance — …it was community around content.

Rich Birch — Well and that I think is a good insight that we that I think a lot of churches haven’t embraced. We know that intuitively that it’s not the content, that content’s a core a core part of what we do on the weekend, say, in our in-person experiences. It’s critical to what we do. You’ve got to have great preaching. You have to actually say something. But it’s a it’s a community-rich experience. The reason why people come back, the reason why they join teams, the reason why they connect in small groups is because of the relationships.

Rich Birch — But it’s like we get online and we forget that. We forgot that you know that that port that part of what we do um which is you know… And then we’re just like, how come we we we look at it like a giant megaphone. Let’s just keep broadcasting. And we’re all screaming online as opposed to saying, hey, let’s try to create a community around that. That’s powerful.

Tyler Vance — Yeah.

Rich Birch — Did they, so are you saying in this example from Dallas with the 21 day kind of marriage tune up or whatever, did that drive ultimately to their website, to their app? How did that all work? How did, like, what, what did that look like?

Tyler Vance — It was all experienced through their app. It was an app-driven experience. So…

Rich Birch — Wow. Okay.

Tyler Vance — I mean, in order to to get into that, their their app is set up to where you had to create a profile, you had to log in.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Tyler Vance — That’s how we knew to go back to your data point of these were new people. The next 20%, this is what I didn’t share, the next 20% were people that were sitting in the seats, but had never done anything in their church.

Rich Birch — Right, right.

Tyler Vance — Right?

Rich Birch — Disengaged. Yep.

Tyler Vance — And so the it just became this incredible experience. And actually, Rich, to go back to your point, this isn’t new.

Rich Birch — Right.

Tyler Vance — Like to to to To your Henry Blackaby nod earlier, the church has been doing this since I’ve been alive, right? We’ve been connecting people around needs in small groups, but we’ve been asking them to come to buildings. And we’re really comfortable still asking them to come to buildings. And all we’re doing is taking those similar experiences that we know to be ah integral to a discipleship journey. And we’re saying you can do them asynchronously via your phone and still have the same level of discipleship and community.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Okay. Let’s talk a little bit about the, from my perspective, the fit and finish of what Apollos does is industry leading. It’s ah fantastic. Your apps are, they’re snappy. You push a button and it actually works. Like, which should not be the benchmark for apps, but you’d be amazed.

Rich Birch — I was joking with another member of your team where I was, I do these visits where I did 22 of them last year, where I’ll be on site at the church and where they’re Sunday, Monday, and we’re looking at stuff and trying to help them, I’m trying to help them find some actionable insights, things that they could apply.

Rich Birch — And I was standing in the lobby at this church, large church, 10,000 plus person church, and they were trying to check their the person who I was with, who’s on staff, was trying to check their kid in to their kid’s thing and they were doing it through their app and like the app was totally broken, did not work. It was not an Apollos app – don’t worry. You know and the and they were joking and they didn’t know that I you know was thinking about these things. They were like, oh yeah, that just happens all the time. like it’s just It’s a piece of junk. And and they just kind of were resolved to like, that’s the way it’s like, that’s just the way it is. It just is like it’s broken. It’s always broken. That’s the way it is.

Rich Birch — How are you ensuring at Apollos that you’re keeping on top of, you know, the fit and finish side of this, that this feel like your app’s—and that’s like kind of a weird question, because it’s like a broad… “how do you be good” is kind of the question. But what are you doing to ensure that the app continues to perform? Because to me, that seems like a differentiator as a person looking in at what you do.

Tyler Vance — Yeah, ah well, um I would say strategically, we are we are a scalpel. And so from leading technology within the local church, I would say one of the hardest jobs I had to do was say no to good ideas.

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s good. That’s good.

Tyler Vance — Right? And we, I mean, gosh, how many leadership talks have been on that concept? But when we when it comes to technology, it seems like we lose that perspective that if if it’s an app, if it can be done digitally, it should be done digitally. And it’s like, no, we actually, not everything in your church needs to reside on that.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Tyler Vance — That is a lack of strategy. We wanna bring strategy to the why and the what.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Tyler Vance — From a really tangible standpoint, Apollos is a white label app, meaning when you buy Apollos, you get a whole team of developers behind you, supporting you. We brand it like your app. No one in your church will ever know Apollos exists. It is your church app, but you have a world-class team behind you that is making sure everything works great. We’re building new features. We’re listening to community. We’re we’re doing everything behind the scenes for you.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. That’s good. Well, this has been a fascinating conversation. When you kind of think to the future, so give us a kind of a poke up over the horizon. One of the things I’ve noticed is it seems to be the churches that are benefiting from Apollos, it’s not like a tack on, it’s not like a bolted on kind of thing. They’re trying to figure out how to um make it central to their experience.

Rich Birch — The example I’ve used in other contexts has been, I still like Starbucks. And I like the Starbucks app. It doesn’t, but I don’t get coffee from the Starbucks app. I don’t press a button and coffee comes out. The Starbucks app helps my Starbucks experience be better. It seems like the churches that are using Apollos or are leveraging it are thinking about it in the same way. It’s not just like this we, you know, we’re, we’re a church and then, oh yeah, we also have this app thing. They’re trying to find ways to integrate it.

Rich Birch — How are churches doing a good job of that? What would be and maybe another example or two of that? And then what does the future look like? How where is the kind of future up over the horizon with Apollos look like you know as you as you dream a little bit about the future? Obviously knowing things change.

Tyler Vance — Well, first off, the higher level strategy decision-maker you can get that’s thinking about all of the things, the the better you get. What what we find on a lot of churches is the technology gets buried at best three or four layers deep in decision-making, right?

Rich Birch — No, that’s good. Yeah.

Tyler Vance — So by the time you’ve planned your weekend sermon, and you’ve got your production team and your marketing team, and then someone underneath them, two or three layers is thinking about, oh, we should probably also blank with the app. And so the higher up you can you can get that decision making. The concept, and we say this as like a tagline, but seven days not just Sundays.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Tyler Vance — The senior pastors and the the executive pastors that understand I have the ability to have 10x the number of touch points. They they get it. And so that that’s one thing.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Tyler Vance — Leaning into a future, golly, Rich, it is so ripe. The harvest is plentiful, um is what I would say.

Rich Birch — So true.

Tyler Vance — And and digital um is never a replacement for in-person church experiences. And so the better we get at creating digital experiences…

Rich Birch — Yeah, so true.

Tyler Vance — …that pull people to in-person, I think the more we win.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Tyler Vance — And so if if that is not our aim from day one, I think we fail. We want to see the local church grow. I want to see my church adding services. I want to see my church you know growing exponentially, but I understand that digital is a tool to make that happen.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. Well, friends, I really strongly recommend, highly endorse your ah reaching out to Apollos and connecting. Maybe you’ve got an app that’s not working well. Maybe this is an area that you’ve been thinking about, hey, we got to take some new steps. I would strongly recommend that you need to take some steps toward them. You know, it’s interesting because You talk to pastors and we all know that the phone in the grand scheme of things has done a lot of not great things in people’s lives. Like we, you know, we see that, we see that. But a part of what I love about Apollos is again, you may not like it that I refer to it like this, but I’ve said this behind your back. I’m like, I feel like you guys are like the Robin Hood of the technology world. You’re like taking the riches of all these, like, “how do you engage people” that we know lots of other apps do that, and they’re they’re trying to mine money out of that. They’re trying to mine, you know, they’re they’re taking my attention and turning it into cash, where you’re using the same kind of learnings, but you’re trying to use that ultimately to drive a deeper community connection with my church, trying to drive a deeper prayer life, scripture reading, gratitude, man, like that’s all amazing. Like, I just think that’s incredible.

Rich Birch — So as we wrap up, kind of final thoughts you know that you’d say before we wrap up today’s conversation?

Tyler Vance — Man, Rich, thank you for the conversation. Anytime we have a chance to to reshape or just to continue the conversation around what does digital need to look like versus what it has looked like, and we’re game. And so thank you for the opportunity to come and and you’ve been gracious with that. I appreciate it.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Nice. If people want to track with you or with Apollos, where do we want to send them online? Where’s the best place to send them?

Tyler Vance — Yeah, you can go to apollos.app. You can find us on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram. You can find me @atylervance and I’m I’m out there as well and love to connect with you. Love to hear the stories of what God is doing. We also want to learn. You know, if you have something that’s working really well, ah share it because we are big “C” Church people and we want to make sure other people know it too.

Rich Birch — That’s great. Thanks so much, man. I appreciate you being here today.

Tyler Vance — Thank you, Rich.

Welcome back to the unSeminary podcast. We’re talking with Rick and Patti Love, founders of the organizations Love New Canadians and Love New Internationals. These ministries equip churches to serve new immigrants, refugees, and international students in their neighborhoods. Since 2014 Rick and Patti Love have worked with more than 700 churches and ministries in 20 countries around the world, helping churches develop pathways to Jesus for immigrants in their neighborhood.

Is your church eager to make a meaningful impact in your community, but you’re unsure where to start? Have you considered reaching out to the immigrants living right in your neighborhood? Tune in to learn how your church can be more intentional and welcoming to this often-overlooked group of people.

Visit Love New Internationals or Love New Canadians for help ministering to immigrants at your church. Plus, download the Intercultural Ministries Pathway Diagram which Rick talks about.

Is your church truly welcoming to newcomers, especially those from immigrant communities? To help you put insights from Rick and Patti’s podcast into action, we’ve created the Welcoming Checklist for Newcomers—a practical guide designed to help church leaders evaluate, plan, and implement best practices that foster a welcoming and inclusive environment.

Welcoming isn’t just a moment—it’s a mindset and a ministry. This checklist will help your church reflect the Kingdom of God and embrace the diverse people He brings into your congregation.

Click here to join unSeminary’s Extra Credit and get instant access to this resource!

There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally!

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Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you’ve decided to tune in. Really looking forward to today’s conversation. Today’s topic is one of those things, it’s literally in the news, it might be every day of the week. Like if it’s not every day of the week, it’s it’s four out of five days of the week. And today we’re talking with some incredible experts that are going to help us think about how our churches can lean in on a real issue that is facing in our communities in a way that we can lean in and ultimately point people towards ah Jesus. Excited to have Rick and Patti Love with us. ah They lead an organization called Love New Canadians.

Rich Birch — Now wait, Americans, do not turn off. Stay tuned. Because you’re going to want to learn listen ah in. It’s a ministry that equips local churches to serve new immigrants, new Canadians in their neighborhoods ah to be more intentionally welcoming with immigrants, refugees and international students. ah Rick and Patti are just incredible folks and excited to have them on the call today. Welcome. So glad you’re here.

Rick and Patti Love — Thanks for having us. Great to be here. Yeah.

Rich Birch — Now, before we get rolling, again, I said, I joked there about our American friends. So friends, if you’re listening in, you know, this, this organization, Love New Canadians, obviously is focused on helping Canadians. But I think it’s important, obviously, not just as a Canadian, but as a leader who served for a long time in the States. It’s important that we learn from other leaders in Canada. Frankly, in some ways, it’s like Canada is a few steps ahead on issues like this. And I think Love New Canadians is the kind of thing that ah that you should be listening to and learning from Rick and Patti. ah So so don’t don’t, I know I made that joke, but please don’t, don’t you need to tune in and be here for the day. So Rick, why don’t we start by kind of telling us about the organization, tell us what you do, give us a bit of the history, that sort of thing.

Rick Love — Sure. Well, my wife started at our church, this ministry, 18 years ago.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Rick Love — And she was she was just trying to connect with immigrants in the neighborhood. And she has training as an ESL teacher. So that’s where she started. And our first class, we had five volunteers and two students every week.

Rick Love — We weren’t sure if anyone was going to show up.

Rich Birch — Love it. That’s a good ratio.

Rick Love — So we just kept working on making those connections because we always want to have a conversation with immigrants in the neighborhood we never met before. And over the time the ministry is growing. It’s grown phenomenally well in our church. Last last Last fall we had an average of 480 students and volunteers coming to our ESL classes each week.

Rich Birch — Wow. Wow.

Rick Love — 10 years ago, we started Love New Canadians to help other churches develop pathways to Jesus for immigrants who were right in their neighbourhood. So we we have we focus on coaching, curriculum and seminars, webinars, ah using the resources we’ve developed ah through this ministry in the last 18 years.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. Patti, you know, I know one of the things just kind of being, you know, checking out your website, being around you a little bit, you mentioned that churches kind of have this heart or church leaders might have this heart to try to reach and connect with immigrants in their neighborhood, but they frankly just don’t know where to start. It’s like, and I think there’s a lot of people that are listening in that see that, right?

Patti Love — Right.

Rich Birch — It’s like you’re, you know, you’re at the gas station, you’re you know in the grocery store, and you’re like, man, there are lots of folks here that I would love to connect with, but we just don’t know. Can can you share what what why what’s the kind of common challenges that that churches face when they attempt to try to engage with immigrant communities for the first time?

Patti Love — Some some churches don’t see the number of immigrants in their community. They just think, oh, we’re historically, you know, a Euro-Canadian community. And then if you look up the statistics, there’ll be like 30% of the people in their community were not born in Canada. That doesn’t mean they’re all recent immigrants. So that can be one, just doing a bit of research.

Patti Love — Another one would be a lot of people are overwhelmed and they don’t know where to start. It’s just like they’re the opposite. Oh, there’s so many new Canadians. I don’t even know what to do, right?

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — And and we can help with that. And then thirdly, I think that a lot of Christians can be intimidated or a little nervous or worried about interacting with people from another culture. They don’t want to offend them. Or maybe they think they can understand their accent, you know, and there’s those kind of hindrances too. Can you think of anything else?

Rick Love — Well, I know that often what we’ve been told is just make friends with your neighbors, which is great.

Rich Birch — Right.

Rick Love — But there’s so much more we can do when we work together as teams. So when we’re in the local church, we can use our various skills to have like an ESL class or an employment class or a citizenship class. Or we do parties, banquets, sports, field trips. We just try to figure out ways that we can invite some new person in the neighborhood who we haven’t met yet.

Patti Love — And that really helps with both the people who are overwhelmed by numbers, but also the people who are nervous to do it because they’re working in a team with other friendly Christians in their church.

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — Yeah.

Rich Birch — Right. Yeah, that’s cool. Yeah. What what does this look like? Like in a, you know, there’s in a church that you work with, you feel like, okay, they’re, they’re kind of doing the thing. They’re they’re they’ve got kind of ah a great, robust model. Um, maybe Rick, why don’t you talk us through that? What does that kind of look like? What’s the, and and we may never actually see a church achieve that, you know, but it’s like, this is what, you know, this is what kind of the ideal is, or or the kind of, what you’ve seen is is super helpful in this and situation?

Rick Love — Well. Historically, churches focus on evangelism and discipleship. That’s what churches are good at. But we found most of our neighbors, they’re not at a place where they’re ready to move in that direction. So we encourage churches to experiment with a three-stage model. It’s the model that we’ve developed our local church.

Rick Love — So the stage one is about friendship. It’s like little or no spiritual content. It’s like ah it’s like the classes I mentioned. It’s it’s ways that it’s appeals to people’s self-interest. What could they benefit from?

Rich Birch — Right.

Rick Love — And it really just depends on the creativity of each church and the the skills and hobbies of of the volunteers that you connect with. And then stage three, for us, it’s like yeah ESL Bible studies, church worship service, small groups. But we found how do you go from like, you know, a ping pong club or an employment class…

Rich Birch — Right.

Rick Love — …and end up at an ESL Bible study or Alpha?

Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah.

Rick Love — Well, it’s not an easy connection. So in the mercy of God, we started what we call stage two. It’s a class for the spiritually curious.

Rich Birch — Okay. Yeah.

Rick Love — It’s really a pre-evangelistic class where we study something about culture each week. And then we read a gospel text. And then we do a vocabulary lesson based on words ah from the the text we just read. It looks and feels like an ESL class because it is. And then we do discussion questions.

Rick Love — And what’s different about this class is, you know, you most Bible studies, the goal is to understand the Bible, which obviously that’s a great goal. But in this class, we use the life and teaching of Jesus to understand our new immigrant friends. So we ask questions like, you know, questions about, you know, if Jesus is by a lake, we ask them questions about a lake in their birth country.

Rick Love — Jesus is feeding ah the 5,000. We ask questions of what would you like to eat with bread? What do you like to eat with fish? It’s like, it’s just very gentle, easy questions, but we’ll do one gentle spiritual question each week. Like when you’re talking about forgiveness, Jesus says, forgive your brother 77 times. We’ll say something like, tell us about a time when you forgave someone or someone forgave you.

Rick Love — And the goal is just to have honest conversations. And what happens is, I’ve asked those kind of spiritual questions before and it’s like, you know, the tumbleweeds are going across the mesa. Nobody says anything.

Rich Birch — Right.

Rick Love Patti Love — But they keep coming week after week, month after month. And and our students will say things like, you know, I’m not a Christian, but…, or if I was a Christian….

Rich Birch — Right.

Rick Love — Or they’d say something about God or prayer, and we just know that the Holy Spirit of God is speaking to them, and we trust that that that ah spiritual interest will develop.

Rick Love — Most of the people who come to the Stage 2 class come from countries where they couldn’t even ask questions about the Bible or Christianity or Jesus or the Church.

Rick Love — So they come, and then and then some of those move on ah to the stage three. We found that ah when things are working well, for every 10 who come to stage one, about four will move on to stage two, and about half of those, or two will move on to stage three. So 10, 4, and [inaudible].

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s good. That’s yeah, that’s interesting, kind of like it. So ah so Patti, fill that out from like a stage one. That’s a really good helpful rubric there, even if you can picture, OK, so we we need to be doing kind of social-oriented, kind of fun stuff, get people connected. And and frankly I can see that. As a person I moved from Canada to the States obviously not the kind of immigration we’re talking about here you know if I’m moving from you know somewhere on the other side of the world obviously there’s a lot of difference a lot of similarities in the cultures. But frankly as an immigrant when I moved in that in environment there was stuff where like just having people locally that I could talk to and ask questions was a huge value.

Patti Love — Right, right. Yes.

Rich Birch — Like that was a massive thing. And I, and I didn’t have a language barrier and didn’t, felt like I know lots, but I still, talk us through what does some of that stage one stuff look like? How would, you know, what, what is that when it’s done well, how does that look?

Patti Love — Yes. So we call it settlement programming because we’re helping our immigrant friends settle into the neighborhood…

Rich Birch — Yep.

Patti Love — …or into the country.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Patti Love — And we have a lot of things like ah like English language classes. And over the years we’ve developed you know beginner, intermediate, advanced, technical classes like pronunciation, grammar. But lots of conversation classes. And our students love that. Some of them are actually enrolled in language schools, but they said, we don’t ah get a chance to actually practice our English skills…

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — …with a friendly Canadian, right?

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — We do…

Rich Birch — Well, and there’s something about a volunteer, right? There’s something about volunteers who are saying, Hey, I want to do this. I want to help.

Rick Love Patti Love — Yes. Yeah.

Rich Birch — That’s like, it has a different texture to it.

Patti Love — Yeah.

Rich Birch — And like the conversation has a different texture to it. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting.

Patti Love — Yes. And what we try to do is um have all of our classes or most of our classes formatted in small groups. So it might be opened up, led for 10 minutes by a lead teacher, and then everybody breaks into small groups. Every group has a volunteer. They have the material right in front of them. We we write material that’s really volunteer-friendly. ah You don’t have to be a grammar teacher or anything to volunteer.

Patti Love — And when we got really serious about changing our formatting from a large group to small groups, that year our attendance doubled…

Rich Birch — Wow.

Patti Love — …because students were making friends with volunteers, right?

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — We also do interesting ESL classes in module form, like ESL for baking, ESL for gardening, ESL for weddings or music or art.

Rich Birch — Oh, interesting.

Rick Love Patti Love — Whatever our volunteers have a hobby for, we go, hey, let’s develop that into a five-week course instead of a whole semester.

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — And a lot of those have turned into semester classes like ah studying for the citizenship test, employment classes. We do a public speaking class for people who are learning English. and we’d call it project confidence. And from the beginning to the end, you can see confidence is growing and they’re using more of their English skills.

Rick Love— Yeah, so the students project confidence. It’s basically Toastmasters for ESL.

Patti Love — Yeah, yeah.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Wow, that’s cool. Yeah. It’s it’s interesting you say that because I in my own personal experience, I was I was talking to an immigrant. now this was in the last couple of years and they were reflecting on their own English and they were they didn’t feel confident in their English. They were like, oh, um I’m so sorry. And I was like, Your English is amazing. Like it’s incredible.

Rich Birch — Like, I don’t, I don’t know what to say. Like, uh, it’s in, you know, you should feel confident. You, you know, ah and they were like, Oh, I don’t know. I don’t know. And so I can see how even having, you know, some regular feedback and people helping to build that confidence would be, would be amazing.

Patti Love — Yes, yes, yes.

Rich Birch — Yeah. yeah

Rick Love — And little short-sightedly, we assumed that our volunteers would all be Euro-Canadians. But we found some of our best volunteers are immigrants themselves.

Rich Birch — Sure. Yes.

Rick Love — They empathize with the the people, what they’re going through. And and the thing the fact of the matter is, wherever you are, you’re going to be teaching speaking with people with accents.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Rick Love — So it’s good to have some of our volunteers with accents. Our students develop that skill as well.

Patti Love — Yeah, that’s that’s our country, right?

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Patti Love — That’s normal.

Rich Birch — Yes. Yes.

Patti Love — That’s our country.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Yeah. Interesting.

Patti Love — We supplement a lot of the classes with things like, um, Rick was mentioning parties and field trips and lessons and banquets. And we have a lot of fun teaching culture through some of those monthly social events, like curling.

Rick Love — Thanksgiving, Christmas. Yeah.

Patti Love — Yeah. And Easter egg hunt and curling lesson. And the area we’re from is fairly cowboy. We do a line dancing lessons, that kind of thing.

Rick Love — Yeah.

Patti Love — And that is an opportunity for our friends to bring their family more into the realm of friendship with friendly Canadians.

Rich Birch — How does the church, if if they were saying, okay, I, this sounds interesting. I, you know, I can see this as the kind of thing would be interested in, um, you know, maybe Rick, how how would they get the ball rolling? What would, what would you suggest are some of those initial steps that move beyond… Maybe maybe you’ve got a leader who has, who has immigrant friends who has like some heart for this, but they’re like, I’m not sure how to go from that to like what you’re talking about. Cause this sounds like a lot, you know, what’s that look like?

Rick Love — Sure.

Patti Love — It just grew grew slowly over the years. We’ve been doing this for 18 years, yeah.

Rich Birch — Right. Yeah. Right.

Rick Love — So obviously, churches can just dive in and try and do things to connect with the neighborhood. We’d love to have a conversation with any church leaders who would like to talk. Usually, we we have an introductory session where we talk about who are the immigrants in your neighborhood? What are the ways that your church is connecting? What are the who are the immigrants that are attending your local church? What what’s something that you might do to begin? We do a lot of coaching because we have pretty much made every mistake there is to make, so we can help churches avoid other mistakes.

Patti Love — Yeah, that’s true. Yeah.

Rick Love — And we work for churches as small as 25, as large as 5,000 plus, everything in between.

Rich Birch — Wow. Yep.

Rick Love — And we found that three-stage model works in any size of congregation. Obviously, the smaller churches will start with one class. But some of the larger churches are able to start with two or three classes and start with a good volunteer team right right from the beginning.

Rich Birch — What would be some of those, like, maybe non-obvious mistakes that we can make, ways we can stub our toe? Maybe even before we get into this, you know, Patti, that makes our church kind of less friendly to to the immigrant community around us? Are there common things you see churches do that you’re like, ah, I can’t believe they did that. You know, it’s and a lot of times it comes out of a good heart.

Patti Love — Yes. Yes.

Rich Birch — It’s not like we’re but it just is like we do dumb stuff sometimes.

Rick Love Patti Love — Right.

Rich Birch — I know that’s the case with me. What would that be, Patti? What would be some of those things?

Patti Love — Well, we were making some stupid mistakes, ah just assuming certain things and ah not being intentional about welcoming people. In a couple of years into our ministry, the volunteers and I got together to work out our values in our intercultural ministry. The programming and the people, we decided, we want them to be welcoming. So that’s like not making it hard to register, not limiting a class size.

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — Oh, sorry, we already have our 20 students – try next semester. It’s like, why would you turn away, you know, an immigrant from the neighborhood? Those kinds of things. So being welcoming.

Patti Love — Secondly, being respectful and that’s not making people feel uncomfortable if they’re dressed differently. Or if um if they have a strong accent.

Patti Love — You know, we we have volunteers who love working with people who are very beginning English speakers. We started writing material for both beginner and intermediate. And that was a huge step in being respectful and welcoming of Canadians who are more at the beginner level. We hate saying no to anybody.

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love —It’s like we have a place for you that you can, you know, feel welcome and make friends and settle into Canada.

Patti Love — Our third value is being interactive. And an example of that is the the small group formatting that we changed to fairly quickly in our experience at the church where students get way more opportunity to talk in a small group.

Patti Love — At first our class, we made the mistake of making our classes with a teacher at the front and all the chairs in the room are full. And the teachers doing 80% of the talking, and right?

Rick Love — Which has [inaudible] validity because that’s what most of our immigrant friends experienced when they were learning English in their birth country…

Rich Birch — Right, right.

Rick Love — …but it’s just not the most effective way to learn it…

Rich Birch — Right, right.

Patti Love — …and certainly not a great way to make friends. You know, there’s one person at the front.

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — And when our volunteers can work in teams like that, like their class has regularly 30 students and they have six or seven volunteers, there’s one volunteer and four or five students. And we say, as a volunteer, if there’s five of you around your table, you should not speak more than 20% of the time.

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — Like this is respectful of the students.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Patti Love — Let them talk, make it interactive, you know, our values, yeah.

Rich Birch — Yes. let the Let the silence hang in the air for a little bit and give space for people to talk and you know all that.

Patti Love — Yes, yes.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. That’s good. You know, I one of the things I know in my own life, like I have ah you know I’ve lots of times where I feel like I’ve stubbed my toe on this this particular issue, but I remember a couple of years ago, this was um yeah a couple of years ago. I was I was doing some work with a summer camp, a kid’s summer camp, and had a friend who was a professor at a local college who ran this like big ah big data class. And he reached out and he said, well, you probably have like lots of registration data over all these years. Would you mind having a group of students run a project on your actual data?

Rich Birch — And, and I was like, well, that sounds interesting. That would be great. And, and so we met and it was all over Zoom. We were meeting over Zoom and, and we met probably every other week for a number of weeks. And, um, actually it wasn’t over Zoom. It was just, it was a, um, uh, like a, what do you call those? Like a, you know, like a conference call kind of thing.

Patti Love — Sure, sure.

Rich Birch — And we were a couple weeks in, and I I was like, I don’t I’m I’m having a hard time. The folks in this class, and they don’t think they understand what a summer camp is. Like they they and so then as I talked with, I I was debriefing with the prof, he was like, oh yeah, like in your work group, there’s six people in your work group, five of the six are from India, probably have no sense of what you’re even talking about.

And I was like, okay, well let’s take a back, let’s take a back up and you come, how about we have people come to camp for a day, come and see what we’re doing.

Patti Love — Yes.

Rich Birch — And it was like, it all made sense then, right?

Rick Love — Yeah.

Rich Birch — And it was like, okay, we got to slow down. And actually I thought this when you said the respect thing, we did a bunch of activities around camp. And um one guy had a great turban on and we were going on the high ropes course and which requires a helmet. And I knew enough that uh you know we’re just gonna let him go without, you know he’s gonna have his turban on that’s fine. And we’re not gonna make it put on a helmet. And it was interesting because that did create this like this internal tension with the people running the program. And I was like, I just, I had to have this quick sidebar conversation. And I was like, we’re just moving on, friends. Like it’s going to be fine. You know, we’re creating space for this guy. We’re glad he’s here. Um, you know, we don’t want to go out of our way to, you know, create any offense here. So it’s interesting stuff.

Patti Love — Yeah.

Rich Birch — But, you know, Rick, as you’re thinking, unfortunately, um this might be like the elephant in the room for some people who are listening to this. Unfortunately, this area has become like really politicized. And that to me seems like a change in the last X number of years, that this is like become a thing that both and on both sides of the border went from like, hey, like this is a positive thing to like, now there are segments of our culture that just are not interested in the immigration stuff at all.

Rich Birch — Not talking about the fast but think about the past, but thinking about the future. How do you see the needs of immigrants and refugees and international students evolving in the coming years? You’ve obviously got your pulse, hand on the pulse of this. And how can we prepare for that as we kind of think to the future?

Rick Love — Sure, so thanks for not asking me to speak on on the politics of it all.

Rich Birch — No, no, not asking to do that.

Rick Love — Each local community has to figure that out. But in terms of the future needs, it’s like it seems to be recurring needs, which is when people come to our country, they need to learn English and they need to get a job. And many are quite desperate to do that. In our country, um most immigrants do not qualify for federal or provincial education ESL classes.

Rich Birch — I didn’t know that.

Rick Love — And the ones who do, most of them are on a waiting list.

Rich Birch — Really?

Rick Love — So what are they supposed to do? Our vision is for our country to become the most the best place for immigrants to come because no matter where they go to, across the country, there’ll be a local church that’s trying to figure out how to help them, welcome them to our neighborhood, and for those with spiritual interests, spiritual curiosity, move along a pathway to Jesus.

Rick Love — It’s regular, we regularly find that when people come, they start learning English. If they get a job, it’s very likely they’ll stop coming to the ESL class. That’s okay.

Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah.

Patti Love — Hey, that’s real life. Yeah.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s normal.

Rick Love — But we we keep offering the ministry. And what happens is you keep building credibility. And over the years, something’s going to happen in their life and they’re going to come back because they know this is a friendly place.

Rich Birch — Right. That makes sense.

Rick Love — This is a place where people smile. This is a place where people will listen.

Rich Birch — Right.

Rick Love — And that that’s what we do is we we keep becoming that place where are our new immigrant friends can and that find safety. And then As things develop, it’s like we trust the Spirit of God to draw them to Himself. And thanks be to God, that happens often. We know, like I gave that number 10-4-2…

Rich Birch — Yes.

Rick Love — …that means out of every 10 immigrants we connect with, 6 will not move any further along the spiritual pathway, at least at least at this time.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Rick Love — We don’t know the future, right? And we do find that so many who do move along a pathway to Jesus, they’ve had some kind of connection with God or church or Christian sometime in the past.

Rick Love Patti Love — You know, some it’s like a grandma. My grandma was praying me. I’m an atheist, but my grandma was always praying for me. And then they start meeting.

Patti Love — Years later, they come to faith. Yeah.

Rich Birch — Which is, that’s normal in, like, in everyone’s life, right?

Rick Love — Yes, absolutely.

Rich Birch — Like, that’s the story, right? That we’re, you know, they we’re immigrant or not, people have their, have all different experiences. And, you know, Jesus, I think, you know, this is like a New Testament kind of some people water, some people, you know…

Patti Love — Yes.

Rich Birch — …cultivate and harvest. And yeah, that, that makes sense.

Rich Birch — So, but I, actually, I think that’s helpful, that kind of 10-4-2 thing. It’s helpful for us to think about that, that, hey, this is a part of us serving in our community. There’s this idea, which I think is a noble one that churches should be interested in, which is like we should be considering, we should be um wanting the best for the communities we’re in. We want to serve the communities we’re in. We should be known as a life-giving place. And hey, there’s good things going on there. This is a potential way to do that. Anything, Patti, you’d say about that as we think about kind of the needs in the future?

Patti Love — Yes, it all sounds so positive, but you know our church, which is probably like other churches, has had people attending that kind of resent that the resources maybe that we’re putting towards helping new Canadians, or they’ll say, oh, they’re just using the church to learn English or that kind of thing.

Patti Love — And and our response is, but how many people come to church because they want to find a husband or a wife?

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — Or maybe they want their kids to make friends in Sunday school, right?

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — There’s lots of different reasons why people come to churc.h And the human…

Rich Birch — Yeah. Or, or how, how many people were sitting on the side of that hill that day and when the five loaves and two fishes were, were broken out that were there for the meal.

Patti Love — Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Rich Birch You see that in scripture, right? It’s like, do another, yeah, do another trick, right? They’re like, you’re just here cause you want to see me do some sort of, you know, magic thing. That’s, that’s like, as Jesus, I guess it comes. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting.

Patti Love — Yeah, and we try to be welcoming to everybody. Yeah.

Rick Love — And like we we’ve become convinced, so we focus on ministry with immigrants, but we think this model, the three-stage model…

Rich Birch — Right.

Rick Love — …could be used in any facet of the church, where we have a stage one where our churches are thinking, what can we do so we can keep having new conversations with people in our neighborhood we never met?

Rich Birch — Right.

Rick Love — And then from that, figure out what can we do for those with some sort of spiritual curiosity? And then, or stage three, that’s what churches are good at. They know how to do evangelism and discipleship.

Patti Love — And then our people…

Rich Birch — Well, and the reason the reason why this caught my attention is, ah well, lots I think there’s lots of great about this, and my brother told me so we should talk. But outside of that, when I looked a little closer, I 100% agree with you on that. Most, one of the things in the work I do on you know church growth and helping churches reach more people is, most churches have a front door problem. They have a, if they’re not growing the the issue, we often look at the back door. We’re like, Oh, somebody dropped out of groups. They’re drop off teams. But actually the more systemic problem is there’s not enough people coming in on the front end. There’s no, we’re like not making any impact. And so yeah, I totally agree with you on that for sure.

Rich Birch — Did what did I cut you off there, Patti? I felt like I did.

Patti Love — We often schedule our events and our classes when there’s a lot of other things going on in our building, so that the new Canadians see, oh, lots of people come into church.

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — Or, oh, what are they singing about over there?

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — Or how come there’s a whole bunch of teenagers, you know, being wild, whatever.

Rick Love — It’s amazing how many people who they’ll hear the singing in the church and they’ll attend a worship service just because they’re curious about the music.

Rich Birch — Right. Right. Yeah. Which is wonderful. Yeah. That’s great. Yeah. That’s interesting. Go ahead.

Patti Love — We have like um yeah ESL, baptism classes to prepare people, ESL communion classes, that kind of thing. And then our our volunteers and leaders involved in small groups are very aware of welcoming people into those small groups. We took a survey a while back among our small group leaders and 100% responded, yes, we would love to have somebody ah who was born outside of Canada join our small group. And that really encouraged us.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. That starts to see cultural shift and change you know in the in the church as a whole for sure, you know. And and there you know I’ve said this in other contexts that you know every for our American friends, every zip code in the country is more ethnically diverse today than it was 10 years ago and will be more ethnically diverse 10 years from now. That’s just true. That’s a sociological truth. And a part of that is what we’re talking about here today, you know, immigration and we can’t just ignore this issue. This can’t be the kind of thing that we’re like, well, we’re just going to look the other way. That that is ah churches that have done that. It just has not ended up well.

Rich Birch — We’re going to link to ah this pathway diagram that summarizes your ministry model. Rick, why don’t you kind of talk us through this? I think this will be helpful for people to kind of picture it, but why don’t you tell us a little bit about that?

Rick Love — Sure, well you can, so people who have access to this…

Rich Birch — Yeah, we’ll link to it for sure. Yeah.

Rick Love — Very good. So it it really just shows that three-stage model. We call it an intercultural ministries pathway diagram. We really took this model from Isaiah 61 which talks about um make a pathway ah for the nations…

Rich Birch — Oh that’s good.

Rick Love — …so they can [inaudible] to the land, right? And what we think of is we just want to get rid of obstacles, get rid of barriers. And for us, get rid of barriers to Jesus. And the first thing we do is just making, focusing on friendship.

Rick Love — So we just find every way we can think of to have a conversation so we can start making friends. And yeah as you can see on that pathway model, there’s, you’re only limited by your imagination in terms of ways.

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — And some people say, oh, why are you offering that? You know, there’s some place downtown that has a class for that. And we go, that’s great. But, you know, many of our neighborhood friends can’t get down there.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Patti Love — So someone in our church is qualified to teach that. And then at the end of our course, we’ll say, hey, take it again. If you can, get downtown. Take it again. It’s good for language learning and networking in the city, that kind of thing.

Rick Love — Many will have local libraries that will have classes. So we don’t think of it as either/or. We always think of it as both/and.

Rich Birch — Right.

Patti Love — We’re not trying to reinvent the wheel. We’re just trying to make access to friendly Christians available in every neighborhood of our city.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s cool.

Rick Love — And then so stage two is that general introduction to the gospel. We tried to make the most gentle introduction to the gospel we could. We had friends who were working with a people group in the Philippines. We were in the Philippines for 11 years. And we’re trying to think, what can we do ah for those who Christianity isn’t very far away from them. Their worldview, they don’t think like a Christian. So that’s the goal of this class is for people to learn a little bit about Jesus, laugh, make friends, learn some English, and come back next week.

Rick Love — That’s our only goal, at this stage. And then the stage three is like, like I mentioned, is a bio studies, Alpha, worship, where everything the church does, small groups. Because that’s our goal, of course, is for new friends to become part of the church so that they’re making their decisions, for them and their family, based on the teachings of our Lord Jesus.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. Well, this has been a fantastic conversation. I I hope folks that are listening in will want to track with you. Why don’t we talk a little bit about where, um, you know, we’ve been talking a lot about Canada, but I know you’ve actually worked with a, with a number of American churches as well.

Rick Love — Sure.

Rich Birch — How, where do we want to send people to connect, you know, to kind of get the ball rolling if they’re interested in learning more of that sort of thing?

Rick Love — Yeah, so we focused on Canada. That’s who are we from. We’re Canadians.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Rick Love — So we’ve worked with about 20 churches in the US in about 10 different states. And ah what we did is we started, ah so we have a Love New Canadians website, but we also have a Love New Internationals website, which is more ah American friendly. I lived in the US for six years while we were students in the Chicago area.

Rick Love — So we yeah, so people can connect through lovenewcanadians.ca or lovenewinternationals.com. Connect with us and let’s just have a conversation.

Rich Birch — So good.

That for us, that’s the first step is let’s learn about each other and see if there’s something we can do together.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s good. I love, you’ve provided a lot of resources here and I think it’s pretty, it’s well laid out, easy to understand, kind of good first step. I would encourage people. We’ll put links to all of that in the show notes, but, um, really appreciate you being here today.

Rich Birch — You know, final words, since Patti, it started with you, volunteering at the church, what would you say to a church leader that’s maybe on the fence a little bit, thinking like, oh, I wonder if I wonder if we should start thinking about this in a more concrete way here.

Patti Love — Yeah, I would keep it simple. I would say you want to reach the people in your neighborhood and, take a look at, how many people in your neighborhood were not born in your country. And then I’d say if you’re friendly, if you’ve got a nice smile, if you can listen to people instead of doing all the talking, you’re set. You’re set to start this ministry for sure.

Rich Birch — Yeah. It’s great.

Patti Love — It pleases God, pleases God when we treat the immigrant like we treat a citizen. Yeah.

Rich Birch — That’s so good.

Patti Love — You’re on.

Rich Birch — Well that was wonderful. Appreciate you guys being here today. Thank you so much. Thanks for being on today’s podcast.

Patti Love — Thanks for having us.

Rick Love — Thanks, Rich.

Welcome to the unSeminary podcast. Today we’re talking with Chad Bickley, the executive pastor at Skyline Church in California.

Is your church experiencing growth, but you’re struggling with how to maintain a healthy team culture? Wondering how to create a culture that drives growth while ensuring your staff remains aligned and healthy? In this episode of the unSeminary podcast Chad shares valuable insights on building a staff culture that defines how to achieve the church’s vision while maintaining health.

To learn more about Skyline Church and connect with Chad, visit www.skylinechurch.org. Plus, to see how Skyline uses its six core behaviors, download their core identity book here.

Do you want to inspire your leadership team to dream big and align around a unified church vision? The 10-10-10 Vision Planning Retreat Overview is your step-by-step guide for hosting a two-day retreat that will energize your staff and refine your ministry strategy. With actionable discussions, engaging team exercises, and prayerful worship moments, this resource will help you map out a bold 10-year plan broken into achievable steps over the next 10 quarters and 10 months.

Ready to take your learning to the next level? Access this resource now in unSeminary Extra Credit and bring clarity and focus to your church’s mission. Get it here.

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Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Risepointe

Do you feel like your church’s facility could be preventing growth, and are you frustrated or maybe even overwhelmed at the thought of a complicated or costly building project? Are the limitations of your church building becoming obstacles in the path of expanding your ministry? Have you ever felt that your church could reach more people if only the facility was better suited to the community’s needs?

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Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. Super excited that you’ve decided to tune in. You know, today I’m really looking forward to today’s conversation because I know this is going to be one of those things that all of us can relate to and it can be really super applicable to our churches. Excited to have Chad Bickley with us. He is the executive pastor at Skyline Church in ah in California. It was founded in 1954 and has a rich history of growth and overcoming obstacles become one of the fastest growing churches in the country.

Rich Birch — Currently, if I’m counting correctly, Skyline has two locations in ah California, one in Arizona, and one in Tennessee, which is a fantastic story, as well as services online. Chad, welcome to the show. So glad you’re here today.

Chad Bickley — Thanks for having me.

Rich Birch — Why don’t you fill in the picture there? Kind of tell us a little bit about Skyline. You know, if we were to come this weekend, what we would experience, and and tell us a little bit about your role.

Chad Bickley — Yeah, I think Skyline, like you said, has a very rich history. We’re 70 years this year and only four pastors.

Rich Birch — That’s amazing.

Chad Bickley — And so, um you know, it started with Orville Butcher who launched the church and it and then John Maxwell was after him, who is who has taught us all a lot of leadership skills. And then it went to Jim Garlow and in that transition from um Maxwell to Garlow is when the campus moved to its current place. And that’s a that’s a huge story of of a miracle on the hill, to be honest. But those guys really battled through to to build this place. And then Jeremy um came on about six years ago. And actually, yeah, six years ago and has been the fourth pastor there.

Chad Bickley — And really, you can you can see God’s hand in each each four guys. And and Jeremy has ah as a major heart for the lost and and and so if you’d come on our campus it would it would be very um ah outreach focus…

Rich Birch — Love it.

Chad Bickley — …very he he he tailors his message that reaches a first time person but also people who’ve been there a long time. So he has a he has a great gift of of, you know, whoever you are in that message, you know, you walk away with, you know, being challenged and motivated to be able to, to move forward. We have a, our strategy is called OIKOS. And, uh, that, that strategy is it’s, it’s in the Bible and touch talks about it’s a relational network of 8 to 15 people.

Chad Bickley — So everybody, has a relational network of 8 to 15 people. And we provide cards that write those people down on your on the cards. We want you to pray for them. And that will give you an opportunity you know when it presents yourself that you know we always say an invite can change a life to invite them to church. And that’s our responsibility as Christians, right? And so we really drive that that strategy into our people um to you know to go out to their OIKOS. And it and it’s really taken off and it’s really been um you know put put, you know us as pastors, you know, we’re responsible as well. But it’s it’s it’s also everybody that’s in the church to be able to equip them with the things we reach their community as well. So.

Rich Birch — Nice.

Chad Bickley — Yeah.

Rich Birch — Love it. That’s so cool. I, that’s really got my attention. I’d love to drill into that. And we might get to some of that today ah because I think there’s a ton there around even just how do we make it make it visible in our people’s lives around who should we be inviting and who you know who are the people that we should that – I love that. That’s such a great, so great practical strategy there.

Rich Birch — You know, pulling back the curtain a little bit. We, you know, are often pursue people to come on the podcast because they end up on Outreach 100 fastest growing church list. And I loved when I saw Skyline bump up on this list this year, I think for the first time. And I was like, I’m pretty sure that was the church Maxwell was at. And then dug into your history a little bit. And I love this because oftentimes we see churches on that list that are like 10 years old or 12 years old. They’re like the the ripe old age of 15 years. But you know here’s a church founded in the 50s that is obviously experiencing um you know some great great things going on, which is is great to see.

Rich Birch — And I can imagine leading in that environment has been challenging that as an executive pastor, we we see the like, oh, it’s all positive and upside. But what have been some of the challenges that you’ve had to face as an executive pastor on the like, looking under the hood a little bit, stuff that you’ve had to kind of tackle in the midst of all that.

Chad Bickley — Yeah, I mean, I would say the biggest thing is just growing pains and what comes with that. You know, you’re your staff, I feel like, you know, we’re very culture-focused. We’re very, you know, we we have a a vision right now of 10/10/10, which is 10,000 people in 10 years in 10 campuses or plants.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Chad Bickley — And, um you know, as a part of that, our our church has bought in and and movin’ and and ah but but it also requires more more people. And to balance that in San Diego where the cost of living is super high…

Rich Birch — It’s so true.

Chad Bickley — …and to get the right people because that’s everything to us. And and really give them the clarity to move forward because ultimately we don’t want to get to 10,000 people and we have an unhealthy staff.

Rich Birch — No, that’s good.

Chad Bickley — And we really don’t you know we put out numbers for numbers sake because we we say every every name has a story, every uh every story matters to God. And well for us It is it is it is less about the numbers but it is definitely a target for us to go after. And then we get the process of how we got there, right? So so it’s really important for us that, that, you know, we have given God the results, like whatever you want, you take it. But are we doing our part that we’re a team and we’re driving in the right direction? And, you know, in 1 Corinthians chapter 12 is just a great illustration of roles and responsibilities and how that the body makes up the team. And and so we really, we really are intentional about health in our teams. And and so really, that is the focus. And and because we believe healthy things grow. So.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Well, let’s dig into that. Cause I think there’s, there’s lots of folks that would be leading their executive pastor of a, you know, maybe not a church as large as yours, 1,000, 1,500 people. And they would say, yeah, I want a healthy staff team as well, but I feel like we’re struggling on that front. What have you been able to do to try to keep your staff aligned, keep them healthy, keep them focused on, you know, where you’re going as a church?

Chad Bickley — Yeah, you know, just a quick, my background, Pastor Jeremy and I, um we actually we played college basketball together. He he he went his story is incredible when it come when he became a Christian. He was in professional baseball, didn’t know the Lord. And and then he came to Christian Heritage College where we met. And we played we played college basketball. Again, I went I went the route of administration and coaching. And he went into ministry. But we’re we’re very close.

Chad Bickley — Actually, my wife and I helped him start a church. And and which which has led to where we are now, which is kind of ironic. But I I my passion you know is more in teams, coaching. And so you know about 20 years ago, just really had a you know, when I was, ah I’ve been coaching for just a really long time. And, and, and so when, when I got, I don’t coach anymore. I gave it up two years ago, but in the midst of all of that, I’ve, I, I had this desire of just like, you know, what, what are the best doing?

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s good.

Chad Bickley — You know know they all had a a philosophy. And that philosophy comes out of, you know, you and and who you are. And and so we we implement that in a little little basketball team at a Christian school. And and really Patrick Lencioni has been a big influencer in my life as well.

Rich Birch — So true.

Chad Bickley — And he has six questions that you need to ask, answer. Why do we exist? How do we behave? What do we do? How will we succeed? What’s important now? And who does what?

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Chad Bickley — And the leaders are actually at the bottom pushing everybody back to the top. And and so when so when, I never wanted to come to Skyline, to be honest. [Inaudible] very close, I was very happy where I was.

Rich Birch — You’re like, no, it’s good. I’m good. Love it.

Chad Bickley — My family was, was my my wife teaches at the school, my kids went to the school. And so when when when this went through, it was definitely a a journey of, a I always tell people it was a 45 day journey that was nuts to me. But it was super, super, super clear in the direction that that God was calling me to do.

Chad Bickley — And I actually remember the day that I was going there and I was I was actually sad. Because I was just like, you know, what is this? But I know at the time, Skyline was going, you know, needed, you know, Jeremy was a perfect timing for this. He came in, um started to create, you know, culture. And when I came in, just help with this. You know, I think a lot of people, a lot of churches have vision. A lot of, you know, we created a vision statement, but we have a purpose statement. But I think the thing that’s missing is just how do we behave to reach that?

Rich Birch — Right, right.

Chad Bickley — I would say the number one thing that most organizations, you know, places, churches miss is they don’t define how we behave…

Rich Birch — Right.

Chad Bickley — …to reach the vision.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Chad Bickley — And then get the people, because every interview we look through and when we look for these six things in in the people that we hire and then we drill it. And it’s been amazing to watch how this has started to go deep into the roots of our teams. It’s starting to go into our volunteers and they’re starting to speak the language because culture is a language that you speak.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Chad Bickley — And all these phrases that we have, you know, are are embedded in the different situations that take place. And so, you know, we have a ah core identity book with six core behaviors that that we really drill into. We do our annual reviews on them. We do our six months reviews on them. We we do cultural spotlights on them. We just have every month we do something um like we drill it into our team to be like, I mean, this is how we behave. You have a conflict, that’s level four accountability.

Rich Birch — Right.

Chad Bickley — We don’t want drama, because drama slows us down. So you gotta attack that. You’re either water or gas in a situation. And so we really use these phrases to really end drama. And that’s where my trigger goes off, is when I see a little bit of drama, it’s like, okay, how are we handling this? Because that’s gonna slow us down, and the mission’s bigger than all of us, right?

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Chad Bickley — And so, the best part about being this job…

Rich Birch — Yes.

Chad Bickley — …is I can hire for my weaknesses. And so I had an awesome team that that really is is experts in their areas, and yet they’re not they’re they’re not siloing people. They’re bringing us together because we’re one team. And I think the biggest caution I would have in churches is you’re siloed. If your teams are siloed, and then then they’re not coming together. If we’re not celebrating, you know, youth had ah five baptisms and the worship department isn’t celebrating, like how can we help you even, you know, on on those days. And they’re helping them succeed and they’re, and all this. That’s health to me and that’s been very, very important. And really, that’s what we control. We control our attitudes and our effort.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Chad Bickley — So we control those things. And so that’s what we’re gonna control. We can’t control the numbers…

Rich Birch — Yes.

Chad Bickley — …but we can control the clarity…

Rich Birch — Yeah, what we do.

Chad Bickley — …in which we believe God’s vision that’s given to Pastor Jeremy can get going. I’d be kind of passionate about this stuff because I know it works and…

Rich Birch — Well, yeah, its well, there’s a bunch I want to dig into here. So the one of the insights I want to underline that you said you said is, yeah which I think is so true, why we exist. You know, at the end of the day, all churches exist for some combo of either the Great Commission or acts one go into all the world. Like we’re we’re, you know, we’re a combo of those things. Most churches, or we probably should be. That’s what Jesus told us to do. But how we do it, how we behave – I love that distinction of like, hey, we got to be super clear with our people. And we’ll provide a link to this, but you’ve given us this ah this playbook that really outlines these six um behaviors.

Rich Birch — And, you know, level one to level six: attitude, commitment, work ethic, accountability, trust, love. When you think about those six, maybe let’s dive in on one of them to start that is maybe where you see your team getting tripped up, where it’s like, hey, we’re having a lot of level three conversations or a lot of level four conversations. Or, you know, where is it that we’re, you know, we we kind of, you’re getting the kind of most, either resistance, or you’re getting the most traction on kind of but pushing towards the kind of culture you want to you want to create.

Chad Bickley — You know, when we first came in and you you you start to do a different culture per se than what was in the past, you have to clearly identify it. And I would say if if we received any resistance to that, it was probably in the beginning. But the great thing is with the clarity, some people are like, yeah, that that’s just not me. And it ended healthy.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Chad Bickley — Right? And so, but it also, what it also did, it took people that were in it that gave them clarity that they, they shined and they, they grew. But I would say the number one thing we focus on is level one attitude.

Rich Birch — Okay.

Chad Bickley — And there’s standards that we talk about is humility, gratitude, and being a teammate. And so those three things, and we just say it starts every day with that one. It’s not like you get to level three and um you go, you’re you’re there. No, it’s every day you start with level one. And if you’re struggling with your work ethic, go back to level one.

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s good.

Chad Bickley — Because you are thanking the good Lord for the things that he has brought your way and then all of a sudden it helps your commitment, it helps your work ethic, it helps your accountability and so forth.

Chad Bickley — So really that that foundational piece is so huge and really what these core behaviors are, are a mindset. And that mindset, the more you get people pulling in the same direction with the same mindset, the more you’re going to see God can take you know you to a whole new level.

Chad Bickley — I mean, we use the example of the Clydesdale horses we’re using it in staff meeting yesterday. It’s like one horse can pull 8,000 pounds, two horses, you know, that are working together can do three times their weight, can do 24,000 pounds. But two horses trained working together with the same mindset, they can do 32,000 pounds.

Rich Birch — Wow, wow.

Chad Bickley — And so, when you have that same mindset and we just talk about our mindsets, level six mindset. It’s those six things. And if we’re all doing that together, you’re going to see things like the fourth fastest growing church. And if that’s what God has in mind, right? And now we can’t walk around just being like, Oh no, we’re the fourth fastest. No, it’s like, man, thank, thank you guys. It’s all in our approach to him and our gratitude to him because it’s, he’s the one, you know?

Rich Birch — Love it.

Chad Bickley — And we can’t, it doesn’t make sense. You know, God can do immeasurably more what you ask or think. And that’s what he’s done. And now we’re like, okay, God, what do you have next that’s beyond our imagination. And so really that foundational level one attitude is just huge for us. Cause are you being humble? Are you grateful? Are you being a teammate or are you being a player on a team? Because those are two different things.

Rich Birch — Right. Yeah. Yeah. Very good. Very good. I love that. I love that Clydesdale horse example as well. I’m sure I know somewhere there’s pastors writing that down. They’re like, Oh, I’m going to rip that off. We’re going to use that in a team meeting next week, which is wonderful.

Rich Birch — Level three: work ethic. So this one, to be honest, stood out to me. I was like, it’s interesting to me. So level three: work ethic – work enthusiastically with grit and with a mindset of how you can be more efficient and better today ah ah than yesterday. So love this idea. I love that you’re calling this out. Sometimes the church is looked at as being like, Oh, that’s where people that don’t have good work ethics go to work. And you’re pushing against that here. Man, there’s like a lean in, Hey, we’re going to make stuff happen. Talk to me about what are some ways that this level kind of works itself out with your, with your team.

Chad Bickley — Yeah, I mean, sports background, my dad was a farmer in Wisconsin before we moved out to California. It’s just, there’s there’s things, you gotta get after it. I mean, you gotta to work hard, but there’s also this like, work ethic could be a um a negative thing, but we want to change it into a positive thing. And again, it builds on itself.

Rich Birch — Right. Yep.

Chad Bickley — So you you start with, I’m a team name, I’ll do whatever, you know,

Rich Birch — Yeah, I’ll do whatever for you. Yeah, I’m going to help you. We’re going to pull on this together.

Chad Bickley — We’re we’re in this together. I’m gonna be a teammate.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Chad Bickley — Worship’s gonna help youth. Youth’s gonna help worship. This is gonna, you know, and it’s like, you start with that. All of a sudden, your commitment level, we identify all the commitment levels, but when you get to work ethic, we identify it in, three three uh like a traffic light – green, yellow, red. So you can identify your mood, right? So if you’re in the yellow, you’re frustrated. You’re, you know, you’re you’re complacent, you know. And if you’re in the red, you’re you’re gone, right? And so you go back to level one you need to take a thankfulness walk. You need to do something to get back going, right?

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Chad Bickley — And so really that mindset, and this is how me personally so much, cuz it’s like when you walk into meeting it’s like, man, what color am I right now? Why is everybody in the yellow? Oh wait, I’m in the yellow. So I need to change…

Rich Birch — Sure.

Chad Bickley — …where I’m going with. And we always say, man, start your day in the green – win the morning. Because if you come to work in the green, it’s hard it’s it’s it’s harder to move forward it’s hard to go from yellow, red to green than it is from green to red. Because [inaudible] back to it rather quickly. So we we just talk about all this stuff. That’s that’s, you know, identify your mood, man. You’re in the yellow man and speak that language to people. Man, you’re in the yellow.

Rich Birch — Right.

Chad Bickley — And and really hold people accountable to the culture because we’ve all signed up for this.

Rich Birch — Right.

Chad Bickley — So if we signed up for this, this isn’t personal.

Rich Birch — Right.

Chad Bickley — This is actually like we’re trying to help people find and follow Jesus seven days a week. So if you’re in the yellow, that’s not going to help people find and follow Jesus seven days a week. And and I’ll be honest, it it it really has helped me.

Chad Bickley — I’m I’m more of an introvert for sure. I love the behind the scenes stuff. And so I’m really challenged every day, man, win that morning. Make sure you’re walking into that environment. Let’s go. And we’ve created such a fun environment too, because part of that’s don’t take yourself too seriously, but take the mission very seriously.

Rich Birch — Right, right. Yeah.

Chad Bickley — And so we have fun. We do fantasy football. We do, you know, we don’t take ourselves too seriously. But when it comes to people, you know, accepting Christ and starting that, that journey, that’s very serious to us.

Rich Birch — That’s a big deal. Yeah.

Chad Bickley — And that’s a very heavy, heavy mission that that we’ve all chosen to be a part of.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. I I think this is fantastic. It’s, you know, I love your passion for it. I love the clarity. I love how you’re, you know, even in these tools you’ve created to try to make it super easy for your people to understand and to onboard new people. Obviously in a church like yours, you know, youre you’re onboarding new team members all the time. That’s an issue.

Rich Birch —You mentioned a couple of ways. I’m looping back on something you said earlier. You mentioned a couple of ways that you reinforce these levels – evaluations, team meetings. Is there, you know, maybe flesh that out a little bit more. What are some other ways, or maybe a surprising way, that you ah reinforce these levels with your people to keep them in front of people to keep defining, hey, this is how we work. This is how we work.

Chad Bickley — Yeah, I heard a story, um the Home Depot, there was a new guy that took over Home Depot and he and he completely changed the culture with with handwritten notes. And and he, and so for us, we have a we have a weekly meeting and we have a section every week that’s called cultural spotlights.

Chad Bickley — So within that cultural spotlight, we’ve created um the six levels and someone, and to embed this, someone, you know, hey I saw Johnny uh level one teammate and he identifies it. And we we really, and this is where it gets a little tricky because everybody wants to highlight the individual and we’re like, that’s great, but we’re highlighting the core behavior.

Rich Birch — The behavior.

Chad Bickley — Because Johnny, tomorrow, can not be a teammate. That’s in him. Today he was a teammate. But what that does is it it sends it sends a message to everybody it sends a message to everybody on the team of, that’s what a teammate is. Not Johnny, but what he did.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Chad Bickley — And what that has done is iron sharpens iron. It is taking these six levels to a whole different level in our minds.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s cool.

Chad Bickley — That’s that’s been probably the biggest way. Now huddles are doing it in volunteers. You know, we’ve we’ve done a culture warrior award of the month. We’ve done those things at our all staff. And and so when you start it’s like I said culture is a language and you have to teach people to speak a language. It takes a while. And so…

Rich Birch — Yep. Yep. Yeah. It’s not overnight. It’s not one time. You know, you’re not just going to do this. I love the weekly meeting thing. That that’s incredible. Can you give us a flesh that a little bit more? What’s that look like? This is a behavior that we’ve seen time and again with prevailing churches that they are not leaving this kind of defining what is it that makes us us to like, uh, we’re going to do it once a year. It’s like, we’re repeating this time and again. And I love that you’re doing that on a weekly basis. So kind of pull pull that apart a little bit more. What’s that meeting look like? When is it, who you know, what’s other things happening at it, that sort of thing?

Chad Bickley — Yeah, so it’s a pastor/director meeting. There’s about 20 of us. And and we come in the meeting and we have a cultural section. We have a cultural section, we have an awareness section and we have a discussion section.

Rich Birch — Yep. Okay.

Chad Bickley — And so the cultural section is just, it’s basically, we we do win, stuck… or sorry, we do cultural spotlights. Does anybody have a spotlight? Then we say, does anybody have a story from this past Sunday?

Rich Birch — Right. Yep.

Chad Bickley — Which trains our pastors like, go find us a story, go talk to people.

Rich Birch — To be looking for it. Yeah, absolutely. For sure. Yep.

Chad Bickley — And, dude, some of the stories are just like, what?

Rich Birch — Yep.

Chad Bickley — Go ask them, how did you come to Skyline? And we want to know, we want that information. And then it’s we usually have one or two people give what we call our win/stuck priorities.

Chad Bickley — And they give their wins of what they had since their last one. They give their stucks. I’m stuck here, and this is what we’re doing, and this is my priority for the next you know few. So they give like a department update…

Rich Birch — Update. Yep.

Chad Bickley — …and we go into awareness. You know, What are you hearing? What are you seeing? um And then at the end if we have something, Pastor Jeremy has a section and then and then if there’s any other discussions that need to take place, we we take place in in that meeting. So that’s kind of how it’s structured.

Rich Birch — Love it. So good.

Chad Bickley — And you know, sometimes, man, this is when you know, you’re healthy when after 30 minutes you’re still on your cultural spotlights and win/stuck priority [inaudible] cultural spotlights and stories and you’re like, this is unbelievable. And it’s just rapid fire.

Rich Birch — Right. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Chad Bickley — You’re just like, this is, we’re healthy right now. And when you’re not getting any, then you’re like, okay…

Rich Birch — We’ve got to spend some more time. Focus on it. Yeah.

Chad Bickley — …we need bit a of challenge, a little bit of training and and the importance, but our people have, you know, and you have to create the environment where it’s, you know, where it’s okay.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Chad Bickley — So that’s the part that has been pretty cool.

Rich Birch — That’s so good. When you look to the future, ah you think about this whole area, you know what’s what’s in development? What are you thinking up over the horizon? Maybe questions you’re asking about how you can continue to, you know, expand this, continue to um you know push deeply the kind of cultural stuff. What what are your what are the questions you’re asking on this front?

Chad Bickley — Yeah, I think the at the the more you grow, the more it’s like, okay, how do we keep it in front of everybody…

Rich Birch — Right.

Chad Bickley — …and making sure they’re training? Because you can you know you can so you can say that the six, levels. Okay. That’s knowledge. Okay.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Chad Bickley — But you have to be able to incorporate those into your daily actions. But honestly, you know, in our interview process, it’s very intense. They have to go through several things. And really, it’s like, do they fit our culture?

Chad Bickley — Not can they do the job.

Rich Birch — Right.

Chad Bickley — They have to have those traits already instilled in them. Or they’re gonna be miserable, right? And so I think it’s exciting and and fearful of just like, okay as we grow, we have to stay healthy. Like that’s that’s the key.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Chad Bickley — You know when I when I first took this job I went to You know, I honestly when I came in Skyline it was like, oh my goodness, where is everybody? Like, why is everybody, we…

Rich Birch — Right.

Chad Bickley — …this, this isn’t working. And, and then, you know, I went to a conference and, and it was like, to listen to churches, big churches and kind of hear behind the doors. I’m like, man, they’re not healthy. And so honestly for me, and my drive and desire is that we have a healthy staff.

Rich Birch — Right. That’s good.

Chad Bickley — And and if you get unhealthy, we’ll work with you. Come on, let’s go. More clarity. But at the end of the day, you know if you’re coming in and you’re you’re gossiping and you’re causing, it’s like, and you’re not you’re not being a part of the mission, like this is not the right place for you, you know? And and I think it’s it’s kind of like, you know, we got to put our hard hats on and and be construction, be a farmer, let’s go. We have to get after it. And so that’s the biggest, you know, I guess to answer your question.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. Well, yeah, that’s super encouraging. And and this has been a great conversation, super insightful. And obviously with your 10/10/10 vision, you know, you’re in in a lot of ways on the front end of what you believe God’s calling your church to do. Like you still got a long ways to go on expanding and new locations and, you know, more staff and all of that. So I’m excited to see how this develops in in the coming years. Any kind of final words as we wrap up today’s ah conversation? I’ve really appreciated this. It’s been a great conversation today, Chad.

Chad Bickley — Yeah, I mean I would just again, the phrase that comes into my mind is is healthy things grow. They just grow and and you have to weed them, you have to water them. You have to put effort into healthy things. If you want a healthy body, you have to exercise, you have to eat right. So it’s work

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Chad Bickley — But it pays off.

Rich Birch — That’s good. Thanks so much, Chad. Appreciate you being here. If people want to track with you or with the church, where do we want to send them online?

Chad Bickley — skylinechurch.org is our website. I mean, it has our staff, our emails are on there.

Rich Birch — Perfect.

Chad Bickley —  So if you want to connect, happy to yep.

Rich Birch — That’s great. Thanks so much Chad. Appreciate you being here today, sir.

Thanks for tuning in to the unSeminary podcast. We’re talking with Danny Anderson, the Lead Pastor at Emmanuel Church in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Is your church growing quickly, but you’re feeling the pressure? Wondering how to balance church growth with spiritual health for yourself and your staff team? Danny shares his journey of leading a fast-growing church while maintaining soul care and healthy leadership practices.

Find Emmanuel Church at eclife.org and explore both the Church Growth Unleashed podcast and book. Plus, find Danny on Instagram @DannyAnderson23.

There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally!

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Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. Super excited for today’s conversation. Really looking forward to this because this every time I interact with this leader, it feels like a kindred spirit. You’re going to love this conversation. You want to lean in carefully because we’ve got lessons both for your church and for you as an individual.

Rich Birch — Today we’re talking with Pastor Danny Anderson. He is the lead pastor at a church that you should be following, Emmanuel Church, ah it which which was established in 1977. It’s a multisite church with, I think if I’m counting correctly, seven campuses in Indianapolis, an online campus, and a number of ah microsites. It’s repeatedly on one of the fastest growing church lists in the country. Danny’s been a lead pastor there since 2006. He also served as the high school pastor, which we all know the best people come up, from Student Ministry. Has got a podcast as well, so I know his audio is going to be good. Welcome to the show. So glad you’re here, Danny.

Danny Anderson — Thanks, Rich. Appreciate you having me. What a privilege.

Rich Birch — Yeah, this. Oh, come on. So our honor. Glad you’re here. Why don’t you fill in the picture? Kind of tell us a little bit about about you, about the church, that that sort of thing.

Danny Anderson — Yeah, so ah I graduated from Liberty University in ’99 and actually interviewed with Emmanuel Church coming out of college…

Rich Birch — Nice.

Danny Anderson — …because it was my wife’s home church.

Rich Birch — Oh, nice.

Danny Anderson — And they they were like, hey, who’s this guy? Maybe maybe he’ll be a good high school pastor.

Rich Birch — Nice.

Danny Anderson — And did the interview process, got the job. And yeah, did did youth ministry for five years, loved it. And then my found our founding pastor ah decided to ah pursue enter into retirement in 2006 and kind of tapped me on the shoulder. Church voted me in.

Rich Birch — Nice.

Danny Anderson — And the wild ride of senior leadership began in 2006.

Rich Birch — That’s so good.

Danny Anderson — And it went smoothly.

Rich Birch — Yeah, no problems at all. Easy, easy. Well, actually, why don’t you give us a bit of some of the milestones along the way? When you look back, here we are, 2025, you know, coming up on 20 years, that’s a long time, ah which is wonderful. Give us some of those milestones that kind of are, have been key and when you look back over these years.

Danny Anderson — Well, I’ll tell you what, the first year and a half was incredibly difficult, you know taking over for a founding pastor. Pastoral transitions are tough anyway, but when you when you transition after a founding pastor ah who’s beloved, um adored by the people, it was really tough. I had some people tell me, look, I don’t care if you were Andy Stanley, this would not have gone any better.

Rich Birch — Right, right. Yes, yeah.

Danny Anderson — But so it was it was tough. I like to say that I successfully led the church from 2000 to 900 in about a year and a half.

Rich Birch — Okay yes.

Danny Anderson — And so it was it was very difficult, very challenging. So a big milestone was in two thousand ah late 2007, 2008, people started to bring their friends. And I remember I remember it vividly. People started to get saved. I was casting vision. I was trying to stop the bleeding. And then people started to believe the message that, hey, we’re here to reach people who are far from God. Like the church exists to see people who are far from Christ you know come to to know Him and grow in a relationship with Him.

Danny Anderson — And those who chose to stay under my leadership began to invite their friends and people got saved, started to get baptized. And yeah moving into 2010, we were so packed that we had to start a Saturday night service. That was a big milestone for us.

Rich Birch — Well, that’s a huge deal. Yeah. Yeah.

Danny Anderson — You know, launching that, we’re like, man, we’re out of space. What do we do?

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — And then moving into 2013, we launched our first campus, and that ah was about a 500-person solution, you know?

Rich Birch — Wow. Yeah.

Danny Anderson — We sent out 500 people, and ah that church is is doing wonderful. They just celebrated 10 years um ah and into in 2023.

Rich Birch — Yeah. That’s amazing.

Danny Anderson — And since then, we’ve kind of launched one campus every other year or so, and and…

Rich Birch — Yeah. That’s great.

Danny Anderson — …and it’s it’s just been um you know an incredible journey.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s amazing. I love to kind of double click on something. You talked about casting vision. That’s a unique challenge coming in after the founding. I know the stats on the guy that comes in after the founding pastor, not great. You know, like I don’t want to discourage anybody that’s listening in, but it’s like lots of times those guys last about 18 months.

Danny Anderson — Yeah.

Rich Birch — But you were able to cast a new vision, interestingly, at that same kind of timeframe, 18 months, two years in, you’ve got to clarify. What was going through your head in that moment around clarity of vision, you know, kind of because there’s ah a balance there of like casting a new vision, but then, but you also don’t want to trample on the past and all that. You want to build on where we get, what would, how, how did you cast a vision in that season and how did that impact the church?

Danny Anderson — Well, I I definitely was naive and some of that played to my advantage and some of that hurt me.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Right.

Danny Anderson — I could have done a much better job honoring the past. And if there’s anybody out there listening and thinking about transitioning or in a transition, it’s very important for the person coming in behind the pastor, especially the founding pastor, just to honor honor the past, honor where you’ve been. I kind of jumped past that um and I was so excited. I was eager. I was 26 years old and I wanted to talk about the future. I wanted to talk about how we are going to do things differently to reach people who are far from God. And so I started canceling programs. I changed the music. I did all these things that I had heard others did to reach the next generation.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Danny Anderson — And that that was fairly easy to talk about. We did a series about it. I talked about it. But what I didn’t understand because I was so young is that people were not ready to receive that vision yet.

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s good.

Danny Anderson — They were still um grieving the loss of their founding pastor, still not sure whether or not they should buy into my leadership.

Rich Birch — Yep/

Danny Anderson — I didn’t really understand the law of buy-in…

Rich Birch — Yes.

Danny Anderson — …you know, ah by John Maxwell.

Rich Birch — Yep. Yep.

Danny Anderson — And I just got, I went right into vision.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Danny Anderson — And so we paid the price for that. It it really hurt us. But in the long run, those who did choose to stay bought into that vision. But you know the I guess the question you asked me was, how did I maybe formulate that vision?

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Danny Anderson — You know for for me for me, it was just the New Testament just reading like, who did Jesus spend time with? What was this heart? Why did he come? You know I was radically saved in high school as a 17-year-old kid. I was not a church kid. My life was totally revolutionized, did a 180. So when I put my faith in Christ, it was it was because I knew he forgave me. I knew he was real. I didn’t really care about church. I just loved Jesus, you know?

Rich Birch — Good.

Danny Anderson — And I just, I wanted, I want people to experience that.

Danny Anderson — And and so my vision was, hey, let’s let’s be a church that reaches people who really need hope. They really need meaning. They need purpose. They need forgiveness. They need grace, all these wonderful things that I had received. And that only made sense to me. Like, why why else would we do church?

Rich Birch — Right. Right. Yeah, yeah for sure. Well, but it’s interesting, right? Like I think a lot of times I know as a person that sat in that kind of executive pastor second chair, I know a part of what I’ve tried to do over the years is encourage the lead pastors I’ve served for to to continue to clarify the vision. And a lot of it like that, that’s a thing that a lead pastor can’t outsource. We can’t be like, we can’t pull 25 people in a room and go, So why do we think we should exist? Like no, no, like you’ve you got to feel it at in your bones. like It’s like, hey, this is I’m willing to drive the and the bus over the cliff over this issue. And that ultimately is what gathers people. And and yeah, that’s that’s good

Rich Birch — Okay, so pivoting in a slightly different direction. So you’re coming up you know two decades, almost two decades as in in this lead role. That’s amazing. Incredible. Congratulations on that.

Danny Anderson — Thank you.

Rich Birch — You know, we often see that, you know, churches of a certain size. One of the kind of common characteristics is you’ve got leaders that are in their second, third decade there that that’s normal. It is not typical that it like happens overnight. It takes time. But one of the downsides, the negative kind of tragic realities is many parents experience or parents, pastors experience either burnout or moral failure amidst the kind of growth that your church has seen.

Rich Birch — You know, can we explore that a little bit? Talk about kind of your own personal reflections on how do you navigate that? How do you kind of keep your soul connected to Jesus in the midst of that?

Danny Anderson — That’s a great question. You know, one ah one of the things that really broke my heart several years ago, and I think many pastors were brokenhearted over seeing some of their heroes and of the faith, the church leaders that they’ve followed for years, looked up to, gone to their conferences.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s true.

Danny Anderson — You know, we’ve all watched some of these guys kind of shipwreck their their church for, you know, ah moral reasons, power struggles. And, you know, I I’m watching this happen, as as everyone else is, and I’m like, man, is it inevitable that this is going to happen to me?

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Danny Anderson — You know, because I’m I’m I’m on the same path these guys are on.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — I’m trying to grow the church. Things are happening. And we’re launching campuses. You knowis it inevitable that I’m going to have an affair or or or do something stupid with money or abuse power?

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — And and I got to thinking about that. And I was like, no, that’s not inevitable.

Rich Birch — Good.

Danny Anderson — And and the reason why it’s not inevitable for me or for any pastor out there is that if you do the proper work on your soul, which is the most important thing that we can do, you know, the Proverbs 4:23 says, guard your heart above all else because out of it flow the issues of life, right? Like everything we do, our leadership, our sermons, the way we lead our team, it all comes from our heart.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — So the most important, I’m convinced, the most and important job of a leader is to take care of their soul.

Rich Birch — Right. Good.

Danny Anderson — Because if my soul is healthy…

Rich Birch — Yep.

Danny Anderson — …and it’s aligned with Jesus and it’s surrendered to his will, like then I can lead well. And I won’t shipwreck my faith, and I won’t fall into temptation.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — I’m not talking about perfection. Nobody’s going to be perfect.

Rich Birch — No. Yeah, yeah.

Danny Anderson — I’m talking about patterns of sin that will destroy your church, destroy your minister, and disqualify you from leading.

Rich Birch — Yes. Yeah. 100%.

Danny Anderson — And so I spend a ton of time, Rich, working on myself. I did it again this morning. I wake up every morning at 5.30. I have a whole routine I go through. And it’s it’s it involves the scriptures, surrender, prayer, confession, journaling, um reading other books. And and I do that, not because I’m a pastor, but because I want but because I want to take care of my soul. I want to have a healthy soul.

Rich Birch — Yes, that’s good.

Danny Anderson — And so I have practices and rhythms that I keep to make sure that I maintain that in the midst of the chaos of leading our church, which there’s never a dull moment, as you know, leading a church, it’s it’s crazy.

Rich Birch — Yes, yes, yes. Yes.

Danny Anderson — But so yeah, I’m I’m hyper focused on that.

Rich Birch — Yeah, I’d love to talk a little bit more about that, kind of drilling, because one of the I appreciate the way you framed that. Because one of the realities of it is like all the people who that you’re thinking of that have shipwrecked their ministries, shipwrecked their lives, they all would have said that they would have said no, I’ve got practices. I’ve got you know and that’s the sad reality here right? And then there is this cynicism I think for me one of the most corrosive parts of this is there’s a cynicism against large churches. And to me that that’s like that’s like gets to you know effectiveness of the gospel kind of stuff then we’re like well we should just keep all our churches small and that’s the answer. But that isn’t the answer.

Rich Birch — We need to be able to lead large churches that are having huge impacts on our community and keep our soul healthy at the same time. So is there one of those practices that maybe it’s like, Hey, I’ve never heard people talk about this. Or like, it seems like a different thing or like this is particularly, has been particularly effective for me or helpful for me, or as I’ve shared with other pastors, they’ve resonated been like, Oh, that’s, that’s different. I I appreciate that. That that’s really helpful for me.

Danny Anderson — Yeah, you know, I think the most effective thing that I have practiced or put into my life in terms of a discipline that cares for the soul is, and this has been talked about, so it’s not it’s not fresh.

Rich Birch — Yes. Yep.

Danny Anderson — It’s just a matter of, are we doing it?

Rich Birch — Yes. Yes. True. Yep.

Danny Anderson — You know, I hear I hear pastors say this all the time. You know, I I have practices, okay, but are you really doing it?

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — And so here’s here’s here’s how I would explain it. I would explain it um it’s it’s the practice of meditation. And and and I don’t I don’t mean the Eastern type of meditation way emptying yourself and emptying your mind.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Danny Anderson — I’m talking about filling your mind with Scripture…

Rich Birch — That’s good. Yep.

Danny Anderson — …to the point where, like in Psalm 1, it says that with that the man of God meditates on it day and night.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Danny Anderson — In Joshua 1:8, you know, we meditate upon your law day and night. Is that really true about us? Because here’s how, you know, Dallas Willard and and and many others have explained the way the soul is wired. And I don’t want to go too deep here, but we do have to kind of go deep a little bit. Like the mind controls, predominantly, for the most part, how we feel, like we think and then we feel. And then the will or the place of action at the center of our soul is dependent upon how we’re feeling and how we’re thinking.

Rich Birch — That’s good. Yep.

Danny Anderson — So if I want to make proper choices, godly choices, live a righteous life, or treat my staff well, or have patience with my assistant, or whatever, then I have to be thinking correctly.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Danny Anderson — My mind has got to be in the right place, which is why the Apostle Paul says, you know, set your mind on things above, not on things on earth, right? That we’re transformed by the renewing of our mind. We can we’ve preached sermons like that, right? But do we live that way? Where’s our mind?

Rich Birch — Yep. Right.

Danny Anderson — Every single day?

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Danny Anderson — Like not just not just at certain times when we’re preparing a sermon or or something, but like throughout the day, are we actually thinking Scripture?

Rich Birch — Yeah that’s good.

Danny Anderson — Because if we are, then that’s going to be shaping the way we feel…

Rich Birch — Yeah that’s good.

Danny Anderson — …and then the way we feel is going to shape the way we act. And so I teach that, I try to live that out. And that’s how that’s the primary practice of of tending for my soul.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Danny Anderson — So if I want my soul to be in a good good spot, I got to make sure my mind is in a good spot.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. I like I like even how you frame that there around I’ve got to be thinking scripture. And and that’s even a good benchmark for me that got me thinking, okay, so when I go to solve a problem, something that comes up today, is the first thing that comes to mind scripture or is the first thing that comes to mind some book I read, or some podcast I listen to? Is it, you know, and that’s I’m not saying that there’s not ah good things to come from podcasts, obviously, but you know but but what is the knee-jerk reaction of my mind? Is it, am I brought back to the teaching of Jesus ultimately? That’s good. I really like that.

Danny Anderson — So let me push in a little bit more on that one thought. You know Dallas Willard teaches this, and and if your listeners haven’t dove in to Dallas’ stuff, I would strongly encourage them to do so. “Renovation of the Heart”, “Divine Conspiracy”, “Spirit of the Disciplines”, “The Great Omission”, all fantastic stuff. But what he actually teaches about scripture, scripture memorization, and the power of it is that as we’re meditating on scripture through the day, we actually interpret life through the lens of the scripture.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Danny Anderson — So so it’s like the scriptures are like the lens that we’re looking through as we’re leading our team or we’re talking with our spouse.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Danny Anderson — And so we’re interpreting the events of life through scripture. And if we’re doing that, then we’re actually thinking the thoughts of Jesus. And you know as Dallas has said in his books that spiritual maturity is being able to act the way Jesus would act if he were in your place, right? So if I want to do that, I have to think the way Jesus thinks…

Rich Birch — Right. That’s good.

Danny Anderson — …if I want to live the way he lived, and that ah one idea has changed my leadership and has changed my life.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. So good. Well, then extending that out kind of beyond you to your team, I’ve had a little bit of interaction with some of the Emmanuel team. And, you know, there, if I can just kind of say the thing that some people are thinking is oftentimes, you know, the teams in large churches, it’s like, man, they’re burnt out, they’re struggling. And it’s like, that’s fine for the lead person. They got it all sorted out, but like the team is in a bad spot.

Rich Birch — But that hasn’t been my impression of the Emmanuel team. It’s like, well, these people are healthy and they seem to be leaning in. And so how have you been able to navigate the challenges of both scaling? Because you seem like an ambitious church. It seems like, hey, we want to take some ground, but at the same time, balance out health of your staff.

Danny Anderson — Yeah, so I have to live it out that everything starts with the senior leader, right? So I talk about this stuff at staff meeting. I challenge my team to do this stuff. We incorporate the Sabbath very aggressively here at the church.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Danny Anderson — So nobody’s allowed to work on Friday. And that is a very that’s huge.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — Like, hey, this that communicates that your soul is more important to me and to God than getting results at this church.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Danny Anderson — So you will you are not allowed to work on Friday.

Rich Birch — Right. Yeah.

Danny Anderson — Like it is a rule unless somebody has died or something, you know.

Rich Birch — Right, right.

Danny Anderson — So, you know people know I’m serious about it. And they know that I care more about their soul than I do about the work that’s actually happening. Now, that does not mean we don’t care about the work that’s happening around here.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Danny Anderson — We want to launch one campus a year for the next 12 years.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — We’re very ambitious. um So I think it’s ah it’s this balance. Like what are you talking about in staff meeting? And what does your staff see from you? Like if my staff sees me walking around the office, and I’m barking out orders, and I’ ‘m they could see my face is frustrated, or I’m upset, you know what is that saying? Like there’s some pastors that lead their church that way.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s true.

Danny Anderson — They lead their church through anger…

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Danny Anderson — … and their face. And everyone’s like, oh, well, look at his face. He’s upset. What’s pastor do… Like, that is not the way Jesus led, you know?

Rich Birch — No, it’s true.

Danny Anderson — So the the so everyone’s really watching my tone of voice. They’re watching my facial expression. Is he upset? You know, is he calm? Is he poised? And so that stuff all goes back to my personal disciplines of meditation and quiet time and prayer and weekly Sabbath. And and so it starts with me and you have to push that down, those values down into your staff.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — And give them the space to practice those things that you’re telling them to practice.

Rich Birch — Right. And there there’s a key there around, you know, when I’ve been around healthy leaders, have worked with healthy leaders, there’s something about you talking about it that then creates, and living it out, and like, like you’re saying, is even simple things as crazy as it sounds like, Hey, we’re not going to work on one day a week. Friday’s the sabbath day. Uh, like even something as simple as that, talking about it enough so that your team will hold you accountable. Like they’ll come back. If you talk about that enough, they’re going to be like, well, wait a second, Danny. Like you said, we’re not supposed to work Fridays, but why is it that you keep sending me the slides Friday morning at 9:30 in the morning to be done for the weekend?

Danny Anderson — Yeah.

Rich Birch — I can’t do what you want me to do. And so, yeah, that’s good. I love that. So, so good.

Rich Birch — Well, I’d love to pivot it in another direction. So you’ve got a book that came out last year and you’ve got a podcast by the same same name, Church Growth Unleashed: How to Grow Your Church Without Losing Your Soul. We’ve obviously been talking about some of these issues today, but this is a huge task, putting together a book. You know, tell us, kind of why why did you drive towards that? What what are you hoping to get out of this? Who are you thinking about as you pulled this book together?

Danny Anderson — Yeah, I’m thinking about the the the pastor who has the passion to see lost people enter the kingdom, but today you’re being told that, you know, big churches are bad…

Rich Birch — Yeah. 100%.

Danny Anderson — …and you shouldn’t want to grow your church. And I’m like, man, I almost fell prey to that, Rich.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Yeah.

Danny Anderson — Like, I really I actually picked up one of those books that had that message in it.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Danny Anderson — And I’m like, man, maybe we should stay small.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — Maybe we should just be be content with what we have and the people that we have. And it’s like, I felt guilty about about my ambition.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Yes.

Danny Anderson — And then I’m like looking at the apostle Paul and the gospel and he’s like, man, let’s go reach the world.

Rich Birch — Let’s go. Yeah, yeah.

Danny Anderson — And he’s ambitious to to preach and plant churches where no one’s heard the gospel.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Danny Anderson — And and I’m like, man, this God’s heart, is to reach lost people – lots of them, millions of them.

Rich Birch — Yep. Yep.

Danny Anderson — And so I wrote this book to help pastors strike the balance of, okay, I know I want to reach people. I want to fan that flame, right? Yes, that is God’s heart. For God so loved the world, He gave His one and only Son, right? But also on the other hand, if you don’t do that in a wise way, you’re going to end up like some of these other guys.

Rich Birch — It’s true. Yep.

Danny Anderson — And you’re not just going to lose your church, you’re going to lose your family. You could lose your health, your your physical health

Rich Birch — Yep. Yep. Yep

Danny Anderson — …because you overdo it and you over you become a ah workaholic. And and so there is a balance.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Danny Anderson — And I feel like I haven’t always gotten that right, but man, I sure have tried. Because I want to make it to the end, Rich. I’m 47. I want to go all the way to the end…

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s so good.

Danny Anderson — …hand this church off to somebody else in a healthy way and still have a family and a healthy heart. And um and and set this church up to reach the even the next generation.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — So I’m passionate about you know helping pastors to find that path.

Rich Birch — Well, I know, I you know, I love that you said church growth right in the title, because as a fellow author with a book with the title, with church growth in the title, that’s like it that’s like a dangerous decision in some circles.

Danny Anderson — Right.

Rich Birch — They’re like, well, church growth, isn’t that like guys in the 80s that got like tapes and they’re you know they’re like old, dodgy you know kind of a little bit like you know slick salesman kind of thing. So I love that you did that. I love I love that you did that. I love your heart both to balance the issues around, hey we want to reach people. I agree with you. I think there is this dangerous um, it sounds good. It sounds like even like noble to be like, well, we should keep small. We should, you know, we should play small and like, I’m only going to reach the people on my street. And we’re we’re going to stay under a couple hundred people. And that’s like what God has called us to. Why do you think that is such a pervasive idea? Why why has that become such a pervasive idea in the church?

Danny Anderson — Well, I think I think part of it is, it’s a great question, but i think I think a big part of it is that when people see these mega church pastors screw up…

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Danny Anderson — …whether it is because some sexual sin…

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — …or they have abused power or something…

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — …they immediately make the connection that, see, the problem is not his, the problem is not his soul. The problem is that the church is too big.


Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Danny Anderson — And so churches are not designed to be that big. And so that, and I just don’t believe that.

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Danny Anderson — I do not believe the problem is the size of the church.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — The problem is the pastor did not take care of his soul.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Yeah. That’s good.

Danny Anderson — Let me think about Billy Graham, Rich. I know Billy Graham wasn’t a pastor…

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — …but that guy took care of his soul.

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Danny Anderson — When you read his stuff, when you read his books, his his he was so diligent to watch over his heart with meditation and his scripture, the scripture. He never missed a time with God. He never missed time with God. So my dedication is I never miss my time with God.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — I don’t say I don’t say that to brag because that would be ridiculous. There’s nothing to brag about.

Rich Birch — Right. No, yep.

Danny Anderson — I do that because I need it.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Danny Anderson — To keep my heart humble and aligned with God’s will.

Rich Birch — Yeah, for sure. 100%.

Danny Anderson — So, you know, I don’t believe the problem is the size of the church. I believe Jesus wants the whole world to be saved.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — So, and I’m part of that solution. So are you.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — So that means we gotta we got to grow our churches.

Rich Birch — Yeah, and there’s way more people in Indianapolis in your backyard who don’t attend church that do.

Danny Anderson — Absolutely.

Rich Birch — And we’ve got to do what we can to get out in front of them and reach those people. I’ve never said this publicly, but I’m going to say it here because I’d love to get your reaction to it.

Rich Birch — Years ago, 10 years ago, I was talking to a lead pastor of a fairly large church, a name brand church, and they said, you know, we we’re talking about this exact issue, growing a church and why do so many people fail and all of that. And this individual said you know I think the problem is or one of the problems is a church—and this is gonna sound crazy—if you’re leading a church of a couple hundred people what I’m about to say, you’re gonna say, that is nuts, but it resonates with me. I actually was like um I think there’s some truth to this. They said, you know, one of the problems is you get to a church of four or five thousand people and as the lead pastor, there’s not enough challenge. And I was like what?

Rich Birch — And I leaned in and I said what are you talking about? And they’re like well At the end of the day, like i if I’m doing my job right, and I’ve told my people to do to do the work, and I’ve built amazing teams, and I’ve got a lot of people around me, and I and they’re they’re making it happen, my core job, sure, is to preach. I’m gonna get up every week, I’m gonna do you know maybe 30 times, I’m gonna preach, and sure, we’re gonna cast vision. But if i’m not if I don’t watch, I can create, ah I can build an empire, essentially, is what this person was saying, where I’m actually not being [inaudible]. Where I can kind of build this thing around me. And I was like, oh that’s an interesting idea. Because that there’s but I think there’s something there. It’s like these people you can you if you don’t have the right rhythms in your life stuff starts to get into your schedule you start doing stuff that you shouldn’t be doing you start thinking about things you shouldn’t be thinking about. You get distracted from the you know, because the thing is running because the thing is systemized. What do you think about that? React – nothing, you know, crazy idea. What do you think?

Danny Anderson — Yeah. You know, that’s I have not heard that. That is a very interesting. I’m processing that as you say that like, huh?

Rich Birch — Yes.

Danny Anderson — Our church is like we reach about 8,000 people on a weekend now and I’m thinking holy cow!

Rich Birch — Yeah. You’re not sitting around looking for stuff to do.

Danny Anderson — No. I have I’m like, wow, I have to say no to stuff…

Rich Birch — Yes. Yes.

Danny Anderson — …because I’m meeting with you know donors…

Rich Birch — Yes.

Danny Anderson — …and I’m I’m meeting with my team and on my schedule. My assistant keeps telling me, um hey, I think we’ve we’ve committed to too much.

Rich Birch — Right. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Danny Anderson — So I that does not resonate with me. I guess if my, if my goal was to, to kind of build something so that I could maybe have some free time in golf, I could see that being a problem, but I don’t golf, and I like to be busy.

Rich Birch — Right. Yes. Yeah, no, I get that. Yeah, yeah. I thought it was an interesting idea. I thought the part that resonated with me was I think as the church grows, as we, you know, when you’re a church of a thousand, a church of two thousand, five thousand, ten thousand, each of those phases demands something different

Danny Anderson — Yes.

Rich Birch — And your leadership has to change. And these kinds of things ah managing our own soul care, although there are some foundational things, like you say, stay committed, stay in the word, what you’re doing at 5.30 in the morning, you have to keep thinking about these at at every level. What does it look like? How do I how do I massage and change? I’m sure you’ve seen over time that your process has changed, what you’ve done, your rhythms have changed because, you know, just things look different.

Danny Anderson — Absolutely.

Rich Birch — So that’s interesting.

Danny Anderson — And my kids have gotten older too, so that really helps.

Rich Birch — Right. That does open up time for sure. Talk to me about on the book, the Church Growth Unleashed, we’re going to put a link in the show notes where people can pick up this. This actually struck me as the kind of thing that a team could read together. It was like, hey, this could be a good framing for us. I talked about earlier this idea of like, you need to talk about these things so that your team kind of like mirrors back. To me, this was like one of these like, hey, let’s let’s let’s have Danny talk to us about these things through this book. And then that will kind of create a conversation for us where we can get outside of it and look at it and say, what do we think about that? How are we doing?

Rich Birch — Can you picture that? What but what could this look like if I if I went through this with my team?

Danny Anderson — Yeah, I think it’s ah it would be a great discussion starter. I don’t think pastors talk about this stuff. Like I have a whole chapter in there on friendship. I don’t think pastors talk about that. They don’t talk about their friends…

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — …because it’s really hard for a pastor to have friends. It’s really hard for staff members to have friends.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — Like how do you have friends? Like all the people in your life go to your church. Like how how does that look?

Rich Birch — Right. Yep.

Danny Anderson — How do you strike that balance? I have a whole chapter in there on your physical health and how your physical health affects your your your ability to to serve and lead and do your job. like Pastors don’t talk about that stuff. Listen, most pastors are out of shape and overweight.

Rich Birch — It’s true.

Danny Anderson — So why would you why would you talk about being in healthy when you’re not healthy?

Rich Birch — Yes. Yes.

Danny Anderson — So this is a book that really puts its finger on like some of the key issues ah that affect ah leadership and having a healthy balance between being really good at your job, but also ah being super healthy in your… Like I have a whole chapter on family where…

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s great.

Danny Anderson — …how do you balance the this the the tensions of, like I know some churches and staffs, they’re so out of balance.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Danny Anderson — Oh my gosh, I was i heard about a church the other day that did six services on Christmas Eve.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — Six.

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — And look, i’m all I’m all about reaching lost people. I think it’s awesome.

Rich Birch — Yes. Yes.

Danny Anderson — But six services on Christmas Eve?

Rich Birch — Right.

Danny Anderson — Like and and they’re like rejoicing and praising God. And hey, I’m sure a lot of people got saved. I’m sure it was awesome. But I’m thinking about guess who I’m thinking about, Rich?

Rich Birch — Yeah, the families. Yeah, for sure.

Danny Anderson — Their staff, their staff, they you know, they just had services on Saturday, on Sunday, and then you turn around and do six Christmas Eve service. Anyway, I’m not dogging the church. I mean, I love reaching people.

Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah.

Danny Anderson — But but man, if they don’t get that balance worked out, their staff will get burned out.

Rich Birch — Right, right.

Danny Anderson — And then they’ll resent the work, you know? And so, you know, it’s really it’s really a book about, you know, helping people talk about the the important things that need to be discussed and work through to have a healthy balance of of ministry and life.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s so good. Well, like I say, friends, we’ve got a link to the show notes in link in the show notes. You can also pick it up in Amazon and I’m sure where other where books are sold, that sort of thing. We want to point people to that. I don’t want to miss an opportunity to talk about the podcast as well. I had an honor of being on an episode.

Danny Anderson — Yes, you did. Thank you for that.

Rich Birch — But tell us a little bit about, now, tell us a little bit about the podcast. I will put a link to that as well. We want people to check that out. And I think it would be a great kind of companion to what we’re doing here on unSeminary for sure.

Danny Anderson — Yeah. So, I mean, the Church Growth Unleashed is a podcast to help pastors, church leaders, and ministry leaders. I mean, I had the host of the unSeminary podcast on there last month.

Rich Birch — Oh, sure.

Danny Anderson — So that’s the quality.

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Danny Anderson — No, no, no. Listen, that’s the quality of people I try to have on there. And we just, hey, we just talk about this stuff. We talk about everything that that pastors go through, ministry leaders go through in ah in an authentic way. Like I’m an open book. Like I talk about everything. Because I want pastors to to have a place where they could be like, man, this guy gets me.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Danny Anderson — Or I was wondering about that, or no one’s ever talked about that before, or I needed somebody to say that. Because that’s what I needed as a young pastor. Like, I need help. And so that’s basic it’s basically, it’s basically the same heart as your podcast, just to help pastors, help ministry leaders to be effective as possible.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. Good, I’d love, like I say, we’ll put we’ll put links to the show notes down there and do the podcasts and the books and all that stuff. Danny, this has been super encouraging. conversation today. I love what you’re doing. I love what Emmanuel’s up to. I love the balance that you, you know, have that you’re striking. You know, Emmanuel is, I love a church that’s aggressive for the gospel. That’s like, hey, we want to do stuff to reach people. And you can see that in the way you guys act, which is great. But then at the same time, you’re raising all these values and us, you know, frankly, some of these deeper questions that it can be easy to just not think about. And so I i just want to honor you for doing that. I think it’s incredible. So, so great to connect today.

Danny Anderson — Well, thank you, Rich. You’re doing a great job. Love everything you do. Love your books. They’ve had a huge impact on my life. Keep writing them. Keep keep pumping into us.

Rich Birch — Yeah. Nice.

Danny Anderson — I know your audience is it gets tremendous value from this podcast and so do I, so thanks for what you do.

Rich Birch — Where do we want to send people online to connect with you or to connect with the church just as we wrap up today?

Danny Anderson — Yeah, so on Instagram, it’s @dannyanderson23. And that’s my Instagram handle. And then the the church website is eclife.org, eclife.org.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Danny Anderson — Yeah.

Rich Birch — Thanks so much, Danny. Appreciate you being here today.

Danny Anderson — Hey, thanks, Rich. God bless.

Welcome back to the unSeminary podcast. Today we’re talking with Adam Ader, the Groups Director at Parkview Christian Church in Illinois.

Is your church looking to improve how you connect people into life-changing groups? Wondering how to lead a growing group ministry that truly impacts people’s lives? Tune in as Adam shares valuable insights on building a thriving group ministry that focuses on leadership development, group engagement, and real-life transformation.

Visit Parkview Christian Church at parkviewchurch.com and download the Parkview Groups Leader Guide here.

Are your small group leaders equipped to handle sensitive situations effectively? This exclusive resource from unSeminary Extra Credit is a ready-to-edit document to make it easy for you to provide your small group leaders with a training resource on when they should refer people in their group to someone else for assistance. Complete with a customizable decision tree and practical prompts, this tool empowers leaders to confidently care for their groups.

Join unSeminary Extra Credit today to access this valuable resource and more! Download this resource now. 

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Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Portable Church

Your church is doing really well right now, and your leadership team is looking for solutions to keep momentum going! It could be time to start a new location. Maybe you have hesitated in the past few years, but you know it’s time to step out in faith again and launch that next location. Portable Church has assembled a bundle of resources to help you leverage your growing momentum into a new location by sending a part of your congregation back to their neighborhood on Mission. This bundle of resources will give you a step-by-step plan to launch that new or next location, and a 5 minute readiness tool that will help you know your church is ready to do it!

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Rich Birch — Well, hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. Man, I am super excited for today’s conversation. This is one of those conversations that’s got in the middle of it a common tension that it’s a misnomer that um that lots of people have that we’re going to bust today. We’ve got some myths we’re going to bust. Plus, it’s going to be super helpful for you. Super excited to have ah Adam Ader with us. He is the groups director at Parkview Christian Church. It’s a multi-site church in ah in Illinois and church online. They’re repeatedly one of the fastest growing churches in the country. Super excited to have you on the show today, Adam. Welcome. So glad you’re here.

Adam Ader — Hey, thanks, Rich. Appreciate it.

Rich Birch — This is going to be wonderful. Thanks for your time. Really appreciate that. Give us a sense of Parkview. Kind of tell us the story. If, you know, if people were to arrive this weekend, kind of give us a sense of that and then tell us a little bit about your role.

Adam Ader — Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I had the good fortune to land at Parkview as my first job out of college. Landed as a student ministry intern in 2005, actually.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Adam Ader — Had a little bit more hair growing up top at the time then I do now. But I got lucky. I didn’t know a thing about the church and landed there to find out that they were one of the fastest growing churches in the country. And I was like, Oh, what what have I gotten myself into?

Adam Ader — But Parkview has been through like an incredible journey, really over the last 20 plus years of of just explosive growth. And we’re we’re in the south suburbs of Chicago. Our original location is in Orland Park. We’ve we’ve grown to the point where we have three locations, and they’re all kind of within a 15-minute drive with each other in a little sort of Bermuda triangle of Parkview campuses. And, you know, our our lead…

Rich Birch — But in in that Bermuda triangle, good things happen, not bad things happen.

Adam Ader — Yeah, we don’t see too many planes almost, thankfully.

Rich Birch — That’s great.

Adam Ader — But yeah, so the church has just been growing incredibly fast. We’ve seen God breathe incredible life just in people being kind of drawn into the church. We’re in a heavily Catholic and ex-Catholic area. And you know and that brings all kinds of exciting and interesting challenges with it. But um but God has just used what we’re doing and blessed it in incredible ways.

Adam Ader — And you know there have been times where we’ve been white knuckling in it and just trying to hang on for dear life as more and more people showed up. And we’ve tried a lot of different things and and God has seen scene fit to to bless some of them in some really powerful ways. So it’s been an exciting place to kind of cut my teeth doing ministry. I’ll hit my 20-year mark in June of this year, actually.

Rich Birch — Congratulations.

Adam Ader — Thank you much. Thank you much. I’m waiting on that gold watch. I don’t think I’m going to get it.

Rich Birch — Nice.

Adam Ader — But yeah, I met my wife my third day at Parkview. And I had my kids here, and I couldn’t imagine a better place to get to do ministry and just feel incredibly blessed every time every day, I get to do this.

Rich Birch — Oh, that’s so great. So fun to hear. You know, we often talk with leaders in fast growing churches, and that’s definitely kind of a substrate of, you know, kind of under all the different people that we talk to. And one of the things I want to kind of pick apart today and understand from your seats, your seat as the what’s multiple seats is you do lots of different things in this area – that’s for sure in groups – is how are you getting people connected to groups at Parkview?

Rich Birch — So maybe let’s start with kind of an overview, kind of talk us through, let’s say you’re talking to an executive pastor or maybe another groups pastor, you’re at a conference and they’re like, tell me about groups at Parkview. What’s what’s all your short hands, open, closed, seasonal, you know, you know, how long do they stay together? All that kind of stuff. Give us a framework for what they are. And then we’ll dig in a little deeper.

Adam Ader — Yeah, that’s that’s great. I’ll I’ll talk you through kind of our our current strategy.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Adam Ader — And then there’s like some history that’s going to have to go go into this a little bit.

Rich Birch — Sure.

Adam Ader — [inaudible] But where we’re currently at, we we focus largely on term-based free market small groups.

Rich Birch — Okay.

Adam Ader — Um, so we you’ll hear more about this down the road, but we we have leaned heavily into Rooted in the past. And we have a handful of sort of core content pieces that we will offer groups for each of these terms. Three times a year, we’ll offer 10-week groups terms. um And people can kind of opt into the group that seems best to them through a group finder tool that’s kind of housed on our website. Kind of a common thing, in a lot of churches do that. We’re not reinventing the wheel by any means in any of those areas.

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — But but really, we lean hard into leveraging like the passions of our leaders. We think that at the end of the day, a great leader is going to outweigh content.

Adam Ader — And really what it comes down to, you know, our belief is a great leader can make average mediocre or even substandard content work really well, but a poor leader can take just to about any content off the tracks.

Rich Birch — Oh that’s good.

Adam Ader — So we we lean hard into raising up good leaders and helping them identify who are they trying to reach with their group? What kind of people along the road of faith do they want to invite in the community and help them just take at least one step forward?

Rich Birch — Wow. Okay.

Adam Ader — So, um you know, we do we do have long-term groups that run and, you know, they kind of do their thing and we love them, but most of them are closed groups. We’re leaning really hard into these term-based semesters, 10 weeks usually. And again, that’s kind of a rhythm that we picked up from Rooted along the way, that 10-week piece. Seems like a sweet spot…

Rich Birch — Yep.

Adam Ader — …for us to help people get in the good community. So give them an off ramp before it gets weird. You know what I mean?

Rich Birch — Okay. That’s good. Well, tell us about, give us a sense of when you say free market, you talk about, it and I definitely want to drill in on that. I think it’s a huge insight, great leaders, outweigh content. We’re going to definitely come back to that, but give us a sense of what some of those kind of free market groups. What we, some of the passions, if, you know, if I was attending Parkview will be some of the things I would see on that tool to pick for the kinds of groups.

Adam Ader — Yeah, great question. We kind of dropped them into a five sort of buckets, but there’s some flexibility with them. The first one would be that Rooted. We’d offer Rooted groups, and we see those as being kind of like a foundation point. People who are, you know, early in their journey can step in, really starting to gain a foundational understanding of who we are, what we believe, how we practice faith.

Adam Ader — We offer shared interest groups. This one is kind of our newest deal. And this is, if we have a leader that has a passion that’s not even a Bible study based content, but they want to get people in the community around that hobby, we allow them to launch a group through our finder with some tools and support from us. And, you know, we see that happen. And we’ve seen some really great fruit from it, especially around a phenomenon that I don’t even understand yet, but it’s pickleball, man.

Rich Birch — I was going to ask, are there pickleball groups?

Adam Ader — Yes, there are.

Rich Birch — Love it. So good.

Adam Ader — The first pickleball group we launched, man, we had to close that 40 registrations.

Rich Birch — Oh, sure. That’s great.

Adam Ader — Yeah, just people love the pickleball. They love it.

Rich Birch — Yeah. That’s fun. That’s fun.

Adam Ader — Yeah, so so we had those available and and we’ve seen some great stuff there and we set we try to set the understanding that you know this is about community. But we want to help every person even in those groups take some step towards Jesus, right? And that’s where [inaudible]. We offer what we would just call a general small group type, which is for leaders that are choosing their own content, but it’s still a discussion-based, Bible study-based group type.

Adam Ader — Support groups are an important leg for us as well. Groups that are just available for people who are going through difficult circumstances or common times in life. And then we also have Alpha groups available. And alpha is, ah you know, Nicky Gumbel and England’s content. And this is stuff that is, ah exists for skeptics, people with big questions about faith. It’s a great content to invite people who maybe aren’t all the way on the bus, maybe have one foot on, one foot off. And we’ve done some some creative things in the past with launching Alpha and bars and restaurants and things like that.

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — And we have those groups now available as well through our finder tool.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s cool.

Adam Ader — So those are kind of the broad buckets. Yeah.

Rich Birch — That’s really cool. I love that. So, so we’ve got Rooted, shared interests, small, small, typical kind of small, not typical, but small group kind of content, support groups, and then Alpha – love those five.

Rich Birch — So talk to me about 10 weeks. I’m going to pretend to be the devil’s advocate. Don’t know that I should say that on a church podcast, but there I just did. 10 weeks. Like I, you, I, you, I understand the like, okay, where it can opt out before it gets weird. But what about on the other end, is 10 weeks long enough to actually accomplish the kind of, you know, community goals, faith goals. Talk talk us through that.

Adam Ader — Yeah, that’s great. And I And I do think that it’s easy to look at this and say, how can we really how can we really get into it and grow together in such a short timeframe? I was one of those people who was skeptical of that model for a while, if I’m being totally honest.

Rich Birch — Sure. Yep.

Adam Ader — I’m like ah But you know what we’ve seen is that under the right circumstances, people open up really quickly.

Rich Birch — That’s good. That’s true.

Adam Ader — And this is something we learned [inaudible] immediately. And I think coming out of out of COVID, out of lockdown, out of having to learn to use tools like Zoom and and Teams meetings to do school and all these things, um man, I don’t think people take as long to break walls down because there’s just a sense of maybe an unspoken desperation for a real community and real relationships out there. And we don’t think that 10 weeks is the thing that’s going to take person from A to Z…

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — …but we do believe that 10 weeks is enough time for a person to take one solid step forward in their faith.

Rich Birch — That’s good. That’s good.

Adam Ader — And so we feel like if we get people through 10 weeks and we can point to that and say, here’s the way that God has shaped or changed you in this time period. Oh man, that’s a win worth celebrating. And there’s something that happens, I think, when when small groups stick together too long, right? And I’m sure we’ve all seen it.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s true. Yep.

Adam Ader — You know, where where you end up in this awkward sort of like a double dutch routine where everybody feels like they kind of want out and they’re no longer putting the effort into it but nobody wants to be the one to say that the marriage is over, sort of. You know?

Rich Birch — Sure. Sure.

Adam Ader — And and what we see, you we were seeing a lot of these groups that would they would fizzle after a certain amount of time. And then they wouldn’t be able to make eye contact with each other in church. Right?

Rich Birch — Right. Right. Okay.

Adam Ader — And it becomes weird.

Rich Birch — Yes.

Adam Ader — And suddenly they don’t know if they’re welcome to try a new group. They don’t know if it’s you know acceptable for them to try something different or if they’ve failed somehow. Right?

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Adam Ader — So I feel like by having an open-ended long-term strategy, you’re setting a lot of your groups up to end in failure. And I believe that how you end things is almost as important as how you start them.

Rich Birch — right

Adam Ader — And while by giving groups a solid end date, you give them the chance to end well…

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Adam Ader — …and also to recommit going forward. We hit the end of the 10 weeks and we’re like, man, this group, we’re we’re going places together. We love each other. like Let’s recommit to each other for the next period of time.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Adam Ader — And I think there’s power in that.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. Yeah, I can, I’m a huge fan of Alpha. I, at my church, outside of my job, I volunteer as an Alpha host. And so I get, I’ve often said like, it’s amazing in 10 weeks. It’s i actually kind of like the beginning of it because it’s like, these are all people I don’t know. And I’m like, I know by the end of these 10 weeks, we’re not only going to see some great progress happen in people’s lives, but we’re also going to see, you know, they’re going to form some friendships, which is incredible. So love that.

Rich Birch — Well, let’s loop back. Great leaders outweigh content. That’s a huge saying. I think that’s true. Huge learning. So talk to us about that kind of philosophically. And I’d love to get in how do you find leaders, you know, doing these term based? I feel like, man, aren’t you on a treadmill all the time trying to get into leaders training them? Let’s talk through all that.

Adam Ader — Yeah, that’s, that’s great. You know, I, I like like every guy who goes to Bible college, I ended up playing some guitar, right? And, you know, and, ah you know, I went through a period like much to my wife’s horror, where I spent way too much time and money trying to find like the the perfect guitar and the perfect, you know, amp and pedal and all these things. And and a quote from a, from a jazz musician named Philemonius Monk stood out to me at the time he said, um you know he said, he said, gear is important. But he said you got to figure that stuff out early and fast so that you can focus on things that are more important.

Adam Ader — And for me, I think that that holds true with content, especially in group settings…

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Adam Ader — …where we can sort of get so focused on finding the perfect content that is going to do you know everything that we want it to do. And that’s going to create these you know these saintly, fully-disciple, fully-on-mission people.

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — And I think we can get so bogged down in the weeds that we miss out on the stuff that is that is truly important. Because I think that, man, people are the thing that make the engine go, right?

Rich Birch — Right, right.

Adam Ader — And and if we’re if we’re helping people become people who can disciple, who can help others grow, right?

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — that’s kind of the that’s the money spot. That’s where wherere where we need to be pouring gas on the fire if we want to really make a difference. And I’ve seen it play out time and time again. You know we’ve had you know we we had a long period of being heavily invested in Rooted. And in fact, for years, it was almost our only group offering outside of the corporate…

Rich Birch — Right. Okay. Just kind of pushing everybody through Rooted. Yeah.

Adam Ader — Yeah, everybody all in, and it was that it was a beautiful season of like top-down involvement from our from my church and our leadership that ah that helped a lot of people grow. And I was one of those, again, early naysayers who was like, you you mean to tell me we’re just gonna keep shuffling out the same content over and over again, right? How’s that gonna work? And then you start to see it in action and you see it snowball and gain momentum…

Rich Birch — Yep.

Adam Ader — …and you see people who participate multiple times, and yet come out of it looking a little different each time.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Adam Ader — And then you see the leader step up and come out of it looking a little bit bit better and a little bit stronger, and the fruit is a little bit more visible each time. So that was enough to kind of break me of my my obsession and focus on content, and instead say, you know what, if we can find something that aligns with where we want to go, where we want to see people go, who we want them to become, right? We can…that’s that’s enough, right? Because if we put good leaders that we trust on guiding people through this content, we can feel very confident that good things are going to happen.

Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. Let me challenge a little bit though. Where do you find all these great leaders? Like that that that sounds amazing. I think our, maybe it’s just me, but I’ve leaned on the crutch of content in the past because I literally have thought I probably haven’t articulated like this until you said it but I’m like, yeah, but if we just get some good content, we can kind of take a mediocre leader and make it work. But man, if I’m putting more weight on finding leaders, how are you finding them? What are you doing to to extract these leaders out of you know your community to find them?

Adam Ader — Yeah, yeah, that’s that’s really good. I think um for us, you know I think a big key has been has been clarity about what we want from a leader first and foremost.

Rich Birch — Okay, yep.

Adam Ader — And when you when you say, you know hey, I have a stack of mediocre leaders and I’m going to try to let the content be you know be a champion, I think we we have leaned hard instead into saying, what do you actually need to lead a good experience through this season? Right?

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Adam Ader — And trying to set the bar for for people help them understand we don’t need you to be a preacher, a theologian, you know?

Rich Birch — Right, right.

Adam Ader — You don’t need [inaudible] certificates to lead a good group. Man, you just got to have some relational chops and care enough to go in on this. And, and then reframing group leaders as as guides, right?

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Adam Ader — You know, its sometimes we’ll use the term Sherpa. But now I think according to my daughters, that means that’s a clothing item. And more than it is, they know.

Rich Birch — Nice. That’s funny.

Adam Ader — But, you know, um but if we can reframe what we actually expect from them, and sort of like remove some of the terror, being asked to lead, right?

Rich Birch — Yes. That’s good. That’s good. Yep. For sure.

Adam Ader — You know I mean, that that helps us get people on the bus. And then you know we like to say that, you know, we can take a willing heart with some relational skill and a love for Jesus, and we can we can get them to the place where they can lead a great group. Um, I think we’ve been guilty in the past of kind of saying, you know, Hey, here’s, here’s your stuff, right? Here’s, here’s, here’s your content. Here’s, here’s a, here’s a one hour training…

Rich Birch — Yes.

Adam Ader — …and, uh, good luck. You know, go go forth us and, uh, and change lives. Uh, and I think that, uh, both through the way Rooted the structured and through the lessons we’ve learned around that over the years, we’ve learned that, um, having a, having a robust investment in helping those leaders figure it out, um, walking alongside of them, not just in a and it kind of a vague address sense, but, you know, weekly, we’re connected to these leaders and um helping them troubleshoot issues.

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — In that sense, right, we are able to get leaders there. The second part of this is, and this is another lesson learned from Rooted for us. I swear, I don’t work for the Rooted network, but you’re going to hear that from me.

Rich Birch — No, it’s good. We’re fans of Rooted. We’ve had, we’ve had the Rooted guys on. We’ve, it comes up for sure. Like it’s, it’s a substrate and particularly, you know, fast growing churches, people across the country, it’s really had a huge impact. We, we love, I love the guys at Mariners and love, you know, their gift to to all of us through Rooted. It’s amazing. It’s great. So yeah, no, that’s good. What’s what’s the other lesson you’ve learned through that?

Adam Ader — Yeah, absolutely, is um that the the best recruiters of leaders are leaders for us.

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Adam Ader — So yeah, and that’s that’s a Rooted foundational principle. And we’ve been able to sort of transplant that from Rooted to all of our group types.

Adam Ader — We start with that end in mind, where we’re asking leaders to from week one, be considering who’s who’s the person that can step up and do what you’re doing right now.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Adam Ader — And since most of them have come from this place of, hey, we got shoulder tapped by our leader, right.

Rich Birch — Right. Right.

Adam Ader — And ah they were crazy. But I took a step out and and I received what I needed to complete a good group experience. So that that has been really helpful for us. And then, you know, our group of pastors on the ground are just, man, they’re really good at casting vision…

Rich Birch — Yep.

Adam Ader — …and making making compelling asks. So that’s kind of a secret sauce for us.

Rich Birch — That’s good. Talk to me about the support and training, just a little bit more, kind of flesh that out. If if I if one of those great groups pastors came to me and said, hey, we you know, you’d be interested, we’d be interested in you leading a group, um how how do you provide some training and support for me for, you know, a term or multiple terms? What’s that look like?

Adam Ader — Yeah, for us, it really comes down to we we do have an initial ah about a 90 minute training that we’re going to take all leaders through. And that’s where they’re going to gain base level understanding of our mission, our vision, our values and our systems in groups.

Rich Birch — Yep. Yep. Love it.

Adam Ader — You know, that’s that’s the starting point. But then from there, once we sort of would get the yes, we seal the deal, you know, we close the sale. We get them connected to do a couple of things. The first one is we get them connected to a coach. And that’s a volunteer leader for us who leads leaders. Not a crazy concept. But that’s just one more voice in their ear, kind of telling them, hey, you can do this. And I got your back, right? I’m praying [inaudible] all that good stuff.

Adam Ader — And then we’re really committed to 10 weeks of ongoing training that happens around the first 10 weeks that their group meets.

Rich Birch — Okay. Yep.

Adam Ader — And that’s been really helpful for us. we’ve We’ve just kind of developed some pieces in-house that can be delivered in anything from a 10-minute bite-size ah video message to an hour-long discussion.

Rich Birch —That’s cool.

Adam Ader — But so it’s kind of modular for us. And for groups that meet on our site locations during the short term, those ten-week terms, they’re going to receive from one of our group staff members or coaches weekly guided training through those 10 topics.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s great.

Adam Ader — And they’re just around you know basic vital things you need to do to lead a group well. Things like how to you know create community from the start, how to serve together, how to deal with conflict, how to help people grow, all these things. And for our groups that generate that need offsite in homes or locations, we have that content in video format, and it can be sort of administered by their coach or by a staff member. Hey, watch this video. Let’s have a back and forth conversation about it. Let’s see how your group is doing in this area.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s great. I love that. And you know, both from Alpha and from Rooted, there’s there is some power you can see in the like, hey, we’re leading this together. We’re all together. We’re kind of doing some sort of pre-huddle thing, you know, a little bit of training, a little bit of um even like, hey, I’m having the trouble with this person or I’m not sure how to draw them out. It’s amazing how that kind of on-site in-person feedback really helps leaders grow and step into you know something great. So you can see how taking similar lessons and then applying them to the rest of your group system. Yeah, I can totally see how that is ah is working for sure.

Rich Birch — Pivoting in a slightly different direction I know when you know over the years sitting in the kind of executive pastor seat, the communication seat, trying to kind of you know we got a lot of different things we need to communicate. And I’m thinking three terms a year group stuff like that’s a lot of talking about groups to get people into groups. What does that look like for you guys? How do you actually communicate like how are you you know promoting groups what does that side of it look like? And then um yeah let’s start there that’s the starting point.

Adam Ader — Yeah, yeah, that’s that’s great. And, you know, it can’t it can kind of feel like a let’s just keep shoveling coal on to the same fire…

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — …you know, over the course of the year thing.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Adam Ader — But ah but what what we found is actually kind of the regularity of it has really helped us kind of create some rhythms throughout the year that have like created a sense of expectancy in our people that have been with us for a while.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Adam Ader — And helps even with things like, hey, when we’re talking speech and calendar, promotional marketing things, the The good thing is we you know we lean hard into celebrating wins of all sizes and we lean hard into gathering stories, right? I mean, if you’ve got the numbers and you’ve got the stories…

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Adam Ader — …then you know you can feel strongly like you’re winning. So if we’re if we’re gathering those things and we have a bucket of those stories, those testimonials, it makes marketing a little bit easier, right?

Adam Ader — And you know and then when we have a a marketing and communications team that has bought in with us, and when our upper leadership is also bought into the vision and the approach for groups, those conversations do become quite a bit easier, right?

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Adam Ader — Obviously we all we all have one sandbox to play in, right? And we know that you know the weekend announcement um you know is kind of the thing that we all vie for, and the the sermon topic mention is you know, even oh that whole question…

Rich Birch — Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. That’s the holy grail. Yeah, for sure.

Adam Ader — Yeah, exactly. So, you know, it’s but ah thankfully, you know, it doesn’t turn into a game of who can butter up the senior pastor best to to get a toss in. When the vision is there from the top, it makes that stuff a little easier. And so when we can go back and say, hey, this is the thing that that is both moving and growing, right, and we’re seeing life change happen in it for us in our context, it’s not really too hard to get the buy-in for the mention we need.

Adam Ader — The other thing that’s been really helpful for us is that we’ve learned, because we now have multiple group types available on this group finder, that trying to create a sense of FOMO, a fear of missing out for people, is, is a real thing that can lend some, uh, that can give us some kind of heat going into a group season.

Rich Birch — Oh that’s good.

Adam Ader — Because when we can say, well, we can say, Hey, but we’ve got a group for you, no matter where you’re at on your journey, but they fill up fast and there’s not an unlimited set of spots for just the one big thing we’re all doing.

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — You need to get up, you need to get up on that group finder on January 4th, when those groups go live…

Rich Birch — Right. Yep.

Adam Ader — …if you want your “pick of a litter.” So.

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — That’s all you know that that thing I think has been able to replace some of that ah, Oh man, we have got to get the main stage announcement every week this month.

Rich Birch — Right. Yeah, that’s good.

Adam Ader — You know?

Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. That’s good. Well, and you can see the, as somebody who’s mildly interested in marketing stuff, you can see how that kind of open window, hey, enrollments open, jump in, ah you know, a couple times a year, you could build some serious insight, excitement around that. We kind of, we kind of, you know, joked about it, but loop back on a lead pastor think of a lead pastor’s listening in and talk to us, you know, what would you say to a lead pastor about the like, random throwaway comment in their message about groups, something they’re learning in a group, you know, how important is that to the, you know, the the group’s culture at at your church?

Adam Ader — Yeah, yeah, you know, for us, um what it comes down to is that’s the most trusted voice in our organization for our people, right?

Rich Birch — Yep.

Adam Ader — We know it all. And um sometimes, you know, you get the sermon, right? Okay, we’re going to do the one big, “this is about community” sermon this year.

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — You know, if it when you get that, you know, that’s gold.

Rich Birch — Right. Yep.

Adam Ader — We know that. But people are listening to that, to the things that are sort of in between the big points, right? So if, if your lead pastor can say, uh, you know, I did Rooted this fall…

Rich Birch — Yep.

Adam Ader — …you know, and in my Rooted group, this is something that happened. In my Rooted group, here’s something I learned. Or here’s a way we connected or in my prayer experience during Rooted, I got, you know, I felt God speak to me in this way. Uh, man, to me, those, those reinforced the importance of the big announcements, and they turned people’s ears. Because we have to battle constantly the idea that all of our ex-Catholics, a lot of them don’t have a strong context for just the things that your mainline denominational churches do, right?

Rich Birch — Yep.

Adam Ader — So the idea that somebody came to us from the maybe the Methodist church down the road that they probably have some idea what a small group is, we can’t assume those things.

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — We can’t take those things for granted. So to hear personal stories, the impact stories, or have stories shared of life change from those things, those are those are invaluable to us. You know? They’re they’re also not things that we can count on at every moment because, like like you alluded to earlier, and in a church that is growing rapidly and whose decision making is filtered through the lens of how are we going to reach the prodigal. We have to fit in and align with that, or you know we’re just pulling sideways energy away from the mission, and that’s something we never want to do or be.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. Um, do you do in any of your, um, types of groups in that maybe it’d be in that kind of small group, the kind of more typical small group content kind of group. Do you do sermon based groups, like groups that follow along and generate questions or maybe do you guys generate questions based on, you know, what you guys are talking about on the weekends? What tell me about that.

Adam Ader — Yeah, great question. We we have a weekly sermon study guide that’s developed in-house.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Adam Ader — And goes out via just an email subscription list that can be accessed through our website.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Adam Ader — Goes out weekly service over the course of the year. And we make that available to any of our long-term group types that want to engage that way. It’s not a primary push for us, but it is available and an option.

Rich Birch — Right. Okay.

Adam Ader — Last data for us was that out of groups that are not meeting ah just in a 10-week window, those long-term groups, about 25 to 30% of them are using that weekly service study guide.

Rich Birch — Okay. Okay. That’s cool. Well, you’ve given us, then and then we’ll link to this in the show notes. You’ve given us the Parkview Group’s leader guide, ah which is a fantastic resource. I would encourage people to, you know, pick this up and, you know, take a look through it. It’s a, it’s a great resource even to inspire you, but tell us a little bit about where does this work in the training process? How are you using this tool? Talk to us a little bit about this.

Adam Ader — Yeah, that’s great. So all of our leaders, regardless of group type that they’re leading, even if it’s a group type like Alpha or Rooted that would have some of its own distinctive training elements, is still going to get walked through this handbook…

Rich Birch — Okay. Yep.

Adam Ader — …by a member of our team as their first step into groups. We feel like it’s really important for them to start with the overall mission, vision, and purposes of of our church, and then how groups fits into that. The last thing we’re trying to do is create offshoots, right…

Rich Birch — Yes.

Adam Ader — …or or little [inaudible] that meet in people’s living rooms…

Rich Birch — Yep, yes. Yes.

Adam Ader — …you know we don’t want that.

Adam Ader — But this handbook tool is meant to just give them grounding of you know what a group leader is, what we expect from them. You know the we have four traits listed in there that would a factor into what we think a successful group leader even is. And then it introduces them to our kind of our systems and processes, which you know are are essential to keep people on track with all that.

Rich Birch — Love it.

Adam Ader — So that’s really the place of the handbook.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s great. i I’d encourage people to take a look what the part what there’s a bunch of it that I loved. I love the clarity of the language is clearly you spend have spent a lot of time to hey, let’s get to something that’s like super practical. Later in the book, there’s a whole or in the booklet, there’s a whole conversation around, hey, you are not alone. And it clearly outlines what a coach is and what a coach isn’t, which I loved. I love that language, particularly. I think it frames that discussion very well. And then also, which I think is so important because I’ve seen too many group members kind of die on the vine on this issue. It’s when to refer.

Rich Birch —So like, if there are things happening in your group that are going sideways, like because these people want to help folks, they just keep taking it. And it’s like, no, there are times where we should you know refer to other people. Let’s let’s escalate this stuff. I thought, again, what ah what a helpful, even just downloading that and ripping it off, sure, give them credit. But you know using that kind of language would be helpful ah you know for you friends that are listening in. It’s a great resource. Thanks for providing that for us.

Adam Ader — Oh yeah, no problem. You know It’s like every every group leader’s worst nightmare, right? That rogue group member that you don’t know what to do with. And man, we we feel like the quicker we can put those fears at ease for people, say it’s not your job to manage people in crisis through these things. You can support, pray and love, but man, send them where they need to go. That’s important.

Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s so good. Great, great, great resource. Thanks for for sharing that for us. As we kind of look to the future, what are, you know, when you think about groups down the road, what are the questions you’re asking, things that are on the horizon, stuff that you’re thinking about, you know, that we’re, you know, you’re wrestling with, or maybe some stuff you’re experimenting with, that kind of thing. What what are you thinking about for the future for groups at Parkview?

Adam Ader — Yeah, you know, I mean, one of the things we’re thinking about is how to help people sort of self-select into the right group for them at any given moment.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Adam Ader — And, you know, we we want to be able to offer with each of these open groups terms, we want to be able to offer something that can catch people no matter where they’re at along their spiritual journey. Right.

Rich Birch — That’s good. Yeah, that’s great.

Adam Ader — And that’s where content’s helpful. But it also means when you have more options, you have more ah more potential for confusion, right? More opportunities to sort of lose people in the weeds of what do I do?

Rich Birch — Right.

Adam Ader — And we’ve also, you know, we’ve all seen what happens when somebody gets in the wrong kind of group, right?

Rich Birch — Right, right.

Adam Ader — And but so figuring out ways to help people gain a greater understanding of what’s available. But also um we’re having conversations about what maybe a short assessment tool for people might look like through through our app or our website to help people, you know maybe if they can answer a few questions and we can spit back some group suggestions, maybe even alongside some personal like growth resources and serving suggestions. That’s that’s the kind of tool that really has my ears perked.

Rich Birch — That’s cool.

Adam Ader — Because you know we all know that there’s no one size fits all group type or even personal growth tool that’s going to be exactly what everyone needs along the way. But trying to help people find the right avenue and the right step. We want simplicity, but we also want enough flexibility that we can yeah really help people take sort of a custom-made step forward.

Rich Birch — That’s great. I love that idea of, you know, you could imagine a survey that’s five or six questions that kind of helps get a sense of that. And then it spits out a likeliness score or something like that. Here’s a couple of different types of groups that you could try. um Yeah, I could see that could be really helpful paired within your online group selector. That could be super helpful for sure for helping people self sort.

Rich Birch — Yeah the the the upside of self-sorting on a you know a menu is, wow, there’s lots of options. The downside is, wow, there’s lots of options. You know?

Adam Ader — Right!

Rich Birch — So um you know helping people with that, is you can see where that’d be helpful. Well, this has been incredible, super helpful, Adam. Anything you’d like to say kind of in as we close today’s conversation, I really appreciate you being here today.

Adam Ader — Yeah, no, no, I would just I just like to say that, you know, the the real journey for me has been people, people, people.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Adam Ader — And, you know, through my whole time in student ministry here, where I was kind of running programming and and doing all of your standard student minister stuff. Um, you know, over, over that 13 year stretch, uh, it really became about, man, all these hours spent in front of the computer, uh, planning and writing, um, are they impacting people as much as, as the leaders that we’re pouring into? And the answer came back to me no over and over again.

Adam Ader — So when I had an opportunity to, uh, to jump into groups world, it made, it made perfect sense to me. And, um, man, every, every hour spent pouring into a leader, pouring into people, man, that’s not one wasted.

Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.

Adam Ader — And that’s where I want to continue to pour my, my energy and I hope others will too.

Rich Birch — That’s so good. Well, I appreciate you being here, Adam. If people want to track with you or with the church, where do we want to send them online?

Adam Ader — Yeah, absolutely, parkviewchurch.com is our church’s website. You can see what we’re doing, see what we’re doing to try to continue reaching people in the south suburbs, in the south side of Chicago. And um you know my contact information is also available on the website.

Rich Birch — That’s great. Thanks for being here today, sir. Thank you so much.

Adam Ader — Hey, thanks Rich, appreciate it.

Welcome back to the unSeminary podcast. We’re talking with Nick Stumbo, the Executive Director of Pure Desire Ministries.

According to a Barna study, 75% of Christian men and 40% of Christian women view pornography at least occasionally, with 67% of pastors having a personal history of porn use. How can churches effectively address pervasive issues of sexual brokenness and foster healing within their congregations? Tune in as Nick shares his personal journey of healing, and how churches can create both a safe place and a safe process through which people can experience transformation and freedom.

Visit Pure Desire Ministries at puredesire.org to find local groups, purchase the Sexual Integrity 101 course, or see how your church can get involved. Plus download the free ebooks for 5 Steps to Freedom from Porn and 7 Keys to Understanding Betrayal Trauma.

There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally!

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Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. Really looking forward to today’s conversation. This is a topic that I know that people in your church are wrestling with. I know people on your team are probably wrestling with. It’s the kind of thing that we maybe don’t want to talk about, but we really should be talking about.

Rich Birch — Super excited to have Nick Stumbo with us. He is a third generation pastor, started his ministry career at East Hills Alliance Church in Washington state. He served as the lead pastor for more than a decade, observing the fallout of sexual brokenness and devastation in the lives of the men and women in his church.

Rich Birch — Confronted with his own addiction to pornography, Nick and his wife found hope and healing through counseling and group ministries of Pure Desire, and it radically changed their lives. Really looking forward to this conversation. His public disclosure to the church body led to a revival of forgiveness and healing that ultimately launched Pure Desire groups for men and women. Nick has stayed connected to Pure Desire and today serves as executive director. Nick, I am so glad to have you here today. Welcome to the show.

Nick Stumbo — Yes, thank you. So glad to be here.

Rich Birch — Okay. Fill in the picture there a little bit. If there’s, you know, what, what did I miss? How, how, how else do I want to, uh, you know, if people bump into you on the road, what, do what do you, what do you want to know about Nick Stumbo?

Nick Stumbo — Yeah, I think it’s so crucial that the ministry I get to help lead is the ministry that changed my life.

Rich Birch — That’s so good.

Nick Stumbo — Because my wife and I were really on the brink of of divorce because of my binge/purge issues with pornography. And I always like to clarify that like many, I think sincere Christian men, I believed my own lies. I believed that, okay, that time was the last time. I’m never going to go back to pornography. I’d apologize to my wife. I would own it. You know, I had accountability software. I did all the things that my Christian upbringing had taught me to do about this subject, and yet I would still find myself going back. And you just, you feel like you’re stuck in this cycle that you can never break out of until we found Pure Desire Ministries and really found ah still a very deeply biblical approach, but with a a much different angle than anything we knew before.

Nick Stumbo — And the way that that transformed our marriage and and my life is what led to, you know, the steps we took with our church and then ultimately becoming a part of the ministry was just seeing that there is real healing, that that Christ does set people free. But sometimes the answers we’ve given in the church are what I describe as being too thin. I mean, they’re they’re very true. Read your Bible and pray and trust God and confess. And all those things are vital elements.

Nick Stumbo — But what we have so often missed is the “why” question. Why do I keep going back to this thing? And when you understand the why, when you understand some of the deeper parts of your soul and your heart and your mind that need to be renewed, it’s a life-changing process. So I think that’s kind of filling in the blanks. It’s like, this isn’t just a job or another ministry. It’s a passion that we’re living. And then getting to see other people find freedom from something they’ve believed, maybe for decades. Well, this is this is the thorn in my flesh, right? This is the, all well, all guys struggle a little bit, don’t they? So I guess it just, it is what it is. It’s like, no, when when Christ said that we could be free, He meant it and we really can experience it um as we walk this road.

Rich Birch — Well, yeah, I don’t think there’s anybody that’s listening in today that’s like, oh, that I don’t know what you’re talking about. This is you know not an issue, but there’s some really compelling statistics. You did a study with Barna that reveals that 75% of Christian men and 40% of Christian women view pornography, at least occasionally. And something like two thirds of pastors have a history with pornography, nearly 20% are still struggling, something like that.

Nick Stumbo — Yep, yep.

Rich Birch — Not, not… ah yeah This a pervasive issue. Let’s start with, from your perspective, why is this issue so pervasive even within the church? Like why why is this why does this seem to be one of those struggles that’s like defining our age?

Nick Stumbo — Yeah. Well, I think one of the pieces we often miss is just the origin of this is not sin. You know, the origin of this is we are sexual beings made in the image of God as sexual beings. You know, male and female, he created us. And in that sexuality, our male and female-ness is tucked the image of God, that we’re image bearers of God, even in our gender and our sexuality.

Rich Birch — That’s good.

Nick Stumbo — And so it makes absolute sense that the enemy of our souls would want to get to the very core of our sense of identity and who God made us to be and create brokenness.

Nick Stumbo — And so what we like to bring up is that there’s not just a few people that struggle with some sexual addiction, but that we all have been born into a sinful world. We’ve had things done to us or by us that often are not discussed. And so ah what I find is so common in churches and Christian homes, and I mean, it’s my own story, is we just don’t talk about this topic. We don’t know how to address it. And yet everybody is a sexual being experiencing some level of fallenness in their sexuality.

Nick Stumbo — And so you ask, why do we struggle? It might be similar to if we said, you know, what if parents never taught their kids like just how to eat, like when to eat, what foods are good, what foods are bad. And just from day one, we just kind of left the fridge open and said, well, eat what you want, when you want, you know, and then if they got into their twenties and they had terrible eating habits. We’d say, well, well yeah, and no one ever trained them how to how to eat well, how to be a healthy human being. And yet that’s almost exactly what we’re doing in our sexuality.

Nick Stumbo — We’re all born into it. We all have desires and longings and hormones and and things that that God gave us and that Satan and sin have twisted. And if we haven’t been discipled, If we haven’t been trained, if we haven’t been given opportunities to learn and grow, then we’ve gotten stuck in some really unhealthy patterns. And for all that we know about Christ and the gospel and the truth, if that area of our life hasn’t been touched by others who helped train and disciple us, I think we shouldn’t be surprised that people are struggling.

Nick Stumbo — So it’ it’s really, I think, a combination of all those things, a lack of conversation, a lack of training, and just the reality that sexuality is a part of our human experience. And then maybe you add to that the fourth component that we’re we’re living in such a sexualized culture that if you put you know immature, and if I could use that word about our sexuality, we’re often immature in our thinking, immature Christians into a world that is just overrun by sexuality. Well, of course we’re going to struggle.

Rich Birch — Right. Right. Of course.

Nick Stumbo — Because we haven’t really ever learned or been taught a better way.

Rich Birch — Yeah, well, I we’re already hearing a little bit of where I think Pure Desire, you know, your ministry has a, I think, a really healthy and, you know, so maybe a slightly different approach to this area than than we’ve maybe seen traditionally. But, you know, you talked about at the beginning that you found that, you know, Pure Desire had a unique angle that, you know, maybe other ministries or other approaches or maybe just our traditional approach was too thin. How does Pure Desire help in this situation? How can you either help an individual or help a ministry that’s that’s trying to wrestle with these issues?

Nick Stumbo — Yeah. Well, I think some of my own story plays into that. You know, as I mentioned, I was doing the things the church taught me to do. In college I had an a men’s of accountability group where every week we would meet together. And, and I think this is really common in churches and kind of say, are you struggling? You know, did you have a bad week? Did you relapse? Did you look at pornography? You know, someone said no. We’re like, Hey, great job. Keep it up. And if someone said, yeah, I had a bad week, like, man, we’re so sorry. We pray for you.

Nick Stumbo — And when you think about that environment, while it it is wonderful and appropriate to have other men or women in our lives that can ask us the hard questions, it really is very performance-based and very much sin management. Did you do the thing this week that you don’t want to do? And if you did it, try harder not to do it this week.

Nick Stumbo — But what is so often ignored, um and what I didn’t see in those days of weekly accountability and all the steps I was taking to be free, was what were the deeper issues that were driving my use of pornography? Like, why was I going to that? And I think that’s what’s made Pure Desire’s approach so revolutionary is understanding that pornography is not necessarily the problem.

Nick Stumbo — It is a problem, but in our lives, it’s not the problem. That pornography is the symptom of much deeper issues. And I think that’s where we start to see the commonality for, whether you’re a Christian or a non-Christian, is we all have a little bit of a warped view of our own identity and value and worth. And because of that, we have a warped view of who God is. And there is parts of our brokenness that because of past trauma or pain or just lies that we believe about ourselves that come out of our early years.

Nick Stumbo — I mean, I’ve I’ve done groups with like hundreds of men now and I think every one of them has some version of the lie of believing I’m not good enough. Do I have what it takes? Do I measure up as a man? Maybe I’m not, I’m not a real man. I’m not good enough. And and that comes from experiences that we’ve had in life as a child and our growing up years. And what happens with those lies, those core beliefs that we’re carrying around is we need to have an answer to them. And of course the right answer is understanding who we are in Christ and in God.

Nick Stumbo — But the challenge is those lies have been rooted in our soul through experiences and through negative relationships or things that happen to us. And when we just preach at it or or throw a verse at it or pray about it, that tends to be a very cognitive response to something happening deeper in our soul.

Nick Stumbo — And so if we cannot understand why I go to pornography, because pornography becomes a false solution to a real problem. Because in a moment, for all of us, whether it’s pornography or fantasy or acting out in any kind of sexually compulsive behavior, for a moment, those lies get answered.

Nick Stumbo — We feel valued. We feel seen. We feel heard. We feel important. We feel wanted. And even if it’s followed a few moments later by guilt and shame, our brain, as God designed it, latches on to that feeling of being good enough and says, man, that reward was worth it. Because it was answering my my deeply held questions. So what we try to help people see is that, yes, pornography is a problem, but actually in your life, it’s functioning as a pseudo-solution. And if we can help you get into some of that deeper stuff of why you go there, and and then learn how to have real accountability…

Rich Birch — Right.

Nick Stumbo — …which isn’t just telling other people ask me how I’m doing, but is saying I’m learning to be accountable to other people by having commitments that I’m following through on. I’m taking responsibility for my own journey, and not just telling people to check in on me, ah then healing and transformation really can be possible.

Nick Stumbo — And I think what what also goes with that is you start to talk about, you know, soul lies and understanding where we need to experience God and and relearn some of those negative messages. You see how it can be a long process. You know, we’re talking about transform. One of the things we say at Pure Desire is we’re not here to change a behavior. We’re here to change the way you do life.

Nick Stumbo — And changing the way you do life, you know, for any one of us, like that takes work and effort and consistency.

Rich Birch — Yep.

Nick Stumbo — And I think it’s an area where churches have been challenged because, you know, we want to have a great men’s weekend and talk about pornography and, and men confess and we’re all like, man, and God forgives. And it’s awesome. It is. I’ve been in some of those experiences, but then we kind of send men home, or women, you know, women can have similar experiences and we’re like, all right, thumbs up. We did it. We dealt with that.

Rich Birch — Right. Check that off.

Nick Stumbo — But if we’re talking about changing the brain…

Rich Birch — Yeah.

Nick Stumbo — …like this is going to be a long process.

Rich Birch — Right.

Nick Stumbo — And churches, I think need to um embrace that as part of a healing structure in their church.

Rich Birch — Yeah, I love that. I think that’s ah what a fresh perspective, and I think a realistic perspective. If you’ve walked with anyone who has struggled in this area, you realize this is true. And there’s like an interesting vicious loop there, you know, I’ve seen…

Nick Stumbo — Yes.