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Walter Veith⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ is available at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Amazing Discoveries⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Walter is⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ a ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Seventh Day Advententast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. I am not. Here is Walter Veith and his take on things. ~ In this episode we look into what the charismatic movement is all about. We also learn that in modern theology there has been a shift from God-centered religion to self-centered religion, from salvation by faith to a social Gospel. This presentation deals with the miraculous manifestations found in modern Christian worship. The origin and methods of mega-churches and their needs-related religion are discussed and exposed for what they are. What is the source of their inspiration? Find out where mega-preachers such as Schuller, Hybels, Warren, Copeland, and Hinn are going with their philosophies. Other topics covered include: the "needs gospel,” origin of Pentecostalism, Kundalini yoga, similarities between sun worship and Pentecostalism, modern Christian musicians, and the influence of preachers like TB Joshua, Oral Roberts, and Jesse Duplantis. Discover the truth about the charismatic movement. Click here to download the Study Guide for this lecture: http://pdf.amazingdiscoveries.org/Stu... The YouTube Video: False Christianity Exposed: Are Mega Church Leaders The Voice of The False Prophet? | Strange FireSubscribe to their ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube Channel⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Visit their ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Watch ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠More⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ~~~~~~~ From ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Me I am not SDA. I just love Walter's humor and passion for the Word. I don't love that he thinks the only begotton Son is also the Father, and much more. But here he is in all his zeal. ~ Eat the meat and spit out the bones. Beware of cults. And be good. ~~~ I just rebroadcast publicly available content. Propagate it. Share it. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Contact⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Me Please Rate or Review ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ or ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Apple⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ or anywhare that's good. ~~~ This work is licensed under a ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported License --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/begoodbroadcast/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/begoodbroadcast/support

Guest Bios Show Transcript Everything rises or falls on leadership. Ever heard that line? Think about what it means when applied to a pastor's role in a church. What about the priesthood of all believers? And where is Jesus in that equation? In this edition of The Roys Report, veteran church planter and pastor, Lance Ford, challenges popular views of leadership, showing how they're the opposite of what Scripture teaches. In the Body of Christ, the pastor is not the head; Jesus is! In 2012, Lance Ford's landmark work UnLeader exposed how unbiblical models of leadership have become an obsession in the church. Now The Atlas Factor, which is about shifting leadership onto the shoulders of Jesus, serves as a sequel to that book. One of the most eye-opening truths of The Atlas Factor is that leadership, when presented as a key to organizational success, is a relatively new concept. The multi-billion-dollar industry built around teaching and training people in leadership—in both the corporate world and the church—has emerged only within the past 40 to 50 years. And this model of leadership didn't come from Scripture; it came from the world. Lance was featured in a recent podcast with his message from the Restore Conference titled, “It's the System, Stupid.” If you caught that message, then you heard a preview of what Lance and Julie delve into in-depth in this podcast. Lance's prophetic message is a clarion call to the church to return to Jesus' way of doing things—or continue to face disastrous consequences. Guests Lance Ford Lance Ford is an author, church planter, coach, and consultant who has designed unique training systems currently being used by networks, seminaries, and leaders throughout the world. He has written several books including The Atlas Factor, UnLeader, The Missional Quest, and The Starfish and the Spirit. Lance holds a master's degree in Global Leadership from Fuller Theological Seminary. Learn more at LanceFordBooks.com. Show Transcript SPEAKERSLANCE FORD, Julie Roys Julie Roys  00:04Everything rises or falls on leadership. Ever heard that line? Certainly, great leaders can make a big difference in the success of an organization. But think about what that line applied to the church really means. Does everything rise or fall on the pastor? What about the priesthood of all believers? What about the body of Christ, where each member plays a vital role? And most importantly, what about Jesus? Welcome to The Roys Report, a podcast dedicated to reporting the truth and restoring the church. I’m Julie Roys, and joining me today is Lance Ford, who spent decades planting and pastoring churches. And recently we published his talk from the RESTORE conference where he argued that so many of the scandals and issues that we see in the church today stem from our toxic model of leadership. Well, today you’re in for a treat, because Lance is joining me to discuss his new book, The Atlas Factor. And this book eviscerates the conventional wisdom that leadership is everything. In fact, one of the most eye-opening things I learned in this book is that leadership is a relatively new concept. Sure, there have always been people who lead and manage organizations. But leadership as this thing that’s crucial to the success of organizations is relatively new. And certainly, the industry that’s been built around teaching and training people in leadership in both the corporate world and the church is super new, like within the past 40 to 50 years. But I think the pressing question, especially in the church concerns whether these notions of leadership we’re training pastors to follow are actually biblical. And if they’re not, what’s the alternative? We’ll dig into those questions in just a minute.   Julie Roys  01:46 But first, I’d like to thank the sponsors of this podcast, Judson University and Marquardt of Barrington. If you’re looking for a top ranked Christian University, providing a caring community and an excellent college experience, Judson University is for you. Judson is located on 90 acres, just 40 miles west of Chicago in Elgin, Illinois. The school offers more than 60 majors, great leadership opportunities, and strong financial aid. Plus, you can take classes online as well as in person. Judson University is shaping lives that shaped the world. For more information, just go to JUDSONU.EDU Also, if you’re looking for a quality new or used car, I highly recommend my friends at Marquardt of Barrington. Marquardt is a Buick GMC dealership where you can expect honesty, integrity, and transparency. That’s because the owners there Dan and Kurt Marquardt, are men of integrity, to check them out, just go to BUYACAR123.COM.   Julie Roys  02:49 Well, again, joining me is Lance Ford, a church planter, coach, and consultant who spent decades pastoring and planting churches. And out of that experience and biblical study, he’s designed unique training systems that are being used by seminaries, church networks, and leaders throughout the world. Lance is also the author of several books, including one of my favorites called Unleader. This book exposes the obsession in the church to unbiblical models of leadership. It’s fantastic and eye opening. And Lance’s latest book, The Atlas Factor, is essentially a sequel to Unleader, and it’s quickly become one of my favorites as well. So, Lance, thanks so much for joining me. I’m really, really looking forward to our discussion.   LANCE FORD  03:29 It’s always one of my favorite things to do is visit with you, Julie.   Julie Roys  03:32 I’m glad to hear that. And I should mention that you also are a recent addition to The Roys Report board. So, we’re pretty excited about that. But I know you spoke at RESTORE and I heard from so so many people, but our board as well, just saying, hey, we need to get this guy on our board. So just really, really glad for all the wisdom that you’re going to bring to the board. So, thanks for being willing to do that.   LANCE FORD  03:55 Well, it’s a huge honor to be invited to be a part of y’all. The boardroom didn’t get smarter because I showed up it probably got a little dumber When I joined.   Julie Roys  04:04 I do not believe that. But as I mentioned, you spoke at RESTORE and gave a great talk on toxic leadership and  our obsession with it and probably had the best line of the entire conference I have to say, which became the title of the podcast that we put out with your talk, which is, It’s the System, Stupid! Just briefly for those who didn’t hear your talk, which if you didn’t hear Lance’s talk, it’s the System, Stupid!, I think it was like back in mid-December, we published that. Go back and listen to his talk. It is so so good. But talk about what you meant by that, that it’s the system stupid.   LANCE FORD  04:41 I think probably Julie one day I was probably somewhere along the midst of listening to The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill  podcast, and I was just thinking, they just keep talking about symptoms, symptoms. They never get to the solution, and I just said it out loud. It’s the system stupid. And it reminded me, James Carville’s deal with Clinton. It’s the economy stupid. So that’s kind of where that came from is that all these problems that we have are downstream from a messed-up system. And you can’t just deal with the symptoms and try to throw drugs at the symptoms. You have to bandage the wounds, pouring the oil on the wine, that’s necessary to say the least. Well, let’s do some preventative medicine. Let’s go back to the headwaters of this thing and try to nip some of this stuff in the bud. And it just seems that the answer almost every time, especially internally, from the groups that are in the midst of these falls and these breakdowns in leadership, usually their answer is, well, we just need better accountability. But it’s the same type of what they call accountability. So rare is it that when you hear a group say, well, we need new leadership, they don’t mean they need new leadership systems. They mean, we need a new hero leader.   Julie Roys  06:05 Yeah. Oh, exactly. I mean, I remember when Rick Warren was stepping down. And of course, there’s all sorts of issues with Andy Wood, who was picked as his successor. And we’ve published many articles on how he apparently is a horribly abusive leader. But he’s now in that position. And when I heard the language, though, it was like we need to find a successor for Rick. And I thought, really, who can be the successor to Rick Warren, and who is capable of being in a position over so many churches and having so many people following you? And I sit there and wonder, because there’s this idea that there’s going to be this really good, noble, full of integrity leader that can handle those kinds of pressures. And I sit there, and I look at that, and I’m like, I don’t know that I can handle that. That’s an awful lot to shoulder. And I think that really is at the root of what you’re talking about in this book, The Atlas Factor. The metaphor is great of you know, Atlas with the weight of the world on his shoulders. But essentially, that’s what we’ve set up leaders to be, to be Atlas, to do the impossible, and then we’re surprised when they fail. Here’s a quote that’s very early in your book from the 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, they’re irrefutable.   LANCE FORD  07:15 Be careful, Julie.   Julie Roys  07:17 But the 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership is this quote from LeRoy Eims, “a leader is one who sees more than others see, who sees further than others see, and who sees before others do.” And then there’s the quote that I said at the beginning of the podcast, that “everything rises or falls on leadership.” It’s almost like we have made these men into gods; talk about that whole dynamic and what it’s doing to pastors.   LANCE FORD  07:47 The thing about the typical the prevailing leadership system in the overwhelming majority of churches today, it puts a weight up on the senior, and I might as well just say senior guy, cuz 99% of them are guys. But there are a few women in senior leadership positions, but just the job description, and then even the unwritten expectations that are placed upon them. I know I was a pastor for well over 20 years and was a church planter and a senior pastor for 10 years. So, if you just look at the job description, you’re basically the CEO. In fact, some of them call themselves CEOs, you’re the face of the church, the organization, you’re the top fundraiser, you are the top theologian, you’re supposed to be a marriage expert, a family expert, a child rearer. I mean, just go on and on and by the way, you need to give 45 to 50 fantastic talks a year too. No one’s built for that. And certainly when you go to the New Testament of any description of any type of leadership in the church, you don’t see that. In fact, Paul mentioned several times that he wasn’t even a good speaker. So, it’s a burden. And so that created the metaphor for The Atlas Factor for the book. It’s the weight of the world. It’s like Atlas, and a lot of people look at Atlas and they go, he was this hero. No, that was a punishment, Zeus gave him the punishment of having to hold the weight of the world on his shoulders. It’s out of order. It’s a misalignment. So, a lot of these pastors are victims too; Even the ones that don’t abuse, they’re being abused by this system of expectations, this fault system of leadership as it’s been cast upon them. And then of course, the ones as you said, that are narcissistic, have the tendencies, then they take that power, and then they become the abusers. And basically, then they take that weight, and they place it up on the shoulders of their staff or the volunteers and church members, and then they crush others with that weight.   Julie Roys  09:49 I have heard that so much from these churches where there is this big celebrity pastor, and they have to put on the big show and it’s really impossible to do. I mean, I have I always said, When my husband and I used to be youth pastors and we always said, The World entertains better than we do. So, if you want to be entertained, like go see a movie, go to all those things, but in the church, we’re gonna focus on worship and prayer and discipleship and Bible study. That’s what we do. But I think we’ve gotten away from that. And we’ve certainly gotten to this model where man we have to put on the show every week, and it’s crushing. And the staffs are getting crushed too. You quote this in your book that there’s a 2021 Barna study, 38% of pastors say they’ve considered quitting within the past year. And then if you look at pastors who are just 45 or younger, that jumps to 46%. So, I mean, if this plays out, we’re looking at a crisis in the church, we’re not going to have pastors willing to take these jobs.   LANCE FORD  10:45 Yeah well, there’s some stats that came out, I forget if it was Barna or who it was a couple of weeks ago. But it said that right now, currently, between four and 5000 pastors a month, are leaving the ministry. So you’re talking about a huge under the watermark in the boat of the church right now. So not only are people leaving the church, but you’ve got pastors leaving the church. So, it is a crisis, as you said.   Julie Roys  11:09 Although, I have to say at the same time, like I’m in this small house church, and he said recently, if we get a pastor, I’m gone. I’m gone. I mean, I think we’re a unique group, because there’s some pretty highly competent, mature Christians in there. So, you kind of have more leaders than you know what to do with. So, God help the pastor that would come in and try to pastor that. But yeah, I think there is sort of a suspicion about pastors. But really, because I think exactly what you’re talking about in this book is that we have merged this idea of leadership that really is worldly based with, we’ve kind of baptized it in Christian lingo. So that now so many people think that leadership, the way it’s being taught, you know, by people who claim they’re Christian, so that, you know, this must be biblical, is biblical. But leadership, it’s not really talked about very much in Scripture is it?   LANCE FORD  12:03 It’s not that there’s not leaders in Scripture, there’s leaders all throughout Scripture, but the leadership system as we know it today, in fact, leader or leadership is not even mentioned. It’s like, a half a dozen times in the entire New Testament. And it’s not spoken favorably, most of those times. But if you really get down to it, and I do try to make a delineation between attorney leader in leadership, because it’s become such a in our nomenclature today, but it’s a real new term. I’ve said that before some well-known authors that immediately react, and just like push back. Okay, first off, definitely, there’s been leadership forever. And it’s been studied. I mean, the Chinese going back to the 1300s. I mean, you can look at Plato and Machiavelli and others that studied leadership, but not leadership as we know it today. And what got me on this was just doing some research on it. And I just got curious one day and thought, Well, I’m gonna look up the word leadership. And I went to my old 1955 Oxford Dictionary, which is probably the best because it gives the evolution of words. And it wasn’t even defined there. I couldn’t even find the term and a definition, I finally found at one time in about a seven- or eight-word definition for the word leader, but then it didn’t even define leadership. That pushed me back further, you start reverse engineering, you know, how you are doing research, and I found the 1915 Webster dictionary. The word leadership was not even in there. And that really took me down a rabbit hole of finding out after just doing a couple of years of research, in searching even secular scholars that had done research on the word leadership and come to find out you couldn’t even find the word leadership until the mid-19th century. So, you’re not finding publications anywhere that mentioned it until the early 1900s. Even the term. Now the reason I say that, and it should stand out to us as a stark contrast, because leadership is an $87 billion dollar industry today. 87 billion, I mean, that’s more than entertainment, media and everything put together. So, it’s a huge thing that’s evolved over the last 100 years. And it didn’t even really start entering in the church, which is a gigantic thing in the church now, it didn’t even start entering into the church until I would say the 1970s. Because you can’t even find a dozen books with the term leadership in the title, even in the 1960s. So, it’s a really new thing. And now, and I say it as its defined, because you could interchange the word management and you’d be just fine because that’s really what it is. It’s management theory. It goes back to Peter Drucker 1966, his famous book, The Effective Executive. There were some significant church growth leaders took that book, they parlayed it into the Church Growth Movement because some leaders such as Robert Schuller, for instance, with Crystal Cathedral, Robert Schuller doesn’t get enough if you want to call it credit or blame for really being the biggest shaper of what we have today. And my research bears this out. You can track Bill Hybels in Willow Creek, they go right back to Schuler, although they scrubbed a lot of that from their history, because Schuler became so controversial that they just didn’t want to be associated with him. Rick Warren was a disciple of Schuler. Schuler was a disciple of Norman Vincent Peale. That’s where he got all of his positive thinking and everything. But then all of them went to Peter Drucker to get the management systems. And then Bob Buford, who created Leadership Network, which a lot of people, the listeners would say, I’ve never heard of a guy named Bob Buford. Well, he was way behind the scenes. But he was hugely shaping of what we have today with Leadership Network and funded and raised up and platformed and helped develop a lot of those leaders such as Hybels and Warren and others. And then a lot of the newer leaders that lead these prevailing, what I call Neo attractional churches today, their heritage, the family tree goes straight back to Peter Drucker and these management systems. And these management systems just conflict with what Jesus said Matthew 20, of the Gentiles, or the world systems; it’s a metaphor, he where if he was in the Old Testament would have said, The Babylonians or the Egyptians. But when he says the Gentiles practice dominating one another, or lorded over one another, it will not be this way among you. But the first will be last, the greatest will be the servant, which basically was pushing back against power, and against dominating one another in any system in his kingdom. But that’s the very thing that we have today. And it goes right back to management systems that we imported straight into the church.   Julie Roys  17:06 And you alluded to this, that we don’t see lead or leader much in Scripture. You write, and this was in Unleader as well, and this just blew me away, that we see the word disciple 260 times, as opposed to leader. Leader, I think is mentioned like seven times. So, it’s a 37:1 ratio. We used to think of the pastor as the shepherd. Even when I was a kid, that was really the prevailing metaphor was that our pastor was the shepherd, that changed. And I remember even when I was at Willow Creek because my husband and I spent several years there. And I just remember Hybels talking about how they had found shepherds to do the shepherding within the church, because he didn’t do it. It was kind of like, yeah, they have been put in as pastors, but they’re really more Shepherd. So, we’re putting them over here to let them Shepherd. Meanwhile, I’ll do the pastor thing, which is being the great orator and charismatic leader, and all that. And that became our model for pastor and then of course, Bill Hybels brought in so many worldly leadership. In fact, if you go and read about the Global Leadership Summit, like I’ve read some of the articles that were published in secular publications saying, Man, this is like the best business school that’s out there, like, I know, it’s at a church, but this is like, this is a great business school. Everybody in business, whether you’re a Christian or not, whatever you profess, just go to this really good. And we love that as Christians, because we constantly were seeking the world’s affirmation, which is really sad. Like we wanted that credibility in the church. So again, you’re putting language into things I felt for so long, and that the research in your book, you even go back farther, and I found some of this stuff that gave birth to our modern leadership movement was fascinating. And you start with 1840s, 1900, around there with this thing called Great Man theory. Describe what this is, and how it’s impacted our view of leadership today.   LANCE FORD  19:01 Great Man theory was the prevailing ideology of where great leaders came from. That was the term that they used. And so, when you go back and you look at even, I was able to even trace back and find some of the speaking topics for some conventions, conferences that were taking place back in the 1920s and 1930s. And so Great Man theory was basically the idea that leaders are born, they’re not made. And so, you’re gonna think about Teddy Roosevelt, you’re gonna think about Abraham Lincoln, Napoleon, people like this, that just have this ability to lead, and you can’t make it. So that that would that would mean there’s a real limitation if you don’t happen to have a great man walk into the room, you know. So, then they started studying the traits of the great man and that about 20 years after Great Man theory was the prevailing theory. Then by the 1930s, 1940s was what was called Trait Theory, and they basically were studying the traits of the great man and saying, Well, maybe it’s possible that we can teach these traits, we can mimic these traits, and we can actually make great leaders. That’s how it started evolving. Then there became for a while it became what was called Group theory, which they said, well, leadership really is an effect upon a group of people. They actually started getting a little closer to what was right about what  I would call leadership, that leadership is a fruit product. It’s not a position, I would say a faithfully following Jesus as a servant. But then they moved away from the group theory, and that really went back into a person at the top. And then Management theory, by the 1950s, to corporate America, and the Industrial Revolution had matured and was getting old by that time. By that time, it really became Management theory. And then we replaced it with the word leadership. And like you said, earlier, Julie, I was just reflecting a while back and thinking, you know, when I was growing up, if you walked into a Denny’s, there were no Starbucks back then. So, if you walk through a breakfast place, and let’s say that there was and we used to have in small towns, they would call it the Ministerial Alliance. And pastors of local churches that actually liked each other, and they get together about once a month. So if you were to see a group of those guys sitting around, have a breakfast together, I say, 1980. I’ll guarantee you; the word leader and leadership would not even been uttered at that table while they’re having breakfast. It wouldn’t even come into their mind. They might have called themselves pastors or shepherds, they probably call themselves ministers. And certainly, the people from the local community sitting around would look over and said, Oh, yeah, that’s the ministers. They wouldn’t say that’s the leaders. That’s the leaders of the faith community. It just wasn’t in their thinking, right? Because the word Minister means servant, but it’s washed out today. And so, I mean, who wants to be a servant? You want to be a leader. This was the problem with the disciples of Jesus, and they watched him be a servant, and he still had to, you know, thump upside of the head, more than one occasion.   Julie Roys  22:20 I want to read a section of your book because I think it really crystallizes the moment that we’re living in right now. You write, “The industrial leadership approach to church leadership caused us to abandon the understanding of the church as a body and turn to a view of the church as a machine. Our language and titles changed as we veered away from the code of the New Testament in Jesus. It became normal to hear terms and titles such as strategic initiative, ROI, return on investment scale, engineering, management, leader, executive, superior, replace biblical language, such as steward, disciple, co-laborers, servant, minister, elder, brothers and sisters, et cetera. Noncompetes, and NDAs, and  HR became leverage points in place of loving your brother, blessing those you believed were your enemy and letting your Yes be Yes and your No be No.” Bingo. Right there. I mean, I talk a lot about the Evangelical industrial complex. And of course, that gets into the money and everything that’s involved. But it’s also once you become a corporation, you’ve got to manage that image. And that is the situation that we’re in. I’m guessing some people who have been really, really schooled in this, because I mean, leadership is everywhere, right? I mean, from the time kids are like teenagers, even maybe younger, in our church, we’re training them to be leaders. But it does beg the question, and I’m sure people are wondering right now is if everything doesn’t rise or fall on leadership, and what does it rise or fall on?   LANCE FORD  23:47 I believe it rises or falls on the headship of Jesus. And I believe that’s where we land on the problem of what’s happened in the church. That’s the other part of the metaphor for this book, The Atlas Factor was. I had written something one day, about three years ago on Facebook or X, it was Twitter then; we had the pretty little blue bird. But I just said something about leadership in the church being misaligned with the headship of Jesus, and the body. Had a buddy that reposted that and then his chiropractor made a comment. And he said, Yeah, that’s like subluxation with the C-1 and the C-2 vertebra in the body. Then he said something that really got my attention. He said, Yeah, when you have a problem with the Atlas vertebra, and the Axis vertebra, it misaligns the body with the head. And I was like, Whoa, that really got my attention because I’ve been playing around with this Atlas metaphor before. And little did I know, and you know, this is as a journalist and a researcher, then it sends me down into this wormhole. I ended up reading three or four books in chiropractic.   Julie Roys  24:57 You sound like my husband. My husband would do that. Give me the Cliff Notes honey.   LANCE FORD  25:02 My wife’s like land it, land it. Yeah, but it was fascinating Julie because he said C-1, the first vertebra is called the Atlas. So, in fact, this particular doctor had written a little book, a real tiny little pamphlet size book called, It Just Makes Sense. Well come to find out there’s a certain amount of chiropractors, it’s a small percentage of chiropractors that just practice, they call it upper cervical care. And so, they only focus on the two top vertebra, because they’re convinced that if you line those up, everything below is going to come in order and align. In fact, they’ve got some pretty large claims of incredible maladies that get healed and come into order when the body, the neurological system starts functioning like it should. In fact, my buddy that had posted this, his chiropractor, so my buddy has a very rare form of cancer. And I forget what it’s called, but it should not kill him. But he’s had it for several years. And so, he’s always having to watch his T counts and everything. And under Dr. Weller’s care, his numbers have totally come in order. And that’s been going on for about four or five years now. So, it’s really amazing. So, one of the quotes that he said, and I did quote it in Atlas, so that Atlas vertebra, that’s where the brain stem sits into. So, he’s talking about the relationship between the head and the body. And he says, there’s that extra something inside each and every one of us that gives life; the inborn, innate intelligence knows what to do and how to do it. The intelligence that came from our Creator travels in and through your nervous system, which is commonly referred to as the neurological system. Neuro logic or intelligence within the nerve, the neurological communication between the brain and the body through the brainstem is imperative for allowing the body the best ability to function at its optimum. We believe that the body does not need any assistance, just no interference in its functioning. When you apply that to what Paul said about the body of Christ, and the relationship to the head, which he really goes in depth in Ephesians 4, he mentioned the other places, but in Ephesians 4, which Ephesians. The whole book of Ephesians is scholars say this is the book for the church. And it’s not a book about leadership. Ephesians 4 is not text about leaders, it’s about the body, it’s a text, read to the body, corporately, it’s talking about the body when he says the apostle, prophet, evangelist, shepherd, and teacher – that’s within the body. These are not professional positions. And I would say, and I know you would agree, Julie, that your house church, you guys already have at least one, you have multiple pastors there already. So, you don’t need some pro that comes in leveraging authority and power. They’re gifted. So, the body of Christ is already gifted in these functions. But the problem is, is when humans try to occupy the place of headship and playing Atlas, then it creates a disjointedness, between the Atlas vertebra and the rest of the body. And so, what happens is, we get paralyzed, we can’t move. We get all these maladies in these atrophy that sets in below the neck because somebody else has stepped in and cause misalignment with our true head Jesus. And so, I really believe that the first job of a church leader, or a pastor that wants to try to change is it’s kind of what Dr. Eddie Weller said is that we need to eliminate interference between Jesus in the body. And usually, it’s our system of leadership that’s causing the interference, and is bringing that paralysis and those maladies that go along the neckline.   Julie Roys  28:54 That’s so interesting. As you’re saying this, I’m beginning to get an image in my head of a body trying to function with just the brain. Right? And the rest of the body being literally paralyzed or just limp and not able to move. And I think about that in the church because we have made these guys at the head who communicate truth to us. I mean, most of the people come into our churches right now, they don’t know how to read the scripture for themselves and listen to the Holy Spirit themselves. They need that pastor to interpret for them what’s going on, which is scary. I remember going to one of these, you know, video, Pastor churches, and I’m like, and it had a celebrity pastor who was in from, you know, states away, who was preaching to them, telling them what to do. And I thought to myself, that guy who was preaching, nothing he said was heretical; however, he was not explicating scripture right. He was making it say things it didn’t say, and it scared me because I thought, that guy anything he says will get swallowed by this mass of people, because they don’t know they are not equipped. They are not connected to the head. They’re connected to the pastor, right? Who really functions in a godlike way with so many of these people? And I think that’s why when you see one of these falls, you see, just huge disillusionment. You know, for a lot of us, it’s been hurtful. It’s been disillusioning. Yes. But not to that foundational level, because my pastor was never my God. He was always just a man. Right? That’s all he was. And so yeah, we’d have lost that idea that really, it’s a functioning body, and all the members have to be functioning for this thing to work. And the guy at the top is not the pastor. It’s Jesus Himself, which is a radical idea, the biblical idea.   LANCE FORD  30:43 You know, the word radical and radish have the same root. Radical literally means root. So, it’s funny how that when you talk about people that are radicals, man, they’re so radical. That’s usually the people that have gone back to the roots of things that we call the radicals. It  was like the hippies back in the 70s, they were reading Mother Earth News, you know, and they’re, you know, got their gardens out the backyard, and they’re doing all this stuff, you know, are they radical? No, they’re doing what people have done for thousands of years. So sometimes that’s the hint that the people that we call the radicals may just be the ones that have tapped back into something that’s at the root of our beginnings as the church. And so that’s one of the things that when you get to this misalignment of the body, the real job description of a pastor or if you believe in those FIFO gifts, the apostle, prophet, Pastor, shepherd, and evangelists and teacher, their job description, Paul says, is to equip or resource and train and supply the saints for the work of ministry. So, it’s not to do everything, it’s not to be the chief speaker to be the end all. Really your job there, when you wake up in the morning, I don’t care what your title is, if you’re on staff at a church, no matter what your rank is, first thing you wake up in the morning and think what I need to do is how can I best resource and equip and serve the people that are around me? So, during your day, you shouldn’t be telling people what to do, you should be asking people, how can I help you? How can I serve you? What do you need youth pastor? How can I help you today to fulfill your calling? But that’s not the way it is. I mean, it’s usually everybody’s here to serve my needs. That’s leadership. That’s the system.   Julie Roys  32:37 I mean, we have a professional pastorate. So, we pay for you to do things for us.   LANCE FORD  32:42 You’re a vendor of religious goods and services, and I’m a consumer. So, give it up.   Julie Roys  32:48 Exactly. And that’s where I don’t put all the blame on the guy at the top. It’s what we’ve allowed as consumers. It’s what we’ve allowed as the body that is not doing what the Bereans did, and going back and saying, is what they’re teaching us right now, is this biblical, or is it not?   LANCE FORD  33:03 One of the things I thought about is you look at iteration or a church says today, most people are biblically illiterate. We don’t expect them to read their Bibles. We don’t. I mean, that’s why we project every scripture on screen. We don’t expect people even to bring a Bible. When you and I were growing up. I mean, people were bringing a Bible to church. I grew up spent a lot of time in the Baptist Church. every other weekend, the whole family would load up and we go spend the weekend with my grandparents about an hour away. They were Nazarene. They were in a little Nazarene church. And so, I literally spent half my time in a Nazarene church. So, I got a lot of Nazarene in me. And that little church of about 60 people and 55 of them were my kinfolks. I mean, you talk about a pastor not having a chance. Stay in line buddy because the Browns and the Fords will kick you to the curb. Anyway, it was a sweet fellowship and all my great aunts and great uncles and everything, They had the little board on the side of the pulpit that told the attendance from the week before, it told the offering. And I’m not making this up, even had a place it said Bibles present, you know, which was always funny to me, because I’ve looked back, and I thought they were trying to make a point. And those folks knew their scriptures. I mean, they knew the Bible, and they may have been misapplying it, but they still knew the Scriptures. And we just don’t have that today. We really have dumbed people down. And that’s part of the entertainment and this all comes from the secret church evolvement but if you go into the prevailing church today, if you go anywhere on a Sunday morning, most of the churches especially of any size you walk in, you don’t even know what denomination you’re in because most of them are singing the same songs. And the style is the same you’re going to go into a dark room. The ceiling is going to be black. The stage is going to be well lit depending on how much money and resource they have. It may even have some smoke machines which I call that the Shekindof. Glory, by the way,   Julie Roys  35:03 When I see the smoke machine, I am so over the top that I just I cannot I just cannot. And by the way, though, when you talked about Nazarene, this is going to warm the heart of Christine Jones, who’s one of our board members because she’s Nazarene. But I did Bible Quizzing. So, when I heard she was a Nazarene I’m like, Oh, dang! Oh, man! You know, and I am was pretty good Bible quizzer.   LANCE FORD  35:27 I bet you were.   Julie Roys  35:29 We went to Nationals a couple times. Our Bible Quizzing, my mom was our coach, but I’m telling you, I learned 100 you know, 150 verses every single year I did Bible Quizzing. I mean, that’s how I learned the scripture. But those Nazarenes they memorized the whole book. They memorized the whole thing.   LANCE FORD  35:45 I had a niece that does the Bible Quizzing in the Nazarene church, and  I don’t ever want to go toe to toe with her.   Julie Roys  35:52 But here’s the thing. Like I know Christine to this day says when they say a passage, she’s going over the passage in her mind, because it’s still there, the memory is still there of that passage. And you can’t distort something that people know. But we’re in a situation where people don’t know it., and so it creates just this fertile ground for everything to be messed up, and it’s gotten really messed up. So, you’re talking about realignment, how do we realign? Like in this situation that we’re in, how can we realign because we’ve got some major, major vertebrae out of whack?   LANCE FORD  36:24 So, you have to start off not with just looking at and saying, Well, yeah, I gotta choose a different way lady. No, you have to repent. This is an issue of repentance. Because we disobey Jesus and the word disobedient in many places. In fact, Paul uses it when he talks about your disobedience coming into a line. It means to, to hearken to not just to hear, but to listen and obey. We’ve disobeyed Jesus disobeyed Jesus, not only with our systems, but just some of those things that you mentioned, when you read the quote from the book earlier, even our what we call ourselves as leaders is disobedient to Jesus. Jesus could not have been more plain, don’t call yourself Father, don’t call yourself Teacher, don’t call yourself leader, because he says it causes you to lift yourself up above your brothers and sisters. Because he’s trying to create a peer type of a culture, a sibling culture. And this is the nomenclature that you see throughout the New Testament, co-laborer, coworker, fellow worker, is mentioned dozens of times those terms. You never see employee and boss. Because what happens is, that’s a power difference, right? It differentiates between the power, every time those words are mentioned, every time those terms and those rank-based titles are mentioned. So, the first thing a leader has to do is say I have to change the culture, I have to repent. And I have to admit this, and then I have to be willing to start changing the culture. So, I think the first thing that a leader has to do is then move into saying, I’m going to ditch the management systems. And I’m going to try to learn what it would look like if people on our team are able self-manage. And as I’m doing that, not only am I changing my titles, which that’s probably the first thing you need to do, because it will just freak everybody out. But what you do is you change your role. And so, you wake up in the morning and saying, I’m no longer going to act like I am chief, and everybody’s here to serve me. But I’m going to do what Jesus said, I’m gonna become a chief servant. I’m gonna out serve everybody here. And I’m gonna go back to the very thing that Paul said in Ephesians 4. I am going to work myself silly in helping the people around me to fulfill their calling. I’m going to do everything I can to resource them, to equip them, and just watch this rising tide lift all the boats around. So that’s the  first moves. And I always say this is when you’re looking at moving from a centralized leadership to a decentralized leadership, you can’t just wipe everything out, because then it’s just chaos and anarchy. So, you have to replace the systems with other processes and agreements. And that’s one of the things I’ve tried to write a lot about, wrote about a lot book called The Starfish in the Spirit. And in this, try to give some processes in some systems and some agreements of how you can rebuild your system into working this way. Because it doesn’t just happen in a vacuum. It’s too enormous of a change to move into it. But it has to be biblical, because that’s where the safety and that’s where the joy is. And this doesn’t mean that everything’s going to be rainbows and unicorns. There’s still stress and hard things and difficulty. I mean, Paul talked about the anxiety he had in the churches, but a lot of that was him trying to straighten stuff like this out.   Julie Roys  39:58 The book that I interviewed Scott McKnight and Laura Behringer on, Pivot, you know, is talking a lot about sort of similar things making this pivot from realizing you have a toxic culture. You guys are talking about it from the same idea, but a little different vantage points. And given, you know, he’s more of a theologian, you’re more of a boots on the ground kind of guy. But I think saying a lot of the same things. And one thing I wonder is that we’re often thinking about it in terms of like you said, we’ve got this church that needs to change. I was very interested in church planting in my 20s. And a lot of people would say that a lot of time, it takes way more energy to change an existing church than it does to grow a new one. And it’s just something I’ve been wondering, you know, out of these ashes, because what’s happening in the evangelical church right now, I mean, it is, it’s imploding, which I know is painful for everybody involved in you know, to see these kinds of implosions. But I’ve really been asking myself, Should we be putting energy into changing the existing church, or should we be saying, we just need to close some churches, we need to scrap this model? Because I mean, even so often, when you get rid of like the toxic guy at the top, it’s a toxic system throughout,  it is so hard. You have so much inertia, that to change that church is so hard. So, I know you don’t get into this really in your book, but it’s something I’ve been wrestling with. And even wondering once you do start that new thing. How can we do it differently because this is what we’ve seen modeled?   Julie Roys  40:02 What you’re touching on there is the whole wineskin issue that Jesus taught. You can’t put new wine in an old wineskin. But can you create a new wineskin for the old wine? Heard a lot of people talk about that. Which yeah, well,  maybe you can, I think is very difficult for the reasons you said. Now, two out of the last three houses that my wife and I have lived in, we built ourselves. And when I say that, I mean, we built it ourselves. I didn’t contract it. Our hands, blood and sweat, and skin. And I just kind of grew up with that, my grandpa was a carpenter. So, I kind of grew up with that.   LANCE FORD  41:31 We built one house. We didn’t do everything ourselves. But yeah, I thought, general contracting, how hard can that be?   LANCE FORD  42:14 Oh yeah, you got that lesson, then, you found out. And you promise, I will never do this again, which I said I would never do it again after the first one.   Julie Roys  42:22 Well, no, actually, I said, I learned so much by making so many stupid mistakes in that first one that I want to do it again, so that I can capitalize on the lessons learned.   LANCE FORD  42:31 Now that’s good. And it is a fun process. And it was very cathartic. This one that we built was a smaller house. And it was very cathartic. But also, we’ve rehabbed houses. And I would say as hard as it is to build from the ground up, it’s easier than rehabbing a house.   Julie Roys  42:47 Cuz you never know what you’re gonna get into.   LANCE FORD  42:49 You don’t know what’s behind that wall, you know, and you think that you know, and you peel it back, and you just discover, oh, it’s deeper, and you’re taking it down to the studs, and you get down the studs and go, Oh, the termites were here before I was here, right? All kinds of stuff. So yeah, those issues come into place. I tell you, one of the things that we’ve seen a lot of success, and I say we because I do work with a few others. I’m a part of a team that we do help churches in consulting and coaching. we talk about terms of a parallel track, just trying smaller little projects, and seeing how they go. In fact, several of the largest churches, and we’ve worked with large churches that realize that they just cannot completely turn that thing around. So, what they do is they start investing in different types of church plants, or micro churches, or whatever. And I think their hearts are good and right in that. And so, I’ve got some friends that do lead large mega churches. And I think that they are, some of them have developed some leadership systems that are closest to what I would hope to see. And I think it’s probably about as close as they can get without just killing the thing.   LANCE FORD  44:06 Our time is getting short. But there’s one term that I thought was so good when you’re talking about developing a culture of equality, and you talked about this term, I’ve never heard this this term before, but equa-potency, thank you. But yeah, explain what you mean by that, because I thought that was actually a pretty key component to what you’re talking about.   LANCE FORD  44:30 What equa-potency basically, is kind of a culture of equals. When you talk about a quality in a leadership system, it freaks a lot of people out because immediately the pushback is somebody has to be in charge. The buck has to stop somewhere. You can’t have equality, everybody’s not equal. You can just look at him. Okay, so let’s start right there. And Paul talks about this in Romans 12. In fact, Romans 12:1-2 you know, we usually start out with be not conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind right? So that you can prove what is the good, perfect, pleasing will of God. And we usually stop there. And so, people usually read that verse and say, Oh, that’s the verse about not being worldly, you know, don’t drink, don’t chew, don’t run around with girls that do, right? And always blame a woman, right? That was the little saying growing up. But don’t stop there, keep reading the rest of the of the text, because then he’s really going into how gifts that the Lord pours out should be functioning. And so, one of the things that he says he talks about the different gifts, in fact, he talks about people that do have a gift of administration, or what we would call leadership. And he talks about, then he says, but do it with sobriety, be sober, and then he starts talking about don’t look on your own things and be selfish. And he starts going into this whole thing about different people have different measures for their giftings. So, in any room, if you have a sizable room, and you think about just outstanding, let’s say the great men or the great women that are great into gifting or whatever. And you and I, Julie may have a similar gifting. But we can just look like I’ve got a couple of friends that are mentors of mine. And I’m thinking about one in particular. He’s been an incredible mentor in my life. And he and I have similar gifts. Mine, I can’t even touch his abilities in some of this stuff. He is just far out. Well, Paul will call that he has a greater measure of faith. It’s not faith like we think about it all. Oh yeah, he’s confident and all that. No, it’s really the term there, really iterates it’s the ability to use that gift. And some people just have that, have a greater measure. And so, Paul warns them to treat the others as equals. And so, this particular mentor in my life, he’s always treated me that way. And in the first few years, we started working together, man, I mean, there was no way I could touch what he did. But he always encouraged me genuinely, not patronizing me. But really, he just thought you never know when what the Lord wants to say or do is going to come through Lance or Jill or Rob or Steve in the room, just because I’ve got the big platform, I’m speaking as him, I can use any of them. So that’s equa-potency. So, it’s potent. So, when you get a group of people together, and you have an equal atmosphere, not meaning that everybody has the same has equal gifts, but they have equal opportunity. And so that’s really what we’re saying. It’s a culture that everybody is treated as equals to have equal opportunity, even if they don’t have the equal faith in the giftings that they have. Does that make sense?   Julie Roys  47:55 Absolutely it does. And as you’re talking about this, we do think of the people that that are incredibly gifted. And we have examples of that in scripture. But we also have probably the greatest leader, or one of the ones that we look to in the Old Testament was Moses, who couldn’t speak, had all sorts of failings. And yet God used him in amazing ways. Because he had that spiritual connection to God. He knew God, and he had a heart after God. And we have majored on the minors, right? We’ve made the gifting so important instead of the heart for God. And there’s so much in your book, we could discuss, and I would love to discuss, you get into how spiritual warfare, how that plays out in this practical steps. And so, I really encourage people, this is going to be our book for this month, for anybody who gives a donation of $30 or more, we’ll get you a copy of The Atlas Factor, just a phenomenal phenomenal book. So, if you want to do that, support our work here at The Roys report, but also get this incredible resource, just go to JULIEROYS.COM/DONATE. And we can get this book in your hands. And I want to get this book as many hands as I can. Because I think it’s a paradigm shift is what you’re talking about. And you’ve been talking about it now for 11 years since you wrote your first one, Unleader. And I think there’s a lot of resistance. But the more and more we see the crash and burns, the more and more we’re going to have to say we’ve got to do it a different way. And so, I feel like you’re very much a prophetic voice when it comes to this issue. Just so grateful for it. So, Lance, thank you. Thank you for taking the time. Thank you for speaking at RESTORE. Thank you for being on our board. Thanks for writing this book, The Atlas Factor. Really awesome.   Julie Roys  48:13 Always a joy, Julie, thank you.   Julie Roys  49:41 Well, again, that was Lance Ford, an experienced church planter, pastor, consultant, and author of The Atlas Factor, Shifting Leadership Onto the Shoulders of Jesus. And as we mentioned, this book releases this month, and we’re actually giving away copies of The Atlas Factor to anyone who gives a gift of $30 or more  to The Roys Report this month. Again, we don’t have any big donors or advertisers almost all the funding for The Roys Report comes from you, the people who care about exposing abuse and corruption in the church and caring for abuse victims. So, if you can please go to JJULIEROYS.COM/DONATE  and give what you’re able to this ministry. And when you give, we’ll gladly send you a copy of The Atlas Factor. Also, just a quick reminder to subscribe to The Roys Report on Apple podcast, Google podcasts or Spotify. That way you won’t miss any of these episodes. And while you’re at it, I’d really appreciate it if you’d help us spread the word about the podcast by leaving a review. And then please share the podcast on social media so more people can hear about this great content. Again, thanks so much for joining me. Hope you are blessed and encouraged.   Read more

Introduction, Nehemiah 1.1-3 Inscribed silver bowl from the palace of Artaxerxes I (464–424 B.C.). The inscription clearly identifies this bowl as having been made in the palace of Artaxerxes I. As cupbearer to Artaxerxes (Nehemiah 1:11), Nehemiah likely would have handled articles such as this.“At the time, I was cupbearer to the king.” (Nehemiah 1:11 NRSV) The main action is crowded into the spring and summer of the year 445 BC Around 13 years since Ezra had set out for Jerusalem (Ezra 7:7). 'Survivors'/'Remnant' could also be translated, “escapees”, with allusions to the flight from Egypt that made the Hebrews into a nation. Now they have the opportunity to become a nation re-born. Summary: God was able to do a new thing because Nehemiah responded to the need revealed to him 1. Nehemiah Prays Neh 1.4ff “Nehemiah's first response to the challenging news he received was an honest outpouring of emotion. He held nothing back. What an example for us as we face struggles and heartache in this world. We don't have to ‘act strong' or ‘be tough'. Thos who follow Jesus are free to express authentic feelings that well up inside us.”  Hybels, Nehemiah, 15.   Nehemiah is a man of action, as events in the book demonstrate.  It is therefore all the more remarkable that his first instinct is to mourn, fast and pray.  We see here that his penchant for action is rooted in a deep conviction about God's honour.  He is first and foremost a spiritual man - not a man of action.  This prayer forms the background to the “arrow prayer” of Neh 2:4 and shows that it is not superficial. “Then the king said to me, “What do you request?” So I prayed to the God of heaven. Then I said to the king, “” Nehemiah 2.4 See also Nehemiah 4.9 2. Nehemiah Acts Neh 2.1ff Four months later - prayed for the right time Sad and afraid, but courageous. He is scared because he is putting his life on the line - for his people.   The king had the power to execute someone for not behaving properly in his presence - and expressing emotion was considered improper. His conviction inspires others“Then I said to them, “You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem, so that we may no longer suffer disgrace.” I told them that the hand of my God had been gracious upon me, and also the words that the king had spoken to me. Then they said, “Let us start building!” So they committed themselves to the common good.” (Nehemiah 2:17-18 NRSV) Conclusion Despite internal and external opposition “So the wall was finished on the twenty-fifth day of the month Elul, in fifty-two days. And when all our enemies heard of it, all the nations around us were afraid and fell greatly in their own esteem; for they perceived that this work had been accomplished with the help of our God.” (Nehemiah 6:15-17 NRSV) What needs has God revealed to you? Family Local faith group Neighbourhood Croxley Business ParkDebbie's friend; Nadya (CAW); Watford church; Harry ...... What action could you take in at least one area this week? Summary: God was able to do a new thing because Nehemiah responded to the need revealed to him Please add your comments on this week's topic. We learn best when we learn in community. Do you have a question about teaching the Bible? Is it theological, technical, practical? Send me your questions or suggestions. Here's the email: malcolm@malcolmcox.org. If you'd like a copy of my free eBook on spiritual disciplines, “How God grows His people”, sign up at my website: http://www.malcolmcox.org. Please pass the link on, subscribe, leave a review. “Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.” (Psalms 100:2 NIV11) God bless, Malcolm

Introduction, Nehemiah 1.1-3 Inscribed silver bowl from the palace of Artaxerxes I (464–424 B.C.). The inscription clearly identifies this bowl as having been made in the palace of Artaxerxes I. As cupbearer to Artaxerxes (Nehemiah 1:11), Nehemiah likely would have handled articles such as this. “At the time, I was cupbearer to the king.” (Nehemiah 1:11 NRSV) The main action is crowded into the spring and summer of the year 445 BC Around 13 years since Ezra had set out for Jerusalem (Ezra 7:7). 'Survivors'/'Remnant' could also be translated, “escapees”, with allusions to the flight from Egypt that made the Hebrews into a nation. Now they have the opportunity to become a nation re-born. Summary: God was able to do a new thing because Nehemiah responded to the need revealed to him 1. Nehemiah Prays Neh 1.4ff “Nehemiah's first response to the challenging news he received was an honest outpouring of emotion. He held nothing back. What an example for us as we face struggles and heartache in this world. We don't have to ‘act strong' or ‘be tough'. Thos who follow Jesus are free to express authentic feelings that well up inside us.”  Hybels, Nehemiah, 15.   Nehemiah is a man of action, as events in the book demonstrate.  It is therefore all the more remarkable that his first instinct is to mourn, fast and pray.  We see here that his penchant for action is rooted in a deep conviction about God's honour.  He is first and foremost a spiritual man - not a man of action.  This prayer forms the background to the “arrow prayer” of Neh 2:4 and shows that it is not superficial. “Then the king said to me, “What do you request?” So I prayed to the God of heaven. Then I said to the king, “” Nehemiah 2.4 See also Nehemiah 4.9 2. Nehemiah Acts Neh 2.1ff Four months later - prayed for the right time Sad and afraid, but courageous. He is scared because he is putting his life on the line - for his people.   The king had the power to execute someone for not behaving properly in his presence - and expressing emotion was considered improper. His conviction inspires others “Then I said to them, “You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem, so that we may no longer suffer disgrace.” I told them that the hand of my God had been gracious upon me, and also the words that the king had spoken to me. Then they said, “Let us start building!” So they committed themselves to the common good.” (Nehemiah 2:17-18 NRSV) Conclusion Despite internal and external opposition “So the wall was finished on the twenty-fifth day of the month Elul, in fifty-two days. And when all our enemies heard of it, all the nations around us were afraid and fell greatly in their own esteem; for they perceived that this work had been accomplished with the help of our God.” (Nehemiah 6:15-17 NRSV) What needs has God revealed to you? Family Local faith group Neighbourhood Croxley Business Park What action could you take in at least one area this week? Summary: God was able to do a new thing because Nehemiah responded to the need revealed to him Please add your comments on this week's topic. We learn best when we learn in community. God bless, Malcolm

What do you do when you're set up to be the successor of the lead pastor of one of the biggest and most well-known churches in the world and suddenly everything comes crashing down? What do you do when it becomes clear that the beloved pastor you were meant to follow has been found to be abusive toward women—and the church's leadership fails to take responsibility for the systems that allowed that?What do you do?This is exactly the situation that Steve Carter faced.  Steve was set to succeed Bill Hybels at Willow Creek Church in Chicago.  And when news broke of the things Hybels had done, Steve had to make a decision.  Would he stay and become complicit in the system that made Hybels' abuse possible?  Or would he step away and let go of everything that to this point had given him a sense of value and meaning?Today, Steve Carter is the pastor of Forest City Church outside Chicago And the author of The Thing Beneath the Thing: What's Hidden Inside (and What God Helps Us Do About It).THIS EPISODE'S HIGHLIGHTS INCLUDE:Steve Carter and Markus Watson walked the Camino de Santiago together in October 2022 as part of the Journey Home cohort led by Jon Huckins.Steve Carter met Bill Hybels while interning with Rob Bell.Steve joined the staff of Willow Creek Church and was soon tapped to succeed Bill Hybels as pastor of the church.Eventually, Steve found out (from his book editor!) that a story was going to come out about Bill Hybels.Ultimately, Steve resigned from Willow Creek because the story of Bill Hybels' history of abuse was being mishandled by the leadership.  Steve felt that by staying he would have been complicit.Leaving Willow Creek was incredibly difficult and painful for Steve.It was while walking the Camino de Santiago that Steve Carter was finally able to say, “I love Bill Hybels.”Markus Watson shares about his experience of healing and transformation and healing while on the Camino de Santiago.According to Steve Carter, we need to respond to the reality of suffering in three ways:Past:  Practice forgiveness for what has happened.Present:  Rely on your core values—because you're not going to make everyone happy.Future:  Prepare and practice for what may come.RELEVANT RESOURCES AND LINKS:Steve Carter:Forest City ChurchCraft and Character podcastBooks mentioned:The Thing Beneath the Thing, by Steve CarterJourney Home: A Pilgrimmage for MenLearn how to lead your church into ministry that matters. Check out my online course, Engaging God's Mission.

Pastor Josh sits down with Pastor Mark Messmore from Mount Olivet Christian Church in Williamstown, KY. This episode is all about Books that we have read and are currently reading. Here are the books listed in the episode by category:Life Changing: 1. Prodigal God By: Tim Keller2. Radical By: David PlattMinistry Changing:1. To Busy Not To Pray By: Bill Hybels2. When Work and Family Collide By: Andy Stanley3. Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes By: Kenneth BaileyGroup Study1. Discipleship Essentials By: Greg Ogden2. Saved By Grace By: Jack Cottrell (Modified By Josh)Fun:1. The Martian By: Andy Weir2. Narnia Series By: C.S. LewisRecent/Current Reads:1. Deep Discipleship By: JT English2. Cold Case Christianity By: J. Warner Wallace3. Delighting In The Trinity By: Michael Reeves4. Live No Lies By: John Mark Comer5. Reach By: Becky Robinson6. Stalled By: Dale Sellers

Since listeners expressed an interest in hearing about this, I revisit the sexual harassment and abuse accusations made against against former Willow Creek pastor Bill Hybels. In contrast to those many against many others, which were heavily substantiated, very little evidence was publicly presented demonstrating that the accusations were true. This is not to say that Hybels is innocent, merely that that the case against him that's been presented is not especially strong. I also examine the case of Canadian radio personality Jian Ghomeshi, who was also credibly accused of sexual misconduct by multiple credible accusers and was event put on trial for it. Ghomeshi was exonerated when he produced evidence showing that this accusers lied. Willow Creek Investigative Report on Bill Hybels: https://globalleadership.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/IAGReport_022819.pdfNew York Times article on Bill Hybels: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/05/us/bill-hybels-willow-creek-pat-baranowski.html Subscribe to my newsletter at: https://aaronrenn.substack.com

In this episode we look into what the charismatic movement is all about. We also learn that in modern theology there has been a shift from God-centered religion to self-centered religion, from salvation by faith to a social Gospel. This presentation deals with the miraculous manifestations found in modern Christian worship. The origin and methods of mega-churches and their needs-related religion are discussed and exposed for what they are. What is the source of their inspiration?Find out where mega-preachers such as Schuller, Hybels, Warren, Copeland, and Hinn are going with their philosophies. Other topics covered include: the "needs gospel,” origin of Pentecostalism, Kundalini yoga, similarities between sun worship and Pentecostalism, modern Christian musicians, and the influence of preachers like TB Joshua, Oral Roberts, and Jesse Duplantis. Discover the truth about the charismatic movement.

Ist Pfarrer der württembergischen Landeskirche, seit September in der Kesselkirche in Stuttgart und erfahren als Landesreferent für Musikteamcoaching im EJW. Persönlich Unsere Webseite: https://ecclesiopod.de Podcast bei Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ecclesiopod/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ecclesiopod/ Podcast unterstützen: https://ecclesiopod.de/spenden Shownotes Kesselkirche: https://kesselkirche.de/ Musikteamcoaching: https://www.ejwue.de/arbeitsbereiche/musikplus/coaching/musikteam-coaching/ Zukunftsmusik: https://www.service.elk-wue.de/uploads/tx_asrundschreiben/Broschuere_Zukunftsmusik_Anlage_Rundschreiben.pdf Church Convention: https://www.churchconvention.de/cc/ Bücher A passionate life, Breen - https://www.amazon.de/Passionate-Life-Lifeshapes-Mike-Breen/dp/0781442850 Einfach, Hybels - https://www.amazon.de/Einfach-Schritte-einem-aufger%C3%A4umten-Leben/dp/3957340640/ref=sr_1_2?__mk_de_DE=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&dchild=1&keywords=hybels+einfach&qid=1633728469&sr=8-2 Leadership axioms, Hybels - https://www.amazon.de/Leadership-Axioms-Powerful-Proverbs-2012-04-07/dp/B00M0DQ8II/ref=sr_1_2?__mk_de_DE=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&dchild=1&keywords=hybels+leadership+axioms&qid=1633728593&sr=8-2 Vielen Dank fürs Zuhören. Es würde uns und dem Podcast sehr weiterhelfen, wenn du den Podcast bewerten würdest und deinen Freunden davon erzählst. Wir freuen uns außerdem über Feedback. Schreib uns einfach auf Instagram oder per Mail an: gebhardtsilas@gmail.com

The German church growth movement invited Bill Hybels to their church growth congress in Nurnburg in 1993. This is his keynote message and the reason they invited WC into Germany. It is the best message I've heard giving both the origin and passion of Willow Creek.

Laura Barringer and Scot McKnight are the authors of the new book A Church Called Tov and it is an important one. Today, Laura and Scot share their sorrow at the news that Bill Hybels had been sexually inappropriate with women over his career. The response from Willow Creek bothered both of them deeply because Laura attended Willow and Scot had listened to Hybels over the years. As someone who trains pastors, Scot was concerned with the damage the Willow scandal would do to his students. We talk about what tov means and how to create a culture of goodness in our churches. Laura and Scot's stories remind us that pursuing goodness is essential to the Christian life. Listen to Laura and Scot's story today! Stories Laura and Scot shared: The motivation for writing Whether or not spiritual abuse is unique to large, Chicago area churches Scot growing up in a world of “decisionism” Scot praying to be filled with the Holy Spirit and having a spiritual experience Scot going to major Christian publisher's book stores in Grand Rapids Laura coming to terms with not having a “moment” of coming to faith How the news about Bill Hybels affected Laura How good preachers mediate Christ Scot reading outside his tradition and how reading the Gospels helped him Why Laura felt a responsibility to speak out How they found out about the scandal Developing skills of discernment The concept of tov in Scripture Becoming an agent of tov yourself Great quotes from Laura and Scot: I grew into the faith as I grew. We need to develop skills of discernment to see people who will lead toward toxicity and people who will work toward tov. (Scot) Tov is a master category for understanding the way we are to live before God. Any notion that we remain worthless or useless type people is an exaggeration of the emphasis of the Bible…the emphasis in the Bible is you were a sinner… and now you have been called to walk in the new ways of righteousness, and justice, and peace, and love, and grace. Resources we mentioned: Scot McKnight's blog A Church Called Tov: Forming a Goodness Culture That Resists Abuses of Power and Promotes Healing by S The Jesus Creed: Loving God, Loving Others – 15th Anniversary Edition by Scot McKnight Related episodes: Mary DeMuth and The Safest Place for Sexual Abuse Survivors Skye Jethani and Living Life with God Steve Simms and the Joy of Early Christianity The post Laura Barringer & Scot McKnight and Becoming an Agent of Tov appeared first on Eric Nevins.

This is a personal favorite and it is one I always go back to. I hope this will help you to make the necessary changes in your life. Yes, even those that scare you the most. You definitely can do it and I hope this Women's Month has been good to you.

Q & A: Lynne Hybels, Paul Young & Ted Dekker

Lynne candidly shares her own story of finding Jesus to be the lover of her soul and the compassionate activist for the broken. After decades of striving to please the tyrannical god she had learned about from childhood, her physical and emotional brokenness led her to search out Jesus in a new way, forgetting all she knew of Christianity and just reading Jesus’ words. She identified with Mary, longing to sit in the unconditional love of Jesus, and once she was there her eyes were opened to the brokenness of the world where Jesus goes and calls us to go, too.

In dieser Folge des 365 Grad Podcast unterhalten sich Hanna, Paulien und Jan über ein schwieriges Thema: Im Oktober 2017 startet die #metoo-Welle. Zahlreiche Hollywoods Superstars stehen unter dem Verdacht, ihre Macht jahrzehntelang ausgenutzt zu haben, um die Grenzen vieler Frauen ignorieren zu können. Am 23. März 2018 veröffentlicht die Chicago Tribune einen Artikel, in dem Bill Hybels ebenfalls mit solchen Vorwürfen konfrontiert wird. Der Pastor der Willow Creek Church und Initiator des Global Leadership Summit tritt am 10. April 2018 zurück. Aber wollte er das nicht eh? Was ist aus den Vorwürfen eigentlich geworden? Was können Gemeinden und Führungskräfte aus der Geschichte lernen? In der Folge weisen wir hin auf: - das Buch "Trügerische Sicherheit" von Christian Rommert - www.nina-info.de (Hilfetelefon Sexueller Mißbrauch) 365gradpodcast.de Facebook.com/365gradpodcast Instagram.com/365gradpodcast

Once you build a 73 million dollar sanctuary, what could go wrong? Willow Creek church in Chicago was the first mainstream mega-church.From keytars and dry ice machines in the 80s to megatrons and coffee shops now, Willow Creek has been rocked by a...wait for it...sex scandal.  Bill Hybels founded the church in 1975. The church has 7 locations and averages 24,000 attendees. Yes, we get most of this from Wikipedia. So do people like to go to large churches to hide and blend in?  In 2018 the whole leadership resigned because they mishandles allegations against Hybels for sexual misconduct. Hybels was big in with James Dobson and they were anti-porn. So Hybels said it was his job to "research" porn by watching it WITH his hand-picked secretary while he wore only a robe. More things happened through the years, but...gross. Karen and Bonnie then reminisce about their big church and it's biggest time of the year--The Singing Christmas tree. Weeks upon weeks of strict rehearsals, a huge scaffolded tree you stood in, and most recently livestock that comes in for authenticity and then falls on the ticket-holders. Send in your funny, true stories for us to read on the podcast. Also, please subscribe, rate, and review. Sign up for your free Audible Trial HERE for a free 30 days and free book. Our recommendations for the week are Educated by Tara Westover and A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle.  

Relationsboken som inte höll över tid. Chokladscrub på Bali. Kritiken mot Pridetåget. Rätt strategi för familjecykelturen. Nödvändigt skvaller om kyrkans män. Blixtar och dunder. Härlig semester trumfar flygskammen. Självömkan i episkt regnväder. Önskemål om Hänt extra-bilaga för kristen dagstidning.

Pastors and leaders fall. It happens all the time. Some are very high profile while others are more private. Not all of them are the same. Too often, many of these are leveled as a weapon at the church including a newer and growing threat. When it happens, what should we do? ©2019 Mike Kerby & Jesus' Outsider Ministries

Guest Bios Show Transcript Two Churches in the Chicago area have been rocked by scandal. Now, how does the Christian community move forward? And how do those hurt by these scandals, the so-called church refugees, find healing? This week on The Roys Report, I'll have two refugees from Willow Creek Community Church and one from Harvest Bible Chapel join me. Also joining me will be two area pastors whose churches have taken in a number of refugees.  I really hope you can join us for The Roys Report, this Saturday morning at 11 on AM 1160 Hope for Your Life and on Sunday night at 7 on AM 560 The Answer! This Weeks Guests Joe Thorn Joe Thorn is the Lead Pastor of Redeemer Fellowship in St. Charles, Illinois, and the author of several books, including Note to Self and Experiencing the Trinity. He has been a columnist for Ligonier's Tabletalk magazine and is the co-host (with Jimmy Fowler) of the podcast Doctrine & Devotion. Dave Jones David has been privileged to serve as Senior Pastor at Village Church since 2010.  He seeks to combine the in-depth study of Scripture with a shepherd's heart.  He has been married to Helen for more than thirty years.  They have three grown sons, two daughters-in-law, and one grandson.    Rob Speight Rob Speight graduated from Dallas Theological Seminary and served in vocational ministry prior to working in the market place and attending and volunteering at Willow Creek for 27 years.  Rob started a blog when the Bill Hybels scandal became public.   Carol Behrends Lifelong Christian. . . Survivor of toxic fundamentalism and sexual abuse. . . in attendance at Willow Creek since 1980 (theater days). . . zealot for Truth and accountability Terri Streich Terri was a member of Harvest Bible Chapel for 15 years until she left 1 1/2 years ago. She has also been in Women's ministry as a counselor for 9+years. Currently she is a member of Redeemer Fellowship St Charles, Ill. with her husband of 35 years Dave. Together they have 3 children and 4 grandchildren. Show Transcript Note: This transcript has been edited slightly for continuity. Segment 1 JULIE ROYS:  Welcome to The Roys Report, brought to you in part by Judson University.  I am Julie Roys and today, we're going to be talking about a topic that has absolutely ravaged the Christian community in the Chicago area. And, if you've been listening to the news, you know that in the past 18 months, two major, evangelical megachurches have been rocked by scandal.  First, Willow Creek Community Church, one of the 10 largest churches in the United States—experienced major upheaval after allegations of sexual misconduct surfaced concerning founder Bill Hybels.  Initially, the women who brought those allegations were discredited by the church. But as evidence against Hybels mounted, senior leaders and elders recanted, and resigned. Yet many say the damage that is done is just too much and they've left the church.  Attendance at Willow is down at least 15-percent at Willow's main campus—and at least 9-percent overall.  Then several months later, another megachurch—Harvest Bible Chapel—was upended when its pastor, James MacDonald, was accused of rampant wrongdoing. This included financial misappropriation, bullying, and shocking vulgar speech that was aired on morning-drive radio here in Chicago.  The results were similar.  All the executive staff resigned. The elders resigned.  And there was a major exodus of people away from the church. Obviously, this has sent shock waves throughout the Chicago area.  There are literally thousands of so-called church refugees—people who feel betrayed and hurt and are in need of healing. At the same time, these people are suspicious of anyone in spiritual leadership. Some don't want anything to do with the church. Yet there are others who are coming into these area churches and they're looking for healing and they're looking and longing for help.  And then there are pastors—many of whom are godly, hardworking, and often underpaid.  Yet now, they're viewed with suspicion.  And God forbid, they ask for money or any commitment from people in the pews.  This has become trigger issues for people who are coming into their churches. So how does the Christian community recover from this? How do we move forward as the Bride of Christ? And can we ever again be a city on a hill?  Well, that's what I'm going to explore today. And I've gathered a very special group of people to help me do that. With me today are two Chicago-area pastors and three so-called church refugees. The pastors are Dave Jones, senior pastor of Village Church of Barrington.  And Dave and I met while I was reporting on Harvest Bible Chapel.  In fact, he was a great source of information for me so I'm very grateful for that, Dave.  Dave, you also were on staff at Harvest Bible Chapel—ten years served there, and I know also your church has become just a major wide-open door for an awful lot of refugees.  So welcome to the program.  I'm just really glad to have you. DAVE JONES:  Thank you.  Glad to be here. JULIE ROYS:  Also joining me is Joe Thorn, pastor of Redeemer Fellowship in suburban St. Charles.  Joe also hosts a podcast called Doctrine and Devotion.  And Joe and I also met while I was reporting on Harvest Bible Chapel.  You had me in, I think it was pretty early.  It was after my World piece had hit—that expose which I think was mid-December—came in and really enjoyed the opportunity and had a good time with Joe.  But I know you've been impacted as well and you have a number of refugees at your church.  Correct?   JOE THORN:  Yeah.  Over the years, even before this broke, people started to kind of bail on Harvest for various reasons.  And some of them have made their way towards Redeemer. JULIE ROYS:  Okay.  Let me start with you, Dave, because I know you've had, I think, when I interviewed you, you said maybe 300 or so had come from Harvest at some period of time, stayed for at least six months or more.  I'm guessing that was with, there was kind of like two waves.  There was 2012 when there was gambling exposed and then there was this ex-communication of elders which a lot of people left then.  Then the church kind of rebounded and then this latest, you know, revelations of wrong doing and, you know, James eventually got fired by the church.  Has that brought in another wave, I'm guessing? DAVE JONES:  Yes, it has.  You know, we did have several hundred people, actually, that came from, you know, during like 1.0 and now there's another wave coming yet again.  And we have not tried to, you know, we have no way of really counting that or anything but we are seeing visitors every service, every weekend. JULIE ROYS:  Yeah.  So tell me, I mean, what's it like being a pastor of a church that's receiving these refugees?  Like, what has it been like the past 6-9 months at your church? DAVE JONES:  Well, obviously we're seeing new people every weekend.  So we're trying to, you know, be welcoming and outgoing toward them and just trying to let them find a place where they can find healing.  We get the context.  We know what's happening there.  And so we've just tried to love and we've tried to model Christ-likeness the best we can.  And let them reestablish confidence in the church and in church leadership. JULIE ROYS:  And when you say you get it not only do you get it because you've been there.  But you've experienced spiritual abuse.  Can you talk a little bit about that? DAVE JONES:  Sure.  You know, I was on staff at Harvest for 8 ½ years and that was, you know, I would say those early years were good years.  And there would be occasional things that would happen.  But toward the end especially, my eyes began to get opened to some things.  And once the leadership there got the sense that I was beginning to think and maybe had one foot out the door, it did get really bad.  And so I came out of that situation quite beat up.  And it took me several months just to even get my smile back.  And I was having nightmares.  I was starting to have like some paranoia.  And I was really beginning to wonder if something was wrong with me on the inside.  But God was gracious and through some loving friends who just walked with me through that, and prayed me through it, I did get to a point of healing.  But I would say the healing took place over a 3-4 year period.  So yes, so I get it personally and I also get it corporately. JULIE ROYS:  Yeah, I'm glad you said that about feeling the paranoia and some of that.  I remember when I was reporting on this story and I'm giving these stories to my editor, right?  And I remember one point he said, Julie, these people, you know, I hate to say it, they sound a little crazy.  And I'm like, you should talk to them.  They're not crazy and you have no idea what they've experienced.  And that comment, you know, I know initially, was just getting used to this story.  And now we've seen, as it's come out, the people are traumatized on a level that I think nobody imagined initially.  And the people aren't crazy but what they experienced has been absolutely crazy.  And so I think churches need to be just aware.  So I appreciate that Dave.   So Joe, same question to you.  What has it been like for you the past 6-9 months? JOE THORN:  Well, we have a small church right, relatively small church — 350's probably the average attendance on a Sunday between 3 services.  So we have a small space. JULIE ROYS:  Now why do you do 3 services? JOE THORN:  Because we can't fit everybody into a small space.  Literally it's not to grow, it's to manage the small growth that we have.   JULIE ROYS:  You sure you don't want to start a big building program? Probably not the right time.  (laughter) JOE THORN:  We're not going that way.  We plant churches.  We planted 3 churches out of us so we're sending our people out all the time.  We're not fans of big church for us.  But our people, at Redeemer, don't really have to do anything different than they normally do.  Our congregation, who we are a congregational Baptist church. JULIE ROYS:  Say what that means.  Congregational.  That's a form of government. JOE THORN:  Right.  What it means is that our church is governed or led by a plurality of elders who all function together in parity, meaning, me as the lead pastor, I don't have more say than the volunteer elder.  We all have the same authority.  But the congregational holds us accountable.  They vote on leadership, they vote us in and out.  They can fire me.  They vote on budget.  They vote on members.  So that's a congregational church with a lot of transparency and accountability.  We don't change anything that we're doing other than, because our people are generally nice and welcoming.  They're very warm towards people that are coming in.  The only thing that we've done is we've let our congregation know, a long time ago during our members' meetings, listen these people are hurting.  Some of them are coming in angry.  They're in the rage stage right because they've been betrayed and hurt or abused.  Others are coming in just broken and mourning.  So we just tell them be gentle, give them patience and space but be kind.  And that's all we've had to do.  And our people have warmly welcomed them.  So people, most people from Harvest and that kind of a church, don't come to Redeemer because we are a small, reformed Baptist church.  Culturally it's just very, very different.  But the people that have come, have come because of that almost.  It's like they want to distance themselves from even the culture of what they went through.  Not because the culture was necessarily wrong in every way, but because they want to distance themselves from not only abuse but some of the other trappings and they wind their way towards us.  And I think it's been, for most people that have come and stayed, it's been a pretty seamless transition.   JULIE ROYS:  Yeah.  I mean it's interesting that we mention even in this first segment church government. Because I remember, again, when I was reporting on this, I had all this information, actually I hadn't published yet that about how church government at Harvest changed over time.  And James McDonald took power, you know, and had had this façade of being elder led but it really was James led.  And I think people are asking about church government.  But I remember when I was first reporting, again my editor saying to me, Julie, you and I are interested in that, and about 12 of our readers but that's about it.  You know, I mean people don't care about church government.  I think people care about church government now.  And I think that's a good thing.  I think they need to care about church government.   Real quickly, because we just have like 30 seconds.  What kind of church government do you have Dave? DAVE JONES:  We are also congregational.  We have elders but they are voted on by the congregation. JULIE ROYS:  Okay, so they're actually accountable to the congregation.  That's a very important piece.    Well again you're listening to the The Roys Report.  I'm Julie Roys.  Joining me today Joe Thorn, pastor of Redeemer Fellowship, Dave Jones, pastor of Village Church of Barrington.   And coming up next, I've got some refugees.  Some people who have come from some of these churches who are wounded and hurt and I think you're going to want to hear what they have to say. Stay tuned, I'll be right back.  Segment 2: JULIE ROYS: After being betrayed by a pastor or a church, how do you ever trust again? Welcome back to The Roys Report. I'm Julie Roys. And if you've followed the news at all, you know that two Chicago-area megachurches have been rocked by scandal. At both Willow Creek Community Church and Harvest Bible Chapel, pastors have resigned, or been fired, in disgrace. Elder boards have been replaced. And congregations have shrunk as many people have determined that they no longer can stay in a place where they don't trust the leadership. So, how does the Christian community respond to a crisis like this?  How do area churches welcome literally thousands of people coming to them wounded and hurting? And how do these so-called church refugees heal and learn to trust again? Do they EVER go to a church again?  Our show today is recorded, so I can't take your calls. However, I encourage you to join the live conversation online by going to Facebook.com/ReachJulieRoys. Or to get to me on Twitter, use my handle @ReachJulieRoys. Well today with me are two Chicago-area mega, not mega church pastors. Two Chicago (laughter) pastors—Joe Thorn and Dave Jones. You heard from them in the last segment. But what I want to do now is have you meet three people who have experienced the devastation at Harvest and Willow Creek personally.    First, Terri Streich was a longtime member at Harvest Bible Chapel. In fact, she served in the counseling ministry, but recently she left after experiencing first-hand some of the abuse and the toxic culture there at Harvest.  So, Teri, welcome, great to have you.   TERRI STREICH:  Thank you.  Good to be here.  JULIE ROYS:  Also joining me are two former members at Willow Creek Community Church—Carol Behrends and Rob Speight. Carol was a member at Willow Creek for decades, right Carol, is that right?  And Rob actually served part-time on staff for a time. Both have been disheartened and disillusioned by what they've seen. And I appreciate you coming on as well and being willing to share your stories.  So welcome Carol.  CAROL BEHRENDS:  Thank you. JULIE ROYS:  And welcome Rob. ROB SPEIGHT:  Thanks for having me. JULIE ROYS:  So why don't we start with you Terri.   I know this, I can see it in your eyes, they can't see it, maybe they'll be able to hear it, but this is still raw for you.  I mean, how did you first become aware of the issues at Harvest and how has this impacted you on a personal level?     TERRI STREICH:  Yes, well, it has impacted my husband and I on a personal level. But to give you a little backdrop, we attended Harvest for about 15 years, and it was wonderful at the beginning.  We felt refreshed as if in a dry and weary land. JULIE ROYS:  When was this?  What year? TERRI STREICH:  Boy, you know it's got to be 19 years ago now probably. JULIE ROYS:  Okay. TERRI STREICH:  Off and on.  So, just got plugged in right away and was very honored to be asked to serve in some leadership roles and made some wonderful friendships there. And we loved to serve the Lord and the people that come and that are new to Christianity or that just need encouragement.  Then I got invited to be on staff as the Women's Director in Elgin and over the years the roles somewhat changed and then I did get invited to counsel women at the church and yes. And so for 9 years I was on staff there. And during those 9 years, front row seat witnessed wonderful things of people getting saved but also the things that you only see whether you're on staff or my husband served as an elder for a few years. So we had the interesting dichotomy of once my husband being on the elder board and me being on staff and we would go home and talk about some things. And it was just shocking to both of us in the spin factor on what was said in the congregation from the pulpit and then behind the scenes, whether it's in the staff meetings or in elder meetings. JULIE ROYS:  Two different things and not feeling like they're telling the truth then to the congregation.  And didn't your husband and you, I don't know if you want to talk about it, didn't you originally discover the gambling that James McDonald was involved in? TERRI STREICH:  Yeah, Women's Ministry or the ministries there at Harvest they have small groups and then they have flock leaders that oversee small groups and then elders, of course, oversee the congregation.  But yes, one of the small group, no, one of the flock leaders that I was serving with had witnessed and had heard about some things and so and then there's rumbling behind the scenes.  We sat on it for almost a year, praying about it, hoping, you know, to test it to see if that's true and finally the gal and I went to, you know, one of the pastors and brought this to the attention of the elders and were very concerned . . . JULIE ROYS:  And when you say “this” that James McDonald was gambling in Vegas, right? TERRI STREICH:  Yes, he was yeah.  And the attitude and the language and the amount of money that was being played all in different areas of the city, we were aware of. So we of course brought that to the elder board.  We brought that to Pastor Rick and it was . . . JULIE ROYS:  Rick Donald? TERRI STREICH:  Yeah, he wasn't shocked, I don't believe, but he seemed to listen and then the next elder meeting my husband was there to kind of discuss it a little bit, so. JULIE ROYS:  He wasn't shocked because he probably knew already.  I mean these are some of the things that are coming out.  So much we could talk about. But I want to get everybody involved here.  So Carol you were at Willow Creek Community Church for decades.   CAROL BEHRENDS:  Yes JULIE ROYS:   The only, you grew up, you said, Plymouth Brethren? CAROL BEHRENDS:  Yes JULIE ROYS:  That's an interesting church.  I mean that's a very small church where you're not allowed to have pastors, right? CAROL BEHRENDS:  They choose not.  Yes, that's not their way.  JULIE ROYS:  Yeah. CAROL BEHRENDS:  One-man ministry is not, they think, the way to go. JULIE ROYS:  So you've experienced these two very different churches.  Tell me about Willow. I'm guessing, there were wonderful years. But then it soured for you.  Tell me about that? CAROL BEHRENDS:  Well, growing up in Plymouth Brethren it was like wonderful to come to Willow Creek and see that style of church, yeah, two opposites, that's all I can say.  We jumped right in.  We were small group leaders and my husband was heading up the prison ministry, Exodus, and many, we had several small groups. JULIE ROYS:  And you probably saw a lot of people come to know the Lord in that time? CAROL BEHRENDS:  Yeah, maybe not through the small groups so much.  We had couples that we were bringing along that we were bringing along that who were young Christians and meeting in homes and became very close to the couples and some of them were still, we still travel to visit. JULIE ROYS:  So, when these women came forward, you know, started out with a few in the Chicago Tribune saying that Bill Hybels had, you know, had some sexual misconduct toward them and abusive behavior.  At first when you heard that what was your response? CAROL BEHRENDS:  I believed it immediately. JULIE ROYS:  You did?  And why did you believe it? Because I'm guessing you had a high opinion of Bill Hybels. CAROL BEHRENDS:  I had a high opinion of Nancy Beach and all the other ones. JULIE ROYS:  That's what was, you know, I felt the same way like we had attended Willow actually back in the late 80's, early 90's. And Nancy Beech, Nancy Ortberg, my goodness.  So, but how did, this is your pastor for like decades you know, how did that impact you, to have your pastor now be involved in something like that?  CAROL BEHRENDS:  My pastor suddenly became in the same category of some of the men I had come in contact with in the work place who were, you know, sexual harassment, guilty of. And so then I hear Bill Hybels is behaving the same way so I just lumped him into that category.  JULIE ROYS:  But I'm guessing devastating, yes? CAROL BEHRENDS:  Devastating, shocking, disgusting.  I was disgusted. JULIE ROYS:  Well, and it's interesting you say that about, you know, you kind of think of the people, you've been in the work place.  For women, I know that's me too.  And now, I read those things I'm like, oh yeah, I've had bosses like that, I know what that's like. CAROL BEHRENDS:  I get it. JULIE ROYS:  It's tough and to think that this person that was a spiritual leader, a shepherd over you.  Now, is sort of a wolf. CAROL BEHRENDS:  Exactly. JULIE ROYS:  Yeah and how'd that make you feel about church?   CAROL BEHRENDS:  I don't need church to have a relationship with the Lord. JULIE ROYS:  So you feel done with it? CAROL BEHRENDS:  I am done with it.  For right now, that's where I'm at. JULIE ROYS:  Yeah, understandable.  I get the pain and I get where you're coming from.  Rob you're not going to have a chance to talk in this segment.  I hate to tell you that. ROB SPEIGHT:  That's okay. (laughter) JULIE ROYS:  But when we come back, Rob Speight will tell his story and Rob was at Willow Creek, also served on staff.  So, you have kind of both worlds there from being on staff and being a member. ROB SPEIGHT:  I do. JULIE ROYS: And now you're kind of, you're preaching in a church and doing itinerant thing. ROB SPEIGHT:  Getting back into the pulpit now. JULIE ROYS:  Yeah okay.  And your wife is going to a small group but that's about as much as she can handle right now, right? ROB SPEIGHT:  I'd say that's affirmative. JULIE ROYS:  Yeah, okay.  Well, again, we're going to explore this more when we come back.  You're listening to The Roys Report.  Joining me Carol Behrends, Terri Streich, also Rob Speight and two Chicago area pastors, Dave Jones and also Joe Thorn.  We'll be right back after a short break.  Stay tuned. 3rd Segment JULIE ROYS: Welcome back to The Roys Report, brought to you in part by Judson University.  I'm Julie Roys.  And today, we're discussing Living in the Aftermath of Church Scandals. Here in the Chicago area, we've had two, major scandals—first at Willow Creek Community Church, involving founder Bill Hybels. And then at Harvest Bible Chapel involving former pastor, James MacDonald. Many feel betrayed and duped and are profoundly wary of churches and pastors. And pastors—many of whom are godly and honest—suddenly are viewed with suspicion. In fact, I remember our first show was talking a lot about the Harvest Bible Chapel situation. I got an email from somebody that said, “Man, you sound like you're pastor-bashing.” And I'm like, “Ahh.” It made me feel awful because I do love pastors and I know the majority of them are great people and godly people. But that's just the reality right now. So, as a Christian community—how do we heal? How do we deal with this situation?  Today's show is recorded, so I can't take your calls. But I encourage you to join the live conversation. That's going on online on Facebook.com/ReachJulieRoys. Also, on Twitter, you can use my handle @ReachJulieRoys. Well joining me this morning, two Chicago-area pastors, Joe Thorn and Dave Jones. Also joining me are three people who have left their churches, following scandal there. We just heard in the previous segment from Carol Behrends and Terri Streich. But now I've got Rob Speight. And Rob was at Willow Creek Community Church. But Rob, I'm sure you saw great things at Willow. That's what brought you there. But tell me how you became disillusioned and decided to leave. ROB SPEIGHT: Well, when the story broke, that was the first time I heard it, anything about it, was from the Chicago Tribune in March of 2018. And very much like Carol, I believed it because of the people, and their characters, who were making these claims. And then when I attended the first family meeting, which was a defense of Bill Hybels and a defense of the Elders and how the women were liars and colluders, I immediately began to write to the Elders. Because, even though I'm a lone, or a small voice in large church, I wanted them to know that there were people questioning decisions that were made. And so I started to write to them, and the answers that I continued to receive were lacking in transparency. They were, I don't believe, forthcoming with what was happening. And then eventually, it wasn't too long after, that we stopped attending. But I continued to write to the elders and continued to be shushed. They did not want me speaking up and sharing my thoughts. JULIE ROYS: And then we had, initially what was it, 3 women? Was it 3?  ROB SPEIGHT: Well, it was Vonda Dyer, Nancy Beach,  JULIE ROYS: Nancy Ortberg ROB SPEIGHT: Nancy Ortberg. And then Jimmy and Leanne Mellado were advocates, trying to tell the story of an affair that they knew about, that the elders supposedly investigated . . . JULIE ROYS: And the woman had recanted. Taken back her testimony.  ROB SPEIGHT: They use that as an excuse.  JULIE ROYS: I know . . . ROB SPEIGHT: They use that as an excuse when there are others that know something very different. JULIE ROYS: So since then, though, as it became 10 women or more, and then Pat Baranowski—Bill Hybel's former assistant—when she had her exposé in the New York Times, that seemed to be sort of a, the last straw . . . ROB SPEIGHT: That was the last straw, yes. JULIE ROYS: So then you had Steve Carter resign and apologize. An elder apologized to the congregation. All the elders resigned. It wasn't enough for you, though? ROB SPEIGHT: Steve Carter was, he isn't given enough credit as he deserves for standing up to a machine. And if he hadn't resigned, I'm not sure what would have happened. But he caused, in my opinion, Heather Larson to resign and all the elders to resign. Was it enough? Well it hadn't been enough, because I'd started a blog and I was writing there. And then when there was a meeting called in August, a very spur of the moment meeting, and Heather Larson and the elders resigned, that was enough. And I stopped writing my blog. And I wanted to give Steve Gillen and the new elders to be, space. JULIE ROYS: Well, and we can talk a lot about because just recently there was a meeting, a reconciliation meeting—I know a lot of the victims didn't feel like it was reconciliation at all, didn't feel like—they weren't even mentioned by name. And so, we could talk a lot about those specifics, but I really want to move it now toward what about your feeling now towards the church in general and toward joining another church? You've left Willow, how do you feel about joining another church? ROB SPEIGHT: I like the idea of joining another church. I like the idea of being part of a community. Do I look with a jaundiced eye at what might be going on behind the scene? Ya, I do. JULIE ROYS: You're skeptical. ROB SPEIGHT: I am skeptical. But, for good reason. But I also know that God uses the local church. God wants his followers to be part of a community, and to build into each other's lives and to use their spiritual gifts. And that happens in the local church. JULIE ROYS: But you're kind of in a wasteland right now. I kind of understand that. We're going to need to go to break. When we come back, I want to hear just briefly, what do you need to hear from a pastor for you to feel safe there. Then I'm going to give our pastors a chance to respond to that. Just reminds me, I remember when we were looking for a church years and years ago and we'd had a bad experience on staff at the church. Really bad. Very wounded. And I remember meeting with a pastor, which it took about 6 to 9 months to get a meeting with the pastor. Finally got a meeting with the pastor and he looked at me and he said, “You know, I just get the feeling that you're not that excited about this church and that enthused.” And I looked at him and I'm like, “Well, yeah, you know, but it's kinda the best we could find. We love the church with its warts and everything else, so we're just going to roll up our sleeves and serve.” And he looked at me and he said, “Well, if that's how you feel, you can't serve at this church. We want people who are enthusiastic.” Needless to say, we walked out of that meeting and we didn't join that church. I know some of you are listening, you can relate to this. I hope you'll stick with us, we're going to come right back after a short break. Again, you're listening to The Roys Report with Julie Roys. Joining me, 2 area pastors, 3 Harvest and Willow Creek refugees. It's going to be a great discussion. Hope you stay with us.  4th Segment JULIE ROYS: Well, how does the Christian community recover from church scandals? Welcome back to The Roys Report. I'm Julie Roys. And today, we're tackling a painful subject that has impacted so many people here in the Chicago area, but also around the country. Of course, in Chicago, we've had two major church scandals involving Willow Creek Community Church and Harvest Bible Chapel. But unfortunately, these scandals are not isolated. I can still remember back in the 80s and probably a lot of you listening can remember this as well when Jimmy Swaggert, that scandal hit. When the PTL scandal and Jim Bakker hit. It was disillusioning. It really was, not that I was a big follower of Jim Bakker or Jimmy Swaggert but man, that was the first big evangelical scandal and I just didn't think that was possible for us.  These scandals are so, so painful. And they shouldn't happen. Pastors should love and protect the sheep, not fleece and abuse them. But that is what has been the reality at some of these churches. And what do we do when this unthinkable thing happens? Well, we're going to jump back into that discussion in just a minute. But first, I want to remind you this month for a gift of any size to this ministry I am giving away copies of the book by apologist Norm Geisler, an amazing defender of the Christian Faith, who just passed away last month. The book is I Don't Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist. And it's a great read by someone I greatly admired. And if you read any of my coverage of the battle for inerrancy at the Moody Bible Institute last year, you'll see Norm's name because I interviewed him several times about the issue. He was so passionate about the truth and inerrancy. And I'm thrilled to offer his book. So if you'd like to support this ministry and get a copy of I Don't Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist just go to my website JulieRoys.com and click on the donate button. Also, I want to let you know, if you've missed any part of today's broadcast or just want to listen again, or share it with friends, the audio of today's program will be posted by 1:00 pm today to my website. And again, the website is JulieRoys.com.  You know it's funny, I even feel this because I just asked for donations, that there's a sense in this room, my goodness how dare she (laughter) and I get that. I will say this, we have made a commitment to publishing a line item budget and how much I have made or taken out of that. I can promise you it's a part-time salary to do this radio program. It is nothing anywhere on the level that we have seen by megachurch pastors. But again, I believe completely in open and complete conversation about that and being transparent. But part of that is because it has to be.  So, let me return to this conversation, Rob and I had said this before the break. Again joining me is Rob Speight. Rob is a former member at Willow Creek Community church. Rob, what do pastors need to know about you and people like you that are walking through their door? ROB SPEIGHT: I believe the folks who are visiting churches who have come out of places like Willow Creek and Harvest Bible Chapel, they're going thru various stages of grief. And there are those who want to be left alone. They want to come in, hopefully experience and be part of good worship and be taught from the word of God and I want to leave. But for my wife and myself, that wasn't the case. We had pretty much recovered from some of the shock of what had occurred at Willow. And we had visited a number of churches and we have never stuck anywhere. And one of the—there's a community in a church, there's strengths and weaknesses about community. The strength is, if you've got it, you love it! And you want to hold on to it. But the weakness is, how does a refugee break into that community? So, for the pastors to communicate to their body, who have community, we know you love each other and you have great small groups and all you want to be together and cannot wait to talk with your friends after church or before church. But there are refugees coming. And will you, you've got to go out of your comfort zone. Your comfort zone is to be with your friends. Out of your comfort zone is to be noticing, watching, who is new? And not to be like, “Hey, did you sign in yet?” Not to be over bearing. But to be caring, winsome, and to be sensitive. Are you hearing from someone who wants more or are you hearing from someone who wants their distance? So that is a value that I believe incoming churches need to have for refugees. JULIE ROYS: Absolutely. Carol, that question makes you furl your brow, just the idea of what do pastors need to hear from you? CAROL BEHRENDS: I don't need the pastors. JULIE ROYS: You've kind of had it. CAROL BEHRENDS: I'm really on my own. I have Christian fellowship without being in church. JULIE ROYS: It would take a miracle for you to go back to the church at this point. CAROL BEHRENDS: I don't trust myself to choose a church that in the end I will be able to trust. Because I was in a church for 38 years and didn't realize what the reality was.  JULIE ROYS: Boy that's hard. You know what? And I've heard people say that, like who have had multiple experiences even at bad churches and say, “What's wrong with me? Why didn't I do a better job picking a church?” It's certainly not your fault, Carol.   CAROL BEHRENDS: I pride myself on my intuition and this time it didn't work. JULIE ROYS: That's tough. Terry? TERRI STREICH: Yah, after many, many years of making relationships and but seeing the hypocrisy that was going on in the church, very painful. You can't equate it to anything. They're starting to write about these things now. It is such a grief and a disappointment to come from the Christian community from Holy Spirit led supposedly people. The paranoia that was going on, on the staff at the end, was difficult. And so when I quit, we invited the pastor over, never contacted. There was no love, no outreach. People are left all by themselves, you feel naked. And it is very, very painful. Many tears, you question your own discernment, even. “Why didn't I see that?” Dave and I, we had our meetings. We had a million meetings. And believing the best and nothing. Most things didn't change. JULIE: Yet you ended up at Joe's church. TERRI STREICH: Yes. JULIE ROYS: I don't think I introduced you at the beginning of the segment, Terry Streich you were at Harvest Bible Chapel and Carol was at Willow Creek Community church.  Joe Thorn one of the area pastors on this program also David Jones. You ended up at Joe's church. Did Joe do something right that made you say, “okay, I can trust this dude?” TERRI STREICH: Well this is what happens. ‘Cause a lot of people were calling us and asking. Dave and I had to decide, “what are the main things that God will have us . . .?” It wasn't easy to go somewhere new. But, you can listen to sermons online now. You can kinda check out people's doctrine before you step in and invest yourself or get hurt again. We did our investigation as best we could, and we came. And our hearts, we really ached for the word of God to be preached with no apology. In regards to doctrine, the theology, we weren't distracted because our lens that we were looking through, its sermons before, we were so critical, all of that. And we just didn't want to be distracted. We wanted to hear God's word just wash over us. That's what we were so hungry for. JULIE ROYS: So you were drawn to the preaching, was there something else?  TERRI STREICH: Yes. Well Joe is very accessible. We met him at a Starbucks that week. Dave wrote him an email affirming his gift. And we asked a million questions. The people were lovely there. But our eyes always have to be set on the Lord and trust his leading and guiding. And ask for discernment as we read His word. That's really important. JULIE ROYS: And you said earlier before we were on air, I'm never going to a megachurch again.  TERRI STREICH: No, we won't. JULIE ROYS: That's interesting. Dave, you don't have a megachurch, but it's, you know what would you say, about 600, 650? How do you respond to you know what these women want from a church, what Rob's wanting from a church? What have you guys done? DAVID JONES: Yeah, so again, I think a big part of it for people is just hearing that they understand and know. And so just to let a visitor who's coming know, “I get what you're going through right now. Like I experienced it myself personally.” And I think that is disarming in and of itself. And it begins a process of building trust. I think another thing that's important for them to realize is that even that this is new to you, this is not new to the church. Jesus predicted that there would be ravenous wolves who would come in among the sheep not sparing the flock. He spent His last major discourse of teaching, according to Matthew's gospel warning people about false teachers. The book of Revelation details seven different churches. And some of them received no condemnation. Some received only condemnation. Some received mixed reviews. And, you know, we look at the problems with Corinth and otherwise. Like the early church was not a perfect place. They were real people who wrestled with real issues, and some of these issues were leadership issues. So I think for people who have come to that awareness of, “This has been going on since the beginning of church history. It's just happening to me now.” JULIE ROYS: Man, that is great. Joe I am going to let you land this plane. Although Dave, you just got us down the runway, Joe, speak to these people hurting right now. JOE THORN: Listen to what pastor Dave, said. JUILIE ROYS: You second that? JOE THORN: Yes, he's giving you the truth of God's word. My encouragement to people that are hurting that are coming out of spiritually abusive and toxic cultures, churches and situations is to give yourself time. But to draw near to God through the means of Grace meaning His word and meaning prayer. But the means of grace are really most vibrantly and intensely experienced in the Christian community of faith. And so, I want to say I understand, I am not mad at you that people are distancing themselves. I am angry at the wolves. But, I guess the challenge would be, I don't think that we can be the people that God calls us to be or I don't even think we can do all the things God called us do, outside of the local church. Now that's going to look different, different kind of churches, whether it's house churches, megachurches, big, regular, small churches were made for that kind of covenant Christian community. So, I think the people that I have talked to haven't completely said, “I'm never going back under any circumstances. They just understand, “I don't know when I'm going back.” So, I want to encourage them, “leave that door open. And surround yourself with good Christians who can speak into your life and perhaps you'll find your way back to church through them, eventually.”  But do not distance yourself from the means of grace, that is going to be critical for your spiritual health. JULIE ROYS: I know Dave you've actually done something intentional at your church about spiritual abuse, inviting people in to process these spiritual abusive situations they've been from. I think those are really important, and I so appreciate. Thank you so much Rob, Dave, Joe, Terri, Carol for being willing to come and be a part of this, I think it was really helpful. You know I resonate with what you guys just said and the scriptures that are coming to mind, Matthew 16:18, where Jesus says to Peter, “I will build my church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.”  So the church is God's church He won't give up on her and I truly believe that these horrible things, and abuses that have come to light, have come to light because God is purifying his church, he has brought these things out, I don't think it's  just man's work, it's God's work. Second scripture is Hebrews 10:25 where the apostle Paul urges us not to stop meeting together and I get it that for some, find fellowship where you can and come to the hospital for healing. We need each other, we desperately need each other. If you missed any of this program the entire podcast will be posted to my website JulieRoys.com. Thank you so much for joining me. Have a great weekend.  Read more

There's no sugarcoating the fact that the church in America experienced a lot of difficulty in 2018. Podcast host Jason Daye speaks to Megan Briggs, the editor of ChurchLeaders.com, to discuss the highlights of 2018 in this year in review. 

On this week's podcast, Marcus sits down with Rick Miller, Jr. Rick is the president of Pro356 Consulting and the director of a new incubator called "Hatched". He learned everything he needed to know about business from working a paper route as a kid, he just didn't know it. Listen to see how all this comes together in his consulting and business incubators.   Rick: Hi, I'm Rick Miller and I'm president of Pro356 Consulting, and I'm also the senior director of a new incubator called "Hatch." Marcus: Awesome. I am so happy to have you with us today, Rick. Rick: Man, it is so good to be here, and knowing you as long as I have, and worked with you I have this is just kind of way too much fun for us to talk about what's going on. Marcus: So, full disclosure and on top of everything else this man has going on, he is also the facilitator, right? Rick: Yes. Marcus: Is that correct? Okay. So, facilitating for Emerging Leaders and today is graduation day. So, in two hours I will be graduating from the Emerging Leaders program. This guy has been responsible for walking me through about seven months of materials. It's good stuff. Rick: I can't tell you how excited I am for you to graduate. Marcus: Yeah, you and I both, man. Wow, you and I both. Rick: I gotta tell you just before we go into Hatch, the Emerging Leaders program is one of the great things the Mobile Chamber's put together. I'm just fortunate to be able to facilitate, which is the right word. Great companies like Bluefish and the other 19 companies in there. Marcus: We won't mention the other companies that have graduated from that program. There's one in particular that's not allowed to be mentioned on this podcast anymore. Rick: And now we go there. All good. Marcus: He knows who he is. No and hats off to Danette and Brent for the efforts that they put forth in making sure that program takes place. If you are listening to this and you have a business that's over 400000. If you have a business that's doing over $400000 in revenue and you have any interest in learning more about running a business and what it means to accelerate your growth I can speak from experience 'cause I just finished the program. That there's a lot of information to be learned by going through Emerging Leaders. Definitely contact Danette at the Chamber. I think it's dannette@mobilechamber.org if I remember correctly. Rick: You got it. Marcus: And tell her that Marcus sent you and Rick. 'Cause I'm sure they'll be looking for people. They have been approved for next year, so 2019 we'll see another Emerging Leaders class, which is really exciting. So, another 20 some odd people will go through that program and anyway. We digress, but I am very excited to have you here because we've spent a lot of time together over the last seven months. This is a chance for me to tell your story. Rick: Okay. Marcus: Yeah. Let's go there. Why don't you tell people some of your backstories. Where are you from? You are from high school and college, but let's get some of your education out of the way, and who you are, and what you've done, some of that stuff. Tell us some of your backstory. Rick: I'm a Mobile native. Born here, Murphy High School, Alabama undergrad in accounting. Went to work in New York for a big ad accounting firm. Now I think there's two of them left. Went from there and got an MBA in Harvard and then decided to head out west 'cause I always wanted to get out there, and worked for about 20 years in a lot of different startups some of which were technology. Mainly just went to big companies to trying to go to small companies, set up a consulting business, and ran into a lady I went high school and college with out there. We got married and had a kid, and then at that point I was running a consulting business in Oregon. We decided that's a little far for our relatives to visit. In the mid 90s, we moved back to Fairhope where I live now. Interesting along the way while we were trying to figure out do you migrate from Colorado back to Alabama. I found an opportunity in Birmingham and I talked to folks, and got offered a job to run the UAB business incubator. At the time, the money they could afford to pay was less than I could afford to live on with the family. I had to say "no," but I spent a year back in the 90s looking at business incubators I always thought what a cool concept. Fast forward to moving back here in the 90s, having a consulting business, working with small businesses, and doing projects. Last year, got a chance to talk about setting up a small town business incubator in Fairhope, and I just at the chance. Marcus: And that's a program with Georgia? Rick: Well, it's modeled after Clemson model in South Carolina, but it's a collaboration between the University of Alabama has got an office of business transfer where they try to commercialize intellectual property, and various ideas coming out of the university, and connect those with the business market. They're providing the base research and kind of collective connections. The model in South Carolina, an entrepreneur set up five small communities. Call them "technology villages" and they basically said entrepreneurs in this electronic flat world don't have to live in a big city. Let's put some incubators in small communities that don't have the big city incubators like Mobile or Birmingham. Fast forward, that worked quite work there, and Alabama said "Let's do it here." They spent a year looking for the right markets and they picked Cullman, Alabama and Fairhope, Greensboro, and a couple other communities. We launched it, got a little training, and up we go. Marcus: Nice. Very good. Rick: Yeah. Marcus: Now, go back to your consulting stuff, too though because I wanna touch on that just a little bit. When you say you do business consulting, what does that usually entail? Rick: Well, it's interesting because its evolved. Initially, because my background is accounting, CPA in New York, MBA, I had spent most of my first 10 years working up the financial side of things. CFO, those type of things, but I found somewhere along the line that really if you look at my DISC profile I'm more of a people person. In the last 10 years, I've evolved my practice into working more in team building, and working with coaching and mentoring. My passion is first tier managers or first level, so that the guy who is a great hourly worker and gets promoted to supervisor. In variably, he gets promoted or her because of their work ethic, but they get no training in how to manager their co-workers who used to be their colleagues. That's where I kind of focused trying to help organizations deal with that level of productive and management. Marcus: Nice. Now, what was your and I always say this is your first crap job, not your first job after you got your fancy Harvard MBA, but your first crap job flipping burgers, sweeping floors. What was your first job and what were some of the lessons that you learned from that? Rick: I was a paperboy apprentice at Hannon Park. What I mean by apprentice- Marcus: Not even just a paperboy, you were a paperboy apprentice. Rick: I had to get in line to get a route. For a year, I folded papers for the guy who was older than me, which meant I got paid a RC Cola and some kind of sandwich; ice cream sandwich was my pay for that. As a result of doing that when I was 10 or 11 when I was 12-years-old I got a weekly route, throw in about four blocks from here in what is now Midtown around the deer drop. My first job was being a morning, weekly paperboy. Marcus: What lessons do you remember from that you took away that- Rick: Well, I learned everything I needed to know about business, but I didn't know it that I learned it. When I got older, took all these other degrees, and then look back and say, "Okay, here's what I learned." Number one, I learned about various cost structures because the gig was you basically paid for your papers upfront, okay. I took all the risks. The paper got no risk, whether I sold them or not, I had to pay for 'em. Then I learned how to deal with people and dealing with collection problems because a weekly route meant that I had to go to each house on Friday, and get paid my 75 cents for that week. I learned that maybe you wanna go on a monthly route where you got the same amount of money, but you don't have four times as many activities to get that money. I also learned a lot about people because there's nothing that you'll ever forget where you're on a bike. You're 12-years old. It's Friday night, it's dark, you're walking up to the door, and you see the lights on in the living room. All of a sudden, the lights go off, and you ring the doorbell and you ring it, and you're thinking, "I'm talking about 75 cents and these people won't even come to the door." Finally, I learned that service and execution matters because when you throw a paper, you had an option. If you couldn't find your paper and there are little old ladies that's right underneath their steps and they don't see it from their door, they don't think it's there. They have an option to call the press register for a paper. Now, that seems funny today that we don't have papers, but the press register would say, "Yes ma'am, I'll deliver you the paper." They charged you 50% of your profit for the month to deliver that extra paper. Marcus: Wow. Rick: If you don't execute, if somebody calls twice in a month at that house, you threw that house for free. Now, you tell me that isn't great business experience that at the time I didn't think about business I just learned it, but now looking back I tell people everything I needed to know about business as an entrepreneur I learned I just didn't know it. Marcus: Now, that's really cool, man. Now, as far as the consulting business goes, though, how did you get started? I mean, was there someway? Did you leave a company and decide that this is how you want it or was it? I don't know. I mean, I don't know what I'm looking for there. How did you get started in consulting? Rick: Well, like most consultants, a necessity. Marcus: Okay. Rick: I had moved to California to Oregon, a venture capital firm recruited me to go help start a startup to put some money in. In the middle of it, I ran into a problem with the inventor, the majority owner he had an affair, and it kind of threw everything wack. I'm sitting there going, "I can't work with this company. I need to do something and I'm 500 miles away from all my friends in San Francisco." You get on the phone and you start talking, and you realize, "Well, at least I have some credentials." The good news is I invested in the right degrees. I started looking around and saying, "Okay, we'll do something like Brent McClure does here." A guy from San Francisco who wanted to go out on and then myself set up a regional consulting business out there. We would rent an executive. We were in the 90s, we were rent a C-suite. We would come into small companies like your company and say, "Okay, we'll be your CFO. We'll do it for 20% of the time. Charge you so much and if it takes off then we want a few. If you sell the company we want a piece of that." Marcus: Yeah. Rick: Did that and invariably what happens like most consultants, you do a good job, and I'm doing this for Bluefish and Bluefish says "We really wanna hire you full-time as our CFO" or some position. I vacillated or count of rotated back and forth between consult for a while, get this going, and somebody makes me an offer that's hard to turn down. Finally, I just reached the point where I said, "I'm a terrible employee, I'm ADD and I really like change. I like being a consultant and that's what I'll always try to be." Marcus: It's interesting that you say that 'cause one of the things that I've said over the course of the last couple of years is that I'm unemployable now. Rick: Yeah. Marcus: Right? Rick: Yeah. Marcus: The only thing that I think, the thing that I go back to with Bluefish that I really enjoy isn't necessarily that I do like the fact that I can control the business. It's not just that, it's that we work with a lot of different people, so we have a lot of problems that we're working to solve. It's that ADD aspect that you mentioned. That there are a lot of different problems that are presenting themselves to you and I'm a teacher first and foremost. That's really kind of my leanings, but then I'm a problem solver. When someone comes to me with a problem like I want to help them solve it because I know that on the other side of that there's some sort of reward. There's a financial reward or kudos, or something. Yeah, that's very interesting. Rick: I think every service business at some level is an entrepreneurial consulting business, if you're good. Marcus: Yep. Rick: I mean, what you're doing everybody here is you're consulting for clients, and I'm doing the same thing. You just may say I've got a contract. You change the terms, but when you get down to what makes a company successful is you gotta have a whole bunch of clients that they're serving in some manner. For me, it just fits because I've tried it, and I found as a financial person I can go about two or years, and then I get bored. In a financial role, you need somebody who loves the same thing over and over again. I am the exact wrong personality fit for what I was doing for 20 years. Thank you lord that I figured out where my ladder should be leaning, and I'm much happier even though there's more uncertainly where's the cashflow. I'm not complaining. It's what I should be doing. Marcus: Right. That's good. This question was perfectly targeted for you. Are you ready? Just prepare yourself. Rick: I'm glad there's no camera here. Marcus: Now, if you were talking to someone that is getting started in running their own business, what's the one bit of wisdom that you would impart to them? Rick: I've heard the [crosstalk 00:14:55] Marcus: I've stumped him. Rick: Oh, you blew it. I heard five seconds of silence gets everyone's attention. I was trying to count to five. Marcus: Sorry. Rick: Nothing like it. I would say make sure you understand your why. Marcus: Yeah. Rick: Just make sure that if you ... Simon Sinek's books really a good book on getting back to if you understand why you're doing that. Either it's because my personality, I need to, or I have some goals that I just really wanna achieve. If you got that down, you can weather the fact that life is never what you expect it to be. I mean, you and I know each other through spending seven months trying to do a plan, and yet my wisdom would be do a plan, but expect it to be long because it's gonna change. The people I have seen that have succeeded as being entrepreneurs when you step back from it, you see they had a clear why. Their why was bigger than the what. When your why is big enough, the facts don't matter is a cliché, but it really is true. You know how many times the facts would have told you to quit. Marcus: Yes. Rick: We all do. If you're married, you've been told that you should quit a few times, but generally speaking most entrepreneurs are just dumb enough because their why is big enough to keep going. The other side of keeping going is where the success lies. Marcus: That's good stuff, folks. That's really good stuff. Who's the one person that motivates you from the business world? Is there anybody? We've been getting a lot of, "Well, my grandfather and my principal from high school" or stuff like that. I don't want that. I want you reading Entrepreneur Magazine or you get Entrepreneur Magazine, and there's somebody who's on the cover that really gets you excited that you're like "Man, I can't wait to read this." Anyone? Rick: Well, I gotta think for a minute because I think John Maxwell. Marcus: Okay. Rick: What I'm inspired Maxwell is his longevity. Marcus: Let's pause for just a second. John Maxwell was the president, CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishing and has transitioned ... No, I'm sorry, John Maxwell. I'm thinking of whatshisname. Rick: I'm going blank on the other 'cause I'm still fixated on Maxwell. Marcus: Sorry, Maxwell is an author who's written a lot of books on leadership and stuff like that. He was published by Thomas Nelson, I think. Rick: Yeah, he still is. Marcus: Anyway, so I digress. Rick: The 17 laws of leadership. The 21 laws or teamwork, or whatever those are. He's known for those books, but some many other people in that field, he started out as a pastor, which is probably the ultimate leadership position. Because you have a voluntary workforce. You have a small staff that most of the people you have to motivate to achieve your mission are there. He transitioned because his calling was leadership. What I'm impressed about him is the fact that he is ... The volume of work that he has done inspires me because he just keeps writing a book every three or four months. He's figured out to grow his organization to each different level. When he writes about stages of growth, you can look at his example, and mainly he also always tries to bring back in the people side of servant leadership. Marcus: Yeah, Michael Hyatt. Rick: Yep. Yep, yep. Good job. Marcus: It was gonna bug me. Don't get lost on that. John Maxwell stuff especially his ... I think it's the "21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership" was one of the most influential books that I've ever read. That and "Courageous Leadership" by Hybels was extremely good, as well especially if you're geared towards that kind of thing. You know you're gonna be in a position of leadership. Hybels book was really interesting because it helped me understand that there are different types of leaders. I leaned towards the entrepreneurial leadership role. It helped me kind of- Rick: Let me throw in a plug for Maxwell 'cause it's something I do that I buy. I buy 20 of these or 30 of these a year. He's got a book called the "Maxwell Daily Reader." It's 300 every day. It's like any other devotional, but it's a management devotional if you will. He takes a page out of his 25 pages, so one day it may be on a one-page day of being a person of influence. Another one may be on teamwork. I've been reading that thing for three years and I give it to all my clients 'cause what it does is it reminds me every day of an aspect of leadership that I probably know, but I forget. You can read a spiritual one. I read it and I give it to clients because Lisette Norman who we're gonna see tonight is an example. The Fairhope store, I gave it to her, and I'll be talking to her, and she'll say "Did you believe what we read today?" It's usually on management. I highly recommend any one go. You've almost gotta go look for it 'cause it's out of print, but the paperback is still great. Marcus: Great stuff, yeah. Are there any books, podcasts, people, or organizations that have been helpful moving you forward? Rick: Ah man. There's so many. Right now, I'll say David Jeremiah's morning podcast called "Turning Point" I listen to and I always put me in a servant leadership role. A guy that's a motivational coach for Alabama, Kevin Elko's got a Monday morning cup of inspiration. I listen to it every Monday and it's three minutes. I'm an avid reader, so it's hard for me because I'm really on the latest book. Marcus: I mean, what are you reading right now just out of curiosity? Rick: I'm reading "Things That Matter," it's written by the John Doerr who was the original venture capitalist. He's a very famous one who invested in Google. It's talking about what they measure Google that's made the behemoth they are. It's a great book on getting back in. I was telling you about that "Traction" book. Marcus: Yeah, the "Traction" book that he suggested to the class. It's geared towards helping you understand how to get traction. I would admit I haven't read it yet 'cause I have some other things on my plate. Rick: There's a book by a guy named Schwartz called "Turn the Ship Around!" It's about a submarine captain who got given a different type of submarine and that's like going from a Mac to a PC only you've been training to run a Mac and they gave you a PC two weeks before. You're now in charge of the entire company. It talked about how he learned. How he learned how to trust people and delegate. It's a great read. He's YouTube has some really nice graphics in there that you can watch a nine-minute YouTube video that explains it all. Marcus: Yeah, that's cool. Now, what's the most important thing that you have learned about running a business? Rick: Staying positive is incredibly important and incredibly difficult. Marcus: Poof. Rick: Did I hit that one right? Marcus: Yeah. No, it's just say that again for those who are listening. Rick: Well, you can see my expression. Staying positive is incredibly important, but incredibly difficult. I say that because running a business means that you get slapped the hardest and the most often. Marcus: Right. Rick: When things don't happen, you take responsibility for it, or when bad things happen. Yet, if you run an organization where you have employees, they look to you for a response just like your kids do. Probably even more so, so the ability to take the blow and still find someway to act positive even though inside you're just dying is one of the keys to being a successful entrepreneur. I wish I had more of it. Marcus: No. Yeah, so I read you touched on things, yes. I mean, the being able to keep that positive, mental outlook is just like incredibly difficult at times. You've touched on servant leadership a number of times, too. One of the books that I'll throw out there that if you are bent that way is Jocko Willink's Servant Leadership. He talks about that whole aspect. I don't know if you don't know Jocko's story, he's been a number of podcasts, and he even has his own podcast. He was SEAL team commander. He was responsible for training SEAL teams. After they've made it through [inaudible 00:24:14] and they've been assigned to a team, he was one of the commanders that was actually responsible for training the teams to work as a team to go out and do the missions. It's such an incredible responsibility. His whole take on that is that if you are the owner of a business then it doesn't matter what it is, it's your responsibility. Rick: I may have drawn it in our course, but I probably didn't. With most companies I do occasionally I'll do quarterly retreats and strategic retreats. The way I introduce servant leadership is I draw the traditional pyramid, which is customers below. Then you have the tiers of employees all the way to the small top of the triangle is the CEO, then I flip it. If you get that then your job, Marcus is to serve the rest of Bluefish. If you can teach, but it had to start with you. You have to model that servant leadership and yet I know from having been the numbers kind of traditional drive it down, that doesn't work. If you wanna know why employees are unhappy, I'm certified in Gallup's employment engagement because I think they're the best at it. The reason people live or businesses are unhappy is because of their direct supervisor, and where I translate that in servant leadership is most people don't wake up thinking, "What can I do to serve my team?" That guy Jocko gets it because you can't fake it when it's life and death. In a company, your emotional life and death is real, too. Most of us don't think about it. We've been raised with this hierarchy, I mean, this paradigm that's just wrong. For me it's wrong. Marcus: It's more traditional. Yeah, traditionally it's wrong. Yeah, it was probably one of the most influential that I've read this year. 'Cause it was a slap up against the face. In the face realizing that if someone's not performing then it's my responsibility because they either need more training or they need me to tell them and guide them, and ultimately if they're not performing and they're still here, and I'm upset about that it's my fault because I'm the one that hired them. I haven't fired them, yet. Like everything, you can't make it about the person it's really about you as the leader of the company. There have been a number of other things that came out of that book, too that I really appreciated it. He's a gruff guy, though. If you listen to his podcast, if you're out there listening to this, and you listen to his podcast then just know that you're in. I mean, he's a SEAL. Let's be real. Rick: I went back when I heard the term and I read a book, I can't remember the author, but I went back to read James Greenblatt. The Greenblatt Center for Servant Leadership, he's the original AT&T guy in the 60s who coined the term. His book is a hard read 'cause it's kind of cut dry, but he goes back and he explains how he spent inside of AT&T trying to bring this concept about. If you know anything about AT&T, it's the ultimate bureaucracy that's not a government. It truly was back then, but he was convinced that in his work led to the I guess it's James Greenleaf Center, which is in Indiana. They have courses and you can get a lot ... They have an annual conference on servant leadership. Marcus: Very good. How do you like to unwind? Rick: Say that again? Marcus: How do you like to unwind? That was such a bad transition, I'm sorry. Rick: I thought you said another term that I'm wide and that's why I gave you that look. Marcus: Yeah. Rick: I like to exercise. I like to play golf. Marcus: What's your form of exercise? Rick: My form is golf and swimming. Marcus: Okay. Rick: Golf because I played it all my life and it's the only game you can play three generations together- Marcus: And not know who's gonna actually beat the crap out of somebody. Rick: Swimming is just ... I was overweight as a kid. I didn't make all the high school teams. To punish myself in college, I started running and I lost a bunch of weight, and I've just been very blessed for 45 years I've been into fitness. I'm well as a result of that. I didn't know wellness was a term, but I invested in it. My knee has finally given out, so I get in the pool because it doesn't hurt. It's the same type thing. I'm in there swimming laps and I unwind, and I have conversations with God because no one can interrupt you when you got your googles on and you're just going up and down. Marcus: Yeah. No, it's amazing to me and I probably need to start asking more questions about this, but the importance of staying physically active when you are running a business. It can't be overstated. You have got to have some sort of exercise regime because the stress will absolutely put you in the grave if you don't get that energy out in some healthy form. And then the other thing, too let's just be real, it's really easy to go to breakfast, lunch, and dinner at some function and before you know it you've gained 20 or 30 lbs. I've recently lost like 30 lbs. Now, granted some of that was stress related because of the building that we're currently in. The reality is I've been trying to lose this weight for a decade and just not been able to. It's a long game like you're saying. Finding something you can do for a long period of time that you enjoy that allows you to kind of keep things in check because it's real easy just to look down one day and realize I spent the last 10 years of my life sitting in a chair. I'm now 30 lbs overweight. I'm not happy. I get winded walking to the car. I don't look good when I go to the beach. I'm not happy with myself. All those things. Those are all things that I've said to myself. Rick: Most of us do. It's not the quantity, it's the consistency that matters. Marcus: Exactly. Rick: I mean, I have a doctor friend that we go through this issue all the time because he's afraid to tell his patients what he knows to be true. He and I have jogged for 30 years and I said, "You need to tell your patients they need to get off their butt and go exercise." He's like, "I can't. I got to do that bedside manners thing," but he and I laugh about it when we're jogging because he says the reason they see me is 'cause they don't what they could do. It's just walking for 15 minutes is worth it, if you do it five days a week. Marcus: I mean, obviously I've been spending a lot of time here at the building over the course of the last five months. Often times I'll come in, in the morning, get started, and not have anything to eat until I leave at six or seven o'clock at night. I'll do an 8-hour, 10-hour, 12-hour day, and not eat anything. It's like fasted cardio, basically. The other thing too is people have been asking me like what I've doing, well besides that it's just cutting back on what I've been eating, and just making sure that I'm exercising consistently. Even if it just means going to the gym for 30 minutes or 20 minutes just going and doing something. Rick: Do you know a guy named Daniel Amen? Marcus: Don't ring a bell, no. Rick: Go on YouTube and look him up. He is a brain doctor, whatever. He's developed all these scans of the brain. His whole thing is it you need exercise for your ability to think. If you go look up Daniel Amen and he's got a diet and more importantly he says if you want to be a thinker and as an entrepreneur you know you need to have your brain working. You already have it working pretty hard, but for longevity, exercise is good for the brain. Not just the cardiovascular. Your brain, your ability to think and process, and deal with things it's better as result of investing in that. Not only is it going to make you look better at the beach. If you need to make critical decisions, it's worth it to make sure you put some exercise in the mix. Marcus: I couldn't agree more. Where can people find you? Rick: Well, . I'm always there and they can actually see what I look like 'cause I put some videos on there, some testimonies. Marcus: Awesome. Rick: We were talking about earlier, Hatch if you go to hatchfairhope.com, that's the hi-tech incubator that we started in downtown Fairhope. Even though I do consulting, I live there more than anywhere else. Marcus: Well, Rick, I wanna thank you again for coming on the podcast and more so I wanna thank you for pouring into all of our lives for the last seven months. Seems like it was just yesterday that we got started on Emerging Leaders. To wrap up, any final thoughts or comments you'll like to share? Rick: Well, Marcus I appreciate you and I can say this just looking at you 'cause people can't see it on a podcast that one of the joys working with you and all those other companies was to watch the growth. And the fact that anybody who gets into a position where they can facilitate the growth of other group or other organizations, the blessing's mine. So my thank yous to you because nobody knows how great it feels when you're sitting there helping other people get somewhere they're trying to get to and they need you to help them. Marcus: Yep. Rick: I go home after those classes every time just saying thank you lord for having the opportunity to deal with great companies, great people, and to help them be a little clog keeping them moving. Marcus: Very good. Well, Rick I appreciate your willingness to sit with me and share your journey as a business owner and entrepreneur. It's been great talking with you. Rick: My pleasure.

Angie interviews Dr. Wade Mullen about discoveries and dangers of organizational "image management." Download the Show Notes for key points, questions for consideration and discussion, and links to resources mentioned in the podcast.

When you stand back and look at American Christianity as it stands today, it's not hard to see the cracks. There are fundamental flaws that plague American Christianity. We'll journey through the week's news to see how Christianity is missing the point. Not only are they missing the point, they may not even be on the same page with Jesus anymore. Christendom is broken in America. Can we fix it? Of course, we can fix it. The bigger question is, do we want to fix it? Just because something is broken, it doesn't mean that the owners are willing to do the work to fix it. That's a problem. Who really owns Christianity anymore? Jesus? Oh, hell no. As the faith marches forward, it looks less and less like its founder and God. Again, I'll say it. This is a big problem. WTF church? This week, we look through the lens of faith and culture to point out some of the major cracks. We'll go through the Bill Hybels scandal, Greg Laurie, and the SoCal Harvest Festival. We'll even look into the pedo that founded the Christian "rock festival" Creationfest. A show about why Christian rock is not really rock will possibly happen in the future but not today. That's not the point. We'll talk through our issues with pastor worship and commercialization of the church in general. WTF church? The church is fundamentally broken. The problem is fixable, but those in power are unwilling to right the ship. The ship looks nothing like Jesus and neither do the Christian leaders navigating it, so why is the Church in America messed up? Well, for starters, it looks more like a business model and less like a movement. The church has learned over decades to care more about itself than about those in our communities that are hurting and in need of help, compassion, and grace. Seriously, WTF church?!? If Jesus left the church, would you leave as well? Come along for the ride as we skewer through life, culture, and spirituality in the face of a changing world. www.SnarkyFaith.com

Mary, Richard, and Israel sit down to discuss Boris Johnson's recent comments around the burqa and what that means for Christians and civic engagement. They then turn their attention to willow creek and the new sexual misconduct allegations regarding Bill Hybels. Join our conversation on Twitter using #BlackBereaPodcast. Sign up to our mailing list : www.tinyurl.com/blackberea The Black Berea podcast is hosted by a vibrant group of Black Christians from the City of London. Join us for regular commentary on matters of faith and culture, in addition to analysis of news and events from a biblical perspective. Follow us on @BlackBerea Please Rate & Review on iTunes Email blackberea@gmail.com www.blackberea.com

This is Jonny and Jeff's take on how us pastors might approach the awful events that have unfolded at Willowcreek. How do we process and think about all this? Jeff and Jonny debrief each other and process Hybels and Willow together. They try to do it with compassion and humility, but also with honesty and openness.

Lessons from the implosion at Willow Creek Church. This is David Wheaton, host of The Christian Worldview. Willow Creek in Chicago is one of the largest and most influential evangelical churches. Founder and former senior pastor Bill Hybels innovated the “seeker sensitive” model of gearing church to non-believers or seekers. An implosion took place this past week at Willow Creek with the entire board of elders and both lead pastors resigning amidst allegations of extra-marital sin by Hybels. While there is plenty to discern about the unbiblical seeker model and its huge impact on churches, the first lesson is to pray for all involved and “take heed that we do not fall”. Hear two other lessons at TheChristianWorldview.org. And then tune in this weekend for another topic that will sharpen your worldview.

The implosion is now complete for Bill Hybels and Willow Creek Church, the highly-influential mega-church in Chicago that Hybels founded and led for four decades. However the consequences will be felt by those involved and the evangelical church at large for years to come. This week the entire board and lead pastors announced they are all resigning as new allegations came out regarding Hybels' extra-marital relationships...

Pastor Bill Hybels became the center of scandal earlier this year when he was accused of inappropriate sexual behavior. This week, new allegations came forward about Hybels, ultimately forcing a major shakeup in the church’s leadership. Find out more after this break.

To help church leaders evaluate blind spots that ruin...everything

Bible News Radio for August 9, 2018 Today we discussed the following and more on Bible News Radio: The Viral Hot Water Challenge Poll: Public Support Grows for Anti-LGBTQ Businesses Willow Creek investigates Hybels as pastor quits over new allegations Anne of Rainbow Gables? The LGBT Agenda and a Children’s Classic Don't forget to protect your identity with #IDShield - sign up today with Stacy at https://stacyharp.wearelegalshield.com Follow us on Bullhorn by going to http://www.getbullhorn.com and downloading the app and following Bible News Radio. Save 20% when you use the coupon code BibleNews at www.Ariel.org Thank you for supporting our sponsors. You may also donate to the show at http://www.biblenewsradio.com --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/biblenews/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/biblenews/support

Note: Listeners interested in the issues raised by the Bill Hybels allegations may also be interested in Episode 102: When You Hear Sexual Misconduct Allegations About Your Pastor or Episode 80: Supporting the Opposite Gender in the Christian Workplace. Last year, Willow Creek Community Church founder and lead pastor Bill Hybels announced he was passing the baton to two heirs and would be retiring in October 2018. A lot has changed in 10 months. Since that announcement, 10 women have accused Hybels of misconduct. Earlier this week, The New York Times reported that one of leader’s former assistants accused the Willow Creek founder of repeatedly groping her. And on Sunday, Steve Carter, whom Hybels who indicated would succeed him as teaching pastor, announced his resignation. All of this occurred several days before Willow’s Global Leadership Summit, an annual event hosted at Willow’s Barrington campus and streamed at hundreds of locations around the world. As CT, the Chicago Tribune, and now The New York Times have reported on allegations of sexual misconduct and complaints about the Willow Creek board’s response, some less familiar with Willow Creek wonder why the ministry deserves all this attention. “Willow Creek was revolutionary in that previously, churches assumed that all that was needed to reach unbelievers with the gospel was simply to say it one more time and not do anything particularly different,” said Marshall Shelley, a longtime editor for Leadership Journal. Rather than just continue to sling religious language at the world, Willow’s leaders realized that “our culture is spiritually blind and is not going to respond to positively to a message that has grown overly familiar or has grown stale,” said Shelley. “Willow Creek said ‘We need to communicate in a way that is going to get people’s attention. Not say it the way we’ve said it thousands of times before but say it in a way that they’ve never heard it before.’” This insight grew the ministry of the church and spawned the Willow Creek Association, a network for like-minded churches thousands of congregations strong. It’s this latter ministry that organizes the annual Global Leadership Summit, which is simulcast around the world at hundreds of locations. Shelley joined associate digital media producer Morgan Lee and editor in chief Mark Galli to discuss what influenced and drove Hybels to do church the way he did, what inspired the church’s leadership and business mentality and focus, and what’s next for Willow in the wake of allegations of misconduct against its founder and former leader.

Earlier this year, Willow Creek pastor Bill Hybels was forced to resign after sexual misconduct allegations were made against him. The board of elders convened to review the validity of the claims. Now the board is out with their official statement. Find out what they said when you listen now.

In March, the Chicago Tribune issued a report in which women accused megachurch pastor Bill Hybels of inappropriate sexual conduct. Hybels and the board of Willow Creek church initially fired back and said the accusers were lying. Now the board has issued a new statement--one with a much softer tone.

The Lutheran Church --Missouri Synod manages to break into the news this week, Bill Hybels, as much as he tries, can’t break out of the news, CBS’ idea of Living Biblically just can’t get a break, and that’s probably a good thing, but we break bad news when we have to here at Radical Grace Radio. Visit Matthew Pancake's Facebook http://www.facebook.com/matthew.pancake Visit Pastor Gary Held's Facebook http://www.facebook.com/garyheld Visit our Website www.RadicalGraceRadio.com  

Nish and Amy are back together again! This week we talk about the abrupt resignation/retirement of Willow Creek's founding pastor Bill Hybels after one of the women who have accused him of sexual misconduct and harassment wrote publicly about her story. When it comes to championing women in ministry, Hybels has been one of the good guys in evangelicalism. But good guys are not immune to abusing their power. We also take up an alarming BuzzFeed News analysis of Muslim-bashing by American politicians that documents instances in 49 states, primarily by GOP officeholders. And we ended by talking about Amy's recent piece in the New York Times about Trump and evangelicals, in which she argued that 80 percent of white evangelicals would vote against Jesus Christ himself if he ran as a Democrat. **_Please visit our [Patreon Page](https://www.patreon.com/impolitecompanypodcast) and consider becoming a monthly patron of the show, for as little as $1 per month. We're planning a Google Hangout with patrons in the month of April--there's still time to sign up as a patron and join us!_** Discussed This Week: [Why It's a Big Deal That Evangelical Pastor Bill Hybels Just Stepped Down Amid Sexual Misconduct Allegations](https://slate.com/human-interest/2018/04/why-its-a-big-deal-evangelical-pastor-bill-hybels-just-quit-amid-sexual-misconduct-allegations.html) (Ruth Graham, Slate) [Vonda Dyer's Statement Re: Chicago Tribune and Bill Hybels](https://vondadyer.weebly.com/blog) (VondaDyer.com) [Flawed Process, Wounded Women](https://www.nancylortberg.com/) (statement from former Willow Creek board member Nancy Ortberg) [Shining the Light on the Truth](https://veritasbetold.wixsite.com/website) (statement from former Willow Creek Elder Betty Schmidt) [Why We Can't Move On](http://www.nancylbeach.com/blog/2018/4/11/why-we-cant-move-on) (statement from former Willow Creek pastor Nancy Beach) [State and Local Republican Officials Have Been Bashing Muslims. We Counted.](https://www.buzzfeed.com/hannahallam/trump-republicans-bashing-muslims-without-repercussions?utm_term=.hvj0Nz8GXQ#.qiEN9kPR8E) (Hannah Allam and Talal Ansari, BuzzFeed News) [Trump's Christian Soldiers](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/31/opinion/sunday/trump-evangelicals-christians-easter.html) (Amy Sullivan, New York Times) [Depolarize](http://badchristianmedia.com/depolarize/) podcast (Dan Koch)

Last week, the Chicago Tribune reported on multiple allegations against Willow Creek Community Church founder and longtime pastor Bill Hybels. “The alleged behavior included suggestive comments, extended hugs, an unwanted kiss, and invitations to hotel rooms. It also included an allegation of a prolonged consensual affair with a married woman who later said her claim about the affair was not true.” Hybels and his church have denied the allegations reported by the Tribune. Hybels, is of course, not the first megachurch pastor, or even pastor, to be embroiled in allegations of adultery and sexual misconduct. Throughout the years, Christianity Today has reported on a number of high-profile ministry leaders who lost their jobs after they confessed to sexual sin. (In fact, news that Southern Baptist leader Frank Page resigned from ministry over a “morally inappropriate relationship” broke right after this podcast was recorded.) Most pastors who have been guilty of inappropriate relationships aren’t in a great place spiritually, says Jim Wilhoit, a professor of Christian formation at Wheaton College who has counseled church leaders who have confessed to sexual misconduct. “No one that I’ve talked with that has had an affair has had what I would say at that time a vital and well-developed relationship with Christ,” said Wilhoit. “I’m just not very sanguine about the spiritual life of many American pastors.” Wilhoit joined associate digital media producer Morgan Lee and editor in chief Mark Galli to discuss why pastors commit sexual sin, when congregations should know about allegations against ministry leaders, and how the expectations of the modern pastorate may make it hard for a pastor to maintain a grounded spiritual life.

Leadership expert Liz Wiseman describes research around the management style of three types of leaders: The "Multiplier” who amplifies the intelligence of the leaders around them, the “Diminisher” who exhausts and frustrates the people with whom they interact and the “Accidental Diminisher” who unintentionally has a diminishing effect.

Jim Bakker goes ballistic for being made fun of, Christian baker not finding any fun in baking cakes for satan, Bill Hybels having fun anointing, not one, but two successors, and we keep up our confessional fun today on Radical Grace Radio. Visit Matthew Pancake's Facebook http://www.facebook.com/matthew.pancake Visit Pastor Gary Held's Facebook http://www.facebook.com/garyheld Visit our Website www.RadicalGraceRadio.com  

Check out this episode's ShowNotes here. 

Check out this episode's ShowNotes here. 

Die Inspiration und die Hauptgedanken der Predigt beim gestrigen Visionsabend kommt von Bill Hybels. Ich finde, dass er immer wieder Gedanken hat, die sehr wertvoll sind und für mich eine Inspirationsquelle, auch wenn man nicht immer 100% einer Meinung ist. Hier mehr zu Hybels: www.willowcreek.com

OK… So... I am rarely one to say “I told you so.” But sometimes I just can’t help myself.   As you will hear on this week’s PODCAST, my dear friends, I told you so.   All courtesy of Jesus.    All centered upon a #MostSignificantParable.   One of a duet of parables, actually. The first having been discussed at length last week. The second to be discussed here and now.   Get ready to think. Be prepared to process. Buckle yourself in as we once again (thanks to Jesus) shift a paradigm.   In short, get ready to view the world differently.   Please remember that depending upon your web browser and connection speed, it may take up to 60 seconds for this podcast to begin to play.     God bless you as you listen!

A packed double interview episode, featuring Nick Vujicic, founder of Life Without Limbs and best-selling author of Unstoppable, as well as Lynne Hybels, co-founder of Willow Creek Community Church and author of Nice Girls Don't Change the World.

Email Warren & Hybels Contradict Each Other RE: Whispers Texas Law Would Protect Scientists Who Dissent from Darwin Ian Lawton and Evolutionary "Christianity" Sermon Review, "Dream Carriers: Dream Destroyers" Paul DeJong, Life Church, Aukland, NZ

Lynne Hybels, Advocate for Global Engagement, Willow Creek Community Church, partners with under-resourced communities in Latin America and Africa. Lynne and her husband, Bill Hybels, started Willow Creek in 1975.

Lectureship Class

Lectureship Class