Here's the truth: sometimes it's hard to admit we don't have all the answers. Or that we don't have it all together. Or even something as simple as "I'm just too tired to think about that right now." We want to prove we can do it all! Like our friend Ronnie Brown once said, we like to pretend we have a big red "S" on our shirts.
But... we don't. And we can't do it all. And that's not a bad thing, that's actually the way God planned it. On today's episode, Mandy Smith joins us again to talk about how vulnerable pastors lead teams, recruit leaders, and manage their time. Mandy brings so much depth and wisdom to the podcast and we know that you'll be encouraged and challenged by her story and experience. Mandy Smith is the Senior Pastor of University Christian Church in Cincinnati OH. For more with Mandy, check out episode 184 where she shares about her book, The Vulnerable Pastor, and be sure tocheck out more of her work at Missio Alliance as part of their writing collective! You won't want to miss out on next week's episode featuring Jemar Tisby of the Reformed African American Network. We had a great conversation with him that we can't wait to share with you! Until then, enjoy episode 223 and thanks for pastoring people in Kingdom living in your 200church!
The Straight Dope: the plain, unvarnished truth, especially something that's hard to hear. Well, that's pretty clear, and that's what Matt Frey is delivering in the area of discipleship in the local church, and in the life of the Christian!
If you want to get a bead on Matt, check out his Men's Ministry Invitation video here. Matt is the Discipleship Pastor at Pathway Church in Beaver Falls, PA. When Matt, Jeff, and Jonny recorded this episode, Matt and Jeff had not talked in over 25 years. Like any old friend, you pick right up where you left off, without skipping a beat! The magic of this episode is that Matt is able to talk to all of us pastors in smaller churches, the straight dope - on discipleship! Very practical, very encouraging! More than 25 years ago, Jeff and Matt worked together on a belt at UPS. Back then, neither one of them could even imagine podcasting, let alone think that they'd be talking to each other over two decades later, encouraging thousands of pastors all over the world. And yet here we are! Matt Frey joins us today to talk about his 11 years as a Discipleship Pastor in Beaver Falls, PA and give some awesome insight into how we can think about and encourage discipleship in our small churches! If you've ever struggled with Sunday school, small groups, or just the big idea of discipleship in general, today's podcast will help you think in fresh ways and have a huge impact on your ministry.
On today's podcast, Jeff has a conversation with Robin Boda, from Bridge of Hope, an urban missionary in St. Louis, MO. Robin shares stories and insights from years of working in and for her community and is realistic about the difficulties and the incredible benefits of committing yourself to your community.
We have talked on this topic many times, but some of our favorite conversations were episode 159 where we talk about growing your community impact, and episode 127 with Karl Vaters where we discuss making an impact beyond the four walls of your church! If Robin's conversation got you thinking about cultivating diversity in your church, we ALWAYS point people back to episode 86 with Christena Cleveland and her discussion of the book "Disunity in Christ." We hope that this episode has been encouraging to you and your ministry! Jeff & Jonny encourage you to feel free to bless Steve and Robin and their team at Bridge of Hope Ministries! You can donate here!
Real talk: do you have someone you can really open up to? To confide in? To... confess to?
As pastors and church leaders, we all know that scripture teaches that we should confess our sins to someone, but in reality, how many of us are actually doing that as a practice in our lives? On today's podcast Dan Tarrant joins Jeff and talks about leadership, spiritual practices, and the importance of confession in his life. Dan is a friend of Jeff's college roommate and frequent podcast guest "Rob from Philly" and we are so excited to have him join us in this very important episode! In this episode we switch back and forth between talking to Dan Tarrant and with Rob Tarnoviski - as they share their perspective on bringing the first Roman Catholic Venue to the Willowcreek Global Leadership Summit. A Seinfeld-esque guitar bridge plays in between the clips... Enjoy! Check out Dan's website right here! To hear more from Rob (who makes an appearance on this episode), check out episode 137, episode 38, and episode 39! Rob and Dan's friendship has had a huge impact on Jeff and listening back to Rob's story will help you and your church moving forward. We'll see you next week! Click on the image below to see all of Dan's books!
Greg Atkinson makes his second appearance on the 200churches Podcast in this episode. Greg was so kind to help us out in the early days, on episode 25 when he talked to us about how to turn around a messy church.
Greg is a great guy with a huge heart for ministry and people. He and his wife have three kids and are right in the swirl of a busy family life just like so many of us are. Greg has written a book to help smaller churches evaluate themselves in the area of first impressions. Studies have shown that guests decide whether or not they will return to a church after just the first ten minutes of their first visit – long before you as a pastor ever stand up to preach! It’s true – you only get one chance to make a great first impression – and Greg has written an ultimately practical book to help you do just that! Here are links to Greg’s online presence, his first episode on our podcast, and where you can buy the book: Greg’s Twitter Greg’s website Episode 23 with Greg - How To Turn Around A Messy Church Greg’s book – Secrets of a Secret Shopper! Check out the official website of the book here - lot's of great stuff about Greg and his book!
Jeff and I get asked to speak once in awhile to groups of pastors and church leaders, and there is a question that we are always, inevitably asked:
What's the number 1 issue facing small church pastors? After 4 years of doing this podcast and talking to pastors from all over the world, we've heard about nearly every issue a pastor could face. Financial struggle. Disgruntled members. Sexual temptation. The list goes on. But there is one constant issue that we hear time and time again, and that is that small church pastors feel lonely and isolated. It's one thing to know the problem and another thing completely to offer a solution, and our guests today understand both. Tim and Barb Claxton are coaches who work with pastors across the country. The main issue they say they see? Loneliness. On today's podcast, they talk about that issue among others and offer some hope to struggling pastors. In fact, Tim and Barb were so excited to work with pastors that they've offered up a special coaching package specifically for our 200churches listeners. They have five openings for a 3-month coaching package - and if you email them during this month of January, 2017, they will offer you a 3-month coaching package for $300, where you will have two 45-minute coaching calls each month. Email them at info@fulfillyourdestinycoaching.com. If you are mired in loneliness and/or isolation, we want you to know that there is hope. We would encourage you to connect with a coach or other pastors or even shoot us here at 200churches an email. Because what you're doing is important, and you deserve all the support in the world. Two resources we would point you toward is one of our blog posts titled 5 Ways To Tell If You're An Isolated Pastor, and a conversation Carey Nieuwhof had with us on his podcast, The Carey Nieuwhof Leadership Podcast titled, What Smaller Church Pastors Need And Why. Again, email Tim and Barb at info@fulfillyourdestinycoaching.com or visit their website at www.fulfillyourdestinycoaching.com. God bless you Pastors! See you next Wednesday! Jonny (and Jeff)
Justin Irving is the Director of the Doctor of Ministry program and a Professor at Bethel Seminary in St. Paul MN.
Andrew Gross is the Discipleship Pastor at Bethel Christian Fellowship Church in St. Paul MN and has co-authored a book with Justin exploring the intersection of leadership resiliency and differentiation of self. This is a great episode where discuss with these guys the importance of a pastor's self differentiation in his ministry leadership. How do we lead our church family with a non-anxious presence that calms and guides, reassures and inspires? How do we stay connected with people who are in crisis without allowing their crisis to sidetrack us personally? This episode comes on the heels of episode 199 with Jeannine Brown and episode 201 with Ray Hollenbach. Check them out if you haven't already as we discuss the concept of differentiation of self. This will be very helpful to you in understanding your own leadership strengths and weaknesses. We also talk about opportunities at Bethel Seminary for advanced ministry degrees, and how Bethel offers them to pastors who want to stay in their ministries while still going "back to school". You will enjoy this! Links to assessments mentioned in this episode: Myers and Briggs Assessment DISC Assessment StrengthFinders Assessment Enneagram Assessment Justin Irving also has some great Logos Mobile Ed courses available on Pastoral Leadership. These courses are serious and significant! He outlines them in his blog post here!
Also, click on the images below to buy the books we mentioned written by Peter L. Steinke and Edwin Friedman. (These are not affiliate links. We receive nothing if you buy them... except the satisfaction of your personal growth!) :-)
There’s too much war in the world – in fact, one war is too much, right? Where there are soldiers, from many countries, there are often Military Chaplains to minister to their spiritual well being.
I remember talking to my brother-in-law on Skype when he was serving in Afghanistan in 2008-2009. He told me about his relationship with his Chaplain. He told me about how hard Iraq had been, how he had felt so spiritually desolate, and how he did not want his time in Afghanistan to be similar. Thanks to a great Chaplain, and some spiritual buddies, his time there was quite different than those desolate days in Iraq. On episode 206, “An Army Chaplain’s Small Church Ministry in Afghanistan”, we talk with Jonny’s brother, David Craig, who is an Army Chaplain currently serving in Afghanistan. His experience has many similarities, and a few differences, with our own small church ministry experiences, here in the U.S., and around the world. My big take-away was how important it is for people to gather together and worship, no matter the size of the group! This is a great reminder for all of us who do not serve in megachurches, or even large churches (about 80% of us!). If you want to hear another military leader who knocked it out of the park on our podcast, head over to Episode 72 with Dave Ronan, a U.S. Air Force instructor in Strategic Guidance and Security Cooperation. He talks about crushing it in a new ministry. With the New Year upon us, check out Episode 128 - Practical Tips For Managing Your Ministry Time with our friend from down under, John Finkelde. Happy New Year! We love all of you pastors! Praise God that we get to love, lead, and shepherd the people of God - all over the place! Jeff (& Jonny)
No worries! In this episode we talk with Silas about easy things like doubt, faith, politics, culture, pastoral leadership, a theology of disagreement, etc.
This is a very timely episode as us pastors are wrestling with how to lead our families of faith in some pretty crazy cultural times! Jonny and I LOVED our conversation with Silas. He has a Ph.D. not just because he is smart, but because he's also persistent and passionate to see the Gospel change the world. This might be our longest episode ever! Listen to it in three sittings, and then listen to it again - the second time is when you learn all the best stuff! Enjoy! You can learn all about Silas on his website here!
Today we talk with Pastor and Church Leadership Coach, John Finkelde, from Perth, Australia. John wrote a book called Preaching In A Whatever World, that contains 21 Preaching Tips for pastors. We dive deep into just a couple of those tips in this episode, and talk about the changing nature of preaching in our changing world.
Enjoy this conversation with our vibrant and cheerful mate, John! John and his wife Di are coaching and supporting pastors and churches all across the Australian continent. John is the creator of GrowAHealthyChurch.com. Click on the image below to visit John's website!
Di Finkelde is the Creator of ConversationsWithAPastorsWife.com. She blogs regularly and has recently released her second book, In Her Shoes, a book about a famous OT woman, Esther! Click on the image below to go to Di's website!
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