Dave Jacobs from SmallChurchPastor.com and DaveJacobs.net, joined us LIVE in the Des Moines IA studio for this episode! The three of us spent a day together recently and could not be together without recording a couple episodes.

Today's episode is about creating margin in your life, those breathable spaces in your day and week that help you live as a real human being, and not a ministry automaton! Dave describes the process he takes pastors through to reclaim their lives, so that they might experience some significant think time, leisure time, and spiritual time.

We hope you are encouraged by this episode as you seek to truly live life - spiritual life, ministry life, family life, and personal life - to the fullest!

As always, if you are looking for some very inexpensive coaching, Dave specializes in coaching small church pastors. His rates have not gone up in the five years we've known him (I told him he needs to raise them!) and we can totally vouch for him as a pastor coach, since we've both received helpful and life-giving coaching from him!

Jeff Keady and Jonny Craig are pastors in Central Iowa, at two different churches. Each of them preaches most weekends. As pastors know, Sundays come every single weekend! Without fail, as the sun rises and sets we need to prep messages every week to deliver every weekend!

The guys normally have a guest, but today they "interview" each other as pastors who preach weekly. They ask many questions throughout the conversation. What is the flow of the week in preparation? How do they think about preparation and delivery? What's the challenge with preaching in 2018? When do they start and end their prep? 

This would be a "Jeff and Jonny Classic". To hear a very fun episode that is another "Classic", listen to Episode 15, where the guys talk about their fantasy Sunday morning service - recorded way back in April of 2013! It's only 15 minutes long, and you can compare how they sound today, to way, back, then! 

Pictured below, some scary pics of Jeff and Jonny on duty in their respective ministries! :-)

Heather Zempel is the Discipleship Pastor at National Community Church in Washington, D.C. Heather joins Jeff to talk about small groups and small churches and how small church leaders might think about small groups in their churches.

Heather gets very practical, while Jeff gets very curious about Heather and her husband Ryan, their move into ministry, the church they serve at, and even what Heather has been learning about small group ministry.

Heather's newest book, published by Orange, is titled Big Change Small Groups Four Ideas To Help You Lead Adult Small Groups, is written specifically for regular, normal, small group leaders. This book is not just for pastors or church leaders, but for your small group leaders.

When you finish listening to Heather here, check out her episode with Rich Birch on the UnSeminary Podcast! It's a good one. (Yes, we will even promote other podcasts! ...but only good ones)

Here at 200churches we love to connect you, our small church pastor friends, with people, services, and ministries that benefit you. It's not very often we run across something as fundamentally beneficial to small church pastors as the 95Network!

In Episode 295 we talk with Dale Sellers, the Executive Director of the 95Network. He shares his vision for how small church pastors can be encouraged, supported, and helped by becoming a part of this Network.

Jeff and Jonny encourage you, no matter the size of your church, to have your church pay for the annual cost - which is less than $2/week. Less than that! As you might plan your 2019 church budget, include the massive, whopping cost of $95 for a whole year of being a part of the 95Network! You won't regret it!

Listen to the episode, check out their website, and see if this isn't the best thing since sliced bread for small church pastors! Jeff and Jonny have a lengthy debrief and "outro" after Jeff's conversation with Dale - so don't miss it!

Finally, check out the video below if you have any doubt about joining the 95Network!

Norma V joins Jeff live in his church office studio to talk about her path to, and passion for missions! Norma is a sharp lady who has spend more than 8 years in Mexico, 20 years in Venezuela, and several years in Native culture. Norma has committed her life to ministry, leadership development, discipleship, and spiritual and soul formation.

We love having women church leaders like Norma on the podcast, as they give us great ministry perspective and wisdom. She referenced the International Training Alliance and encouraged our listeners to inquire online and see if they might want to be a part of it! Check it out!

This is a very encouraging podcast episode - ENJOY!

Jeff is joined by friend of the show and host of the Small Church Big Deal Conference, Chris Vitarelli, to talk about Chris' own ministry journey, how he came to love small churches, and the heart behind his upcoming conference in Fenton, Michigan. You will be encouraged by Chris' story and by his heart for the Church and the work he is doing. If you can make it to Michigan on October 12 and 13, make sure you do! But even if you can't, you can enjoy the wisdom of conference speaker Dave Jacobs by heading over to his Podcast Series page.

Ray Hollenbach is a HUGE fan of the 200churches Podcast, texting Jonny and me after many of our episodes come out. He gives us feedback, almost always positive, (okay, always positive!) and is a great friend and encourager.

Ray lives online at www.studentsofjesus.com. You, should check out his site, his books, his coaching, his blog posts, etc. Ray has a sharp mind and warm heart.

Ray joined us to talk about what we as pastors accept as leadership models in ministry. He takes exception to the modern "pastor as CEO" model of ministry leadership. He shares his passion for what he believes pastoral ministry really is all about.

Ray recently tweeted, Phrases like “visionary” and “executive decision” do not appear among our examples, but such phrases are all too common in the North American church, and this episode unpacks this tweet in audio form...

Pastor, you will be challenged by Ray in this episode, and we are happy to share it with you! Enjoy!

Tony Morgan, from The Unstuck Group, joins Jeff and Jonny LIVE and in the flesh as the three of them converse on what it means to get your church back on mission, back on the road to reaching people in your community who have no hope! Tony's organization helps get stuck churches - Unstuck! This is a very helpful and encouraging episode! 

Right on the front end of the episode, before everything else, Jeff shares all the information you need to find The Unstuck Group's resources online. They have a book, a blog, a YouTube channel, and a podcast, just to name a few of the free resources!

So much great stuff available through this episode. Take advantage of it all! 

See you next week! Enjoy the episode!

Jonny and I would be completely over the moon if you and your church decided to collaborate with our guest today, to help toddlers, kids, and young people, avoid the ugly and horrible world of sex trafficking!

Al Henson is the founder of Compassionate Hope - found at www.compassionatehope.org - and is so powerfully committed tp helping young ones in Southeast Asia avoid being trafficked. He shares some of his own story, which turns into the story of Compassionate Hope. Our goal in sharing Al's story is that some of you might realize just how much Kingdom work your small church actually can do.

If one child is saved from a horrible life and finds LIFE and HOPE in Jesus, because of Episode 290 of our podcast, all 5+ years of this podcast will have been worth every minute of work we've put into it! No lie!

Check out the Compassionate Hope website, search Google for all things Compassionate Hope, and enjoy this episode!

Jeff and Jonny debrief with each other, and process out loud - the sad situation that Willowcreek Church, Bill Hybels, and some suffering women find themselves in. These events have rocked the ministry world to its core.

Jeff and Jonny do not usually talk about current events of the day, but the events with Bill Hybels and Willowcreek, aligned in time with the Global Leadership Summit - simply cannot be ignored.

This is not an exhaustive critique of things, but a conversation among pastor friends simply trying to process and understand.

We refer to this episode of the Theology on Mission podcast.

Jonny referenced this Missio Alliance blog post titled 7 Questions All Pastors Need To Ask Themselves Post-Hybels

The guys offer their heartfelt prayers and compassion to the women involved who have suffered so much, to the beautiful people of Willow, to the Hybels family, and finally to Bill Hybels himself. God uses everyone, even those with broken hearts.

May the lives of the women who have suffered find beauty and redemption as they reach for the comfort and encouragement of the Savior. May the Hybels family find reconciliation in the Gospel they have believed. May the people of Willow see their brightest days are yet ahead...